The Day After the Rain

This morning on my way to work, this was the scene at one of the streets.

It was several inches deep in water.

And many roads are like this around the city. The drainage system either doesn't work, or the street was paved too flat for the water to run anywhere. Or there is no existing drainage system.

The water is muddy from the dirt and dust, as well as the sidewalks, as they're constructed using bricks and held together by sand.

By the way, the sky didn't clear up as I had hoped. It was still overcast today.

And now in the evening there is a giant lightning show. Bolts of light are flashing across the dark sky making for an amazing night display, and thunder rumbling in the background.

Hopefully tomorrow will be a clear day.

Naturally Cleaning the Air

For the last few days it's been hot and humid here, which is unusual for Beijing, known for its hot dry summers.

But everyday it's been muggy and hazy. And yesterday was so hot that I thought it would surely rain last night.

However, the temperature cooled just enough to prevent any precipitation from forming.

A visiting friend thought she needed to get her eyes checked because she couldn't see clearly outside. "It's not you," I replied. "It's the pollution."

This morning China Radio International said the forecast was "foggy" with heavy rain in the afternoon.

While it might have looked foggy, the city was covered in a deep haze rather than mist.

And finally late this afternoon the sky grew dark and rumbling thunder and flashes of light flew across the sky signaling rain. And it rained hard for a few minutes.

It's evening and there's still intermittent lightning, thunder and rain.

I hope it continues all night so that tomorrow morning the sky will be so clear my friend will wonder if her eyes are too sharp.

Speak English Please

Beijing Television held an English contest that was taped in the basement of the Millennium Monument, a strange structure with a needle not upright, but on an angle like a radar gun.

The contest called "I am the Hero" was also loosely related to the Olympics, encouraging people to come out of the woodwork and speak English.

Anyway, it was sponsored by a company that produces software to learn English, but interestingly enough, none of their staff spoke the language.

The contest had been going for a few months a la American Idol style, eliminating people and now they were down to the final 12. They ranged in age from an 11-year-old girl to an elderly man, but he wasn't able to make it that night for some reason.

In the competition they had to translate and perform a skit that is quite well known in China. It's basically an interviewer asking a country bumpkin couple about their lives with both comical language and physical comedy.

It was quite strange to have them translate something, when they really should have created their own skits in English. These were then graded by three judges, one of whom was an actual English person. Six people were then eliminated.

The next round was to get each contestant to wear a funny headband with a word on it they couldn't see. Through asking a series of questions in 90 seconds they had to guess what the word was. Some of them were volleyball, Mickey Mouse, traffic officer and yoga.

The young girl who had excellent English, flubbed this section because her word was "credit card". She knew it had to do with banking and it was a thing, not a person, but she couldn't figure it out. And when time was up, she couldn't even begin to guess the answer and started to cry in front of the cameras and studio audience.

Everyone tried to console her, but it was no use. She wept openly even though everyone told her she was a "hero".

She and two other people were eliminated.

The finale was a major presentation each of the finalists had to give. Another young girl used two wooden clappers and performed a rhythmic poem about the environment and that we were all heroes.

Then a university student had two boxers come on stage pretending to spar with each other. It turns out she is an interpreter for a boxing coach and she explained how she was so thrilled to be chosen by this coach to help him communicate with Chinese boxers training for the Olympics.

Last but not least was the flashiest presentation of them all -- a police officer and his cohorts in uniform marched on stage. With slide images in the background, the officer talked about his experience being in London during the bombings two years ago and how he is proud to be helping with security for the Games next year. And also sharing the stage was an attractive dancer in a sexy police-like uniform who provided the eye candy.

It was no contest who won in the end.

While the actual "tests" the contestants had to go through were a bit strange, it was impressive to see the calibre of spoken English in Beijing.

Shop to Your Advantage

My friend took me to a little unknown place really close to the Silk Market, or Xiu Shui Jie.

It's across the street from the giant superstore where you can buy fake T-shirts, shoes, handbags, as well as beads, electronics and bolts of silk.

We got there from the subway station, Yonganli and got out of exit C. We came out to the side opposite the market. And nearby is another subway entrance. That's where this underground shopping arcade is.

It's a far cry from the hordes of people crammed in the Silk Market, with sales girls grabbing your arm or chanting off names like Gucci or Prada to get your attention. There's hardly anyone in this place which is ideal for a shopper who wants to take her time. But it's also a great bargaining chip too.

