While most laowai are probably familiar with the phenomenon of the “ant tribe,” a recent article in The Economist introduced a number of other “tribes” of stressed-out young Chinese struggling to survive in the urban jungle.

Perhaps the most unusual is the “crush-crush tribe” (捏捏族), who release their frustrations by hiding in supermarket aisles and crushing packages of instant noodles.

The crush-crush tribe first made its appearance in late 2009, vexing store owners and psychologists with their trails of crumpled packaging and furtive Weibo confessions.

(I’ve written a post taking a closer look at the crush-crush tribe here)

Since then, they have branched off into a number of different tribes, each with its own unique method of venting stress at the expense of innocent food items.

Here’s a partial list of the new tribes spreading chaos and destruction in China’s supermarkets, along with their rank on the “uncivilization index” helpfully provided by Shanghai’s Xinwen Chenbao.

Rip-rip Tribe (拆拆族)

Uncivilization rating: 5 stars

Unlike the crush-crush tribe, this group mainly targets household items and clothing.  Members of this tribe tear open packages, leaving underwear, socks, bedspreads and similar items scattered on the shelves.

Shopkeepers say this group is difficult to police, given the large number of shoppers who also open packages to get a closer look or feel the material.

Switch Tribe (调包族)

Uncivilization rating: 5 stars

Rather than destroy items on display, this tribe switches similar items in different packaging.  Small boxed items such as toothpaste and makeup are mixed up, with a tube of one brand being put in the packaging of another.

Some stores have advised customers to check their purchases of any such items to avoid paying the sticker price on the box only to discover a cheaper version hidden inside.

Taste-taste Tribe (尝尝族)

Uncivilization rating: 4 stars

This tribe is not limited to thrill-seeking twentysomethings who sneak a cookie or two out of the box when no one’s watching.  It also includes older shoppers  who like to sample their produce before making a selection, plucking a grape or peeling open a tangerine to see if it’s ripe.

Gentle reminders from shopkeepers to leave the fruit alone often go ignored – if you don’t try it out first, shoppers reply, how do you know if it’d any good?

Scatter Tribe (乱放族)

Uncivilization rating: 4 stars

A freshly roasted chicken hidden in the freezer aisle, a bag of frozen dumplings melting on a rack of underwear… the possibilities are endless.  Like the taste-taste tribe, this group includes as many careless customers as frustrated malcontents, and many laowai likely know a few tribe members from their home country, as well.

This past November the following question was posted on Quora: Why do so many Chinese learners seem to hate Dashan (Mark Rowswell)? He seems like a nice guy. Does he secretly eat children or something?. I’m sure we all have our own answers to that question, but none are likely to come close to the insight and self-reflection that the big Canuck himself answered with yesterday.

Mark Rowswell, the man behind the Mandarin, broke it down into 5 reasons:

1. Overuse – People are sick and tired of hearing the name “Dashan”;
2. Resentment (Part A) – Dashan’s not the only Westerner who speaks Chinese fluently;
3. Resentment (Part B) – Being a foreign resident in China is not easy and Dashan gets all the breaks;
4. Political/Cultural – People wish Dashan had more of an edge;
5. Stereotyping – The assumption that Dashan is a performing monkey.

The whole answer is a bit lengthy, but well worth the read. Here are a few choice excerpts:

On why Dashan is so popular (related to #2 above):

… Dashan represents or symbolizes something very powerful to a Chinese audience. I don’t want to get too deeply into this, because my answer is already running too long, but let me say this: Chinese have a very complex and conflicting view of themselves and the world at large. They have a very strong self-identity and sense of pride, and this leads to a strong sense of “us vs. them” and of being misunderstood and misaligned by the rest of the world, or the West in particular, as well as a strong sense that they are gradually losing their language and culture in the process of globalization. In the face of this, Dashan represents a Westerner who appreciates and respects China, who has learned the language and understands the culture and has even become “more Chinese than the Chinese”. It’s a very powerful and reassuring image that appeals to very deep-rooted emotions.

On being Canadian (related to #4 above):

Culturally, the Dashan character does tend to be quite Canadian. We’re just not as aggressive in general as Americans. The adjective most used to describe Canadians is “nice”. How dull and boring can you get?

Although Canada and America are very close culturally, there are some fundamental differences. Primarily, Canadians never consider themselves to be number one in anything apart from hockey. And although we are both relatively young nations built by successive waves of immigration, Canadians have a much weaker self-identity than Americans. We don’t have a strong mainstream culture of our own, which I think makes us more malleable culturally. When Canadians come to China, we don’t do things “the Canadian way” because nobody has the slightest idea what “the Canadian way” is. So we tend to adapt pretty well to different cultures.

On why Dashan isn’t political (also related to #4 above):

… So I work within cultural norms. This spills over into the political realm, because, to be honest, Chinese cultural acceptance of foreign political criticism is almost nil. In short, I don’t have to worry about what government censors might say because Chinese audiences would never let me get that far anyway.

