Mama hoo hoo

Sadly, Mama hoo hoo isn't my new Chinese name -- it really means, "so so".

But it's one of the reasons I'm in love with the Mandarin language. I answer, "mama hoo hoo" to as many questions as possible from my Berlitz teachers.

How are you? Mama hoo hoo. How was lunch? Mama hoo hoo. But after all these wish washy answers, they finally taught me the word for wonderful -- and it's fun, too -- Bang!

A bus is gong gong chi che. My younger brother Joe is didi. Darling Madeline (when she's not calling me Ning) could call me lou lou (which means granny from my mother's side).

My language classes have given me an unexpected benefit -- I've gotten to know a lot of smart, young Chinese people. We study hard...but we laugh a lot. I begged them to teach me to say to a taxi driver, "If you abandon me again, I'm going to punch you in the nose!"

This morning I went to a seminar called "Inspired Beijing" -- designed for expat-spouses. The women there seemed nice, but I was immediately drawn to the one young Chinese woman in the room... Laushe -- teacher

A key element of Chinese culture is not looking silly (losing face) or making mistakes. But my life is an endless mistake -- fumbling for words...getting lost in taxis...not knowing what the hell I'm eating...

One of my Chinese teachers (her name is Jing Jing because she was born in Beijing), has this charming way of explaining a clause or sentence -- she'll say the word and then go, blabity blabity blabity to fill in the gaps. Thank God I finally realized it wasn't new vocabulary!

I watch a lot of Chinese music videos (Asian MTV). Songs are slower than when people speak. I adore Chinese boy bands (shades of "New Kids on the Block" with a lot more hair gel). I thought I was really improving my comprehension until I realized that they often throw in a few English words! I even find myself humming the tunes...

When folks in China realize that I'm trying to speak Mandarin (I'm still that bad...), at first they're shocked...they often laugh...then help me correct my tones.

Everyone in China is my Laushe.

Technology Ning

Many of you might think I'm only learning Chinese over here in Beijing -- but I've also had a lot of technology adventures!

Getting our computers set up -- learning how to use a digital camera (a baby step most folks have taken already) -- getting our new tiny Chinese .mp3 players to work -- and finally, getting a cell phone!

The cell phone experience was crazy -- my only requirement was red color (hongse). My friend Joanne took me to the store -- I had a bemused expression as the Chinese language swirled around me. Our beloved (late) dog Ruby often had the same look, "I don't know what's going on -- but I'm certainly interested" as she watched us work in the kitchen...

I became truly Chinese because I paid extra for a phone number that had good mojo (numbers are very important here...). Mostly because I thought the numbers sounded fun in Chinese:

6 6 0 6 0

leo, leo, ling, leo, ling

My other technology adventure -- a word processing program that allows me to write in pinyin (the phonetic, romanized version of Chinese) with the correct marks for tones. It's time for me to keep notes!

Technology Ning!

Sheer Beauty -- Sheer Terror

Beijing is cold. Icy cold. Freeze you to your bones cold. So an ice show is perfect.

John and I went to a snow and ice sculpture event in the mountains outside of Beijing. It was incredible...and even had fireworks. But even gazing at ice can have it's challenges.

As we wandered among the sculptures, we saw folks entering another area and marched through. I noticed we were entering the mouth of a dragon...


We started taking escalators...up, up ... again up...up yet again -- over 8 (steep!) in all.

Finally, it hit us -- our guide had discussed an ice slide down the mountain. Our eyes widened in terror ... and we noticed the only folks with us were teen-age Chinese boys! Perfect ice sliders!

We got to the top and desperately tried to explain that we did NOT want to go down an ice slide. Bu yeo! Bu yeo! Bu FLIPPING yeo! I don't want to...I don't want to -- I REALLY DON'T WANT TO!

No one understood us -- and there was no way out. The boys hunkered down, entered a little door, and began to scream. We looked at each other with horror. We noticed a tiny old woman -- and thought in a panic, "Are they going to fling granny down the slide, too??!!" We figured if she could do it, we could, too. And anyway, there was no option.

So we entered the door. We were on top of a sheer drop (a dam in the gorge) of over 500 feet. Straight down. In the night air we could see the ice sculptures far at the bottom. I began to make animal noises of terror...John grabbed my hand. We shuffled along the ridge...in granny's footsteps...and got across. What part of bu yeo do you think they didn't understand??

When we reached the other side, we realized we weren't headed for the slide of death...instead, we were walking into another display area. But we were grateful for every downward incline... we kept expecting to be forced to slide.






We ended the night in a Chinese restaurant...we were the only weiguoren (foreigners...). As we ordered our beers (we deserved it!), we could hear the boys at the next table making fun of our language... sigh...

The adventure that is China!