This time between the “Western holidays” (Christmas, New Year etc.) and the Mother of all Chinese Holidays, 春节, has been fraught with changes, stalled projects, snow, worrying about calamities both in China and abroad, new friends, and 太多的咖啡，香煙，和啤酒。In the midst of all this strange limbo between festivals, I’ve been rather absent on the interwebz. Fear not, here are some interesting links to tide you all over while I’m busy figuring out my life and buying fireworks for the impending New Year.
Some menacing work from NeoCha
–> NeoChaEDGE is an amazing, bilingual Chinese design and art website that I’d heard about from several sources, but never really checked it out until Mike sent me the link. It’s a website devoted largely to Chinese designers and graphic artists, but also reports on music, performance, and other aspects of the offbeat or underground art world. It’s definitely a unique interactive site to see artists who didn’t necessarily come straight outta 798 or 莫干山路 and represent a more independent slice of the Chinese art world.
More work from NeoCha
–> This band, La Loupe, consists of some new American friends who rock out folky tunes (often featuring my second favorite* instrument, the melodica!) with Chinese lyrics. They have a small, but awesome following in Beijing and are a little Dean & Britta-esque in their compositions and overall vibe. Really catchy songs, the music is simple and witty.
–> This is just absurd. Welcome to our scary world.
–> Last but not least, check out my girl Tao Yang being a total expert on Chinese independent film all over the news–holla! Tao Yang was interviewed for a Chicago news station about film festivals and the direction of Chinese film and aced it fabulously.
*after the glockenspiel, of course
This entry was written by , posted on January 22, 2010 at 12:04 am, filed under adventures, art, beijing, chinese, film, music, news and tagged beijing, chun jie, dean & britta, la loupe, neocha. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink and follow any comments with the RSS feed for this post.
Rapture on the Great Wall:
Hallelujah!
This entry was written by , posted on January 9, 2010 at 12:28 am, filed under adventures, beijing and tagged great wall. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink and follow any comments with the RSS feed for this post.
Once in a while, you find yourself gobsmacked by a totally unsuspecting cultural experience. When James Wallace, a Nashville-based musician who I met in Beijing way-back-when, invited me to a concert he was playing in, I was more than happy to drop by and see an old friend. What I didn’t expect was an astonishing show combining traditional Chinese and Mongolian instruments with some of the finest bluegrass and Americana on either side of the Pacific.
The headliner was Abigail Washburn, an amazing artists who’s made the world hear just how sweet Chinese bluegrass can sound. Abigail plays a range of instruments and carries songs in such a strong, smoky voice in both Chinese and English. What’s most incredible, though, is not her considerable musical talent, but her ear for bringing together seemingly incompatible sounds to create an unexpected fusion of Chinese and American musical traditions. When a Chinese musician went to town on the pipa, I realized for the first time that this instrument (that I’d formerly thought of as just vaguely whiney) sounds like the fiercest, most badass banjo in town.
Charmed as we were by Abigail, James, and conspirator Kai Welch’s renditions of old American fare with some Chinese instrumental interludes, I was totally blown away by the introduction of the Mongolian rock bang, Hanggai. I know: Mongolian. Rock. Band. We were skeptical, but it was rad, you guys. They wore fantastically pointy hats and with instruments with such names as the “horse head fiddle” and “Tobshuur,” as well as electric guitars, bass, and drums, totally rock on with their frocks on. (Observe frocks below.) The whole company brought the house down with Mongolian and American drinking songs–they were clearly having a great time.
What I found so inspiring about the whole show was not just the obvious skill of the musicians, but the enthusiasm they showed for doing something new, something innovative, something beloved. I’m no musician (apart from my unfortunately well-documented bongo skillz…Black Yak Band, you were all there in my heart) and no informed connoisseur, but I know when I’ve seen an amazing show and I left the concert feeling good about life. I feel like seeking out these experiences–those that leave you feeling colorful and energized and even nostalgic–is especially important in Beijing, where life can fall into grayness or sameness quite unexpectedly, and this show was enough to inspire ridiculous cliches about art and inspiration and how, at the end of the day, a banjo and a pipa and a Chinese song and an American song can do the trick to make life that much better.
