Chinese people

Chinese people are interesting. They are outstanding at everything that has to do with their own culture, for example if you start humming a Chinese folk song every Chinese person present starts to sing with you, no matter what song it is, because they know all of them.

The Beijing I live in is very two-sided. Sometimes I walk around in hutongs (small narrow alleys) and chat with real Beijingers and eat street food, and sometimes I eat pizza with my Western friends at the pizza place in Wudaokou, the centre close to our school. Beijing is becoming a modern multi-million city with skyscrapers, international business and luxury stores. However, the common Beijing workers still live in their hutongs, drive their flatbed mopeds and shop at the outdoor markets, and that's the way they want to keep it.

Still, the young generation has more and more access to Western culture with music, tv, internet etc. New Western restaurants are frequently opened and especially around Wudaokou where several universities are located. Last Sunday Robin and I decided to indulge ourselves breakfast at an American restaurant. Usually my breakfast consists of cereal or jian bing, an egg pancake with spices that street vendors cook on the back of their bikes.  Anyway, at the restaurant there were several Chinese couples ordering food, and they ordered omelettes, steak, pasta and they shared all the dishes. The Chinese way of eating is to order several smaller dishes to share, and so the Chinese eat Western food that way too. If you would see it, you would realize how strange it looks when a couple split a steak with mashed potatoes, a seafood pasta and a ham and cheese omelette, and all they use is one fork each.

Chinese people at the gym are also an interesting sight. The majority are not wearing sport shoes, and the treadmill is only used for walking. When you think about Chinese sports and training you think about Kung fu, Tai chi (Taiji) and Qigong. It is common to see Chinese people training in parks, they do different types of simple exercises. At many places there are small outdoor gyms, with some tools and easy machines that the Chinese earnestly use. At the school gym however, I sometimes wonder how much physical training they really get. Every time I'm there I see some guy using the machines completely wrong, definitely without effect.

Most Western articles are still quite new in China, but the more the Chinese are exposed to it the more they learn, especially from contact with Westerners. However, this makes me quite sad. Of course I want China to be open to the outer world and for us to be able to get to know Chinese people, but I'm afraid that it might be too much Western. I'm here to learn about China and the Chinese culture, not for China to become what I have back home. Globalisation makes it easier for us to explore other countries, but it also makes us all more the same. I want China to preserve their own culture and old ways of cooking food, play music and live in hutongs. That is what is so unique about China; the amazing ancient culture.