The stalls have very similar merchandise to Xiu Shui Jie, and because there aren't many customers around, you can bargain the price down lower. Most of the things on sale include clothing, pashmina shawls, handbags and shoes.

We bargained the pashminas down to 28RMB (US$3.70) each.

Another bargaining tip: a bit of flattery helps with the negotiations. Each party has time to kill, so why not toss in a compliment or two? Makes for a fun conversation as well.

Ensuring Good Coverage

I'd read stories when poorly-paid journalists go to press conferences or events and are given hong bao, or "a red envelope" with some cash in it as an incentive to get a story or two out of them.

The public relations people or organizers tell the reporters that the money is to pay for their transportation or meals, a monetary "sorry to take up your time, but here's a little souvenir..." token.

Apparently this is very common practice in China.

And it's very hard to give the hong bao back, as it can be seen as rude to refuse a gift. The people giving out the envelopes really urge the journalists to take the money and it's only after some persistence on the reporter's end that they may give up and take back the monetary gift.

When journalists only make around 3,000-5,000RMB (US$397-$661) a month, the temptation is too great.

Fair reporting can only begin when they are paid a decent wage. Until then, anyone who consumes Chinese media may want to think twice about what they're reading, hearing and seeing.

Hot and Oily All Over

Beijingers love chillis. They can't get enough of these brilliant red peppers that ignite fires down your throat. Just as vicious are Sichuan peppercorns, small dark brown round spices that literally numb your tastebuds.

And last night at Fei Teng Yu Xiang, diners hovered over various dishes covered in oil and chillis. The restaurant is best known for its shao zhu yu, or fish slices cooked in a basin of oil and seasoned with the hot peppers.

Definitely not my idea of an enjoyable dining experience, but for these customers, it looked like they were having quite the fiery hot feast.

Feng Teng Yu Xiang
No. 1 Gongti Bei Lu
Chaoyang District

The ABCs of Sex

Recent reports coming out of Shanghai say that more teens are having sex in that city this summer and are calling the accidental pregnancy hotline asking how they can get an abortion.

This comes on the heels of a previous story that nearly half of the pregnant teenagers in the coastal city met their partners on the Internet. Most of the fathers disappeared after learning about the pregnancy, and the teens didn't know their partners' names.

And many of these young women have had multiple abortions, as their form of birth control.

The lack of adequate sex education in schools and parents' reluctance to talk about the subject with their children is a challenge Ma Yinghua is familiar with.

She is a senior councilor studying health and HIV/AIDS education at Peking University.

Ma explains that students are taught health education -- nutrition, health and fitness along with a bit of sex education. It's not until grades 5 and 6 do they learn about puberty and the effects that can have on bodies and minds. The ABC's of sex ed are: A for abstinence, B for be able to say no, and C for condom.

And learning how to use a prophlyactic isn't taught until college and university -- not senior high school.

When pressed if students really know how to use a condom, Ma just said yes without elaborating, instead saying she's gone to conferences in the United States where instructors there admit they have problems talking about sex in class.

She showed various textbooks on sex education that were sanctioned by the government. They were filled with cartoon drawings and not being able to read Chinese, on the whole looked pretty tame. The teacher's handbook was also hardly riveting, also with cartoon illustrations.

Ma trains teachers on how to teach sex education, as well as HIV/AIDS prevention. She started working in this government-funded area in 1996 and teachers had no clue what HIV/AIDS was. But a decade later, they are all quite knowledgeable and are now finding ways of teaching the subject more effectively. She travels around the country, particularly Henan, Guangxi, Heilongjiang provinces as well as big cities.

However, her biggest battle is with school administrators who limit the amount of class time devoted to sex education and HIV/AIDS prevention. Or Ma is asked to lecture to an auditorium filled with students when a small class is more effective for this kind of interactive instruction.

She admits she's frustrated, but continues to have hope that more young people will be armed with the information they need to prevent sexually transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS.

While the resources and information are great, Ma also adds that these young people don't know how to resolve problems, especially when it comes to relationships. And with more of them experimenting with sex, they need to understand there's no black and white answer. This too is a big hole that Ma thinks parents should be responsible for and communicate with their sons and daughters.

The sexual revolution in China continues, but only a fraction wiser.