This entry was written by , posted on December 19, 2009 at 10:03 pm, filed under adventures, art, beijing and tagged abigail washburn, beijing, hanggai, music, yugong yishan. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink and follow any comments with the RSS feed for this post.
It’s getting cold. Well, to be fair, it was frigid and (government-generated) snowy for most of November, but temperatures have kind of leveled off to a season-appropriate chill. In any case, the temperature is going to continue to drop and then remain glacial for the forseeable future.
I am devising strategies to stay sane in all of this without hibernating or scorching myself on an electric blanket.
Survival tactic #1: Bright colors!
In the gray gloom of a Beijing winter, there’s a small comfort waking up to a bright orange bedroom. The Chinese seem to have embraced this concept with great vigor and I have encountered a countless collection of tangerine, clementine, and brightly golden hued walls in houses, restaurants, and hotels all over China. My apartment takes the (carrot?) cake, though. My roommate has situated our flat not only with orange walls, but orange curtains, an orange couch, and a charming array of orange throw pillows. Delightful. And citrusy.
Survival Tactic #2: Uniqlo Heattech Clothes
(This is probably the closest this blog will ever come to product placement, so please forgive me.) One arena in which Beijing has far surpassed New York is in its number of Uniqlo stores, which thrilled me when I first arrived here. Unfortunately, most of the Uniqlo stores here boast clothing more akin to 1990s Gap (tech vests, anyone?) and less like the sleek SoHo Uniqlo wares, but they do carry the heattech leggings and turtlenecks that allowed me to prevail through last winter un-frostbitten. I don’t know what “Japan Technology” means, but it makes me feel like I’m wearing robotic clothes, which is never a bad things. Overall, these leggings and shirts are thin and silky and keep me toasty. And the logo is partly orange, you guys.
Survival Tactic #3: Calming, wistful music
Winter is a season that boasts the delicate charm of looking out a window onto softly falling snow whilst wearing a thick sweater and smiling gingerly like a J.Crew model. Sadly, this charm has often worn its welcome out by February. I have found an effective way to revive romantic notions about winter is to seek out some sweet and gentle melodies to allay the murderous frustration that you haven’t seen the sun in days and coax a soothing sense of domesticity and coziness…and French-ness?
In 2007, I listened to Nouvelle Vague nonstop. Last winter, I took further gestures in deluding myself that my life was a French New Wave movie (starring Louis Garrel, apparently) and kept ‘The Dreamers’ and ‘Les Chansons D’amour’ soundtracks on repeat. This year, I have joined the huddled masses of Beijing expats in listening constantly to Au Revoir Simone. The dreamy quasi-electro folk trio (who are from Brooklyn, btdubbs, and not actually French) just played in Beijing and Shanghai and the onslaught of coverage in the expat media circles left us all clamoring to hear their new album, Still Night, Still Light. I’ve been hooked for weeks: their melodies are shy, but poised, soothing, wintery music. And while much of Beijing may have flocked to see the band at Yugong Yishan, only one person got to unexpectedly hang out with them at the airport the next morning because we were all going to Shanghai. So, go me.
Survival Tactic #4: Don’t go to 五道口 three days in a row! It’s really far away! And it’s cold! (I learned this valuable lesson this weekend.)
Survival Tactic #5: Good friends. Good movies. Fun work. A gentleman caller or lady friend to help keep you warm. Whiskey. Jiaozi. Vitamin C. Making plans for spring.
This entry was written by , posted on November 30, 2009 at 4:00 am, filed under adventures, beijing, chinese, news, style and tagged au revoir simone, beijing, uniqlo, winter. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink and follow any comments with the RSS feed for this post.
How high? ShangHAI!
Having never been to Shanghai before and eager to escape the Eskimo’s meat locker that is Beijing, I was thrilled when my friend Tao Yang invited me to wayfare around Shanghai for the weekend. We’ve walked miles around the old city, eaten the most unbelievable soup dumplings, and taken the requisite pictures in which Pudong Tower appears to be growing out of our heads (coming soon…).
As they say in Shanghai, 生活蛮好。 Life is pretty darn good.
oh RLY?! (lolz, by the way. Serious lolz.)
