laowai Posts

Dec262011

Posted By
Ryan

From Foreign Friends to Foreign Felons – new law wants your foreign fingerprints

Because living in China didn’t feel uneasy enough, a new draft law currently under review will require any foreigners staying longer than 6 months in China to have their fingerprints taken by the Entry & Exit Bureau and kept on file.

China Daily: Foreigners who stay in China for more than six months will be required to give their fingerprints to local police when applying for residence certificates, according to a draft law submitted to the top legislature on Monday.

The draft law on the management of the exit and entry of personnel also empowers the ministries of public security and foreign affairs to decide if a foreigner should leave their fingerprints or other human biological characteristics when they enter China.

Sep112011

14Comments

Posted By
Ryan

Laowai trapped in China and trying to leave

I caught this video on Hao Hao Report. Basically, Vahram Diehla is a 23-year-old American who is pleading for some advice on how to quickly raise some money to get the hell out of China.

According to his blog he’s working up in Dalian as an English teacher, but the ESL racket has lost its luster and a woman on the other side of the ocean is pulling at his heart strings.

Sep032011

19Comments

Posted By
Ryan

Review: River Town — Two Years on the Yangtze

I realize I’m about a decade late posting a review of Peter Hessler’s River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze, but it was only recently that I finally took the time to read it.

I can’t be certain why it took me so long to pick up Hessler’s seminal work, but I think it was due to the weight of it. Not the book itself mind you, though a bit weighty for a travelogue, it reads quick and handles well. Rather, because for any post-Y2K laowai, Hessler is definitively known as the laowai. Next to Mark Rowswell, few foreigners in modern China are as well known.

I suppose I was worried that reading Hessler’s experiences might colour my own. Lord knows I’m susceptible to such things, as it took me more than a couple years to stop spouting off facts learned from Jung Chang as gospel (worry not Changites, when last I visited an expat pub the doctrine was alive and well).

Sep012011

2Comments

Posted By
Travis

The Outdoors Poetry Exercise

Keith, already suspicious of John, is doubly suspicious now that John missed their dinner appointment. On a rainy Friday, he wonders about John’s motives for being in China, as he implements a fresh idea into the classroom: a poetry exercise, where the students go outside, and use English to write a poem about what they see.

Keith started class. He did Tongue Twisters. He had arranged them in such a manner that they grew harder the further they went down the list, until the last student had the hardest.

“Theolphius Thistle,” Keith corrected. “Like THis. TH. Got it?”

The boy was shaking. He tried again. He got closer on the ‘th’ sound. Closer. But not correct. Keith kissed the air, drawing some ahhs from the front row, and said, “TH. Like this. Got it?”

They repeated until the bell, and the boy, now trembling, quietly slipped out of class. He never came back.

Aug202011

8Comments

Posted By
Travis

Keep It Simple and Stupid

Our hero is John, who is wandering through life without purpose. This wandering led him to a humanities degree, then to unemployment, and finally, to the great refuge of unemployed humanities majors: ESL in China.

Though Wuhan later becomes an existential swamp for John, here at the beginning, everything is new and exciting.

This is John’s first day of teaching, where the incumbent dancing laowai, Keith, schools our hero in how to stay in rhythm and step effectively.

Aug112011

off

Posted By
Ryan

We’re looking for a few good Laowai

Lost Laowai Wants You Like to write? Got something to say about being a foreigner in China? Why not contribute your thoughts and opinions to the Lost Laowai Blog?

We’re looking to stir some fresh expat pee into the writer pool here. If you’ve got a unique voice, a solid ability to write, and — most importantly — something to say, we’d love to feature your contributions here. Whether you’re dredging out an existence as an ESL teacher, toiling away in the salt mines of Chinese learning, or comparing the size of your (expat) package at the local laowai bar; we want your thoughts, opinions and stories.

Check out the contribute page for some basic guidelines and short FAQ, and then get in touch! Simply outline who you are and why you’d like to contribute. Past writing experience is favoured, but not necessary. We’re a blog, not the New York Times, after all.

May092011

8Comments

Posted By
Ryan

Guangzhou laowai rolls out some high-level traffic justice

Should we get involved? A question that has plagued foreigners living in China since time immemorial. Do we step in when we see some gross injustice, or simply let it pass as “not our fight?”

It’s a tough question, and one not easily answered — unless you’re a rollerblading laowai in southern China’s Guangzhou. Being called “Rollerman”, the foreigner has been caught on traffic cameras around the city animatedly pointing out traffic violations to cars sporting government plates who no doubt thought they were above such petty laws.

Mar052011

17Comments

Posted By
Ryan

Are you affected with China Bore Syndrome?

Whenever I journey home for a visit, I’m certain that I push the limits of friendship and familial bonds with my constant weaseling of “in China…” into far too many conversations.

Out for dinner, I may casually mention how much cheaper dinning in China is. Walking down the street, I’ll drop a remark about how clean and uncrowded it is, and how no one is j-walking or spitting. And god forbid that some well-intentioned family member order “Chinese” take-out.

Jan242011

20Comments

Posted By
Travis

The 7 Year Laowai: Part 8 – The Graveyard of all Ambition

… He died an old man in a cold Chinese hospital an entire hemisphere removed from everyone and everything he had ever known. Surrounded by strangers, he couldn’t even have read his own obituary.

Jan082011

11Comments

Posted By
Travis

The 7 Year Laowai: Part 7 – Safety

I had an English class once where this girl interrupted me to ask what I thought of Japan, and without waiting for an answer, proceeded to tell me that Japan had killed many Chinese people, that they hated China, they were jealous of China. Then she went into Korea. Korea “stole our culture”. You’d think imitation the sincerest form of flattery, but not this girl.

I didn’t know what to say. On one hand, listening to this recorded message, it dawned on me that I was 12,000 miles away from everyone and everything I had ever known…and that according to some people, this, this, blind allegiance, blatant censorship, and self-checking all in the name of “harmony”…this is the next superpower.

On the other hand, she was speaking. I take what I can get.