Nov 11 2009 - Kaifeng, Henan Province

A heavy fall of snow and a deep minus-2 degree chill feeding my bones toughened me up as I exited the train from Qingdao for my first day in Kaifeng. A long morning of settling in to my surroundings and lodging made its way into the afternoon, when I finally ventured out through heavy sleet to the Kaifeng Museum. A series of Chinese displays and ancient pottery and earthenware did little to impress me, due to my inability to read Chinese script. Nevertheless, the main reason I visited was to find out something more about the so-called lost Jews of this city, this ancient capital of China’s Song Dynasty.

Efforts to locate an apparent Institute for the Research of Chinese Jewish History apparently on location at the museum according to Lonely Planet were met with seemingly blank looks from the workers there - all they could indicate of the Jewish presence was the exhibition locked away on the fourth floor upstairs, which was only open upon request for a fee of 50yuan (entry to the museum itself is free). I pleaded for more information on the Jewish community in Kaifeng and some contact that I could speak to for more information, but was told in no uncertain terms they could not help me. It is true that the Internet has now reaped plenty of rewards on this account. Nevertheless, their reaction did impress me as fair enough – either they did not know anything, or were not meant to, and after twenty minutes of pressuring I was very content with that.

Making the journey up to the fourth floor was a lonely but intriguing ascent, accompanied by my vacant-looking, yet friendly, ‘interpreter’ and one very cool, old Chinese keymaster. No photos allowed, but not too much to really take photos of. Three exhibits in all – two large Chinese style inscription stones from the Jewish temple of Kaifeng (first destroyed around the 13th century, its replacement apparently destroyed by floods and to make way for the construction of the city wall in the 17th) and a ritual basin for washing of hands. My ‘interpreter’ told me some basic historical information I could have gleamed from a couple of paragraphs on the internet. The experience was an eerie one. Making the lonely ascent back down, our footsteps echoed through the still, silent corridors, then the clinking of the keys as the door locked behind me, it felt as if an unknown part of history was being concealed not only from me but the world itself.

Stories relate that a Jesuit priest in China met a man in Kaifeng who described himself as a believer in God and was found out to be an Israelite, though he had never heard of the word ‘Jew’ before. This seems interesting to me regarding what I have recently uncovered that many people believe Ashkenazi Jews to actually be descendants of Central Asian Kazhars who converted to Judaism and not in fact descendents of the Israelites of Palestine. Other information I have found online relates that Jews in Babylonian exile (supposedly Sephardics) may have felt disgruntled with their community and come through India and finally made their way to China. So the Jews of Kaifeng were Sephardic? History really is a mystery. Some know, others don’t, some believe they know, others know they don’t, and various intentions, good and bad, disguise the truth which slips away into the treasure trove of the past. Makes you wonder once again what is a Jew, who is a Jew, does it really matter, or how important it could be.

The next day I made my way to the old synagogue, which was now located inside the grounds of a hospital, and very easily found my way to Esther’s house, descendant of some of the last remaining Jews in Kaifeng. A narrow hutong labeled ‘Torah Lane’ in both Hebrew, English and Chinese at its entrance led its way finally to Esther’s grandmother’s house. The home was indeed part of the original synagogue itself and here Esther had set up a miniature museum, where she welcomed me very warmly and spoke in great English about the history of the Jews in Kaifeng and what little remained up until this day. As her old grandmother sat with her friends in the next room heavily focused on their game of ma jiang and nought else, Esther spoke to me with knowledge and pride about Kaifeng’s Jewish history and the importance of retaining the remnants of the old capital’s Jewish culture.

9 Sep 2007 - Xingping to Yangdi and back again

He was just a normal 12 year old boy with a passion for games and adventure, just a normal 12 year old Chinese boy who knew more than a few English words and phrases from his school in the village, but was too shy and nervous to try them, just a normal Chinese boy with a curiosity for all things foreign, including me. Yet he was also just a normal Chinese boy born into a village which provided him no real access to or opportunity to interact with the outside world - that is, until the tourist trail from China’s famous Guilin, with its picturesque riverside limestone karsts and once far cleaner environment, finally stretched its way first to the town of Yangshuo and then his own scenic hometown.

His name was … and he lived in Xingping, Guangxi Province, situated on the beautiful Li River in southern China, a place where I travelled to and spent three days. Then the house down the road from him situated beside the banks of the river turned itself into a guesthouse.. and later his family decided to also follow in their footsteps. I truly felt as if I must have been one of the very first guests, let alone foreign guest, to lodge in their home. The room was recommended to me by a relative who ran the before-mentioned guesthouse down the street, the four or so rooms were either freshly renovated or still under construction, while there was as yet still no sign or characters written out front the house to indicate guests could abide here.

Perhaps the family had invested much effort and capital into their new business with as yet no fruit born from it…and life was still very tough for this family of mother, father, grandfather, cousins, uncles, aunt, daughter… and son. Yes, … had a sister, an older one, and his parents were forced to pay up big money the 10 or so years ago when he, the second child, was born. His often drunk and over-proud father would refer to his one son as “Ba qian” or 8000, referring to the sum in Chinese yuan he was required to outlay on his son’s birth.

