It appeared for a while that the Chinese, and more relevantly, the Chinese government, were weighing these autonomous events with more mass than they actually contained, and it threatened to hurt the community as a whole. But with the heat somewhat cooled from last year’s flame-up of angry nationalism towards us laowai, I think it’s probably important (or at least entertaining) to again start reminding foreigners that you are always being filmed, and if you lose it in public, you will get 400,000 views on Youku in the course of a day.

As is the case with a video Beijng Cream came across yesterday of a foreigner losing his shit on a bus driver in Chengdu. According to comments on the post, the guy is intermittently speaking English, Chinese and Croatian; and not in the friendliest terms.

It appears his anger stems from the bus driver not waiting for him, and in forcing him to run after the bus, either splashed him or caused him to splash in a puddle, getting his jeans in a mess and panties in a bunch.

And with that, we add “bus” to the list of troublesome methods of transport for the laowai to lose his cool (why is it never “her” cool?), along with trains (twice), cars, and just walkin’.

Stay classy my foreign friends, and maybe take a taxi.

The original Youku video seems to have been removed. If anyone knows of an in-China link to the video for any without VPN, please share in the comments.

The post Foreigner loses it on a Chengdu bus driver appeared first on Lost Laowai.

Sinica’s Jeremy Goldkorn and Kaiser Kuo in the studio

The Sinica Podcast just celebrated its 3rd anniversary in April. Can you take us back and explain how it came into being?

Kaiser: It started with a casual conversation between Jeremy and me in the spring of 2010 about how there weren’t many good China-related podcasts. I can’t find the time to blog regularly, but at the same time, I felt a need to participate in the conversation about China, and a podcast seemed like a good way to go about it.

Only a couple of weeks elapsed between the moment we said, “You know, we should just do a podcast on China” and the recording of the first podcast. We already had the name: Jeremy and I had worked together years and years ago on an embarrassingly abortive project called Sinica, and though we’d allowed the domain name to lapse, at least we still had the logo! The idea was pretty simple: We were going to invite on reporters, academics, writers, subject-area experts and other China-watching types to chat about the issues of the day. I shamelessly borrowed format ideas from some of my favorite podcasts, most notably (and most shamelessly) Slate’s Culture Gabfest.

Jeremy: The show was Kaiser’s idea, and it was my idea to hook up with Popup Chinese, which gave us a good platform, a studio, an engineer, and an initial audience. I love all forms of media: although I started my career as an ink-stained wretch of a print publisher and editor and went on to work on Internet publications, I’ve dabbled in movies, TV and radio too. Podcasting is a wonderful medium: it’s low cost, relatively easy to produce, and there is a superb delivery system.

I think Kaiser started calling me co-host after about half a year of doing the show.

How has the show changed over the past three years? What’s improved?

Jeremy: We have become a little more professional over the years, and realized that the better we prepare for the show, the better it will turn out to be (doh!). In the last six months we have been doing a lot more shows on topics that are not tied to the news of the moment.

Kaiser: We wanted to keep it pretty casual—to give listeners the sense they were just dropping in on a conversation like many of the conversations people have every evening here in Beijing over beers. That’s still the idea. We decided at some point early on that once in a while we’d also tackle topics that weren’t just the week’s news. We tend to do that more and more of late. We’ve tried a couple of things that haven’t worked out well and dropped most of them except the inclusion of a “recommendations” section at the end, which we introduced pretty early on and kept. So basically the format hasn’t changed much at all from what it was when we started.

Can you tell us more about the show’s connection to Popup Chinese?

Kaiser: None of this would have happened without David Lancashire and Popup Chinese, which is a terrific language-learning system that relies heavily on the podcast medium. Jeremy had the brilliant idea of reaching out to Dave and seeing whether we could simply use their recording facilities, and once we started talking, we realized it was an ideal marriage: Our show would potentially bring in customers for Popup Chinese, and their existing subscribers would presumably be interested in China, since they’re going to the trouble of learning the Chinese language.

Dave and company would let us come in once a week to their oh-so-glamorous studios to record—hey, at least the microphones are good quality and there’s foam on the walls—and they’d not only produce the podcast and cover our bandwidth costs, but also, and most importantly of all, keep a refrigerator stocked with beer.

With so many podcasts hosting a wide range of guests and topics, is there an episode or episodes in particular that you favour or are most proud of?

Latest Sinica Podcast: An Evening With Bill Bishop

Kaiser: Yes, there are definitely a few that I really enjoyed and that I thought were up there among the best we’ve done. Just from memory, the shows we did with Geremie Barme (not the live one from the Capital Literary Festival, but the one in the studio); the one with Victor Mair on topics like the Xinjiang mummies and pinyin; the show with Pankaj Mishra about his latest book, “From the Ruins of Empire”; the show we did on Manchus with Jeremiah Jenne; and (this is probably my favorite) the live show we did called “The Soul of Beijing,” with David Moser and Zha Jianying. I guess I also quite enjoyed the two “Call-In” shows that we did, where we took listener questions. Both of those, one with Jeremiah and one with Gady Epstein, were both a lot of fun.