I could make a short public statement like that of Christian Bale recently or Björk a few years ago. It’s very easy to do and ensures you get very good coverage in the Western media. You go home and everyone thinks you are a person of moral conviction who stood up to the great Chinese monster. But the fact is that these kinds of statements elicit almost no sympathy whatsoever from ordinary Chinese citizens. They simply are not culturally acceptable to the broad Chinese audience. And it’s very difficult to see what impact they have other than to further convince ordinary Chinese people that China is misunderstood and that the Western world is antagonistic towards China and resentful of China’s development. What use is that?

I’m curious to read what others think of Dashan. John, of Sinosplice, mentioned in his post on this topic that, “the hubbub about Dashan has finally started to die down”. I can’t tell if this is true, or if after a certain number of years you just stop noticing it. Any FOB laowai still cringe at the mention of Dashan by a taxi driver? Do the new generation of foreigners in China even know who Dashan is?

The film, now titled Living With Dead Hearts, explores the issue of kidnapped children in China and how it affects the parents, the children and the whole community. And it needs your help to finish being made.

Earlier this week on his blog Imagethief, Will Moss wrote a poignant and humorous post that couldn’t have summed up better why, as a new father, this issue touches me deeply. So rather than rehash that point here with half the quality of Will’s post, please go read it.

After you’ve done that, please take a moment to watch the following trailer for the film, read my interview below with Charlie and consider giving what you can to help this film be made.

Lost Laowai: What originally moved you to pick up this cause and build a documentary around it? Was there a catalyst or specific moment that made you feel this had to be made?

Charlie: After we made Kedong County, which is not good but showed us that we probably could make a good documentary if we put more time and work into it, I was actively looking for a topic to make a longer and more serious film about (Kedong County was just something we did kinda for fun over a weekend, basically). I had been interested in the topic of street children ever since I first moved to China, and I had learned about kidnapping and how that connected from an ex-cop Chinese friend of mine when I was living in Harbin. So I was thinking actively about the issue, and how we could approach it in a way that would be meaningful and at the same time (hopefully) not get us arrested.

When I read this article by Austin Ramzy in TIME last year, I realized that the angle he took–focusing on the search and personal stories–might work well for a film. We were researching and raising money for the film that is now called Living with Dead Hearts within about a week of my reading that.

Lost Laowai: How has the project changed since last year’s round of funding and starting filming? Any unexpected challenges or obstacles?

Charlie: Well, we’ve obviously learned a lot over the year, both about kidnapping and about filmmaking since this is our first time, and that has changed our outlook a bit. The original structure we had in mind for the film has been changed a bit, although we haven’t settled on a final structure yet. And we’ve come across new subjects whose stories are too interesting not to pursue, so where we once planned to mostly follow one family, now we’re already following two and making plans to go shoot a third when we have time. It may elongate the filmmaking process but ultimately their cases are very interesting and very different from each other, so we’re going to follow them and see where they go.

Practically speaking, things have gone fairly well. The biggest challenge we’ve found thus far is that several places our subjects live seem to be enforcing a regulation that requires foreigners to stay in at least three-star lodgings — we’d been planning to stay in fleabag joints, so that’s raised our travel costs quite a bit from what we had planned for. Other than that, it’s been about what we expected. Travel with so much heavy gear is exhausting, of course, and our subjects have gotten a little harassment from the police for speaking to us in a couple cases, but we knew that would be the case from the outset.

Lost Laowai: In what ways has being a foreigner affected the production and how have you handled it?

Charlie: Aside from the housing issue, there’s just the general issue of access, which is pretty key in the documentary field. People want to see films that can take them a place they couldn’t go themselves, metaphorically speaking, and that means getting people to trust us and open up to us and tell us these intensely personal stories. Needless to say, my being a foreigner can be an obstacle to that, because people are extra suspicious. I should note that at least in some cases, they’re right to be nervous, as this is a pretty “sensitive” subject and talking to foreigners with cameras can definitely attract attention you don’t want.

So, I’ll give you two examples of this. For example, prior to our filming my wife had been a volunteer with Baby Come Home for a little while. When she told them about the film and asked if there was someone who we could interview, they told her that not only would they not grant us an interview, but that she couldn’t continue to volunteer for them as long as she was associated with a foreigner working on this project.

More or less the same thing happened when we got in touch with Yu Jianrong, the CASS professor who started that Weibo campaign to help street children. We never spoke with him directly, but his assistant was very willing at first but every time we spoke with them we couldn’t seem to nail down an actual time to shoot the interview. Eventually, I realized we were getting the run-around, and then someone forwarded me an interview Yu had done in the Chinese press where he said he doesn’t ever talk to foreigners associated with the media. That’s really frustrating, although I understand where it comes from. For people with some power or position, there’s not much they can gain from talking to someone like me, and quite a bit to lose.

Lost Laowai: Aside from donating to the film’s production, are there ways that the expatriate community can get involved and help?