You could easily notice how … was so comfortable within the gentle company of his mother. She had welcomed me with a very Chinese reserved smile but an outstretched heart, and seemingly spent all her days toiling around the home washing, cleaning, gathering food, cooking…or helping me.

…’s father worked from dawn to dusk seven days a week beneath a thatched hut by the banks of the river that sold food, drinks and souvenirs. And when he returned at night to his family, he would find himself a certain refuge from reality with a certain rice wine he had been prodigiously brewing, he said, for the past three years out the back of their house. In many ways he was one of those normal Chinese men, at first reserved within the company of an outsider but soon enough boisterously happy and acting fiercely proud to be then walking alongside a foreign guest under the curious gaze of his fellow villagers. He was also a good Chinese father, earnestly guiding his son in attaining the skills to become a man, while at the same time granting him the freedom to learn to become one on his own.

It was this freedom that led him to, with a small wink and simple nod of his head to accede to his son’s excited intent to join his new foreign friend on my intended adventure to bicycle ride northward to the town of Yangdi. And it was this small, 12-year-old boy, who I at first perceived would turn out to be a huge burden, but whose irresistible gleam in his eyes I could not bear to dislodge, who turned out to be the most wonderful gem and inexpendable companion on my adventure.

But in fact, this was no boy. He was a young and courageous man, who earned the respect of numerous locals along the way, all amazed at the vision of his unfailing determination to follow his intended path. Young …led me along windy, bumpy tracks that never invited the use of a bicycle, let alone that of his rickety, rusted and ramshackle one that clanked and clattered consistently throughout the entire journey. He instructed me in the skills of procuring fruit and nuts from trees to satisfy our as yet unredeemed appetite, and in finding fresh springs to quench our thirst. He led me in the search for raftsmen to take us and our bikes across the river at the correct crossing points.

After making it into the town Yangdi and enjoying a ride round some of its little streets, we enjoyed a home-slaughtered, cleaned and cooked meal of chicken. And then with the sky starting to blacken and the evening encroaching, my young friend and I made our way back to the river to negotiate a ride home with the raftsman. We were not expecting that those encroaching black clouds would so soon give way to a severe storm that would leave only our particular bamboo raft, bicycles and all, pacing down the now frenetic currents of the Li River

We forged an inseparable companionship with our raftsman along the way, as the three of us all braved the torrents and heavy downfall. Though it was summer our drenched bodies had quickly become very, very cold, particularly. ...was only wearing a cheap set of plastic sandals, the thinnest of cotton shorts and singlet top, but he didn’t flinch. We were both on an incredible high…

…until finally, at the very moment the sky had immersed itself into a pitch black, the young man and myself, drenched, with muddied feet and grins of delight etched across our faces, trudged wearily up the footsteps of his family’s house.

But …’s joy of an amazing day with his friend was soon to turn to heartbreak on his arrival home. His inebriated father was apparently made to feel envious of the respect the young man was heaping on his new friend, and berated him every time he provided details of the feats we had achieved and obstacles we had overcome. My most awesome little friend was soon crying uncontrollably, his father acting oblivious to the significance of his son’s pain as he heaped abuse on him. And I could see that this was no happy family at all – that this boy lived in fear and, maybe even more so, his mother too. It was such a sad end to a beautiful friendship I had made with the boy, who was consequently scared to approach me for fear that his father would see and feel threatened once more. I knew I had to leave first thing the next morning and it broke my heart to do so. And I broke my promise to send … the photos we took that day, to which he was so looking forward – for fear that his father would not like them.

7 Sep 2007 - Xingping, Guangxi Province

I was searching for tranquility …and it seems to have found me. After a 13 hour train ride west to Guilin, I boarded the 1-hour bus to the backpackers’ haven of Yangshuo (where I, but even more evidently the ticket seller, created quite a scene after I chastised him for overpricing the laowai). But one hour in Yangshuo was enough – it was still too big for me, too touristy and too many touts followed my every footstep.

It was the right choice. I’m now in the quiet town of Xingping, nestled amongst the most amazing scenery of karst peaks you could ever imagine and lying along the banks of the Li River. Rows of ancient courtyard houses line the village’s cobbled lanes, old tanned women crouch on their footsteps, an obligatory photo of Mao smiles from the wall behind them. Local farmers pass by carrying meat, live or dead, for sale, the occasional motorbike skidding past, still-live poultry hanging from their handlebars. It’s an arresting scene after Beijing, Hong Kong and Shenzhen.

60 kuai a night grants me a view from my window only eyes could believe – a stretch of old black tiled rooftops resting beneath a skyline of forested karst peaks. It’s simply beautiful. Xingping shuts off its lights after 8, and the streets are quiet if not for the occasional murmur of footsteps fluttering by, just like the cool breeze from the river (..the same river that, combined with the mellow old man selling wares on its bank, has now armed me with my little slingshot.)