Jeremy: Kaiser’s mentioned some of our best shows already. Off the top of my head and just thinking about the last few months, I’d also add the show we did on Apple’s troubles in China with David Wolf and Laurie Burkitt, and I really enjoyed doing the recent show with Bill Bishop. But what I am most proud of is that we have managed to keep it going for all this time, despite the fact that both of us have very busy jobs and kids.

The show consistently manages to attract some very high-calibre intelligent guests. Do you have dirt on these people? How do you get so many great people to take part in the show?

Jeremy: Beijing has a lot of high calibre residents, and many interesting people who pass through. There are not many spaces for such people to discuss Chinese matters without having to really dumb everything down – I think that’s a reason guests enjoy being on our show.

Kaiser and Jeremy post-show, Photo by Tricia Wang.

Kaiser: Both Jeremy and I have lived in Beijing for an awfully long time, and over the years we’ve made lots of friends and accumulated lots of contacts. I’ve always enjoyed the company of reporters, academics, NGO types and China bloggers—the kind of guests who we typically have on. Jeremy of course has run Danwei now for a decade, and is quite well-known (and surprisingly well-liked!) among those same types of folks. I think once we got the ball rolling and once people realized that we were doing a pretty serious job of producing an informative and entertaining podcast, we were able to get some good speakers.

It’s a good chance for reporters to talk about stories that they’ve just published, and I think listeners are keen to hear about the reporting process, and about what reportage was edited for length and ended up on the cutting room floor. There’s a nice symbiosis with authors promoting new titles, as well. We make sure it’s fun, too. Half the time we end up chatting for a long time after we’ve wrapped the recording, and we’ll often all go to dinner at a terrific restaurant, Dongsi Minfang, right near the studio after the recording.

You guys have covered a lot of ground on the show, is there more to cover? What is the future of the Sinica Podcast?

Jeremy: Hell yeah. China remains huge, fascinating, and enthralling. There is no end to the subjects we could cover that we have not touched on, and we can always talk about current affairs as the news does not stop. At the moment we have no plans to change the show, get funding or further professionalize it.

Kaiser: We still have a whole ton of topics in the hopper. As Jeremy says, China keeps on serving them up, with current news stories. And our listeners and our friends keep adding wonderful suggestions. Just the other night over beers with Alice Xin Liu from Pathlight, we were talking about an episode on the “golden age” of Chinese television shows. Yes, there used to be good ones: 编辑部的故事 and 北京人在纽约 were the two we were going to focus on. I’m really eager to do one exploring generational differences in a serious way. I dearly want to revisit China & Africa. I want to do one on the state of China’s oil economy both domestically and abroad. And many more on environmental topics: Coal and water. I’d also like to take the show on the road and do some shows from Shanghai, from the Pearl River Delta, from Chongqing maybe.

More Info

Kaiser Kuo
Kaiser currently works as director for international communications for Chinese search engine Baidu. He was previously a technology correspondent for Red Herring magazine, and also worked as director of digital strategy, China, for Ogilvy & Mather in Beijing. For 10 years he also wrote the column “Ich bin ein Beijinger” for the The Beijinger. A former member of Chinese rock ensemble Tang Dynasty, his current band Spring and Autumn (Chunqiu) will be hitting venues this summer. Follow him on Twitter.

Jeremy Goldkorn
Jeremy has worked for several Beijing-based magazines, including Beijing Scene, TimeOut and technology magazine ReDegg; but is best known as the founder of Danwei, a prolific blog cum Chinese media/Internet research and analysis firm which was recently acquired by the Financial Times. He has frequently spoken about Chinese media and Internet culture; including at the University of Sydney and Columbia Law School, and in interviews with Frontline, the Australia Network, and the Asia Society. Follow him on Twitter.

Be sure to check out the Sinica Podcast (RSS/Twitter/Facebook), and keep an eye out for more Things Done Well.

The post Things Done Well: Sinica Podcast appeared first on Lost Laowai.

Begin watching in the top right of the screen.

I remember when I first purchased an e-bike 5 years or so ago, it had been a while since I’d been on any sort of bike, let alone a motorized one. There really is a certain amount of trial by fire when buying a bike in China, with most bike shops deep in urban centres; hell, most of China is an urban centre. So I do sympathize with this fellow to an extent … like for the first bump into a car. After that, why didn’t he just get off and walk it across the intersection?

