More than meets the eye

One would think this was a serious aerobic class in full throttle. And I guess it was. But not for everyone:

Apparently, the aerobic class, with bom-ba-da-bom-tunes blasting from the speakers, was also a perfect place for reading a book! Who would have guessed?! Not me, anyway. 

If there's a will, there's a way

When I say I need a run, I mean it

I’ve had a bit of a rough week, with a lot of stuff going on, making my mood anything but stable. Yesterday I decided that no matter how much work there was on my desk by the end of the day, I would still hit the gym in order to burn some energy. I kept my promise… but just as I was about to leave for the gym a strange feeling hit me.. Did I really pack all my training clothes? I decided to have a look, and very well. I had packed all my training clothes, except for a sport’s bra. There’s no way (on earth) that I will hit a gym wearing a normal bra, so the remaining question was: could I bother going home, picking up a sport’s bra, and then head back to the gym? (It’s definitely not on the way, rather, I live in the opposite direction) However, after a moment of mental self-consulting, I decided that I very well could.

So I went home, found what I needed, spent extra time on a crammed metro and arrived at the gym one hout later than planned, but hyped about the thought of hitting the treadmill. I had dinner plans at 8pm, so I went over to the reception and asked to “rent” a towel a 5 kuai so that I could shower and head out straight after my workout. Imagine my surprise when the (RUDE!) guy behind the desk said:

-No towels today.

If it would have been any other day I might have shrugged my shoulders and left, slightly annoyed. This particular day, however, his words made me see red.

-That’s IMPOSSIBLE! That’s not OKAY! I need a towel. I NEED TO WORK OUT!

(again, I normally don’t yell at people, but…)

-Well sorry, we don’t have any.

-No, this is not okay. You always have towels. If you suddenly decide not to have towels you need to inform your customers in advance so that we can bring some ourselves! I didn’t bring a towel today just because I thought I could “rent” one from here!

-Well…

-Well you have to find me a towel. I am not leaving. I need a towel otherwise I cannot workout.

-Eh.. maybe you should speak to the manager?

-Yeah, where is he or she?

-Eh… he will come in 3 min.

I waited for 3 minutes, feeling angrier by the minute. I simply refused to just go home. 

The reception guy was really annoying:

-I know this situation is really annoying… (he said it in a sarcastic way).

-VERY.

-Why don’t you go and workout first, have a shower and THEN come and see if we have found you a towel?

-WHAT?! How am I going to shower without a towel?! (I wanted to say "do you want me to walk out naked and ask if you have now found me a towel?!" but I don't know the Chinese word for naked, so I left it like that)

(I guess his suggestion here was: "why don’t you do like all the other girls at this gym and dry yourself off with the hairdryer once you come out of the shower").

Then, 2 girls suddenly arrived (manager?). The reception guy told the girls they needed to find “this laowai” (pointing at me) a towel.

-There are no towels, the girls said.

-There HAVE to be towels! I know there are, somewhere! I don’t care what kind, you just have to find me a towel!

-But there are no!

-Please. Try!

The girls sighed, rolled her eyes and went away, only to come back 30 seconds later…. Carrying a LARGE, WHITE, TOWEL!

-Oh, I found one.

Oh my, oh my. At that point, however, I was too relieved to continue bitching about their lousy attitude towards problem solving, I simply accepted the towel and went to the ladies changing room.

Once at the gym all the treadmills were busy. However, I didn’t even consider the thought of giving up this workout, or settling for anything else but running. I simply located a girl who was walking along to a clock ticking down (she only had 4 min left), and I was rude enough to stand behind her and wait for her to finish and get off. A number of people realized what I was doing. Some laughed, some pointed, and some tried to sneak in between when they realized the girl would be done soon! But I was faster and once I got up there I enjoyed the best 7km run I’ve done in ages… ahhhh. Relieeeeeef!

Once I made that 8pm dinner I felt rather proud of myself and my nagging-attitude. If there’s a will there’s a way –this appeals to most of the “impossible to solve”-situations in China. It's not as if I have not been told that I "cannot run" before... 

Metro moments

A captured metro moment from 2007

Fellow metro-commuters in Shanghai, have you noticed lately (at least during the morning rush) that more and more people nowadays stand on the right hand side of escalators?! That way, it’s almost as efficient (Hold your horses, I said almost) as the London underground system (where I believe you stand to the left, but I might be wrong?) where you literally get walked over if you accidently stand on the “walking hand side” of the escalator. Of course, there are still a few cases of people (OK, not just a few, more like… some millions) standing on the left hand side when you come walking, but with a gentle push/tap on the shoulder, a good 90% immediately move to the side to let you through. Good stuff. 

