Don’t mind me, I’ll just be over here, acting natural
“You don’t look natural enough.”
“Can’t you sit more like him? He looks natural.”
“(Under breath) He’s not the one being photographed, is he?”
I agreed to be interviewed for this Chinese magazine because 1) one of the editors is a friend and needed someone easy to access for questions and photos, and 2) she is very keen on promoting the print edition of What’s On Xiamen, and promised to do so in the interview.
Every issue I (well, the company that publishes my little rag) put out invariably has me searching for a photo of myself to include in the editor’s note. I’m not necessarily the most comfortable in from of the lens, despite years of enduring my dear sister sticking her camera in my face. You know how people sometimes look pained, or dazed, or just plain cheesy in those instant passport photos? That’s always me. I don’t know how to arrange my features for that optimal photo-taking expression, and please don’t tell me there are classes for that.
So I’m not good at being photographed. I’m not painfully shy, but I’m no ham for the camera either. The team from the Chinese magazine came over to our flat to photograph me ‘doing my thing’ last week, which meant photographing me and my sock dolls, me and my magazines, and using my computer (I lead such a full life). The photographer let me look at the shots when he was through (the wonders of a digital SLR), and I have the usual ‘this is slightly torturous’ half-smile on my face while posing with the sock dolls and the first first issue of What’s On Xiamen. The shots of my surfing the Internet on my laptop were a small problem, because I sit at a desk to work and the wireless router is plugged into my computer so there’s no chance I can be mobile anyway, especially if Neil needs to be online too. Sitting at a desk trying to keep my back somewhat straight and resting my arms on the armrests so my trapezoids don’t cause me agony: not natural. Sitting cross-legged (as in a semi-lotus position) on the sofa, pretending to surf while using Neil’s laptop (I was looking at Google Earth): not natural. Neil, his arse practically grafted to the sofa, also sitting cross-legged (but in a more manly way): perfectly natural, according to them. I can’t help it if the way I sit and work is not what they would conceive as natural, can I?
Then there were the outdoor shots. The lanky photographer ran ahead to snap me walking along a busy shopping street — “Look natural, don’t look at the camera!”
Eh. It’s kind of hard to pretend someone’s camera isn’t there when it’s constantly pointed at your face. I only managed to stick my tongue out at him once before I was admonished for looking into the camera lens. I’ve either got to be more… er… media-friendly and learn that a camera isn’t going to capture my soul like in that dumb horror movie we saw most of at The House last week, or stay away from more photo shoots in future. So while it appears he got hundreds of shots of me, I’m not sure if enough of them are usable, and if there aren’t enough, they’ll have to schedule another shoot and that will probably make things worse because I’ll be so aware that I wasn’t natural enough last time that I will be even less natural next time and it will all be shit.
Because, you know, the camera could capture little bits of my soul, and I can’t afford to lose any weight.
Some fur for you?
I snapped this photo along Hexiang Xilu — Uighur men were flogging furs on a, er, freelance basis outside McDonalds. I did my best to work out what it was they were selling, but the best I can come up with is some kind of ferret-like creature (long pelts as neckwarmers?) and feral cats (possibly an asiatic wildcat on the left?).
I personally do not have a big problem with the fur industry, as long as the animals are treated humanely (and killed as painlessly as possible). The thing that gets me most about how people treat animals is the cruelty, as if beings that are different do not feel pain. I don’t own any fur myself, but I stomp around in leather Doc Martens, so I’m not about to get all PETA on fur-wearers — but if anyone chooses to farm animals for their skins, they had better make damn sure the animals are treated kindly while they are alive, and not to waste what is left after they have been skinned.
Demolish
Finally got off my lazy arse and cycled to the gym yesterday morning, put my legs and lungs through a bit of a workout on the treadmill, felt some small-scale wanderlust, and decided to locate Zhonghua Pianqu (中华片区), an old neighbourhood that is slated for demolition and redevelopment.
The neighbourhood is pretty old and a lot of the buildings are really beyond hope (i.e. the redevelopment, in principle, is a good thing), but does Xiamen really need another mall or overpriced condo development downtown?
Much wiser, we hope
L-R: Vivian, Angela, Andrea. Over 18 months ago, the three of us launched What’s On Xiamen. A lot has happened since then, and here we are, photographed for posterity on 16 November 2005 at The House. I’m the only one still involved in the magazine (i.e. work for no pay, that’s the price for being stubborn, I suppose), and I still look like a little boy. Jesus H. Christ.
Mmmm, nummy nummy in my tummy
People think I’m weird when I stick my camera into the tubs in the fresh food section of Trust-Mart, Xiamen’s Taiwanese answer to Wal-mart.