Charlie: Yeah, there are lots of ways! The easiest is just to help us promote it by sharing it with your friends, family, and followers online. Maybe you can’t afford to donate right now, but some of them can. Beyond that, of course, there are a million other ways to help too. Last time we raised money, the publicity also led a bunch of people to get in touch with us and offer their help with everything from research and translation to photography.

It was also through a connection from the last round of fundraising that we got to know the folks at the Xinxing Aid center, who we’re donating 20% of the money we raise to this time around. As of the time of this interview, we have already gotten an offer from one person to help us out with the production any way he can, and a number of other people have offered help with promoting the film or have offered their expertise as interview subjects; we’ve already found two new experts to interview.

So there are lots of ways people can help. A little simple promotion is the easiest way, but we’re obviously on a shoestring budget so we’ll accept all kinds of help, all people have to do is send us an email and tell us what they can do! One of the things we will need going forward is music, so musicians especially can help by donating us songs assuming that (1) they own the copyrights to every part of the song and (2) they’re willing to grant us legal rights to use it in the film and the film’s promotional materials. Obviously, not all music is going to fit — sorry, death metal guys — but we’ve already gotten some music and we’re going to need quite a lot to score a full-length film.

If anyone out there is a composer, especially a composer who can work with Chinese instruments as well as more modern ones, donating that kind of talent (for example) would be invaluable to us!

Lost Laowai: How has producing this film, and being involved with this film, changed you and the way you look at China?

Charlie: Well, it’s forced me to go a lot of places I wouldn’t otherwise go. For example, we spend a lot of time in Taiyuan — the city once described in GQ magazine as “a fucking shithole” — and while I can’t say that characterization is wholly inaccurate, it has a sort of special significance for me now just because of some of the experiences we’ve had there shooting, and the kindness that we see from these people who invite us into their homes and just open up for us in a way that’s quite remarkable and moving.

Of course, if you just visited Taiyuan the way a tourist does, you’d never see any of that, and you’d never see the places we see, down these back alleys, the places where people actually live. It’s good to have something to remind yourself of that, because traveling in China can easily become about the public transportation and hotels and tourist sites or bars or whatever. The film forces us to travel, but to completely ignore all of that stuff and focus very intensely on people. And then of course you see that behind this modern city there are these tiny tragedies that are just everywhere. For us it’s kidnapping, but if we were making a film about forced demolition or the problems of rural-urban migration or anything I imagine it would be the same. Making a film or doing any project kind of like this just forces you to get out of your daily mindset and routine and look at things from someone else’s perspective for a little while. In our case, that’s often really depressing, but it’s also important.

It’s especially important for me because I get into routines very easily and have to work very hard to force myself out of them. What’s great about this film is that it’s now so much bigger than just me that I can’t back out or make excuses; I have basically forced myself to get out there and talk to people and learn something.

Lost Laowai: When do you expect production to wrap up, and any word on distribution?

Charlie: We hope to finish it up before the end of 2012, but I’m not making any promises at this point. It’s our first real film, and I expect we’re going to hit some points in editing where we go “Oh crap, we didn’t get a shot of this…” or “We really need to get more of this…” and then we’ll have to go out and shoot whatever we’re missing. Ultimately, I’d rather spend 2 years making a great film than 1 year making a crap film. But there does have to be a balance between that and just working on a project with no end in sight, and a deadline forces you to make decisions and think about what’s really important. So, our deadline is by the end of 2012, but I reserve the right to push that back further if need be.

As far as distribution is concerned, we don’t have anything nailed down yet. The goal is to get it in front of as many eyes as possible, and we’ll do whatever it takes to do that. We’ve already had a few representatives from schools reach out to us to say they’d like to invite us to speak and hold screenings there, and we plan to submit the film to some festivals as well to see what kind of interest and reaction there is. We’re also considering digital distribution options of course, and donors [of a certain level] will get a DVD copy of the film as soon as it’s done regardless of how it’s being released. But beyond that, we’ll have to see how things go as we get closer to that point; like I said our main focus is to get it in front of as many eyeballs as possible and we’ll ultimately go with whatever we think can best accomplish that.

Within China, of course, things are a little different, because there’s no hope for any independent documentary to be screened commercially, and certainly not one like this. But there are some small independent festivals, and some filmmakers also organize screenings on their own. In China, we’ll probably try to combine some screenings in major cities with some kind of digital distribution options, probably that would allow people to watch it for free because especially in China, it’s more important that people see it than anything else really.

But we’re still a ways away from all of this, so I can’t be sure about anything yet. First, we’re worried about making a good movie and doing justice to these people and their stories. If we can accomplish that, then distribution is the next major hurdle, but while we’re still filming, our focus is basically 100% on trying to get good footage and true stories.

For more information, check out Living With Dead Hearts (and this page on ChinaGeeks), and if you’re able, please consider helping this film get made with a donation.