What I find so thrilling about Shanghai, apart from its reasonable temperature and welcome walkability, is the amazing cinematic quality of this city. Maybe it’s because my associations with Shanghai are all from movies (Admittedly, this is case with most places. My entire geographic knowledge of LA is based on the conversation Cher and Josh have in the car in Clueless.), but Shanghai’s reputation as a historic, romantic, dramatic city becomes strikingly apparent as you stroll through the old city. Shanghai has a charm (no matter how reproduced or manufactured, in some cases) that is rare in Beijing and the crowds of moter-bikes, low, stacked houses, and sprawling courtyards are more vivid and visual than any cinematic simulacra.
This Zhou Xuan is not the same as that Zhou Xuan…
This is a total film nerd’s dream*: We’re staying right on Suzhou River, have seen the Paramount Theater where the stars of the 1930s and 40s flocked, the 新世界 signs of old Shanghai, and seen the old gongyu (apartment) of many a famed Shanghai star, including Zhou Xuan. (It’s right beside the old residence of Eileen Chang, FYI. In case you were, you know, really curious about the proximity of residences of, like, famous Chinese women from the 40s involved in the arts…)
Zhou Xuan is looking fierce.
Maybe we’ve lucked out with exceptionally sunny weather, but the light has been soft and beautiful and hits the river and peeks through the clothes hanging out the dry everywhere in an incredible way. I’m certainly no photographer or cinematographer, but I’m all swoony over this light.
It’s all very touristy and fun and the perfect city for a bunch of cinephiles to go roaming around in.
*Okay, a Chinese film nerd, probs. On that note, I am totally missing meeting Jia Zhang-Ke by being here in Shanghai this weekend. I’m trying not to think about it.
This entry was written by , posted on November 22, 2009 at 7:09 am, filed under Uncategorized, adventures, art, chinese, film, style, travel and tagged chinese cinema, shanghai, suzhou river, zhou xuan. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink and follow any comments with the RSS feed for this post.
Further dispatches from the Hawaii International Film Festival:
HIFF is renowned for its promotion of Asian-American films, as well as American indies with Asian content, and this year’s selection is quite exciting. Two films that have impressed me in particular, both of which have also getting (well deserved) mad awards and press on the festival circuit this year–Made in China and Children of Invention.
Made in China is not, as the title immediately suggests to many people, a profoundly depressing documentary about Chinese factory workers (!!!), but rather a hysterical American-produced comedy about an oddball American entrepreneur on the loose in Shanghai.
Following his lifelong dream to invent novelty products in the tradition of Groucho glasses and slinkees, Johnson (Jackson Kuhne) travels to the motherland of all knick-nack production: good ol’ Zhongguo. What ensues is an always entertaining, often sweet, incredibly original film and one of the most unique American indie comedies I’ve seen in a long time. I may be a teeny tiny bit biased, since this film is about an American (yep) who travels to China (ah-huh) to start a business (mm-hmmm) and encounters a bizarre, inexplicable, frustrating, but sometimes magical world (yeeesh) and I can identify with the story just a smidge, but this is genuine and funny story that also sheds great light on the perils and pitfalls, but also triumphs, of life in China.
The film definitely has the stamp of an American indie comedy, but doesn’t lose itself in superfluous quirkiness. The film has was a huge hit at SXSW this year, winning its Grand Jury prize, which is super exciting for the film and especially for first-time director Judi Krant.
On the other end of the American indie spectrum is Children of Invention, a moving film that shows the American neo-realism movement at its very best. Directed by Tze Chun, the film tells the story of Raymond and Tina, two Chinese-American children who have to fend for themselves when their single mom, Elaine (Cindy Cheung, fragile and startling as a woman who struggles to keep her family afloat) finds herself trapped in a dangerous marketing scam. The film is certainly socially conscious and a powerful immigrant story, but it also shows great heart and prowess as a cinematic work. I was deeply impressed by Tze Chun’s ability to coax such confident and honest performances out of Michael Chen and Crystal Chiu, the respectively twelve and eight-year-old actors who play Raymond and Tina. Children of Invention has had an amazing festival run this year, from Sundance to winning the Puma Emerging Filmmaker award here at HIFF
Children of Invention has definitely garnered comparisons to So Yong Kim’s Treeless Mountain, which was released earlier this year. While the content of the two films is somewhat similar (both present partially autobiographical accounts of Asian/Asian-American siblings abandoned and left to their own devices), I was more struck by the similarities of each film’s calm, graceful pacing and assured storytelling. This films beautifully embody not only the current American neo-realism movement, but also the sophistication and global awareness of today’s American indies.
