Same Same Vang Vieng

The last time I was in Laos, I was locked out of China due to covid, floating around SE Asia with only the clothes that I had in my backpack, trying to teach online for two months. Bathing suits, mind you, do violate the dress code.. After a short stint in Kuala Lumpur to join a few other misplaced teachers, I returned to Laos until I had to evacuate the country, one of the more traumatic moments of my life, grown folks begging with ticket agents to board planes.

Why do I hike?

When I find myself literally at the end of a rope in China, hiking is the ultimate brain eraser. Either I’m concentrating on the beauty or not slipping, totally forgetting that the snack I purchased for my cat was freeze dried baby birds (I will spare you the photo).

Nails

Hopefully, someday, Easter will be restored to a holiday where I can enjoy going to church, biting the heads off chocolate bunnies instead of eating frozen pea-sicles, and thinking about the nails of the crucifixion, not mine.

Tombs and Brittle Bones

It’s sad. Folks spending eternity in a cemetery really are forgotten. We have don’t even have a word for them. We have words for the grounds (cemetery, necropolis, catacombs), words for the urns and burial stones, words for that stupid piece of plastic on the end of your shoelace (aglet), but no word for our collective of loved ones that left us their Hummel collections.

Rice 饭 Fàn

his year for Christmas, I travelled to Xishuangbanna, where rice is anything but a bland side dish. There are rice stuffed pineapples, purple sticky rice, speckled rice dumplings wrapped in Bamboo leaves, and rice stuffed bamboo shoots.

Local Color

I went to Kunming’s Museum of Contemporary Art this weekend and viewed what I thought was an abstract poodle. While I enjoyed the art, I found the streets just as colorful. This bean lady at the market reminded me of my mom. I really think it was her. She didn’t have her own booth or her own QR code, but […]

Paperwork

Working at an international school, I have been trained for fires, earthquakes. Hostage Takeovers. But what if a student gets stuck in the bathroom? It was photo day and my class was right after the snapping of pictures. Mars’ bow tie was next to the crayons. Albert’s jacket was on the back of his chair. But Yael’s kitty cat ears? […]

An American in Wuhan

Oh yes I did! I have just completed the Covid 19 Triple Dog Dare. I went on a cruise, ate at a buffet and ended up in Wuhan, then lived to blog about it. Actually, it’s not as insane as it sounds. Since I’m “land-locked” in China this summer, I thought I’d finally see the country. It’s not like I’ve […]

Pokes and Probes

So what’s an expat to do when it’s time to get back on the saddle again–wait–I mean back in the stirrups? Make an appointment at Women’s Angel Hospital for a pap smear and mammogram. Considering China makes more babies than any other countries, maybe it’s time we trust them with other female needs.

Temple Attire

So, just what do you wear to a temple or monastery, even if it’s one for chickens in Shangri La? It depends on if it’s a Buddhist temple, monastery, or the Hundred chicken temple.

Yak and Hack

Does anyone know of a good wine pairing for yak? That’s what you eat in Shangri La. And don’t laugh. Yak is where it’s at. I was referred to this little hole in the wall, a Tibetan version of a blue plate diner. I ordered Diced Yak with noodles and Yak Meat Pie. The crust was amazing. Plus, I had […]

Born to be like ginger

In America today, I officially turn into human wallpaper. It’s my birthday, or 生日快乐 shēng rì kuài lè, in Chinese. But no Barbie dolls or pin the tail on the donkey games this year. I turned sixty. The big Six-O. In dog years, I’d be dead. In America, childhoods that pre-date Google means you have become as desirable as panty […]

You Care Too Much

The three words silenced my room: “What the hell?” They weren’t from a junior high student, because the utterance would have been in Chinese. The slip of the tongue was from a second grader. From the same kid who doesn’t know his sight words. I looked at a coworker, who heard it too. While I was thinking about school policies […]

Smoke

There is a famous Chinese proverb: 不到长城非好汉. He who has never been to the Great Wall is not a true man. And after he visits the Great Wall, he picks up a pack of cigarettes.  Smoking is huge in this country, even with doctors, including my “no chicken, no OJ, drink broccoli juice” acupuncturist. Before the young doctor light his cigarette, […]

The Un-memorial

I couldn’t see the beach. The white sand, all of the beer bellied sunbathers in small speedos were all washed away. All I could see was the wave of the Tsunami of 2004 hitting the Patong beach of Phuket. My mind went back to December 26th, 2004. I was in a coffee shop in Amsterdam with my husband, doing what […]

Holiday Dare

The last few days have been filled with food indulgences but not your typical holiday fare. Our school celebrated the New Year’s at a Chinese version of the Four Seasons Sunday Buffet. Usually, a picture is worth a thousand words.  But in China, sometimes the translations are better, like Baked Pumpkin Mud. Imagine a Crème brûlée made with a pumpkin […]

Black is the New Pink

I just came back from Bangkok. Usually the city is a swirl of color, from the taxis to tuk tuks. But now, it’s black black. Since King Rama IX died in October, a year long memorial started. Mind you, the love for this king was fierce. If you stepped on a piece of money with his picture on it, you could […]

Think Inside the Box

Duct tape has a lot of cool uses. Getting a kid to speak English is one of them. A new business moved right next to a school, a paint ball court. Yeah, just a slight distraction. But last week after installing the air ducts, the workers dumped  a gazillion huge boxes into the trash. I’m talking larger than life boxes–well, […]

Some things need to be retired. But never are they people.

I cannot eat this apple, I thought as the old lady handed it to me, her beef jerky like fingers trembling, the smile under her hat lighting up the dingy room. “Xie Xie,” I nodded, admiring  her face. Every wrinkle lead to a different story, from China’s Cultural Revolution to her recipe for jiaozi. Why was I at this human time capsule […]

Chinese School

A friend invited Hamburger Laoshi for “Show and Tell” today. She’s an English teacher at a Chinese Public School on the north side of Kunming. Four Thousand students, forty crammed into every class, all wearing the same uniform. The students learn by rote memorization. Check out this video clip of them “getting their English on”. I talked a bit about […]

Wǒ jiào Beetlejuice

  I haven’t seen a rat that big since I lived in Chicago.  It was scruffy, looking like it had better days, huddled next to great wall of soy sauce in my favorite local store. That’s when  universal phrase for “I just saw a rat!” came flying out of my mouth: “SHRIEK!!!!!” A group of young female employees came over […]

WeChat English. YouChat Emojis.

I admit,  I was not the best behaved best high school student. I will be remembered for detention slips and making popcorn during chemistry lab more than my grades. So when I unexpectedly got a message from a teacher in the USA, I thought I was being summoned to the principal’s office. But it wasn’t from my alma mater, WHS,  in Watervliet, Michigan. It […]

The Smell of the Blues

It was a good night for a glass of peanut juice over ice with a splash of Jack. My heart was sad as my life wasn’t turning out like a Julia Roberts movie. I had papers to grade,  forms for my lawyer and Microsoft did automatic updates on my computer, turning all of my software back into Chinese. Then I […]

Hamburger Lao Shi

While many of you call me Ginger,  or Ginge or some even refer to me by my maiden moniker, Sinsabaugh, Byt my Chinese students call me Mai Lao Shi or Hamburger Teacher. And this week, I had a lot of lessons beyond pickles and sesame seed buns. For instance, the fourth graders.  Thanks to them, I had to learn that […]