Hello! Hello! Welcome back for another addition of my China summer experience. This week I am going to partially discuss my time spent in Nantong and then finish it sometime later this week. This is because it is quite extensive! I also have a lot to do this week and then my weekend starts Thursday when I fly to Virginia Beach for my cousins wedding, yah! Without further ado, Nantong:
Nantong:
The second night I was with Terry’s family (remember the first we were still in Shanghai) we went to dinner and then drove to Nantong. Nantong is a place that has two people of western descent, me and some other creepy looking guy on a bike. It is also really hot and muggy so one must shower twice a day. What is awesome about Nantong is that because it is not a very well known Chinese city there are a lot of very Chinese things to do, and very few western things to do. This was awesome for me. Some notable points are the Museum, local food, the night markets, group dinners, and family life in China. But let me start with food and dining with a Chinese family and then next blog I will move onto other aspects of Nantong:
Dining Habits and Customs:
What is scaring and yet surprisingly fulfilling about Chinese families is their luncheons and dinners. Imagine sitting at the head of a table with between 5-8 Chinese people rocking out Shanghainese/Mandarin Chinese at 100 miles per minute (excuse me: km/minute) and pointing at you saying “chi le chi le” (Eat more). Needless to say my face is hidden in my bowl pounding the different foods while they ask me how I got so good at using chopsticks. But that’s only half of it. The other side is wonderful. I got to eat some delicious homemade food. I had baby lobster dipped in vinegar sauce, a lot of jellyfish, some pig lung and stomach, about 5 different kinds of mushrooms, and about 20 different kinds of tofu. All these foods are incredibly tasty and fairly healthy. You just need the right sauce and texture.
Food in China was very satisfactory as long as one is open to it. You eat a lot of spicy things because you are only considered a man if you like spicy food. You also get a lot of fish and other assorted seafood because it is considered main dish material. This is both a blessing and a curse because when it arrives at the table the family swarms around it, yet they also force you to eat the first piece because you are the honored guest. This is problematic because the fish are never de-boned. I have actually gotten kind of good at slowly pulling meat away from the bone without bringing too many stragglers with me. Still it slows down the eating process considerably.
The next interesting aspect of eating in China is that they believe the more difficult it is to eat a dish, the better the dish. This is the same sort of argument someone makes when they get a diet coke and a Big Mac – to cut calories. I am not exactly sure why they believe this, but it brings me to an important eating tip: never bite hard into anything. ANYTHING. Just when you think you have a nice piece of meat or fruit or candy and you chomp into it, your mouth cracks down on a large piece of reality… and it hurts real bad!
Another fun dining example is what is considered culturally acceptable. Normally in China your dining habits can model those of a five-year-old (slurping, spitting, picking, etc), but then there are fancy affairs. In these shindigs one is allowed to slurp and spit out bones and things, but not pick things out of your mouth. And when you do spit things out it has to be behind your bowl so it is not offensive. You are also supposed to regularly toast the host and other guests to show your gratitude of their company. When you toast, if you are younger or in some way a lesser person your glass is supposed to be lower than theirs is in the toast. Finally, when you do toast someone (I found this one out the hard way) you are supposed to stand, clink glasses, and drink until they are done and then sit down only after them. If you hadn’t guessed, I accidentally sat down first and made the ENTIRE table erupt in laughter.
Another interesting aspect of Chinese culture is that the elders must pay for a meal and you must accept a meal if you want to stay friends. The first is awesome because I haven’t had to pay for meal and it is rude to even offer and the second is cool because I eat all the time. This is because it is considered customary for youth to respect their elders while the elders are expected to care for the youth – sound familiar? It should! I feel that is an example of a cultural norm we understand in the U.S. except taken to the next level!
Now, I am Irish. Thus I take some pride in my ability to have some tolerance in alcohol consumption. Yet there is a dangerous custom in China that stems from the desire for Chinese hosts to try and satisfy their guests. This means offering delicious (and large amounts) of both food and drink. It is also rude to refuse things unless having a good reason to. So I didn’t realize that when the Chinese decided to toast me (or vice-versa) on every toast is was because they wanted to fulfill my desire to drink. Thus one night I drank a copious amount of high quality “baijiu” and had some terrible headaches the next day.
I had the opportunity to go into the country with Terry’s family and while we were there we went to a traditional coastal family meal. Now the first thing that study abroad programs warn Americans is to NOT EAT RAW SEAFOOD in China. But how could I refuse the family I was living with? So I didn’t. Well as it turns out, the Chinese realize that raw seafood is incredibly dangerous. Does this deter them? Hah! Their solution is to drink the raucous drink of 70% alcohol per volume “baijiu” I aforementioned to kill the bacteria. Whether this works or I may never know, but I do know that it makes for a fun lunch experience!
Well, this concludes the fun dining experiences I had in Nantong with a Chinese host family. Next blog will be about some of the incredibly Chinese experiences I had! But first, I have to finish this accounting homework… boo!
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