Seeing MIC, Children of Invention, and even Treeless Mountain, and meeting the fantastic director, producers, and actors who worked to make these films so compelling, gives me enormous faith in the future of American indie cinema. The remarkable ingenuity of these films more than makes up for their minimal budgets and I find it fitting that both the films incorporate themes about invention and innovation. Just as MIC’s Johnson longs to be a novelty inventor and Children of Invention’s Raymond and Tina make and sell toys and inventions to finance their dreams, so do these filmmakers who, even when the odds are stacked against them, rely on great invention and improvisation to create great work.
This entry was written by , posted on October 22, 2009 at 6:41 pm, filed under Uncategorized, adventures, art, film, travel and tagged children of invention, hawaii international film festival, hiff, judi krant, made in china, treeless mountain, tze chun. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink and follow any comments with the RSS feed for this post.
The other day, I was at my friend’s house and happened to noticed that she had an email open in her inbox, the title of which was “Holy Shit! Midgets! We’re totally going to Kunming!!!”
I didn’t really want to pry.
But! It turns out that there is a real life dwarf commune in Kunming, China.
More Evidence
Apparently, the citizens of said commune live in little mushroom-shaped houses and dress up to perform for tourists. Either this is Chinese kitsch reaching new and horrifying heights, or a really sly stab at irony.
Is this an actual refuge for little people? A blatant tourist trap? A backwards attempt to glorify vertically-challenged Chinese while actually kind of exploiting them? Totally weird? Something that would probably only happen in China?
Yes.
This entry was written by , posted on October 10, 2009 at 11:00 pm, filed under Uncategorized, adventures, chinese, travel and tagged china, dwarf, kunming. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink and follow any comments with the RSS feed for this post.
Due to my crippling fear and loathing of technology, I’m not normally one to geek out about web design. The bloc site We Live in Beijing, however, has a cool, eye-catching layout and a multi-functionality that combines elements of facebook (may we who live in China continue to mourn this loss…), twitter, and any clever news and events source. The site contains especially great previews and reviews of the Beijing music scene, as well as pithy little articles on dating, travel, sex, and all that makes up Beijing life.
Fuck yeah! These guys are all over the China music scene…I have no idea who they are!
While the site is funny and informative and helmed by style-conscious Norwegians, does somehow lend itself to certain stalkerish habits.
As much as we facebook-stalkers of bygone days might have longed for the ability to see who’s been visiting our profile…be careful what you wish for. On weliveinbeijing.com, a member can not only see who’s been visiting their profile of late, but also what any given member is currently doing. If Klaus is looking at Zhang Wei’s profile, I know. If Ning is contributing to a forum entitled “Don’t Marry a Foreign Man,” I know. This is weird and awkward, but just seems to just encapsulate a larger truth about life and love in Beijing: this is a city of creepsters.
Within the expat community, it kind of makes sense. When you have people coming from all directions and cultural backgrounds, you’re going to get some signals mixed and some wires crossed when it comes to communication between and among the sexes. But…also, this seems to be a breeding ground for desperate, tactless losers. New York is not exactly a cathedral of chastity, but I’ve never felt so grossed out when I go out to bars and such. Men have no problem eyeballing you in a way that’s not exactly, um, subtle, saying totally inappropriate shit, and touching you within minutes of meeting you. Mostly it’s harmless and non-aggressive, but sometimes it’s best to signal your friends, do the Wolverine thing with your keys between your fingers, and grab a cab.