You can follow Charlie on Twitter.

Let’s make a deal

Simply put, gift recycling is the selling of presents by recipients who neither want nor need them. The majority of such exchanges take place inside the countless cigarette and liquor stores found along any Chinese city street. Indeed, high-end cigarette brands such as Chunghwa and Panda, along with the famous baijiu labels Moutai and Wuliangye, are among the items most frequently brought in by customers and bought by store owners. But many recyclers accept a wide range of gifts. More exotic presents such as birds’ nests, shark fins and sea cucumbers are also typically welcome.

There are limits, though, to what recyclers are willing to trade. One Guangzhou store owner declared that he refused to buy back Double Happiness brand cigarettes – a favorite gift at weddings – because they don’t fetch a high enough price.

A customer with unwanted gifts to sell can frequently get a decent price for their goods, but naturally any deal favors the recycler on the other side of the counter. An investigative report conducted in February by a local newspaper in Jiangxu found that on average, cigarettes are bought for twenty to thirty percent less than the usual market price. Liquor, on the other hand, is typically bought for as little as half the market price. Purchased goods are then resold at or slightly less than full price. A similar survey in Henan found local customers getting a far worse deal, being offered an average of seventy percent less than the store price.

While most shop owners are willing to bargain, one long-time recycler in Zhengzhou told a local reporter that the sellers usually just aren’t interested. “Some people who come in, they’re not poor, and they don’t really care. If I give them a low price, as long as they see there’s money to be made, they’re ok.”

“People like this are becoming more and more common,” he added.

Open for one week, eat for a year

Even with a customer willing to bargain, a single exchange will almost always bring the recycler a bigger profit than an ordinary sale. But it is the volume of such transactions which makes gift recycling such a lucrative business.

Almost all of the recycling that takes place in a given year centers around two holidays: the Spring Festival at the start of the new year, and the Mid-Autumn Festival in September. One recycler in Jiangsu boasted that in the week following the Spring Festival he could make enough to see him through the end of the year.

Typical estimates put the average gift recycler’s profits for a single holiday in the hundreds of thousands of yuan, or tens of thousands of US dollars. Such numbers far exceed the country’s per capita income of 4,260 USD, according to the World Bank.

A rapidly transforming business

While cigarettes and liquor have traditionally been the mainstay of the business, in some cities they are quickly being overtaken by a popular new gift item. A gift recycler in Zhengzhou told the Henan Legal News that since 2009, her business has primarily dealt in gift cards. Another Zhengzhou recycler explained the process: a card worth 200 RMB might be purchased by the recycler for 178, and then resold for 189 RMB.

But the market for second-hand gift cards is relatively small. Most individual gift recyclers resell the cards to larger outfits, who in turn resell them in bulk to the store which originally issued the cards. Occasionally, recyclers simply use the cards themselves, buying still more liquor and cigarettes to sell in their own stores.

In recent years, gift recycling has expanded beyond its brick-and-mortar beginnings and established a rapidly-growing presence on the internet. A search for “recycle gifts” on Baidu brings up over thirty million results. The growth of online gift recycling can be explained, not surprisingly, as an issue of convenience.

“A lot of customers don’t particularly enjoy taking their gifts to the actual store to sell them,” one recycler explained to Guangzhou’s Southern Daily newspaper. “Trading on a website is more convenient.” After a transaction is completed online, the two sides schedule a time for pick-up at the seller’s home or another place of their choosing.

Hidden costs

But gift recycling can be a risky business, for both customers and store owners. As an off-the-books, underground enterprise, gift recycling is often linked to organized crime, particularly the flourishing trade in counterfeit goods. According to Chinese law, gift recycling itself is an illegal activity, as it involves businesses engaging in activities not authorized by their state-issued licenses.

But one official with China’s State Administration for Industry and Commerce told the Henan Legal News that prosecuting the trade is all but impossible. “If questioned, shop owners will insist that the gifts they buy back are simply for their own personal use, not for reselling,” he said. The widespread lack of any bookkeeping further means that the physical evidence required to bring charges against recyclers is almost impossible to find.

Not only is the practice difficult to prosecute, but officials have little incentive to do so.  Indeed, many of the most frequent and large-scale patrons of gift recycling businesses are government employees eager to unload the cartons of cigarettes and bottles of baijiu presented to them by ambitious underlings.

And so one of the most frequent ways that experts and cadres describe gift recycling is to simply call it a “gray area.”  Indeed, with such a name it joins a long list of other activities that make up a crucial part of China’s economy.  And as such, it is likely to remain a regular presence in Chinese society for years to come.

Maybe this is only true for me, but when I first arrived in China I was fascinated with everything. I sucked it all in like a sponge. Every discarded baijiu bottle, weathered shoe repair person, steamy baozi vendor… it was all so noticeable. But after a time these things, and the millions of others of still frames that blur together to form a tapestry of modern China, began to blend into the background as I just got on with living. I shifted from being a curious tourist to a preoccupied resident.

