Arriving in Harbin was bittersweet. We were happy to be there but Marina was still very worried about what she was going to do about her missing ID card. How was she going to stay in a hotel, how was she going to do anything, how was she going to get back to Beijing? Not only that, but we didn’t actually have train tickets to go back to Taiyuan and Xi’an for Spring Festival yet. Of course I tried to comfort her, telling her that, no matter what, we’d be okay and I’d make sure she got home for Spring Festival either by train or plane. Of course, my word only means so much, considering I can’t really speak Chinese. She must have felt pretty stressed, since she’s practically babysitting two foreigners.
After about 24 hours in Pingyao I awoke relatively early in the morning to head to the bus station. From there I was able to get on a bus for ¥25 RMB to Taiyuan. On the bus I chatted with a guy from Nanjing. He asked me the same typical questions, like why I’m here, where I live, where I’m from, etc. This guy told me he really enjoyed photography so he showed me a lot of his work, a lot of which was quite good.
Upon arriving in Taiyuan about 2 hours later I was greeted by Marina. I was pretty happy to see her because she had been in Taiyuan for a little over three weeks before I arrived. We spent a good part of the afternoon just walking around and seeing things in her hometown. A bit later on we met up with
Back to School
two of her friends (one of which we visited in Chengdu in November) and hung out with them as well. They showed me their high school, we ate some local snacks as well as a nice dinner and then went to a club for a few drinks. A very enjoyable day without all the touristy sightseeing.
The next morning I went to pick-up Marina outside her house so we could walk to the train station. There I met her mother who wanted to come out and see who this boy, her daughter was going traveling with, was. We didn’t really talk, but I said “hello” and shook her hand and 30 seconds later Marina and I were walking to the train station.
Today was the first day of my vacation, if you don’t count the traveling I did overnight. It all began last night, at the Xi’an train station. When I arrived, the station, like I expected, was packed to walls. There were people seated on every available space as well as standing and waiting for their trains. Being so close to Chinese New Year, the train system in China is being stressed to its limits. After a two hour wait for my train, we finally took off at a max speed of 120 KPH toward Pingyao. I had from about 11:00PM to 6:15AM to sleep on the train, but due to the jerky motions and stops and starts most of my sleep was pretty unfulfilling. As a result I think I was just as tired when I finally arrived in Pingyao as I was when I first went to sleep.
When I arrived in Pingyao it was still dark. I didn’t really know where to go but I simply followed the other people to the train station exit. On the outside of the train station I must have been asked if I needed a taxi at least 5 or 6 times. I didn’t. The hostel I was looking for was only a couple kilometers away, and I wanted to see the city early in the morning before most people were awake. I stopped for breakfast, and ate some sort of noodles and bread, though I don’t really know what it was called.
My first look at the old city of Pingyao was beautiful. The surrounding city wall and the old buildings within, give it a very quiet and ancient feeling, like stepping back in time a bit. » Read more: The Ancient City of Pingyao
All this work I’ve been putting into my Winter break plans and I think it’sstarting to finally pan-out. On Saturday I woke up at 6:30 AM (!) to go purchase a train ticket to Pingyao, Shanxi. I was a little worried about buying the train ticket because you can only buy tickets 10 days in advance and during this time of year (Chinese New Year) the trains are crazy busy. I’ve heard stories of people camping out all night just to buy a train ticket!
Marina advised me of a lesser-known ticket office semi-near my school so I went there. I was rather nervous because I’ve never bought a ticket before and don’t think I know enough Chinese to complete the transaction. Being the helpful girlfriend that she is, Marina sent me a text message to show the ticket clerk telling him exactly what I wanted. Long story short, I arrived at 7:30, waited til the window opened at 8 AM (3rd in line), showed the clerk my message and had my ticket in about 5 minutes. Pretty smooth actually!
So now that I’ve got my train ticket, and Marina booked us another train ticket as well as airline tickets, I can actually say that I have solid plans for this trip. It looks a little something like this:
Sunday morning I naturally woke up at about 6:30 AM, which was fortunate since I had forgotten to plug my phone in and it had died overnight, meaning no alarm. After showering and putting on the best clothes I had with me, my father and I headed down to the lobby to meet up with Yu Yang. She made me repeat to her at least four times (in Chinese) the night before as to when and where I was supposed to meet her. Tomorrow, 7:30 AM, hotel lobby. She was there waiting when we came down the stairs. We walked north a few blocks as I listened to her and my father talk about what our hotpot dinner and KTV the night before (at least that’s all I could understand anyway). About 10 minutes later we stopped off at a small cafe of sorts. The cafe was really just a large garage type area with the typical short tables and stools spread out amongst the area, it was the only place open that I could see and therefore quite busy! I had a bowl of noodles and a 肉夹馍. We even saw a few other people there that I recognized from the previous day, this was clearly a popular place!
