Haizhou Hijinks

The hilariously named Haizhou Wholesale Mansion is a higgledy-piggledy collection of shops and stalls in a roughly hewn assembly of corrugated metal and concrete alleyways, in Haizhou (pronounced Hai-Jo), another of Lianyungang's many districts.

 

It houses what is effectively a department store where you can buy almost anything that you need, from kitchenware to clothing, electronics to beauty products, artwork to tools and is contained within the inevitable throng of food carts.

 

 

 

 Love Candy anyone?

 

No you are not seeing things. These are hologram willies for your living room wall.

Badly translated and, frankly, bizarre stickers.

This place offers a fascinating and unbiased insight into everyday Chinese life. The style and diversity of the products tell you all you need to know about people's shopping habits.

 Shoe shop

 Towels

 Wadding for combating the persistent cold

Oh bumholes, what have we forgotten to do with this display...?

 

 

As you know, one of my previous bizarre professional incarnations was as a fabric merchant. I am no stranger to materials that can both delight and startle but nothing can prepare you for the madness that is Chinese taste in bedding. The first clue was when I first moved into my apartment and was shown my brand new bedding. The sentiment was not lost on me and I was and am grateful for the care that has been directed my way, but sweet mother of god – what’s up with people’s vision? Does everything have to be SO LOUD?!

 

 There are some really beautiful goods on offer - you just need to root around.

Red is the only colour that really matters in China and this is reflected, in amongst many other things, in the wedding business. Haizhou Mansion has myriad wedding supply vendors and paints a vibrant picture of what is involved in a Chinese wedding. I have not had the pleasure of attending one but have been told that it works very differently to our typical booze-filled extravaganzas.

Wedding bras

Wedding mirrors

 Wedding party cups

 Wedding 'aged' eggs. Grimace if you will, but they are very popular.

 The British seaside meets China! Titter!

 Wedding gift boxes, to fill with sweets

 Wedding bedside lamp. Ideal nightmare fodder.

 His'n'hers plastic wedding cups.

 Weddin' beddin'

And, erm....more wedding stuff!

Typically a Chinese wedding will involve the official marriage which, as it does in European countries, happens prior to the ceremony.  The pomp happens at a later date and will include lots of food, some Baijiu and an abrupt end as soon as everyone had finished eating. As previously reported, there is no post-scoff lounging here. As is customary at soirées in the West, you eat then you sit around for hours digesting, talking and enjoying a drink or three together. Here, as with many other facets of life, it is function over aesthetic; purpose over pleasure. This is something you see in various forms every day. Does it work? Yes – then it doesn’t matter what it looks like. Do I need a piss? Yes – this lamppost will do, nevermind the hundreds of people here. Do I need to blow my nose? Yes – I’ll expel on the street. No need for tissues. Does this shop sell stuff? Yes – no need to take stuff out of boxes to display. Do I need to get on this bus? Yes – push and march; no need to offer any courtesy to anyone else as they are also pushing and marching. This is a no-nonsense place and although I spend much time disliking things like the inescapable witnessing of bodily functions, I like the candid and direct nature of things. There is an honesty here that is missing behind the gloss and sheen and impeccable manners that I am used to.

 A bike with walls!

 Canal near my apartment, en route to Haizhou

 Ingenious make-shift table inside the 'Mansion'

 Crufts dissident

 One of the many reasons China has such poor air quality. Haizhou electricity plant. It's touching that they've decorated the chimney with Mediterranean detailing...

At the other end of the road is a recycling plant. Quid pro quo!

 

What day meandering around the shops is complete without a few drinkies at the end? We downed some real German beer and chatted to various people, including these guys, one of whom appears not to quite grasp the intricacies of the V sign. Excellent!

 

 

Celtic highlights

Amusing little things crop up every day. Very often it’s something perfectly mundane that has transformed into an anecdote due to being lost in translation. Such as the sign for newly planted seedlings at a local beauty spot, which reads ‘The grass is shyly (sic) smiling and would not like to be interrupted’.

 

I have been shown a vast array of t-shirts with bizarrely translated slogans upon them and have taken home several items that I asked for, but were not necessarily what I asked for... such as this reusable bag. I asked for a generic green one, like the dozen or so on display, but was presented with this beauty from under the counter.

 

On the other hand it is surprisingly easy to find something if you really want it. With the help of some generous new found friends I have acquired some plates and a sewing kit, both of which have made life in Chez Jiu much more amenable.