Which is why I’m grateful for having caught Last Train Home, a documentary by Chinese-Canadian filmmaker Fan Lixin, as it re-humanized the mass of strangers just off the edge of my doorstep.

Over the course of several years, the documentary follows a family led by migrant working parents, chronicling the myriad of challenges they face. Far from their small rural town in Sichuan, the parents have worked in in Guangzhou factories for nearly two decades. The couple’s two children have been raised by the children’s grandmother, only seeing their parents once a year at Spring Festival.

The film takes its name from the chaotic 1,000+ km convoluted and crowded journey home that the parents make each year for the Chinese New Year, getting quite literal at points when the parents very nearly aren’t able to find tickets at China’s busiest time of year.

Last Train Home Trailer

On Youku too.

One of the central points of the story is the conflict between the parents and their oldest child, a daughter of 16 or 17. They want her to appreciate how hard they have worked for her to have a better life. Against their wishes she ditches school for the allure of making her own money and living her own life.

And it’s in that where I find the most common ground with the subjects of the film. The story is used as an example of how the hardships of the parents have torn apart the family and led the girl astray. The documentary does a good job of framing it in typical “traditional Chinese” terms, with the girl portrayed as foolish, ungrateful and unfilial. However, what struck me was how incredibly normal the behavior seemed. It was exactly what you would expect from a teenager. Pushed a little far, perhaps, but on par with the climate she was living in.

At times bone-cuttingly honest, Last Train Home is a unique opportunity for outsiders to get a glimpse of the hardships and tough decisions many, if not most, Chinese face. With so many headlines about China’s accession into development and prosperity, this film does well to remind on whose backs the country is rising.

But more than that, I felt it did an effective job of nailing one more plank on the bridge between “us” and “them.” Despite the disparate level of adversity between their lives and mine, despite all the culture differences we’re subtly taught differentiate us to the point of no recognition, I saw myself in these people. I saw the daughter’s actions in my past and the parents’ dilemmas in my present and future.

In October of 2010, I was invited to take a welcome break from my life on the hamster wheel that is Shanghai, and visit Jinhua’s famous Taoist temple and caves. I was very excited by this invitation, partly because of my interest in Taoism and its place in Chinese culture, and partly because I had been invited by my new friend Kathy; a US-educated professor of Biochemistry, Taoist, and my guide to the considerable development of Taoist activity in and around Jinhua.

Meeting a dream butterfly

“This is Meng Die,” my friend Kathy told me. Meng Die was a slight woman in her thirties, dressed in the simple robes of a daoist acolyte. She had a ready smile, and a strong Beijing lilt that to me sounded out of place on this secluded bamboo-clad mountainside in Zhejiang province.

Over the best tea I have ever tasted (Da Hong Pao, no less!), we learned that Meng Die had been a Taoist for many years, and a disciple of the renowned Master Wang Liping. Until last month, she had been working as a yoga teacher in Beijing, when she made the decision to leave it all behind, and move to a small cottage in the mountains of Jinhua to cultivate herself full-time. Now she spends her days reading Taoist books, meditating, guiding tourists, and teaching ‘Taoism classes’ once a week in the town at the bottom of the mountain.

From left to right: the author, Kathy, and Meng Die

Meng Die is not her birth name. It means ‘Dream Butterfly’, and she chose it because the famous Taoist philosopher Zhuangzi (circa 400 BC) once had a dream in which he turned into a butterfly. When he awoke he was unsure if he had been dreaming he was a butterfly, or whether he was a butterfly who had been dreaming it was Zhuangzi.

Meditation in caves

A three minute walk from Meng Die’s little abode was a cave entrance. The sign read ‘Chao Zhen Dong’ – Towards the Truth Cave. I was told that Taoists had been using the cave for thousands of years to meditate and cultivate themselves in seclusion. Apparently Taoists choose these isolated mountain locations very carefully, as the geographical location has an impact on the result of the meditation. I asked why, and my (Taoist) guide said that Taoist alchemy, or transformative self-cultivation, works in accordance with the energy meridians of the body, that are so important in TCM.

But energy meridians are not merely confined to human bodies, say the Taoists. The Earth itself has locations which are on energy meridians, and these are the best places to practice Taoist alchemy. All the self-cultivation in the world will not yield the maximum results unless you are in the right spot. Old pre-Christian belief systems in my native Britain also refer to ‘Ley Lines’ – energy meridians which are found in certain locations, and had mystic significance attached to them.

Once inside the cave, it stretched back almost a hundred meters. There were little narrow channels which could be squeezed through to get to other chambers, and a substantial population of bats, whom we smelled first, and then saw hanging upside down from the ceiling in one of the higher vaulted chambers.

Which cave contains frogs, ham, immortal curtains, and the largest cave waterfall in China?