And for those without a VPN (thx Seraph):

The post Video: Epic Chinese scooter driving fail appeared first on Lost Laowai.

Seeking Asian Female director Debbie Lam with her subjects Sandy and Steven.

I suppose the thing that gets my back up is the hinted presumption that all white people with Asian partners are somehow suffering from a fetish. Of course this is as silly as the spouses of all well-endowed people having a big bits fetish, or all those with red-headed lovers having a twinge for the ginge. But only a few minutes into the film you’re left with little doubt that the film’s focus, Steven, is suffering from a quick-get-him-in-a-bath-of-ice fever.

The documentary introduces Steven with a voice over from Lam explaining how the genesis for the film came from the constant leering of men, like her subject, that have caught the Asian contagion and constantly hit on her because of her race. Steven helps this along by leering and hitting on her — and then awkwardly taking a wall-covering amount of photos of Lam filming him.

Twice divorced, the 60-year-old parking attendant first started looking east (as he lives in a San Francisco suburb, I guess technically it’s west) after his son married an Asian woman. Steven has had several Asian girlfriends, but his preference is for the Chinese. “China is just amazing right now. The vitality, the growth; there seems to be an endless supply of women over there,” he tells the camera with a chuckle, “… they’re all just so beautiful.”

After exploring Steven’s comprehensive collection of mail order bride penpal books, and his shelves adorned with pictures of various women of the Asian persuasion; the documentary begins to follow his relationship with Sandy, a Chinese woman from Shenzhen who is about half his age.

The age difference between the two is not all that deeply explored in the film, which is a shame, as it certainly plays a huge part in the stereotype here in China. To say seeing an old white guy with a young Chinese in tow is commonplace would be an understatement. In expat communities across China, I doubt there is any greater stigma.

Seeking Asian Female’s Steven and Sandy

We travel with Steven and Sandy as they traverse money problems, jealousy and a litany of cultural differences. We watch as Sandy’s wide-eyed excitement of being in America begins to fade and turn to apprehension, confusion and frustration. Through it all though she comes off as confident and pragmatic. Despite the documentary’s premise and setup, never do you feel that either Steven or Sandy are victims of any sort, and I think that’s the biggest take away from the film. They’re sometimes bumbling and sometimes flawed, but we all are, and while Steven’s initial weirdness is creepy, his relationship with Sandy is as normal as any other modern relationship.

For me, it strengthened my belief that relationships come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. The moment we judge or criticize, and I’ve done both, presumed motivations (“He’s just in it to have a cute young thing on his arm.” / “She’s just in it for the money/Green Card.”) we admit our own ignorance towards why we do the things we do. Ultimately, Steven and Sandy may have a less than conventional relationship than some, but I was left feeling that despite their differences and the challenges unique to their relationship, they certainly didn’t seem any better or worse off than the rest of us.

“Seeking Asian Female” aired on PBS on May 6th. It can be viewed online (in some areas) here. If you’re in China, and unable to watch through PBS, or purchase the DVD, the film is circling the torrent sites as well.

Additionally, there’s a 5-part Web series related to the documentary called “They’re All So Beautiful” available on Youtube.

The post A look at yellow fever documentary ‘Seeking Asian Female’ appeared first on Lost Laowai.

The list, sent to the group anonymously and entirely in Chinese, “contains the names of 796 teachers of which 673 are foreigners. 82% of the foreign teachers listed working in the Beijing and Shanghai Provinces [sic] with the balance scattered throughout China.” The list breaks the teachers into a number of different categories, including the following (along with the number of teachers who made the infraction):

• TARDINESS 189
• DISAPPEAR (Midnight Runs) 167
• DRINKING PROBLEMS 59
• SEXUAL ADVANCES 17
• TROUBLE MAKER 213
• BAD TEACHING 119
• GOVT. COMPLAINTS 34

The anonymous admin of the CFTU site explained:

Perhaps this list is justified considering that many “English teachers” working in China today never taught any subject before arriving in China and most of us would not want to hire anyone who constantly comes to work late or hung-over. Our only concern is who qualifies as a “Trouble Maker” and we will investigate and report further is we are able to find out. We are grateful to the donor of this document who also indicated that SAFEA officials have access to this list and may use it to disqualify visa or FEC renewal requests. Again, we have no proof of this last comment, but it makes sense that it is a possibility considering that most of the blacklisted teachers are no longer in China, and we may assume that their visas many not have been renewed – or the teachers simply decided to return home. Fortunately only 7 current CFTU members were listed, and 6 of them have filed formal complaints with the Ministry of Education, SAFEA, Ministry of Justice, and/or their embassies.