4-5 Sep 2007, Shenzhen

After four fascinating but ultimately uninspiring days in Hong Kong – and a new visa - I crossed the border back into China proper, at Shenzhen. It felt great. People were to-ing and fro-ing once more with that frenzied rhythm absent from a seemingly straightforward Hong Kong, the waitresses in the restaurant were comprehending my Mandarin, even the immigration officials glared at me with suspicion. He he - the old China!

But the feeling didn’t linger long. And now, already, even just the very name Shenzhen is starting to turn my blood cold.

I headed off to the cheap hostel suggested to me by Casey from the Peace Corps who I met as we both awaited our new China visas in Hong Kong.

At first it was the all-too-white super-clean interiors of Shenzhen’s subway system that seemed to immerse me in some kind of sterilised test tube; and was it idiosyncrasy or simply irony that the only advertisements appearing in my carriage were for mouth wash? Like their backdrop, the commuters’ expressions were blank and lifeless, seemingly bored with even the notion of a destination. It was horribly reminiscent of the book written by Aldous Huxley that always bothered me, and still does - ‘Brave New World’.

Yet it’s not merely the apparent cultural barrenness of this place that irks me. It’s also this American in the youth hostel which fate threw me beside as I wait now to find if I have a bed for the night. He’s been rambling about the wonder of Las Vegas. Now it’s college life and American football. And now I realise this is one of the two Americans Casey had warned me about. “You see, Shenzhen is a great place to live – it’s closer to civilisation. And there’s plenty of things to do in this city –you can go downtown to Subway or Starbucks, you can go and pick up cheap whores.” I tell him I want to see something Chinese - after all I am in China - to which he rapidly, and resoundingly, retorts, “Are you serious?”

Before I simply mash it up, I’m out of his face in a flash.

I spend the night – I meet a drug dealer, an uninteresting Australian and a pommy who gets so excited that I’m a reggae dj and plays me Shaggy! The next morning, I’m gone!

29 July 2007 - Compromise

Ultimate compromise - it’s a principle I have really struggled to come to grips with since arriving here in the Middle Kingdom. I’m off to South Korea to work on a two-week English camp!

Wed 6 Dec - Hutong face-off

I saw a funny thing today. While on my way to the subway station, I saw two cars having found themselves head to head smack bang in the middle of a narrow hutong only wide enough for one of them. But rather than either driver reversing to the end of the hutong so both could then go on their merry ways, both men creating a verbal collision by getting out of their cars to defend their right of way. Neither were backing down and, as I left them to their own devices, I really pitied the poor rickshaw driver who found himself caught between the two of them.

Face is a powerful thing, but it can also be an incredible waste of time. Development is happening fast in China, but old culture also slows things down. I often wonder if it’s not merely red tape, but old ways and culture that get in the way of China becoming an efficient modern state. Does the current China really fit with a modern Western economy? Or is it just moving too fast for the whole of its society to catch up to. Or am I simply displaying a Western bias? I would have just immediately backed up my car, but it seems this is not the way things are done in China.

7:48am Sat 30 Sep 2006

Well, another day, another yuan; and it’s Saturday - 7:48am. My colleague Lee is trying to fix my alarm clock on my new mobile phone. Not that the last one didn’t cause me any trouble. I believe it was sold as a kind of fake Sony Ericsson, in the local outdoor market in Dawang Lu. It had video, camera, mp3 music capability, but it was a hopeless experience and the problems never ended – once one problem was solved, another one would come to the core. Last weekend the shit hit the fan because on returning from Europe my clock had skipped back to 2005 and could not be changed, and then the alarm wouldn’t work either, even on 2005 time - which didn’t make the weekend shift at work easy. Getting colleagues and friends to wake me up at 1am Friday morning, 4am Saturday morning, 3pm Saturday afternoon, and 4am and 3pm Sunday didn’t pan out too well when my colleague woke up late and called me 10minutes into the shift on Saturday morning. (For your information, I live on the other side of the city from my work, which is a 5minute walk and half-hour taxi ride – or 10 minute walk and 45 minute subway ride - away. At 4am in the morning, subways don’t run, while taxis – or drivers who are awake - are not in abundance in my community). It also didn’t help when the screen on the phone turned white and I was unable to access any items on the phone, for example, make a call or send a message for extended periods of time.

I recall how upset I was with myself when I lost my last mobile phone in China, as I realized at that moment that my life was incredibly screwed up as a result. I couldn’t believe how dependent I had become on technology – no numbers, no way to be contacted by friends or work, no way to know when to wake up or when I should go to sleep (since I used it as a watch too).

Well, Lee’s had a look and so have I and the diagnosis is: the alarm simply doesn’t work. Well, at least I got a reminder application on the phone which does, and at least I took my friend advice and bought a Nokia, which is a reliable phone – except, in this case, it seems, for the bloody alarm function.