Question

I could be talking to a friend, a relative, or a stranger. I envision dramatic conversations, canvassing the foibles of utilitarianism and the merits of Arminianism; discussing Fermi problems and dissecting ecumenical rationalism. But alas, in reality, conversation tends more toward the concrete. We chat about what we’re doing in life, where we live, and what the culture is like there. And really, that’s a pretty close second to the dialogues conjured by my fanciful imagination.

So when I say that I’m living in China, I get the question: What’s it like there? Is it the same as it is back home, or is it wildly different?

I pause for a moment, confounded by my limitless options. I look up and think: You likely aren’t in the mood for an exhaustive list, replete with photos and equations (yes, I have those). But you’d probably like more than the half-sentence summary. Should I tell you it’s the same, or should I tell you it’s different? Because it’s both. Should I share the highs or should I share the lows? So I give my Magic 8-ball a good shake, and pick what I think will best entertain my hapless listener.

Fortunately, you, dear reader, are not a captive audience. I’ll never know if you hit the back button. But if you’re still around, enjoy the medium-length version as it resides in my memory: as a series of vignettes.

Welcome to China. Welcome to a land where folks reach far out of their way to help you, even if English is a real struggle for them. A land where people are genuinely curious about what it’s like where you’re from and more than happy to let you practice your Chinese with them, but more often than not end up practicing their English with you. A land where shiny Bentleys glide by sweating street vendors, a land where you dump tea over your utensils to clean them, where it’s easy to make friends with strangers, where it’s normal for your electronics to shock you, where without hesitation, friends welcome you into their home for two weeks, and where crowds form oceans of faces, expressionless features lit by the eerie blue glow of the digital world.

Bike rental: $0.00 (killer promo)

Steamed pork bun (baozi): $0.25

To-your-door delivery: $0.50

10 gigs of 4G data: $3

Starbucks drink: $6

Talk about overpriced coffee. Value is strange here in Shenzhen. Property speculation has driven real estate prices sky high – we’re talking well over $1500 / square foot for these no-frills high rises – but rent is still relatively inexpensive. The opulent and the opportunity-less rub shoulders, and it shows: You can pay as little or as much as you want for a meal.

This is great on the wallet, but less so for planet earth. With delivery prices like those, everyone under thirty orders most of their meals online. To Shenzhen’s credit, they’ve banned motorcycles so these countless deliverymen swarm the streets on electric bikes, but the food comes with so much packaging I fill a dustbin every meal. When dining in, it’s customary to sanitize your utensils and dishes before eating on them with boiling water. But instead of just boiling water, they give you a pot of tea – so after dribbling it down your chopsticks you can drink the rest of the pot. You’ll catch them using the words “water” and “tea” interchangeably. And then, they bring out these dishes served on a bed of peppers or bean sprouts. You’re not actually supposed to eat that – it’s there mostly for flavor or maybe presentation – but for some of these dishes, it feels more is meant to be thrown away than eaten!

That aside, I’ve really enjoyed the food here. I’ve tried some spicier things and oddities like fish eye, chicken stomach, sheep lungs and the like. One of the wilder foods that I tried, though, was snake. My trusty roommate Max took me to an upscale snake restaurant. It was surprisingly quite enjoyable, once I navigated my way around the phalanx of bones bristling through every piece. I imagine the meat-to-bone ratio is better in the big snakes, but those snakes are a bit pricier.

If you think the Western world is leading the payments industry with trendy new things like Apple Pay, think again. In China, everyone from the poshest hotel to the vendor selling bananas on the side of a mountain accepts WeChat pay. You open the app, point the camera at a QR code, and just like that you’ve paid. As long as you’re not bothered by the Chinese government tracking your every purchase, then there’s no reason to carry cash unless you actually enjoy the feel of a walletful of coins jutting into your pelvis.

There’s a lot that doesn’t faze the Chinese. You have to boil the water before drinking it, and since the specific heat of water is unfortunately high (for my non-nerds: this means water takes a long time to cool) everyone here is stuck drinking lukewarm water half the time. But it doesn’t bother them. Online, most locals don’t use their real name or picture for WeChat (their messaging/calling/payments app), but this isn’t an issue for them. There’s a suspicious, ~ 50 hertz buzzing you feel when you touch your electronics, but it’s “normal.” Drivers and cyclists are aggressive, but don’t seemed perturbed when they have to dodge through oncoming traffic to avoid taxis parked in the middle of the road. Not everyone is like that – I had one driver who made it his duty to honk at every slow vehicle he passed – but it’s nice to see people just work around obstacles instead of grumbling about them.

I give my roommates credit for teaching me the majority of my Chinese, but it works both ways: I teach them English too. A day or two after meeting Yanhui, he told me that he didn’t have an English name yet and needed help deciding. Plenty of people pick their foreign names to sound like their original name, but that’s becoming less popular these days. Plus, I wasn’t about to name this poor guy Yankee. So after going through a variety of different names, we settled on Alvin. A friendly name. The next time I’m picking a name again I’ll probably have a pregnant wife (gasp).

In other words, I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Yeah, it’s hard sometimes. There are days when the streets could be streets from any city, just littered with rude cyclists and stinky tofu vendors. But I dwell on the days when instead I see a thriving community full of sixty year old women dancing together in the streets and men practicing tai chi. After all, who knows when I’ll get to live in China again.