The CFTU is offering to let ESL teachers know if they are on the list by sending an e-mail to TBLC@ChinaForeignTeachersUnion.org, adding that they have confirmed “that 18 of the old China Teachers Alliance are on it as well as 3 directors from the CFTU even though two them left China in 2011. So it appears that nobody is really maintaining the list, just adding to it.”

NOTE/UPDATE: Before e-mailing the above, it is worth reviewing this comment and the link attached to it. Allegations have been made that this may itself be a scam.

The post Are you on the China ESL teacher blacklist? appeared first on Lost Laowai.

I found out I was pregnant while on May Day vacation with my (Chinese) boyfriend in Beijing. I live and study in a small town in northern Shaanxi province, a tiny city where practically everyone knows me and my boyfriend, so in Beijing at least we could go to buy a pregnancy test at Watson’s without risking seeing someone we knew.

We did the test back at our hotel and it was positive.

Our time in Beijing was running out and I accepted the fact that we’d have to wait to go back to our small, 4th tier city and get it done there.

We came back on a Friday night, and set out for the hospital the next morning. For those who are wondering about the specific hospital I went to, it was 榆林第一医院 in 榆林 city of Shaanxi province, and I highly reccomend it. Very modern, clean and (somewhat) professional.

The first order of business was to check-in (挂号). We filled out a simple paper with my name, sex, age; and handed it to the clerk. She formatted and gave us a special card (it looks like a credit card with a bar code)  that electronically tracks the procedures you do and the prescriptions you get. That was kinda cool. The check-in procedure was simple and any expat with basic Chinese skills can do it alone. The card and check-in cost 10 yuan.

Next we went upstairs and found the women’s health-OB/GYN area (妇产科). It’s important to note at this particular hospital, there’s a 2 hour period in the middle of the day where the doctors are off work. So the day is divided into two parts, morning and afternoon. I suggest checking out the hospitals hours or calling beforehand to find out when you can see a doctor, because waiting in the OB/GYN area for so long was a little awkward, especially when all the Chinese people around are asking you questions/trying to talk to you/find out why you’re there.

When all the doctors got back from lunch, we had to go into a small office where there were two doctors with computers. They’re the ladies you go see and tell what you’re there for and what you need. We told them I hadn’t had my period in a long time, and they asked for specific dates and if I had any symptoms of pregnancy. After that, they typed up some things on the computer, scanned our card, and printed out a slip/form (单子) for an ultrasound. Before doing each procedure or test, you have to pay. So we paid downstairs, got a receipt, and took the receipt back upstairs to the ultrasound department.

I’m not sure why they do ultrasounds to check for pregnancy rather than a typical pee test, but this way you can actually see the results instantly and it’s kind of cool to watch the screen and see your insides. This is called a B超 or 超声.

I waited my turn and went into the room. They had me unbutton my pants a tiny bit, squirted on some gel, and did the test. Just FYI, they have to press really hard to get a picture and it was a little uncomfortable, but it doesn’t really hurt. On the screen they highlighted a part, which I suppose is the fetus, and confirmed I was pregnant. Then they printed out a page with two pictures of the results. The ultrasound cost around 60 yuan.

After that, we had to report back to that little office from before. When we showed them the results and confirmed we wanted to terminate the pregnancy, they sent us off for more tests. Next up was an ECG (heart test) which they call 心电图. Like before, we got a slip that we took downstairs to pay with and then headed up to the testing room. I think you can see by now that there’s a lot of running around in this process. The whole shebang takes an entire afternoon, so plan accordingly.

The ECG is my least favorite because you have to (partially) take off your shirt, bra, and expose your legs. I had forgotten to shave my legs that day so that was embarrassing  but quite frankly the least of my problems at the time. It was a simple test that took less than 2 minutes and cost about 40 yuan. It’s the same ECG test you probably got after applying for a job/to a university.

We ran back to the office and got another slip for the next test–a blood test. This cost about 65 yuan and was simple, the results only took 3 minutes to get. It’s just a standard blood drawing procedure. I noticed the lady who drew my blood wasn’t wearing gloves though, and had my boyfriend mention that to her. She looked embarrassed and sheepishly said, “Um… it’s just easier to do without gloves.” Um, okay.

So by this point we had done an ultrasound, ECG, and blood test. The final test was the worst part–the internal exam. I was led into a room with two gynecological chairs with a curtain between them. At most hospitals in China it’s likely similar, they have to get many people done in a short amount of time, so they do it assembly-line style. My boyfriend couldn’t come into this room with me so I had to communicate with the doctor myself, which really wasn’t a problem. She gave me a little blue sheet, told me to put it on the chair, remove one leg of my pants and underwear then lie on the table.