Unfortunately not all people are as friendly/helpful. I’ve had cases where I’ve gently tapped the other person’s shoulder (in 98% of the cases it's been middle-aged Chinese men), and said something like “不好意思（bu haoyisi= pardon me)” indicating I want to be let through. But do they move? Oh no?! In one case, the man turned around, looked at me, and stood like a brick of stone on his spot, refusing to even let me squeeze between him and that person to the right. (When he started pushing me back with violence I decided to give up).

Still, a great improvement from previous years, so Shanghai metro –I have hope!

One thing I still wish people could relax a little bit about is getting on/off the metro. The other day we had a work-dinner after work, and me and a few colleagues caught the metro just one stop to get to the restaurant. We were a group of five, and since the metro was quite full we stood just at the door. I immediately felt the push from behind, some guy that tried to squeeze in between us to stand JUST at the door, so I turned around and told him that we too were getting off at the next station. He looked like he understood, and for a short second he stood back… until something must have hit him (maybe that eagerness to STAND at the DOOR) so he still decided to elbow his way through our little group and catch the spot JUST at the door. (Guess he’d been taught never to trust laowais?).

The funniest cases are still all those people that push like mad in the metro, RUN off the metro as if their houses were on fire, and then, finally, when they get to the escalator –they just stand there, rather than continuing moving upwards.

Speaking off the metro –Shanghai’s new metro system (with new lines and plenty of new stations) is simply G-R-E-A-T N-E-W-S-! I’m loving every little bit of it, especially line 7 that’s now connected to Line 1’s Changshu Lu. Simply great. Me and my significant other are planning a metro-exploring weekend someday in April/May (when you don’t freeze your fingers off every time you step out the door) where we are going to spend 2 days catching all new lines, getting off at stops we’ve never heard off before and explore the surrounding. We used to do this at the magazine where I worked back in 2007, and it's not as bad as it sounds... you actually get to see quite a lot of new stuff. I promise to report back to you afterwards.

Compliment or crush?

Whatever you do -as a girl- only pay attention to the guys

Sometimes, China’s just so funny. While western guys can receive an unlimited amount of compliments over here (from men as well as from women), there’s a clear line when it comes to women. The other day I went shopping with four Chinese girlfriends. We are not super close, but have known each other for some years still. They are all a bit younger than me, and especially one of them (her name is Luna) really likes me and the fact that I’m tall, blonde, and big-nosed.

We went into some shops and were all trying on clothes. I had one of those good (and rare) days when everything fits, and my dear friend Luna simply would not hold back on the compliments:

-Ah, Jonna, you look so great in everything you try on today!

-That’s perfect on you!

-You’ve got a great figure!

I was blushing/”nail-nali-ing”/”bu gandang-ing”/and so on (yeah, accepting a compliment is simply not my thing, especially not here in China) until one of the other Chinese girls decided she’d had enough:

-What’s the matter with you Luna, the way you speak to Jonna one would think you have a crush on her?!

-Come on… I’m just saying she looks good in this dress.

-No you’re not. I think you like her. 

-Yeah, I think you do! Another one filled in. You've been speaking to her as if you like her all day long!

(Yikes. Uncomfortable situation number ONE. Chinese girls are fighting over if one of them has a crush on me or not?! And all she did was paying me some compliments?)

-I don’t, come on.

-Well, so how come you don’t have a boyfriend.

-I have not found one I like.

-Well maybe you like girls. Maybe you have a big problem…

-Hahhaha, well well, shall we all go for lunch?! (I decided it was time to step in and change the subject -and what better way to do so than distract them with lunch?).

However, the conversations continued over the food when Luna asked me if I wanted to try her salmon pasta (we were having a Wagas lunch).

-Seeeeeeeeee….. you totally like her!!! You've got a problem! You like girls!

Both me and Luna sighed.

Man! There’s no way to get a compliment over here, is there?

Tasteless party

What a weekend! Since I’ve now been living in Shanghai for 2 months, we decided that it was time to throw a small housewarming party.

Now, housewarming parties are not really a unique kind, so in order to do something different we decided to have a theme at our party, namely “bad taste.”

Shopping proved to be the best part of it all. We headed straight to the small shops on Fuxing Lu where I tried on everything from flower-power pants to zebra meets leopard dresses. I eventually settled for a skintight golden/leopard shirt, a high-waist black/gold skirt, and a silver/snakeskin jacket that was way too small for me. All in all: I looked like jungle girl going disco.