I found out why the cafe was so popular amongst the family. It’s literally less than 100 yards from the bride’s parent’s home and that’s where everyone was converging. It was 8:15 AM and there were already a 8 or so friends and family of the bride at her home, and the crowd was growing steadily. Yu Yang introduced me to the bride, as she was getting putting her make-up on in the bedroom. The bride actually said she we had met before, and that she remembered me. I felt a little bad, I’m certain she met me at the big family dinner right before Tianyu left for America, but I didn’t really remember her. I said hello, congratulations, and told her I was pretty excited to be here for this. I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect in a Chinese wedding, but I’d soon find out. I relaxed for awhile, drank some tea, and my mother showed me some extended-family pictures that were around the house. A picture of my mother and her sisters 20 years ago, a picture of the cousins maybe 10 years ago, as well as a picture of laolao as a young woman. We took the downtime as an opportunity to take our pictures with the bride-to-be dressed in her white dress before the groom would arrive. The men of the family were relaxing in the living room, drinking their tea, smoking and watching TV. Shortly before 9:00 AM we heard a loud explosion, and then many in quick succession. Everyone streamed out to the balcony to look down at the street where a 20 foot string of firecrackers was going rattling off, creating a billow of smoke and echoing off the surrounding buildings. This was the groom telling us “I’m here!”.
The younger cousins then ran to the apartment door and closed and locked it tightly. The groom wasn’t getting in here! At least not without a little bribing. It’s Chinese tradition that the grooms family brings gifts for the brides family when the groom comes to take her from her home. The gifts start with the “hongbao”, little red envelopes with money inside. We opened the peephole slot, it was just big enough to talk through and shove small red evelopes through. The male cousins taunted the groom and his friends, telling them we needed more hongbao, all the cousins gathered in front of the door, including myself, received at least 3 or 4 evelopes with money inside. Generally it was only 2 yuan, but occassionally ten, always a multiple of two. After everyone received some hongbao the groom was finally let into the apartment, his friends and family streaming in behind him, carrying gifts for the family. The brides’s family was gifted with 2 large boxes of baozi (Chinese steamed bread), 2 bottle of baijiu, 2 boxes of chocolate, 2 boxes of tea, and 2 cartons of “Double Happiness” cigarettes. Everything in pairs. The groom ran into the apartment, only to find the bride’s bedroom locked. He carried a bouquet of flowers, looking a little anxious he knocked on the door asking the bride to come out. She didn’t come out, and he kept knocking. He slid a couple hongbao under the door to the bride’s close friends, and shortly thereafter the door opened…enough to get his foot in. Finally after pushing (and a little help from his friends) the groom managed to get inside the bride’s bedroom.
The cousins and friends of the bride all packed into the room to watch the show. The groom was on his knees, begging the brides friends to let her come with him. They said they’d let her go, as long as he could answer a few questions. So they quizzed him while one of the other friends hid one of the bride’s shoes. “Tell us 10 reasons why you love her.” was one of the requests, so the groom, on his knees did his best to appease the bride’s friends. Once the friends were happy, they rleased the bride to her groom, but she couldn’t go anywhere without her shoe! A couple hongbao to the bride’s friends and the shoe magically turned up, how lucky! It was now the responsibility of the bride’s brother (or oldest male cousin) to carry her out the car waiting outside. By that time I had grabbed my coat and was prepared to follow along. The bride’s cousin carried her down the stairs at a break-neck pace, I could hardly keep up, let alone manage to get a picture! I finally got a decent picture as her cousin placed her in the backseat of the car. What happened next, I didn’t really understand. The groom arrived at the bottom of the stairs and his friends just attacked him with silly-string, and some kind of red paint. They did their best to just harass the shit out of him, spraying him, tearing his shirt, and ripping his pants before he managed to get in the car. I mean, it was all in jest, but it just seemed really overboard. This was just the beginning.
A 15 minute cross-town drive in the motorcade and we arrived at the home of the groom’s family. There was a large assortment of fireworks exploding in the courtyard in front of the apartment to signify the arrival of the bride. Once again, as soon as the groom got out of the car he was assaulted. The sprayed him with paint, silly string and practically ripped the clothing off of his back. I followed my cousins inside where we all sat around the dining room table. There was about 14 members of the brides family, including my father, my cousins, some other aunts and uncles, and the bride’s parents. We were served 2 poached eggs in a very sweet, surgary soup. It definitely wasn’t bad tasting, but a little too sweet. Then we were all given larger red envelopes, “da hongbao”; the big payout. These larger red evelopes were given to everyone in the bride’s family sitting around the table, incluing me, and contained 200 yuan each! The cousins were all pretty happy about this, I mean, poor students like free money, right? Seeing the groom eat his eggs and soup was almost appalling, his clothing had just been torn to shreds and his upper body and parts of his face painted red. I didn’t get it, but clearly this was okay with everyone else. Twenty-minutes after we arrived at the groom’s home, we left, and the motorcade proceeded to the Mandarin hotel in Xunyang, the same place I had just left 3-4 hours earlier.