There are a lot of girls going in, out and around these rooms; but I was still a little shell shocked when I saw another girl (patient) basically walk in and decide to watch me take my pants and underwear off. I stood there looking dumb for a few minutes before the doctor caught on and told her to GTFO. So don’t be surprised if there’s very little privacy while getting your tests and exams done. This is China, after all.

At the same time as me there’s another girl behind the curtain beside me and she’s getting undressed too, but I make it onto the table first so the doctor inspects me first. I should mention now that I have never gotten a gyno exam in my life, so I was feeling really embarrassed and awkward. The doctor tells me not to be nervous and she pulls out a sterile, disposable, plastic speculum from its package.

The attitude and method they use while conducting this exam is similar to how some people feel that ripping off a band-aid as fast and violently as possible will get it over sooner and with less suffering. So she shoved (there was actual shoving going on) the speculum into my vagina, wasted no time turning and then expanding it as fast as possible. Ow. Ow. OW. My eyes widened and I was seconds away from complaining about the pain (I have a somewhat high pain tolerance, but this was pretty bad) and then it was finally over. She pulled out the speculum and said it’s all normal down there. The next step was to, as she put it, “摸一下” where she put two fingers inside me and pressed down onto my abdomen with the other hand. That wasn’t pleasant either but it was leagues better than step 1. She 摸‘d in 3 places, each time asking, “疼不疼?” to which I answered 不疼. Then it was over and I could finally get up and put my pants on.

As I was wrangling with my jeans and boots I could hear her move on to examine the girl next to me, who made a very vocal protest about the pain during her examination. I don’t blame her, it wasn’t fun, but the sounds she made sounded Japanese AV-esque and was really disturbing.

So with the last examination over we could go to the office again and get the final verdict from the two ladies. They looked over all the tests and said I was fit for an abortion.

There are two options: medical abortion (药流) and surgical abortion (人工流产手术, which is abbreviated as 人流). Before you jump on it and immediately choose the medical abortion, like I wanted to, you should consider the facts. The lady told me that overall, the medical abortion only has an 80% effectiveness (not sure if that’s true), sometimes causing incomplete abortions. Also there’s a much longer recovery period and many nasty side effects like vomiting, nausea and excess bleeding.

Also it’s not as if you can just take the medication and go home to abort in peace, the pill comes in two steps. You take pill number 1 first when at home, and then a day or two later have to come back to the hospital and take pill number 2 under the supervision of a doctor, who will watch you bleed out for what can be up to 3 hours. They have to ensure that the fetus is completely aborted so I imagine there’s some inspecting of the stuff coming out of you going on.

It’s not at all as pleasant or non-invasive as it seems at first. So I chose surgical abortion, the cost of which is 1500 yuan. When I made my boyfriend question the lady about anesthesia during the procedure, at first the lady wanted to write me up for a friggin’ epidural. Apparently this option is cheaper than getting full anesthesia (going to sleep) so she figured that’s the one we wanted. But I made a big fuss to my boyfriend about getting a needle in the spine so we got it changed to the full anesthesia. This part is really important. Make sure you’re clear when selecting anesthesia options, because I was still worried even after going home about them accidentally misunderstanding and changing it back to the epidural option, getting an injection in the spine is not something anyone looks forward to.

So the day was over, the appointment was set for Monday (they don’t offer the surgical abortion service on weekends), and I got to go home. They told me to not eat or drink water the morning of the operation.

The morning rolls around and I went to the hospital bright and early. We had to walk around and find the doctor who for some reason wasn’t in his office at the time (the only male doctor in the entire process you will meet is probably going to be the one who does the actual abortion). We found him, talked for a bit, and he wrote up a slip that we used to go pay. After payment we went up to the “abortion theatre.” It was a very nice, clean looking room with lots of equipment and everything was all ready for me. I took off one leg of my pants and underwear and mounted the table. I was surprised that so many doctors (5 or 6) were present for the operation.

I was in the room without my boyfriend, so I chatted with the doctors while they were preparing. They put an IV drip in one hand and a heart monitor on the other. It was the first time they discovered I could actually speak Chinese so we all had a laugh while the female nurses compliment my skin tone and looks. They strapped my legs onto the table, but the straps were soft and very elastic so it didn’t feel confining or horror movie like at all. For some reason, at that point I wasn’t scared or in a bad mood. The doctor put a 氧气 (oxygen) mask over my face and turned on the IV drip with the sleepy stuff in it. My last words to the doctor before completely blacking out were “瞌睡了…”

I woke up feeling very drugged and dazed. There were nurses struggling to put my underwear and pants back on and suddenly my boyfriend came out of nowhere, picked me up, and carried me to a bed on the other side of the room. I was half out of it and decided I wanted to get a pad from my purse and put on, but I soon realized that the doctors had already put a thick wad of tissues into my underwear to catch the blood.

