Tim’s Nomad Diaries

Censored, are you serious? This website, Tim’s Nomad Diaries, is being blocked by the Chinese Authorities because apparently its initials, TND, stand for a bad swear word in Chinese (something equivalent to fuck or shit, or some fuckshit like that).

Not being able to access my web page is not only a problem because it is a real hassle for posting entries–of which this will be the last one until I arrive in Vietnam on the 20-something of October. More importantly, though, this censorship acts as a huge impediment to achieving my readership goals put forth in the mission statement upon launching TND. Well, I guess an audience of 4.8 billion people will have to suffice–for now at least…

On the bright side, however, this whole censorship thing will serve as a great cocktail-party conversation starter:

Me: “Hi there. Before we start getting to know each other, I must be honest with you. There’s something I have to confess: I have a little bit of baggage (as my face tenses) I…I…I’m a (gulp) censored man.”
Blond Floozy: “Wow! What a coincidence, I just love the bad boy dangerous criminal type! Where were you censored?”
Me: “China”
Blond Floozy: “Oh my God, get out of here! China is the BIGGEST and the (biting her lower lip) BADDEST nation-state. Come here you rebel, take me right here and now (as she swipes the glasses off the coffee table).”

Besides for the whole censoring business, there’s not that much to say. I’ve spent my time here in China in two cities, Beijing and Zheng Zhou. In Beijing, I was pretty much on a site-seeing bonanza for five days, my host Jen acted as a tour guide the whole time and kept stressing how she wanted me to maximize my short stay in her wonderful city. It was quite tiring, but I did see a lot, eat a lot of amazing food, and enjoy some incredible hospitality.

The most memorable experience had to be at the electronic market, a twelve story building filled with every single piece of electronic equipment imaginable. I was shopping for a new digital camera, and after about an hour of looking in some of the seemingly infinite row of stands that all appear the same a man takes us to the top story to talk business. We sit down on the couch sipping on our tea they gave us as a crew of slickly dressed young twenty something kids hand us the camera I wanted. After hearing the price quote of 2800 Yuan (aout $350), I look at the one youngster and lay on a fat grin and let out a snicker. “Jennifer, tell the kid that I like him” (nobody in the market spoke an utterance of English). The boy smiles. “Now, Jen, tell him that he is a smart and charming young man, and that I think he will make a great business man one day”, as I lay on another ear-to-ear smile and look the boy and his salesmen posse in their eyes. After about a half hour of this, I ended up purchasing the camera for 400 Yuan less than Jen thought possible.

So now I’m here in Zheng Zhou, a medium sized city on the China scale of only seven million people. My time here has been totally chilled out, as I have been staying with UNC friend Phil, whose been teaching English here for the past couple of years. He has a ridiculous collection of movies here, as he buys one DVD for about one sixth of what it costs to rent one in the states, so we’ve just been lounging around, hanging out with his friends and eating huge diverse buffet style dinners every night.

Oh, and not to forget the daily acupressure sessions. On my list of things to do while on my travels here through Asia is to learn various techniques of oriental healing. So while taking mental notes on the physical motion of the movements from the acupressure therapist, she would also point to what part of the body the area of the foot that she was touching corresponded to, and than I would say the word in English and she would then slowly repeat it. Free knowledge exchange, her teaching me acupressure while I teach her English, what a wonderful thing!

As far as my political views go, you know I have a bunch. But lets just hold off on expressing them for now…