I'm Here!

I finally decided on a blog name: Peanut Buddha and Japan. Sure it's cheesy, but I currently can't find any cheese at all in Beijing, so I'll take any I can get.

For those of you who don't know: I'm venturing out on a 2 1/2 month journey to China and Japan. I'm living in Beijing for a month, volunteering at an orphanage, then making my way to Tokyo (while stopping in Shanghai and Osaka) where I'll live for another month.

Two days ago my flight left Toronto at 8:30 am. I spent the five hour flight to Vancouver sleeping on some guy with a gross beard and a nike cap. He wasn't too happy about it.



Here, taking place in Vancouver Airport, is the photo I've titled "The Last Supper: Canadian Style". Seeing as this was my last chance to have proper western food, I opted for Tim Horton's classic 'Soup and Sammich' combo, complete with Panda Baba over yonder in the corner.



On my next flight I was entertained by a number of things.



First, the kid behind me was wailing away, so I entertained him with my trusty bear puppet. Sweet.



Then, I played around with the personal t.v. in front of me and tried to pass 11 hours by watching Flight of the Conchords. It was that or an HBO Special featuring George Lopez. Gross. Then finally, when we were about two hours away from Beijing, I decided to start writing out some Mandarin characters so that if I was to go to a restaurant, I'd be able to read the menu. I decided to start with "Corn on the Cob" even though thats probably the last thing I'd ask for in China. I was interupted by the woman next to me laughing her ass off. Apparently my symbol for "Corn" was literally, laughably bad. She then proceeded grab my pencil and draw it herself, then encouraged me to copy her. Each time she laughed, so I can only assume that when I write Corn, it doesn't say Corn. Regardless, I now have an entire page of paper that reads "Corn Corn Corn Corn Corn Corn Corn Corn Corn Corn Corn Corn Cob" in Mandarin Chinese. For the next hour me and her attempted to have a conversation, her speaking Mandarin and me using my phrasebook. All I managed to say was that I came to Beijing to "babysit" and that I was from Toronto (which she thought was in America).


When we landed, it was 30 degrees outside. Right now it's 30 degrees outside. Earlier today, it was 30 degrees and tomorrow will probably be another 30 degrees. I know that sounds nice, because you guys are probably freezing or something, but DEAR LORD IS IT SMOGGY HERE! I have yet to see the sky. Today was the first time I saw the sun. Seriously, SERIOUSLY.

I got picked up at the airport by Noora, a girl from England who is my roomate until Tuesday. We got picked up by the Orphanage's driver. That's right, a driver. If we want to go anywhere this dude takes us, FREE! Me and Noora have planned to go to Beijing on the weekend, see all the tourist sites.


Today however we took some bikes and rode into town. It took us about 20 minutes to bike to a small town about 30 mins outside of downtown Beijing (basically where I live in Toronto in relation to Yonge and Dundas) once we got there, people went apeshit. I'm not even exaggerating. The people there had obviously rarely seen white people and jumped at the chance to scream "Hello!" to the blond westerner and her less interesting friend, me. One guy saw us, froze in his tracks, then ran into his store. The next minute, two young guys chased after him as he ran outside. They stood on the side of the street screaming "HIIII!" until we turned and addressed them. Then they spent the rest of the time laughing and staring until we left. Kids stopped licking their ice cream to stare, old men on bicycles stopped looking at traffic to stare, a bus beeped at us then all the passengers proceeded to press their noses against the glass and wave. Noora told me that downtown wasn't like this, but the small town that she was staying in earlier had her stopping consistently so people could take pictures. She told me about how when eating at restaurants, people would press up to the glass to stare and wave at her. I spent three dollars and bought: Lay's Mango Chips, Pokemon Toothpaste, Apple Flavoured Cookies and five plums.



There was a puppy with the dog too. He ran away while I was taking this photo.



He ran away to chase this kitty. Turn your head, I cant turn it on this computer.



All the stores had the EXACT SAME SIGN! I mean I'm sure they said different things, but they were all blue with red writing. Except for one which was yellow with red writing.



This was the supermarket I bought all of my gross stuff from, none of the bikes were locked. When we left our bikes we didnt lock them, apparently no one steals them *shrugs*



This was the only place that wasn't: Selling meat, A supermarket, An eatery....
other than the hairdressers



My Mango Lays. Not terrible. Not good either.



My apple cookes that expired in January. Yum.



My Torchtic toothpaste! Strawberry falve. Yum.

When we came back we had a nice chinese dinner (we can eat the meals they provide for the nanny's) and escaped to our room to watch bootleg episodes of House.

Before we had biked out, we went downstairs and played with the children.



This kid was absolutely adorable. The entire time I was there, he didn't move a muscle and stayed in the same place, just starting at me. I came up to him with a teddy bear and made it snuggle with him. He didn't budge. I picked up a decorated rattle and tried to get him to play with it, nothing. I picked up some other freaky stuffed animal, and still he just sat there staring. Then suddenly, he picked up the bear I had given him, squished it into his face and started bawling. Startled I petted him on the back and said "It's okay!". Then suddenly everything was and he stopped crying and eating the bear and just sat there, staring. I left to go to the other nursery and he sat there and stared at me the whole way out.





This girl was a treat. She was so amused that I could take a picture of her and then she could see herself. She explained to me in Mandarin that she was wearing very pretty bows, then showed me them on her head. Later she came by with a book, which I thought she wanted me to read, but instead just wanted to jump on my leg and be bounced around.





Soon enough these two kids caught onto the bouncing and I had three kids sitting on my legs, demanding they bounce up and down. Another smalled kid caught wind of it and tottled over, after realizing there was no room for him, his face scrunched up and made like he was about to cry. Before he could I scooped him in one arm and bounced him up and down that way.


The first little boy brought me a book about bugs and wanted me to flip through it with them. I opened it up and upon seeing the first bug he yelled "CHA!" and smacked it with his hand. Not knowing what Cha meant, I just repeated it and figured it meant "Ants". Then on the next page he screamed "CHA!" and hit the book again. I started to realize that he meant that he was squishing the bugs. After the second read through he stopped squishing them and started to repeat the english versions of them, mumbling "Layy Bug" and "Capillar".

I've talked to the people here, and originally they wanted to send me to Singapore to pick up a kid (SINGAPORE!) but apparently I won't be here to pick him up...or will I? ...We'll see...
I do know that they plan to move me to one of their sister orphanage by next week. So we shall see where I end up.