At that point, I felt no pain at all. In fact, it was really alright. I’d even go as far as to say it was nice. If you’ve gotten your wisdom teeth out, just imagine the feeling of waking up all happy and loopy in the dentist’s chair. Not bad at all. Also, my boyfriend informed me that he had only been waiting a little more than seven minutes for the operation to be over. At first I didn’t believe the doctor when he said it’d take less than 15 minutes, but it seriously does go that fast.

A few minutes passed and I could finally stand. Still feeling good. We walk into the hall and found a place for me to sit while my boyfriend went off and got all the prescriptions filled. They gave us two different antibiotics to prevent infection in the uterus and something called “motherwart” in English which supposedly helps “replenish blood.” I’m not sure about the effectiveness of the last one, but the doctors told me to take it, so I’ll do it. After about half an hour I felt pretty sober, so we got a cab and went home.

And that’s it. So here I am now, sitting in my dorm, only a few hours after having had the abortion done and I’m not feeling bad or painful at all. Honestly the experience was not bad, despite being slightly panicked and worried throughout the process. I’ll give some final important notes/tips for those who are considering getting an abortion done here in China.

1. Bring a Chinese friend. Preferably a female friend that you trust. There wasn’t much hard vocabulary I came across except the names of medicines and the description of the operation procedure. But you’re going to want someone to give the doctor clear instructions about your choice of abortion method and the anesthesia option you want.
2. Be aware of the time. The first day, you’ll be doing a lot of tests and going back and forth between floors, paying and then running up to do various tests. For the test day, you’ll need an entire afternoon. For the operation day, you’ll need just a little more than an hour, with the actual procedure being less than 10-15 minutes. Get there early on operation day so you don’t have to wait long.
3. Bring a lot of money. It wasn’t too expensive, but you won’t want to be caught without enough to finish all your tests. The entire two days cost me about 2300 yuan, including the operation, prescriptions, tests and various other fees.
4. The testing is way worse than the actual abortion. Seriously, I promise. The abortion itself is nothing to worry about and you will feel next to no pain at all afterwards. It feels kind of crampy and bloaty, just like a period that’s slightly worse than normal. The testing process, however, was stressful, a little scary, and the internal exam was painful.
5. You can’t have sex for a month afterwards. At least that’s what the doctors said, so I’m sticking to it. Also don’t forget to take your prescriptions.
6. My final piece of advice, get the surgical abortion option. It sounds scary at first, especially with the word “surgical” in front of it, but honest to God it wasn’t a bad experience at all. I would much rather do this option than be all nauseated for days and have to bleed out for hours under the supervision of a doctor. Also the success rate is so much higher this way.

I sincerely hope the retelling of my experience can help another girl who,  like I was, is scared of doing an abortion or similar procedure here in China. I hope someone can find this information valuable and wish you the best of luck.

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published on the China subreddit, /r/China, and appears here with the permission of the author.

The post Expat Advice: Having an abortion in China appeared first on Lost Laowai.

The 10 cities were selected based on their performance in terms of policy and administration, as well as working and living environment for foreigners. Criteria required the cities be prefecture-level or above, and excluded Hong Kong, Macau and any cities in Taiwan.

Below is a quick summary. For the full story, see the People’s Daily article.

#10 – Qingdao, Shandong

Qingdao Pier/Jiaozhou Bay, Qingdao, Shandong. Photo: M. Weitzel | Wikimedia Commons

• Pros: Favorable living environment.
• Cons: Administrative environment, children’s education and level of globalization.

#9 – Xiamen, Fujian

Xiamen. Photo by groucho.

• Pros: Exceptional living environment and favorable entrepreneurial environment.
• Cons: Foreigners’ salaries are lower than expected.

#8 – Tianjin

Tianjin. Photo by qejecit.

• Pros: Health care working environments.
• Cons: Policy environment requires improvement.

#7 – Nanjing, Jiangsu

Nanjing Night. Photo by Let Ideas Compete.

• Pros: Attractive living environment. Promising future work policies and career development opportunities.
• Cons: Unsatisfactory administration due to institutional and procedural issues. Low salary.

#6 – Hangzhou, Zhejiang

Hangzhou’s West Lake. Photo by Ryan McLaughlin

• Pros: Favorable living environment, especially its abundant natural environment. Optimistic outlook for future career development opportunities in the city.
• Cons: Low marks for its working and entrepreneurial environment and salary.

#5 – Kunming, Yunnan

Kunming. Photo by Alan Ye.

• Pros: Good administrative environment, and an attractive living environment.
• Cons: Lacking cohesive policies to attract and hire talent. Healthcare and education could be improved.