I’m not trying to be a puritan here, but the extremely explicit advances and general forwardness, excessive hair gel use, and Chinese dudes’ totally unironic use of the phrase “baby girl, I wanna get wit you” has caught me a bit off guard. (Maybe I’m just used to hanging out with socially-idiotic hipsters for whom eye contact is a notch too intense for bar banter.) To address the social networking thing again, I’ve only just joined weliveinbeijing, but I already have a mailbox full of totally weird messages from men I have never met, none of whom feel compelled to actually spell out the incredibly complicated and lengthy word Y-O-U. From the fairly innocent (What u do? Where u frum, girl?) to the more forward, (”i wish to know u better and be a good friend. you feel it. i feel u. give me cell phone.”…On this one, I couldn’t tell if this person wanted to have sex with me or steal my cell phone.), to the plain inexplicable (”u have a good profile. i like ur name. it mean tree.”) I am fairly certain that there is no language in the world in which my name means “tree,” but that’s one way to get a girl’s attention…
Of course, not all of Beijing is swarming with creepsters, but there’s a fair bundle in the land of of the 10 kuai beer, uninhibited nightlife, and social networking that practically begs you to stalk other people. Until I figure this out, I’ll be going out in my habit, Wolverine costume, and telling all inquiring minds that my name is Tree.
This entry was written by , posted on October 8, 2009 at 11:07 pm, filed under Uncategorized, adventures, beijing, chinese and tagged creeps, dating, facebook, trees, weliveinbeijing.com. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink and follow any comments with the RSS feed for this post.
I’ve been asked by a few people to post pictures of Beijing on this blog and I would oblige except that a.) I am a terrible photographer and b.) I never remember to take my camera anywhere.
Luckily, my good friend Domo Kun has come to visit Beijing from his home in Japan and has decided to document the experience! Inspired by both Katie’s Domo antics in the past (and general involvement with monsters and magical creatures*), as well as Amelie’s gnome, Domo has decided to share his photos from a recent shopping trip in Beijing. In the future, Domo plans to visit many exciting landmarks here in Beijing and also hopes to venture to other cities in China!
Domo is in the apartment, getting ready for a big shopping adventure!
Domo walks down a pleasant Beijing street. Skies are blue–an all-too-rare occasion here in Beijing.
Fruit! Domo salivates! He is partial to melons.
Domo is a kinky sort of fellow.
Domo is having a chat with these security guards. He admires their small turquoise benches.
Domo is tired. Time to ride home and feast on melons. Until next time, Domo reminds you to keep it so real it’s HD.
*I’ve just realized this totally makes her sound like Hagrid. She is not.
This entry was written by , posted on October 3, 2009 at 12:43 pm, filed under adventures, beijing, travel and tagged beijing, domo kun. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink and follow any comments with the RSS feed for this post.
My computer is being a bitch right now, as is its custom. All technology conspires against me, but that’s another story.
Luckily, since I am among the happy Apple-toting hordes, there is an Apple (苹果） store in Beijing. Located in Sanlitun Village–an enormous and terrifying mall-like structure in the center of Sanlutun Area (embassy and tourist grazing area by day, ready to party by night) with imposing geometric architecture and a center courtyard featuring a LED screen ready to burn your eyes out of their sockets.
The Beijing Apple store is eerily similar to the various New York Apple stores, especially the 14th street one (detailed in my forthcoming memoir, Apple Stores I Have Known And Had Panic Attacks At) from the frosted fiberglass staircase to the eager geeks scrambling to out-nerd each other with shiny gadgetry. I knew that my sojourn to the (in my experience) somewhat-hyperbolically named Genius Bar would be a big bilingual headache, since I need help translating what I’m told at the American, English-speaking Apple store, but I sallied forth with my broken USB ports, irrevocably corrupted iPod (been spending too much time with Chinese government officials…), and a head full of dreams.
马克？ ? (Ma Ke) Asked the Eager Young Genius who greeted me.
Whaaat? 什么？
马克？ 还是i-P -O-D? He smiles, Mac or iPod?
They both have problems, I reply, 这两个都有问题。。
What ensued was a careful and utterly wordless examination of both my computer and iPod. Pressing keys, restarting, plugging and unplugging…(opening up applications, copying and pasting) Ten minutes later, he had finished poking and prodding. “Would you like me to tell you what the problem is?” I asked.
“No.” He replied. “No time today. Come back tomorrow.”
To put a fine point on it, emoticon-wise: -_-
Really: 苹果 can suck it. All over the world.
This entry was written by , posted on September 30, 2009 at 12:37 am, filed under adventures, beijing. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink and follow any comments with the RSS feed for this post.