Chinese Souvenirs: Silk Shirts
The first time I went to a market in China, I had two weaknesses: Game Boy Advance games and silk clothes. I loved shopping for silk clothes. I don’t even use the silk jackets or silk pajamas I bought for myself, but knowing they are hanging up in my closet makes me feel pretty darn special.
The silk shirt in the above picture is actually a woman’s shirt. I don’t wear it, either. And I’m not about to give it away as a gift, because I spent way too much money on it. It was the first article of silk clothing I bought, and I thought I was getting a good deal at 250 yuan (equivalent to $36). The next day, I went to another market and stumbled across a booth selling full silk dresses for only 35 yuan.
When things like that happen, it makes you feel sick inside. You want to go back to the other vendor and chew them out for ripping you off, but you know it’s all your fault for not playing the game right. My only consolation was knowing that that vendor and her family probably ate a little better that week. And since I spent so much on the silk shirt, I decided to keep it as my own souvenir.
Eye Exercises are for Losers
Sometimes I wonder if I’m going cross-eyed and don’t realize it. In class, I have the hardest time making eye contact with the student I’m trying to call on. I’ll point at someone, and they’ll mouth, “Me?” then look behind them, even if they’re sitting on the back row. I nod my head, expecting them to stand up, but then the student next to them stands and starts to answer my question. The only way I can ever get the student I want is to go right up to their desk and wave my hand in front of their face.
The eye exercises the students do several times a day must not be working for them. While music plays, and a woman’s voice counts from one to eight over and over, the kids massage their face and around their eyes. They hate doing this, of course, and I don’t think they’re very concerned about their eyesight, anyway. For some crazy reason, glasses have become a popular fashion trend. And the bigger and brighter the frames are, the cooler the wearers think they look.
In American culture, we go to great lengths to get rid of our glasses, whether we switch to contacts or get surgery or just go without and stumble into everything. The younger Chinese crowds love glasses so much, though, they’ll even wear the frames without any lenses. Their glasses don’t have lenses! These people look ridiculous, like they were playing “dress like grandpa” or were on their way to a Halloween party but got sidetracked with shopping and going to school. I’m pretty sure Harry Potter is to blame.
Dear Chinese Men,
Please stop rolling your shirts up in the summer. I know it’s hot outside, but nobody wants to look at your big, nasty belly. Thanks.
Sincerely,
Clark
I Hate Shopping for Clothes
Oh, big surprise. A man who doesn’t like shopping for clothes. What are you going to tell us next? You don’t like wedgies, either? My problem with clothes shopping, however, isn’t that I hate the process of looking for things to buy. Well, okay, I hate that part, too, but I actually take longer to find what I want than my girlfriend does. She’s the one who doesn’t like going shopping with me. The hangup is that I have very simple tastes which are becoming harder to find as ridiculously large brand logos are all the rage now.
The bigger hangup is that I also wear a very selective size, forever caught in that frustrating transitional period between the boys’ and the men’s sections. My wardrobe has always consisted of a meager handful of both. So when I finally do find clothes that fit, I tend to wear the hell out of them to the point where they can’t possibly be patched or sewn up anymore. The seamstresses who hang out on the streets of China give me a funny look every time I ask them to stitch my sad pants back together. “Why don’t you just give up?” they want to ask… but don’t because the money is good.
So there’s the setup. Now imagine if I had no men’s section to fall back on, and that’s how shopping in China feels. Even with my skinny build, loose-fitting clothes are hard to come by. I bought a pair of extra large pajama bottoms, and they were still too tight. Extra large was the biggest they had! I went shoe shopping today, too, and was not able to find anything that comfortably fit my average American feet. One seller tried to blame it on my socks, saying I needed to convert to a thinner brand (i.e. most Chinese brands) in order to squeeze into a pair of size 44 Nikes. 44 was the biggest they had!
I ended up buying a pair of Kappa shoes, though I don’t know why. I don’t even like them. They hurt my feet. Part of me was just desperate to finally have some new shoes. The other part of me was stupid enough to name a price and commit myself to the bargaining rigmarole. Word of warning: don’t name a price. Even if it’s low, the vendor may end up giving it to you, and then you have no choice but to accept.
Chinese shoes, as I have now discovered, are all padless pieces of crap, anyway. I only found one pair with a decent amount of cushioning, but, alas, they were the Nikes that would require me to switch sock brands and cut off my big toe (the seller didn’t mention that part, but I knew it would have to happen). Sure, you can buy additional shoe padding, but it all sucks. When my US shoes reached their breaking point, I invested a lot of time and money into mixing and matching different shoe pads and never did find the right combination.
Obviously, I have to keep my wardrobe as American as possible if I am to continue being comfortable. It’s a good thing my parents are coming in two days and are bringing some extra clothes. For Westerners who live in China long-term, though, and who didn’t stock up on clothes beforehand, I don’t know how they manage to survive.
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