#4 – Suzhou, Jiangsu

Shantang Jie, Suzhou. Photo by Ryan McLaughlin

• Pros: Balanced development. Human settlement environment, working and entrepreneurial environment and promotion opportunities.
• Cons: Administrative environment could be improved.

#3 – Shenzhen, Guangdong

Shenzhen’s Meridian Genting Observation Deck. Photo by Richard Yuan.

• Pros: Attractive working environment, and high salaries. High marks in terms of its development plan.
• Living environment was graded unsatisfactory, particularly in regards to health care and children’s education.

#2 – Beijing

Bustling Beijing. Photo by Trey Ratcliff.

• Pros: Outstanding administrative environment, policy environment, health care environment and children’s education.
• Cons: Natural environment of habitat, working environment and traffic.

#1 – Shanghai

The Bund, Shanghai. Photo by Christian Ortiz.

• Pros: international atmosphere and multicultural environment. Health care and children’s education.
• Cons: Administrative and natural environments.

The post Top 10 attractive cities for China expats — 2012 edition appeared first on Lost Laowai.

Kay with Xiao Gou

Over time I, and the team of women I slowly built up, accomplished a lot in our pledge to improve the lives of the little ones, but even though I’d found something meaningful to do, there were times that I was completely disheartened—a battered and bleeding soul. I remember a day when another child I’d been fighting for had died, and when the news reached me, the usual strong armor I wore fell from me, leaving me broken as I sobbed for hours. We’d fought so hard for little Xin Xin and lost–her life cut short because of miles of bureaucratic red tape.

When asked how I got through it all, I can honestly say that it was through a hobby I’d had all my life that I was able to hold back the demons and release the daily pressure cooker of emotions I held.

Writing. It was the through the keystrokes on my keyboard that images I couldn’t speak of came to life again, allowing me to grieve for the precarious truth of institutional life in a third world country. I left China almost five years later, torn between wanting to escape the sad environment I’d immersed myself in and wanting to stay to continue the fight.

Silent Tears – A Journey of Hope in a Chinese Orphanage

Soon after returning home, because of the stability of a salary and significant title, I was sucked right back into the corporate environment. I spent a few years back where I’d started, wasting my life in a job that meant nothing to me. Quickly becoming miserable again, I took a step back and realized that I thought I’d left China with nothing, but the truth was that I left having reinvented myself and my role in society, yet I was squandering that opportunity!

Inspired by the success of my memoir, I once again focused on doing what I loved and began writing more material. I have now authored six Asian-inspired books and am on my third publishing contract, this time for a 3-book deal–a trilogy chronicling the inspiring life of a scavenger in China. The first book in the Tales of the Scavenger’s Daughters will be released in August 2013.

Thankfully, I am no longer forced to navigate the demanding maze of a corporate environment to help support my family. I may not be able to hold those children any longer and look into their dark, trusting eyes as I pledge commitment to them, but I can do the next best thing. I can continue to use my platform as a writer to create fictional but truth-inspired stories to bring awareness to issues that affect women and children in China.

The post The Reinvention of an Expat Trailing Spouse appeared first on Lost Laowai.

Richard Brubaker recently wrote a poignant piece at All Roads Lead to China called “When the Ambulance Doesn’t Come“, in which he talks about the recent heart-breaking story of a 3-year-old British boy in Shanghai who died from injuries sustained when a partition at a restaurant fell on him.

Though the mother and restaurant owner rushed the boy to the nearest hospital, they were told by a security guard that the hospital didn’t have an emergency room. At a second hospital the boy was examined, but the doctors said they didn’t have the necessary equipment or medicine to properly treat him. After waiting for an ambulance to be transferred to a third–better-equipped–hospital, the boy was pronounced dead.

The All Roads piece points out that “fully staffed ERs that are either specialized in child care or able to take children were within 15 minutes” from where they were. It goes on to outline what some of the key hospitals in Shanghai are, and includes a helpful Shanghai medical emergencies map (PDF), but before that he relays some important advice:

… it is important that all parents in Shanghai know where to go when things go wrong.

So, before I get into the hospitals themselves, a few points to make clear is that not every hospital is Shanghai is specialized in children, and even those that are, they often specialize in a different condition. So, while getting to an ER that has pediatric care is of tantamount importance, it is also important to know (and research) the fact that you may be driected to another hospital who can give the specialize care.

Another point that should be made clear is that within the expat community there is the belief that Shanghai United and Parkway have the “best” quality of service, but these are not necessarily options depending on the emergency. In fact, as I posted earlier, they are not legally allowed to treat anyone with a fever, and in many cases their pediatric staff is not working evening shifts. So, if you are fortunate enough to be a regular at either of these facilities, then I HIGHLY RECOMMEND that you speak with your pediatric about emergency care. Get them, or the nurses, to give you their thoughts on where you should take your child. particularly if your child has a chronic condition (asthma).