Another easy find were dumplings. Since arriving here I curbed my dumpling addiction on account of my face beginning to resemble one. However, following a birthday BBQ which ends as all birthday BBQ’s do, with copious amounts of alcohol, the following day saw me craving some full on carbs so on my way back from kindergarten I e-biked around the back streets near my apartment woefully begging each and every stall holder  ‘Qian, wo yao jiaozi! Qian, wo yao jiaozi!’ (‘Please, I want dumplings!’) until someone pointed out a place that served nothing but. I bought enough dumplings to feed four people, which amused the lovely dumpling lady who kept making a big belly gesture and laughing. She may have been calling me a fat cow but I am now a happy fat cow as I have a reliable seller of dumplings on my doorstep. PHEW!

The bowl on the left is a normal sized rice bowl. The one on the right is big enough to cover my face and contains at least 30 dumplings.

The Spring that I had previously reported has having sprung was a false start. It went back to being bone crunchingly freezing, but not as nerve damaging freezing as it was. The problem with the cold is not so much the temperature, as it is no different to any other cold place in winter. It is a dearth of places where you can get respite. It is cold outside. It is cold inside. It is cold in shops, it is cold in bars, it is cold in the street barbeque tents, it is cold in school, it is cold in bed...you get the picture. In the UK, it is cold outside but going innfer a warm is perfectly simple, acceptable and easy. Here, the taciturn elements are a constant and challenging entity. To ameliorate the discomfort, I bought some extra warm leggings. Mirth awaits at every turn, and the label for my leggings did not disappoint:

Another pleasant surprise was St Patrick’s Day. A bar in Xinpu had Guinness so off I went to meet up with a group of likeminded Westerners who wanted to celebrate, well, anything really. Fortunately there was St P's day plus a formidable win by Wales in the Six Nations Championship to underpin reasons to go out and get drunk. When I arrived at half past eight, there were indeed cans of Guinness, all of which were empty due to the more diligent gentlemen quaffers arriving before the ladies and cleaning them out. Ah well, we celebrated with the traditional Irish beer, Erdinger Dunkel which had precisely the same painful next-day effect as Guinness. The pain was alleviated a little by the discovery of an import shop that sells honest to goodness Heinz Baked Beans! I bought four tins and retreated to my lair.

My lair is now a little cosier than it was thanks to the discovery of a plant market, which is unfortunately intertwined with a pet market. It is a series of stalls that sell plants or pets and much like many other vendors, appears in a flurry of activity around early evening. The plants are lovely but I found the pets pretty upsetting. There are majestic dogs in dog sized cages and little puppies in cardboard boxes; rabbits, reptiles and various other animals biding their time for either a home or what must surely be a pitifully slow death. As you walk along the street you will get a dog being held by the scruff of its neck flapped in your face in a bid to make you part with your cash. I have only managed to avert my eyes or mutter expletives so far. I know that this is how it’s done here but it doesn’t mean that I have to like it or accept it. Plants on the other hand are a different matter and I happily loaded up every spare inch of my e-bike with greenery and carted my quarry back in an impressive display of a one legged, multi beeping bike display. Pah! Who needs cars?!

 

Another triumph has been in teaching one of my classes that consists of two beautiful little terrors, called Olivia and Eric, how to speak properly. And by properly I mean that I have taught Olivia to say ‘Hiya’ in a thick Welsh accent. In return, she taught me how to use Chinese hand signals when counting, which differ greatly from our how-many-fingers method. It’s a very useful acquisition as it’s used widely in a whole array of scenarios, many of which are the extremely serious business of settling the bar bill.

 

The only disturbing outcome of this particular class was that Olivia drew a portrait of me, at my behest, and this is what she produced. I do not yet know how to feel about it, but terror was an initial reaction.

I am still meeting lots of new people and making some firm friends. Living in a different country creates an easy environment in which to assimilate yourself, partly out of unknown time constraints and partly out of necessity. You meet other people in the same boat and quickly form friendships due to your common situations and time is fleeting as everybody seems to be on their way somewhere else at some point in the not too distant future. There is none of the usual getting to know one or two new people over long periods of time – it’s here and now. Instant home, job, social circle and friends. It’s been a lovely revelation, knowing that I can up sticks, land somewhere on the globe and find such a lovely alter-existence, just waiting for me to step into.

Carpe diem indeed.