chicken bar

A couple fun short stories before I rewind to the weekend:

• Yesterday when I was out for a run, I was startled out of the rhythm of my stride and iPod music when I passed three high-school aged boys. As we crossed paths, they yelled in unison, "You make me want speak English!" Yet another run where I laughed intermittently throughout my entire way home. Quite possibly the best pick-up line of my life.
• My year 1 students have taken to calling me "Hamburger," one of the few English words they know that admittedly sounds quite a bit like my name. Today when I was walking to the ISS I passed a gym class filled with my 1st and 2nd year students. They all yelled out excitedly as I passed, a mix of "Amber!" and "Hamburger!" Should have known which version would win out... Sure enough, in my Year 2 class today my students had a new name for me. American teacher, American food. Ah well, hopefully it helps them build a lasting association.
• A couple weeks ago, eating lunch at the dumpling place, I unsuspectingly found myself with an order of pig brain soup. As soon as I received it, I was immediately aware of what it was; you could probably use it to diagram the various areas of the brain, as it was totally intact and alarmingly brain-shaped, complete with the little creases and folds. Since I eat at this place at least a few times a week, I decided I would avoid making the same mistake by asking the students in my English Corner course to translate the menu for me. When I helped them through the translation this afternoon, I almost wished I hadn't; the chewy meat from this weekend was pig heart, and the only other "pig" choice on the menu was pig stomach. And here I've been ordering pig thinking it would be a safe choice...

This weekend was fairly "normal" - a night out at Beers of the World, where I thoroughly enjoyed three Belgian beers and hung out with a big group of teachers; a day trip to "Windows of the World," one of Shenzhen's only tourist attractions, filled with miniature replicas of the world's greatest wonders; and a night out in Shekou, the expat quarter of Shenzhen.

My experience in Shekou this time was quite a bit different than my last few. The night started with gigantic - and delicious! - burgers and fries, and ended at a place called a "chicken bar." Although I'd been warned about what it was, I was still a bit taken aback by my experience.

The bar we went to, Wendy Bar, had six women working in the smallest bar I had ever seen. They were dressed conservatively enough and seemed to simply be overly friendly, which made the whole experience even more bizarre. As I sampled a dish that Wendy offered me and sat playing a very popular dice game with Andy, Dave, and a few of the women (a bar game that is, incidently, really aiding me in my fluency with Chinese numbers), Steve commented, "I hope this moment makes your 'Memoirs of a Supreme Court Justice': eating fish heads and rolling dice with Chinese hookers."

I should have been relatively out of place, but the women greeted me warmly and were happy to talk with me. In fact, Wendy even got out a Connect Four board (I'm telling you, this was a Twilight Zone experience) and played several games with me. The more we played, the less I spoke, and the more I became lost in a depressing realization: next year, I would be at Yale Law school, while Wendy would still be working at her chicken bar. She had no idea of this, I'm sure, as she smiled at me slyly across the bar and proceed to beat me four of five rounds of Connect Four.

I didn't make it out much longer after that. As Andy commented, "If you keep thinking so much you're just going to make yourself miserable." But there is nothing like the reminder of fated existence to kill a Saturday night buzz.