Our next stop was the big sister of Towards the Truth Cave. Shuang Long Dong, or Double Dragon Cave, is the main attraction for tourists here. It is much larger, and more glam too, having coloured neon lights at strategic points to highlight some of the formations caused by thousands of years of mineral-saturated water dripping down through the roof of the cave. They were worth highlighting too, as the shapes they make are varied and bizarre, and have been named accordingly, such as The Frog Who Steals Heavenly Grass (naughty frog!), The Ham, and The Immortals Curtain.

We continued into the cool, dripping interior of the cave towards the sound of pounding water. The final chamber, which is called Ice Pot Cave, contains a raucous waterfall that gushes out of the rock at the top of the chamber and falls 26 metres down into a natural underground pool. This is the largest cave waterfall in China.

Priest Yu and his project

From the right: Priest Yu, Kathy, Me and Jason.

After leaving the caves, and visiting the nearby Jinhua Taoist Temple, we drove down the mountain, until we pulled up outside a small temple nestled in front of some modern single-storey housing in a pleasant rural setting. Dogs ran out to greet our car, followed by an old man in Taoist robes, and his long hair piled up in a bun, skewered by a long pin.

The old man took us to meet Priest Yu, a young man with a ready smile and a dignity that seemed beyond his years, who seemed to be in charge. If the first temple was small, the one currently under construction made up for it. The skeleton of the building was already in place, consisting of huge timbers –- the largest I have ever seen — joined at right angles. I was told the framework for the temple would be all timber — no steel or concrete.

The timber frame of a new Taoist centre under construction near Jinhua

I asked what the plan was that required such a impressive feat of engineering with timber only. Apparently it will become a Taoist centre to help bring Taoism to the local, and wider, community. Activities, and workshops in meditation, would be made available to residents and visitors, thus bringing Taoism into the lives of non-taoists. Funding for the project was coming largely from donations, which are evidently pretty substantial. It seems the land is being donated by the local government.

The re-emergence of Taoism?

Taoism certainly seems to be experiencing a renaissance in the scope of it’s activities. In Hubei Province, Zhong Yun Long heads up the Wudang Taoist Association which has hundreds of registered priests and nuns, and a college for teaching Taoist arts like Qi Gong, Taiji, and traditional Taoist music. Through tourism, Taoist culture in Wudang Mountain has become one of the main sources of income for the town of Shiyan, Hubei Province.

In Zhejiang, Jinhua Temple is frequented by both tourists, and young Taoists seeking ‘The Way’, as is it’s sister temple in Hong Kong. Based in Shandong Province, Master Wang Liping, author of “Opening The Dragon Gate: The Making of a modern Taoist“, publicly teaches the ‘internal alchemy’ techniques he apparently learned over many years of study under three Taoist hermits. Master Wang’s students are numerous and come from many countries, including: the US, Germany, and Russia.

Both in Jinhua and Wudang, the promotion of Taoist culture is aimed at local and international audiences, is well funded, and has the support of local government. It appears to be engaging people at the  grass roots level, while clearly being in contact with the upper echelons (our guide in Double Dragon Cave was both a Taoist, and a PLA general). Is this more marketing of packaged ‘Ancient Chinese Culture’ a la Shaolin Temple? Or are we seeing a renaissance of Chinas oldest organized belief system, which has in the past exerted enormous influence over both Chinese society and its rulers?

A quick guide to Taoism:

What is Taoism?

As the pre-eminent, and as far as I know only, meta-physical religion to originate in China, Taoism by its nature tends to defy definition in conventional terms. This is made clear in the opening sentence of the Daode Jing, the most influential Taoist text, which says: “Dao can be spoken of, but it is not the constant Dao.”

Accepting the short-comings of any definition I might offer, I will venture to say that Taoism is a belief system that directs its followers to seek an understanding of their place in the harmony of nature. It advocates a path of self cultivation and transformation to a higher state of understanding.

The development of Taoism in ancient China

The Daode Jing was written around the 4^th century BC, at a time when there was not any formal Taoist organization or institutions, as far as is known. It wasn’t until the 2^nd century AD that Zhang Daoling established ‘The Way of The Celestial Masters’ – a lineage of Taoist teachings and practice which Taoist priests today claim as their heritage.

From the 2^nd to the 7^th centuries AD, Taoist rituals and literature developed and became known as an institutionalized belief system, which exerted considerable influence. The high political profile of Taoism in this period meant it held precedence over Buddhism, which had been brought to China by missionaries from India and Tibet; although Buddhist ideas and practices were absorbed into Taoism.

During this period royal advisors would often be respected Taoist adepts, and government ministers were known to retire into contemplative seclusion in Taoist monasteries. According to legend, one such seeker of ‘Dao’, or ‘The Way’ was Xuan Wu, a prince, who retreated to the holy Wudang Mountains in Hubei Province. After 42 years of self-cultivation he became an ‘immortal’, and today is one of the principle deities in Taoist lore, also known as Zhenwu Da Di (True Warrior Grand Emperor).

