This term I've had the pleasure of the company of two friends from America, Stefanie and Nissa. They taught in the city of Yangzhou last year and this year decided to come to this university to work on my recommendation. This has led to a lot more American-style fun lately, including a colorful Halloween last Wednesday.As I mentioned a year ago, celebrating Halloween in China can be pretty memorable. Christmas has become popular in China (some stores and bars even have Christmas decorations year-round) but Halloween is still barely known in these parts. Not being within a thousand miles of a good Halloween costume store, we first had to make our own costumes, which involved a long, long weeknight on October 30th making a cardboard box into a witch's hat. We had earlier also done some pumpkin carving with Chinese characteristics; small, green Jack-o-lanterns fashioned out of souvenir Xinjiang knives.
At night we held a Halloween party for students, with decorations, the Monster Mash, apple bobbing, toilet paper mummies, a raffle and a cake walk. With 35 freshman practically bouncing off the walls with excitement in my apartment ("do you want to play a game?" "YEEESS!!!!") I was feeling a little claustrophobic, but the students had a great time and it all went pretty smoothly. Afterwards we went to see our friends at our favorite bar, China Fire, and shower them with candy.However, my favorite part of the day may have been in the afternoon after we first dressed up. We each went to class in costume, which was cause for plenty of excitement and camera phone pictures with students. We also had some shopping to do, leading to the priceless reactions of locals to the sight of a witch (Nissa), vampire (Stefanie), and devil (me) getting money from the ATM....
...eating pasta at the nicest restaurant in town...
...shopping for produce.....
...getting assistance at the supermarket...
...deciding between eel and chicken in a bag...
...picking up some sausage....
...choosing candy for the party...
...buying imported liquor...
...checking out...
...and checking a cane and witch's broom at the bag check.
7 comments:
Your Halloween looks more advantageous than Halloween in the decaying rust belt of Broome County, that's for sure!
The redhead's cute.
I have tried to explain to Nissa and Stefanie why Binghamton is very difficult to like but they don't seem to be convinced (especially Nissa, the redhead, who is from a very small town).
Send them to bcvoice.com : it's the bile of Broome County distilled into a message board. I'm at an age when I can remember Broome County had more on offer, but as I grow older those memories begin to seem almost imagined. They're not, but they feel that way.
You may be in "rural China," but it's got more going for it than dying old B. C.
It is not without irony that Binghamton loves to champion Rod Serling, yet Serling hated Binghamton with a passion, considered it a haven for antisemitism, and every epsiode of the TWILIGHT ZONE that featured Binghamton (in reference or as a location) always had very bad things happening there (take, "The Monsters Are Due on Main Street, 'for the best example!). It is not coincidental, either!
I can't wait to get outta here. I came back for a year that morphed into two. Headed to Wenzhou, myself.
Keep on rockin' in hangye.
I meant "Zhangye." Keep on Rockin' there.
Out of curiosity, how did you find this blog? I can't say I've heard of too many other people from Broome County heading to China.
I've been living and working abroad for over a decade. Been to China a few times, too. I was shocked when I was scouring China-based blogs and saw another Binghamton survivor in China.
In Tawian I ran into a lady who attended B. U. When I told her I was raised in Bingo-town her immediate response was, "Oh, I'm so sorry!"
I meant "Taiwan." Sorry again.
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