Move anywhere new and I promise there will be hate, at least at the
start. The feeling eventually passes but in the beginning it’s a gut reaction
that’s hard to avoid. We have lived in four countries over the past six years
and I have hated: the paper-thin walls of apartments in Washington, DC, the emptiness
of Milan in August, and the soju-kimchi haze of late night subway rides in Seoul.
I am currently busy hating the sidewalks in Chengdu – or more specifically, the use of Chengdu's sidewalks as toilets.
But we don’t live in Bangkok so I didn’t have to hate
anything there. We wanted to lounge around in a place that wasn’t China and this city fit the bill. People sometimes use the word “international” to describe a city,
meaning that it has everything you're looking for from the modern world, but
I’m starting to think that what we really mean is that it has all of the things
a westerner expects. International or not, this westerner couldn’t have been happier.
The meals we had were a confluence of freshness, complexity,
and bright flavors, and the hotel breakfast was so sprawling and overwhelming
that we were tempted to stay there to eat away the day rather than go outside. But the
best part is that you can eat the food without
worrying that someone used shoe leather to thicken your yogurt or dredged
cooking oil from the sewers and added it to your noodles. And yes, those things actually happen in China.
Our hotel had a chocolate boutique that sold painted chocolates with decadent fillings, boxes of rainbow-colored
macaroons, and cake by the slice. Outside there was a palm tree ringed pool with British retirees drinking watermelon juice, Italian families nibbling on French fries, and this
American couple reading magazines (Shi-wen) and studying Chinese (me) in the shade.
Being free to enjoy what we were eating was a welcome detour
from the underlying anxiety that accompanies every meal in China. So we ate and
ate and ate. We downed volcanic oysters and prawn curries and durian sticky rice. Jack fruit and pomelo salad and wildflowers dredged through green curry. Bangkok made it easy.
And even with all the eating Shi-wen was still able to fit into the tux he’d been fitted for on our first day there. This was due in large part to the hotel’s gym, which overlooked the pool and had working machines. I was stunned – probably because the last hotel gym I'd visited was a small room nudged behind the swimming pool, where a 1980’s era treadmill, a few hand weights, and a stationary bike that was listing to one side were all collecting dust in the dark. What can I say... live somewhere long enough and you adjust your expectations.
And even with all the eating Shi-wen was still able to fit into the tux he’d been fitted for on our first day there. This was due in large part to the hotel’s gym, which overlooked the pool and had working machines. I was stunned – probably because the last hotel gym I'd visited was a small room nudged behind the swimming pool, where a 1980’s era treadmill, a few hand weights, and a stationary bike that was listing to one side were all collecting dust in the dark. What can I say... live somewhere long enough and you adjust your expectations.
Coming back to Chengdu was a little like falling out of bed
and hitting the floor with your face. Getting off the plane was the cue to start
the fight. The fight to get your bag, the fight to get a cab, the fight to find
the food you think is safe enough to eat. But once you live here long enough you
forget about the extra energy you have to expend and it’s just the way that life
is lived. This is good and necessary, but step away from it for any length of time and
coming back is a thud.
I stay flexible. I weave around the spitting and the squatting and the children with no pants. I never upbraid the drivers who come alarmingly close to running me down on the sidewalks. I follow the food scandals and adjust accordingly.
In this way I live the life that China gives me. I am thrilled to have an opportunity to know this place and to live its life, and I genuinely like it here. But I still
love a grocery store selling food you don't hear about on the nightly news and I never thought I’d be so giddy about kids wearing
full coverage pants.
They have these things in Bangkok. They also have the
feeling that you may not be so alone after all – that there might be other
people out there who have the same expectations as you do about what city life might entail.
It’s just that they live three hours away. In Bangkok.
1 comment:
I've thought a lot about what makes a city "international" or i guess palatable to Westerners and I think perhaps its not really the restaurants or the museums, its about whether the city is a place people come to or come from. The places that people "come from" are the places where everyone looks the same, talks the same, thinks the same (Chengdu much?) The people from these places who are different enough, adventurous enough or curious enough leave the places they are from and go to the places other people also "come to." So its these places that people "come to" that have a sort of vibrancy, diversity, freedom to be "different" to crave different things on different days of the week that we miss in the places like Chengdu. Because those are the people who are attracted to a "come to" city rather than a "come from" place. Long live Bangkok!!!! Sorry about more food safety issues. i gotta admit, I'm loving me some Whole Foods and T' Joe's right now!
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