Around 600 years ago, after claiming Zhenwu’s help in winning out over his rivals to ascend the throne, the third Ming Emperor Zhu Li actively encouraged recognition and development of Taoism in his Kingdom. The magnificent and unique temples and architecture at Wudang Mountain perhaps best represent Zhu Li’s efforts.

Taoism in the modern era

The period 1949 to 1980 was not kind to the institutions of Taoism that had developed over the millennia. The overt practice of Taoism was banned outright, and many temples were destroyed. However, in 1980 Taoism ceased to be an illegal practice, and since then Taoists in and outside of China have been working to re-establish their traditions.

“And American love isn’t?” Nick said.

“Western love,” Walter said, “is not real love. Not in the Chinese sense. It’s not. Their love is deeper, truer.”

“Yeah,” Nick said, “I can see what you mean.”

He could too. One night at dinner he had casually remarked that he had worn holes in a pair of socks. The next day his girlfriend brought him a new pair. And he hadn’t remembered mentioning it until she handed him the box.

Nick had been with his girlfriend for five months now going on six. Already talk of marriage. Already she had taken him to her hometown, which just about fitted his finger for a ring. He did love her, he did, but marriage? Marriage was a large step. At least, it ought to be.

“It’s quite a bit to learn,” Walter said.

Walter also had a Chinese girlfriend, had been with her for as long as Nick had been with his. Except while Nick and his girlfriend were only two years apart, Walter and his were thirty-seven. Or thirty-five, depending on what age Walter felt like giving you that day.

Nick knew Walter had taught his girlfriend in freshman English, and that he no longer taught freshman English. Past that…Nick preferred not to think about it. Leave that to the other teachers. Nick preferred not to judge, as he would hate for anyone to judge his relationship. Love was love, and if they were happy, then what of it? So despite the usual warning bells, Nick kept his feelings in check.

“I’m far behind on how to love,” Walter said.

“Well you’d think with three marriages under your belt, you’d have picked up something.”

“I did. High blood pressure, a couple heart attacks.” He laughed, crushing his cigarette and lighting another. “I am behind though.”

Nick took a cigarette from the pack, lit it. “In what way?”

“Well just here the other day see, she was out on her way to my apartment and she texted me,” he lifted his phone and shook it, “and said it was hot out. Well me, I just sent her a message saying okay, see you soon. Now, do you know what her response was?”

Nick shook his head.

“Asshole.”

Nick blinked.

“Yes, that’s right. She called me an asshole, then she turned around and went back to her dormitory.”

Nick blinked again. “Why?”

“Because I am an asshole,” Walter said. “I did not offer her any water.”

“But…she was outside.”

He shook his head, gently, and said, “If I cared, I would have offered her water, see, she said she was hot, which means she was thirsty, and if I truly cared, I would have offered her some water.”

Ash fell from Nick’s cigarette onto his pantleg.

“Do you see?”

“Yes,” he said. Slowly. “Yeah. I do.”

“Right, now, here’s another thing that happened. She came over here the other night to…” His eyes shifted around. “To do her homework, right?”

It took Nick several seconds to realize Walter was looking for confirmation.

“Right,” Nick said.

“Right, and she got comfortable over there on the bed while I made myself a coffee. I sat down with my coffee, and she folded her arms. I asked her what was wrong, but she didn’t speak. She did not say one word to me for the rest of the night.”

“Why?”

“Because if I cared, I would have fixed her a coffee.”

“Yeah, but she didn’t ask for one.”

“It doesn’t matter. If I truly loved her, I would have just made her a coffee. No asking needed. It’s Chinese love.

“It’s like, ‘hey you stupid asshole, where’s my fucking coffee?’,” Walter went on, looking truly horrified. “And the thing is, she’s right. If I were not such an uncaring asshole, I would have fixed her a coffee.”

Nick stubbed out his cigarette.

“It’s a fantastic way of doing things,” Walter said. “With a Chinese girl, you must always prove that you love her. Whatever I do is good for one time, one time only. Next time, I have to prove that I love her all over again.” He lit another cigarette. “Yes, it’s absolutely fantastic.”

Nick soon left. And later on, he thought about Walter’s words and wondered what type of life that was to lead, to have to always prove your love. But he reminded himself that it was not his place to judge. Leave that to the other teachers. If they were happy, then good. After all, he did not want people judging his relationship.

But seeing Walter’s horrified face, he had to admit that sometimes, sometimes, it was just so hard to keep your feelings in check.

That is to say, I’m quite open to the concept of a man with a purse-like device. Being “practical” is manly, even in heels and a dress. But upon moving to China, I noticed that the men of the Middle Kingdom take things to a whole new level. There were some ground-rules to murse-wearing in the West: it shouldn’t be fancy; if it wasn’t on your back, most of it should rest below your hips; think more Indy than Cindy; and the width of its strap was inversely proportional to its level of femininity.