As a final note he also states that should you find yourself in an emergency, you shouldn’t wait for an ambulance, but rather pay a taxi generously to drive like the wind to get you to the nearest (applicable) hospital.

I encourage all readers, especially those with children, to sit down and come up with a general emergency plan, as well as the addresses and phone numbers of all local hospitals (in a format that you can quickly take with you and show a taxi driver, if you don’t speak much Chinese), including what their specialty is. You can’t be a parent in China and not always be on edge about safety, but I think it’s easy to let the constant deluge of news about health dangers lull you into a bit of a fate-accepting complacency. Knowing where to go and what to do in an emergency will hopefully be knowledge never needed, but when it is, you don’t want to be Googling it.

Additional Resources

• Important Numbers:
  • 110 – General police emergency number. English service may be available in major cities.
  • 120 – First-aid ambulance
• Free First Aid by American Red Cross App (iOS/Android) — a helpful education tool and first-aid resource that will always be close at hand.
• St John Ambulance emergency first-aid how-to videos – includes how to stop a baby from choking and how to perform CPR on a child.
• First-aid basics from About.com – a variety of first-aid resources.

If you have any additional tips or resources, please share them in the comments below.

The post Do you know what to do when emergencies happen? appeared first on Lost Laowai.

Chinese students salute during a flag-raising ceremony at a junior high school in Shanghai. Photo from NPR

I constantly have this battle with my mother, who despite having lived in America for over 25 years, still maintains a strong Chinese mindset. Every now and then she’ll bring up the fact that neither I nor my sister managed to get into a top 5 university. Perhaps our neighbors down the street have a daughter who was just accepted to Princeton, or she hears of an old friend whose son recently graduated from Columbia; no matter the case, there will always be constant reminders to my mother that her children have, in her eyes, not met her standards. For the record, I went to a fairly reputable university and my sister is about to start school at an Ivy League in the fall. However, to my mother, success = Harvard, and even though compared to the rest of the world, my sister and I may be considered extraordinarily successful, my mother cannot help but feel that it’s not good enough. I’m not trying to antagonize my mother; she has wholeheartedly only ever wanted the best for my sister and me, but I think her attitude speaks a great deal to the difference of thought between the Chinese and (in my experiences) Americans.

In the past, America was a land of opportunity; a place where immigrants could start fresh and succeed in a way they never would have in their home country. Yet, as the years have passed, the perception of the American dream has changed. For many people, no longer is the goal in life to get rich. Rather, it’s to pursue your own passions and dreams. Most colleges in America emphasize a liberal arts education – one where students supplement their minds with a broad spectrum of subjects before settling down with a major that truly stimulates their interests. In China however, the idea of making choices that leads to a wealthy and comfortable lifestyle is still held steadfastly in the minds of many.

I work at a high school in Beijing. Recently, I read an essay written by a student responding to the question of whether giving up is ever the right thing to do. She told of her passion for music and her struggle with whether she should give up playing instruments in order to have more time for her studies. In the end, she heard a story of a different girl who faced a similar situation. This girl gave up her extracurricular pursuits in order to focus on school, and eventually was admitted to Peking University. This girl’s decision led to success, my student concluded, and so she should do the same. Later, the same student came in to ask for advice on how to talk to some visiting US admissions officers. I suggested that she talk about her intended majors: either finance or engineering. When I asked her why she chose these two majors, she replied: “Well honestly, it’s because they make the most money.”

More and more, I hear of Chinese people speaking of the importance of financial security. “If you can’t succeed career-wise,” I was once told by a family member, “at least try to marry rich.” And while I personally can’t bring myself to gold-dig my way into a permanently comfortable lifestyle, this type of trend has been growing in China. From surveys that show that 60% of Chinese college girls aspire to marry a 富二代 (Rich Second Generation) to classes that teach women how to attract rich suitors, it seems that for many women in China, “financial assets” has become the number one quality a woman looks for in a man.

I’m not trying to place judgment on the mindset and ideas of the Chinese. After all, differing cultures have differing definitions of “happiness” – as long as no harm is done, who am I to judge whether someone’s actions are “right” or “wrong”? But as a girl who grew up around the liberal values of America, I’m personally more willing to give up a life of comfort and luxury if it means that I’m pursuing real interests and passions. However, I can also understand people like my parents who, having lived the harsher life of the Chinese Revolution, don’t want their children to go through similar hardships.

“What do you think is more important?” I asked my mother last week, “Going to Harvard but being miserable, or going to an average school and being happy?”

“Well of course Harvard,” my mother replied. “Life would be so much easier for you. That’s the dream.”

The post Chasing the Chinese Dream appeared first on Lost Laowai.