Don’t they look thrilled at the prospect of being taken away and cooked?
Anytime any Chinese person asks if you want tian ji (田鸡), please know that that’s a frog (at least you won’t get H5N1). It is also a good time of year (in China) to start eating dog stew, very warming, apparently.
How sad
This is what Chinese people who visit Fire Island (火烧屿) in Xiamen find entertaining: domestic cat breeds doing stupid circus tricks.
If you visit the Flickr set on my visit to Fire Island, you’ll also see a cat jumping through a hoop of fire. There was also a bear, goat, and monkey doing silly stunts. We didn’t stick around to see the pig (I hear it gets beaten, but I can’t corroborate).
I was quite sickened by the way they were throwing the cats around. When they’re not performing, they share a partitioned cage with parrots and monkeys (how fucked up). There were many other animals caged in this ‘zoo’, and it made me feel sad for how little regard the Chinese have for animals (as someone remarked, they care so little for humans, what kindness is left for animals?).
Note: the animals do not look underfed nor fearful of the trainers. I just wonder what kind of inducement a cat needs to leap through a (small) hoop that’s in flames, as well as how many cats they went through before they found one that would do it.
Cabbie issues
Ever have one of those days in Xiamen where you get in a cab and the driver is familiar with your intended destination, what the best route is (and if he doesn’t, has a map with which to consult for directions*), and drives safely and carefully, but not too slowly, delivering you to your destination in a clean, neutral-smelling vehicle, then quickly collecting your money and giving you the right change?
Bet you can count those incidents on the fingers of one hand.
I do swear that cab drivers in Xiamen must pass a special screening test, the kind that you fail if you exhibit more intelligence than the average slug.
Evidence:
The attraction of slow cycle / bus lanes
No matter the situation on the road, be it clear or congested, if there is a bus and/or cycle lane that is busy with buses starting and stopping, cyclists, and pedestrians, the Xiamen taxi driver will gravitate towards it to ’save time’. Most of the time this means you get stuck behind a bus, with your driver craning his head out of the window to see if he can get round it, tsking all the while. Then when you have to turn left at an intersection the driver drives across three lanes of traffic to cut someone off because he has to turn left before anyone else.
Drivers without licences or any driving experience
Yes, unscrupulous cab licence holders will employ those who do not know how to drive to drive their taxis while they are off-duty. We recently got a taxi whose driver didn’t know he was driving into oncoming traffic, who then decided to slowly drive across four lanes of traffic to turn right because I told him he was in the wrong lane to turn left, so we got out of that cab post-haste. Who in their right minds would send someone with who can’t drive off to certain prangdom?
Non-destination-reaching drop-off
Say you’re a taxi driver and you’ve picked up a fare who wants you to go to destination A. You drive them to destination B, which is 300 metres from destination A, stop, and tell them to walk through that dark alley over there to get to their actual destination. Do you: a) giggle, say it was a joke, and drive them to destination A; b) sit and wait to get paid? If you picked b), congratulations, you’re right. Which cab driver who is not completely out of their tree expects a customer to pay them after they have not driven them to where they requested, but tells them to walk through a dark alley to get there instead?
Update: I forgot to mention this one when I first posted the entry, but:
When ’stop’ doesn’t mean ’stop’
How many times have I said, “Please stop here,” to a taxi driver as we approach the entrance of my destination, only to have him slow down to a crawl and creep creep creep along, as I keep saying, “Stop, stop stop!!! STOP, for God’s sake?!”, before he finally stops, ten metres past where I’d first asked him to stop? Far too many.
I’m not even going to get into the transparent ways cab drivers try to cheat passengers of their money**. Listing them is enough: taking the scenic route, refusing to give change, giving counterfeit notes as change, refusing to use the meter, pretending they don’t know where they’re going so they can take the scenic route… and if you’re wondering why I don’t shut up and get my Chinese driver’s licence and buy a car, I am not interested in acquiring the terrible driving skills that one must pick up in order to survive driving in China, as they would replace my current skills, which involve being cautious and looking both ways and using my mirrors and signal lights. Driving in China would completely destroy any ability to drive anywhere else in a safe and law-abiding manner. Also, where on God’s green earth would I find the money to buy a car?
* That I have never seen. A Xiamen cab driver with a map is as rare as a Chinese restaurant with Western toilets.
** Not to say that cab drivers in other countries won’t try these ‘tricks’; but my experience in Singapore is that there is more legal recourse if a cab driver tries to fuck with you. Here, if you’re a foreigner, there are generally no options unless a local Chinese friend stands up for you.