My bf picked his outfit from another shop. We knew straight away that it was going to be fun, because the moment we walked in, the sale’s girl went ballistic.

-OH MY GOSH!!! You are the most handsome man I have ever seen! She gushed to my boyfriend.

She followed him around, stroking his arms, giggling and picking out stuff for him to try. She had no idea that we were going for something rather tacky (and that we therefore actually kind of liked the stuff she picked), and said “yeeeeeeees!” and “perfect” to every single shiny garment that he agreed on trying on.

In the end he went for a gray, silver sequence suit jacket, a check-patterned hat, a tight t-shirt and some golden jewellery chains. He looked like a complete yuppie and the sale’s girl looked like she was going to pass out on the spot:

-Oh my Gosh! You look SO GOOD!!

(We laughed so hard we didn’t know what to do!).

While he was paying, the sale’s girl turned to me:

-Is he your boyfriend?

-Yes.

-Oh my GOSH! You are so lucky! SO LUCKY! I admire you!

-He’s indeed very popular in China.

-Well, he is the most handsome man I have seen! And you…..! You too are very…. (long look at me) special!

-Special?

-Yes, in fact. I like the both of you!

-That’s nice of you to say.

-I love your nose!

-My nose?

(small moment of hesitation).

-It’s the biggest and most beautiful nose I have ever seen!

(I had to bite my lip not to have an uncontrolled laugh fit)

-Ehum, right. Eh… thanks!


She waved goodbye when we left, opening the door and yelling:

-Come back soon! You are my favourite laowai couple!!! After us. We were high on laughter as we hit the streets.


The party itself was a blast, despite an insane number of strange cancellations from our friends:

2 girls confessed they were preggers and couldn’t make it, one guy confessed his girlfriend was preggers and that he was going to Korea to get married (!), one girl had to work, another one thought it was raining too hard outside (…), and then one guy broke his arm in an ice-hockey game the night before?! Hahaha! We still managed to pull a crowd, however, and ended up having a great time. People had really made an effort and one guy actually showed up in a dinosaur costume.

My boyfriend was a hit in his pimp-outfit, meanwhile my Chinese girlfriends expressed their disappointment in me:

-Jonna, you actually look good in those clothes. I would totally wear that on a night out!!

Go out as the golden meets silver jungle-disco girl?! (well I shouldn’t say too much –because that’s exactly what I did some drinks later). I guess our taste levels are different!

Bad taste party calls for bad taste-snacks: we picked these up at our local bakery
Mmmm, green bean bun anyone?!

Korean or Japanese?

I've been keen on trying to learn another language for a while now. Since Finnish is not happening (still cannot count to 10...) I've been thinking a lot about Japanese or Korean. I think Japanese would be the most natural choice, seeing that the Japanese characters are often the same or at least similar to Chinese (even though the meaning differs). However, I'm a huge fan of Korea and Koreans, so that's what I'm leaning towards. Anyone who's had the experience of learning either language that can give some hints or recommendations? 

When I was in Seoul back in 2008 and spoke to a local he told me that if I could speak Chinese (which I could not do that well at that point -but he didn't know that) Korean wouldn't be too hard to learn, especially not the reading and writing part. Their words and pronunciations, however... Well, it will be a challenge I'm sure. 

Another decision to make -do I study at a school (evening classes) or do I get myself a private Korean tutor? A tutor would be comfortable, then again I'm kind of a fan of the classroom environment, especially in the beginning of learning a new language.  

Finally -do I have time for all this? Definitely not! But that's the beauty of it all. 

The New Bund

Went to visit the Shanghai Archives yesterday and got a pretty good view of the “new” Bund (that’s still in the making). Such an important landmark for Shanghai –and still it looks far from ready. The Bund renovation has been going on for more than one year now. One part of the project was to dig another tunnel, or an underground roadway, leading you straight to the Bund without having to cross the busy road.

The Bund back in 2006

Future tourists can also expect tropical fish tanks and special walls that change colour as wind conditions change, or at least that was the talk one year ago (mind me, I have not been following the development with great interest -not excited about the fish tanks though. I hate seeing captured animals). My personal wish is that they ban all vendors form the Bund. I’ve never really enjoyed the place, because just like Badaling area at the Great wall in Beijing, you cannot walk one meter without being asked if you want to buy something.

Let’s see how it all turns out. The Bund, just like many renovation projects in Shanghai, is a race against time and part of Shanghai’s “Expo facelift.”