Chinese men seemed, by comparison, to have quite literally “clutched” on to metrosexualism in a more drastic way. Seeing men walking around with designer purses that looked perfectly suited to carry a tampon and a compact just seemed bizarre.

But then I’ve never been much for status or fashion — my work uniform is a frayed 12-year-old hoodie and a cheap pair of bargain jeans.

According to an article just published in the LA Times, Chinese men represent a whopping 45% of the designer handbag market — a figure that sits around 7% in the US (and no doubt much less among my hocky-lovin’ hoser kin to the north).

At business meetings and social events across China these days, many of the Prada, Louis Vuitton and Burberry bags are being toted by the fellows in the crowd.

Wang Zhongzhu, a 42-year-old insurance executive, wouldn’t dream of networking without his $1,000 leather Dunhill slung over his shoulder. He said the creamy brown mini-messenger bag sends a message that he appreciates — and can afford — fine accessories.

“It’s a way of representing where you stand,” Wang said. “It makes people think you could potentially work for a big company.”

Designed for men, many of these guy purses often known as shou bao in Mandarin would be right at home in the women’s handbag section of an upscale department store. Popular styles include the oversize wallet with wraparound zippers like Zhang’s and the embossed leather Coach handbag with the slinky shoulder strap and handles. Colors trend toward solid brown, black and gray. But some fashion-forward gents don’t mind showing a little flash: Burberry plaid, Gucci’s interlocking GG pattern or Louis Vuitton’s distinct LV monogram.

Luxury leather goods makers can’t believe their luck: Both sexes in the world’s most populous country adore purses.

Men represent 45% of the $1.2-billion market for all luxury handbags in China, according to Victor Luis, president of Coach Retail International. That figure is just 7% in the U.S.

I’ve oft joked that China would be a great place to open up an umbrella company, as rain-or-shine your product sells; perhaps I should have been looking at what was in the other hand.

She led me off the bus and behind the wall. Two men sat playing cards, smoking, their puffs fast and panicky like a beached steamboat. They were sitting in the light and she took me past it, past the horns and hammers, the high rise apartments, the bars and hotels and KTVs, away from the engines and shouts and the growing modern age and together we dropped down into this, Hankou’s quiet tributary. A couple was perched on stools as quiet as the dark house they faced and the man cocked an eye at me and as I passed he lowered his eye and continued to watch his house. Contained in there the sum total of his many decades on this earth.

We arrived. A dog came. Clothes hung from a powerline beside stacks of bricks and coal and I reached down and rubbed the dog’s ear as she went on ahead.

The inner door opened and dim light fell out over the dirt, slit through the barred outer door. A man his figure weathered well past his years stepped into view.

They greeted each other.

He unlatched the outer door and at sight of me teeth and black gaps overtook his mouth.

“Jín lái, jín lái.”

He waved us on and clapped me on the shoulder. We stepped inside. A white net hung over the bed. A dresser stood the distance of a child’s hand from the bed and the fridge stood the distance of an infant’s from that and the table on which they had their meals stood not even that from the fridge.

“Zuó, zuó, zuó,” he said. “Qí a me?”

He was addressing me, pretending to shovel food in his mouth.

“Qí le,” she said, but he was already up. The woman already had the watermelon. She slammed it on the table and brought a large blade down through it and then cut it into pieces, the largest and first for me, then their niece, then themselves.

“Qí qí qí,” he said, and we did.

We Qi’d.

*

I drew out the seeds with my tongue and rolled them around near my lips. The man noticed.

And pointed to the floor.

We spat our seeds as they spoke. The language a variant of Pu Tong Hua common to their hometown and common further to them. Clan upon clan forged in dialect. When we finished eating, the man’s arm stretched out over her, over her protests. I took the cigarette and he lit mine first, his second. We smoked. The three of them went on speaking.

Outside, the man put his arm around my shoulder and said something I did not catch. My wife translated. He was apologizing. For what? He was apologizing for his home being dirty.

*

The men at the gate were no longer playing cards but kept on smoking and did not look at us. We crossed the street and walked up on to the bridge. The man hooked his arm with mine and when I sped up, he slowed me down. With each passing vehicle the bridge shook a little, sometimes a lot. We crossed the river and took the stairs back down into Wuchang, where the trams were just now pulling in.

I put one foot out into traffic and the man pulled me back. My wife’s aunt had her arm. Together, we stepped across, pausing for the cars and trucks to weave around us.

We got on the tram and took a seat near the side door and they both came to it and stood there watching us. When the engine started, my wife and her aunt and uncle exchanged goodbyes and when her uncle turned to me, he raised his hand and I raised mine.

“Bai bai!” he shouted with a smile.

I returned it and waved and as we pulled out, I turned back and waved again. I settled in my seat, the window open. People got on the bus. The buildings were growing taller. Lights flashed for hotels, for bars, for restaurants, and I leaned my head near the window, his words faded as a horn sounded, echoed, filled my ears and the background well they share and a bus pulled out in front of us, choking up black smoke as it went.