Upon arriving at the hotel I saw that the groom had cleaned up a bit, and changed into a new suit. He looked respectable now at least. Well, funny thing, that didn’t last too long. Quickly after stepping out of the car, he was quickly assaulted with the silly string and red paint. This time I was prepared, so I took a video of it so everyone can see what kind of assault I’m talking about here. Definitely not something I’d ever expect to see at a wedding in America.
Finally the groom was allowed to go into the hotel, where I hoped he had another suit to change into as this one had also been ripped apart in the span of two minutes. Once inside the wedding hall, we simply relaxed and discussed the mornings events while waiting for the rest of the bride & groom’s family and friends showed up to the banquet hall.
The wedding ceremony started shortly before noon; in northern China its good luck to start the wedding before noon. The only people on the stage in front were the bride & groom, and the master of ceremonies. The groom had clearly changed into a new suit again, his third one of the day. I was sitting right in front so I had a great view of everything that was going on. Which was pretty good for me, because I certainly couldn’t understand anything they said. So instead I took a lot of pictures. Every once in awhile there’d be someone shooting confetti at the couple, as well as some bubbles floating around. At one point, the groom’s parents came up on the stage, where it beame quite apparent that the even the groom’s parents weren’t safe from the red paint and silly string. In fact, as soon as the bride and groom said I do, there was a flash mob headed to the stage with more paint and silly string, now spraying the groom AND his bride! Talk about crazy. Near the end of the ceremony a few family members came up to say something about the couple, including my father. I’ve no idea what he said, but it must’ve been good, as everyone clapped.
Following the ceremoney everyone began to enjoy their wonderful wedding lunch, with many courses ranging from pretty typical to pretty delicious and expensive. The bride then came to our table giving Yu Yang the bouquet, it was then that I found out that her boyfriend is actually her fiance and they plan to have their wedding on May 10, 2010. (another wedding? Hell yeah!) The lunch continued with much livelihood, people talking, laughing, as well as coming around to toast their friends with a shot of baijiu. I even toasted laolao with a shot of baijiu and she was happy to have one with me.
Following the wedding we stopped by laolao’s home to collect some things and say goodbye. It had been a wonderful weekend and I had met quite a few great people! On the ride home we took a different route to avoid the 6 Km from hell. My ride was filled with some beautiful scenery, a nice nap, and telling some really lame jokes. I seriously can’t wait for the next wedding!
Sunday morning I naturally woke up at about 6:30 AM, which was fortunate
The Happy Couple
since I had forgotten to plug my phone in and it had died overnight, meaning no alarm. After showering and putting on the best clothes I had with me, my father and I headed down to the lobby to meet up with Yu Yang. She had made me repeat to her at least four times (in Chinese) the night before as to when and where I was supposed to meet her. Tomorrow, 7:30 AM, hotel lobby. She was there, waiting when we came down the stairs. We set out walking north a few blocks as I listened to her and my father talk about what our hotpot dinner and KTV the night before (at least that’s all I could understand anyway). About 10 minutes later we stopped off at a small cafe of sorts. The cafe was really just a large garage type area with the typical short tables and stools spread out amongst the area, it was the only place open that I could see and therefore quite busy! I had a bowl of noodles and a 肉夹馍. We even saw a few other people there that I recognized from the previous day, this was clearly a popular place!
I found out why the cafe was so popular amongst the family. It’s literally less than 100 yards from the bride’s parent’s home and that’s where everyone was converging. It was 8:15 AM and there were already a 8 or so friends and family of the bride at her home, and the crowd was growing steadily. Yu Yang introduced me to the bride, as she was putting her make-up on in the bedroom. The bride actually said we had met before, and that she remembered me. I felt a little bad, I’m certain she met me at the big family dinner right before Tianyu left for America, but I didn’t really remember her. I said hello, congratulations, and told her I was pretty excited to be here for this. I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect in a Chinese wedding, but I’d soon find out. I relaxed for awhile, drank some tea, and my mother showed me some extended-family pictures that were around the house. A picture of my mother and her sisters 20 years ago, a picture of the cousins maybe 10 years ago, as well as a picture of laolao as a young woman. We took the downtime as an opportunity to take our pictures with the bride-to-be dressed in her white dress before the groom would arrive. The men of the family were relaxing in the living room, drinking their tea, smoking and watching TV. Shortly before 9:00 AM we heard a loud explosion, and then many more in quick
Watching The Fireworks Below
succession. Everyone streamed out to the balcony to look down at the street where a 20 foot string of firecrackers was rattling off, creating a billow of smoke and echoing off the surrounding buildings. This was the groom telling us “I’m here!”.
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