Unhappy Palm Trees

It snowed in Shanghai yesterday. This morning there was still ice and snow over everything. That wasn't supposed to happen. El Nino, why have you forsaken us? You were supposed to be creating mischief! Ah well, it's probably better for the farmers this way.

A Christmas Recital


Hey, that's your narrator playing the guqin in his neighborhood guqin shop.


And there he is again!

And here's the music to accompany the pictures. Hear it here first, your narrator playing "Xiang Fei Yuan", "The Concubine's Resentment"

Christmas Ought Four in Shanghai

I went to the XuJiaHui Cathedral on Christmas Eve with some Asian friends, including a devout Shanghainese, a recovering Malaysian, and two curious Taiwanese. We had to get there early because tickets were required for admission. Inside, packed from altar to door, we crammed in the back and watched various incomprehensible ceremonies on flat screens attached to the pillars. Much different from the candlelit Christmas Eve ceremonies in the Sheridan Congregational Church of my youth.

I asked my Shanghainese friend why he was Christian.

"Because Buddhist ceremonies are too noisy."

And why are you catholic?

"The other churches don't have Jesus hanging on the cross in front."

Oh! Something!

I spent the evening discussing advertising markets in various Chinese cities with the Taiwanese and holding the Malay's bottle of wine while he applied glitter eyeliner while the Shanghainese crowded forward for communion and everything else.

I've gotten over my repulsion of Chinese Xmas, which you can relive on my old site Life in the Development Zone. This year, I tried and failed to interject sprituality into the season.

A Drag?

Afterward, we went to a little teeny bopper bar called Mollis on the Bund for what turned into the most bizarre Christmas Eve of my life. Mollis is just a hole in the riverwall next to the tourist junk shops. Blends in except for its giant rainbow of neon that says "Coffee Bar."

The music was tinny and piercing and bad and a kid had just freaked bad when a strange masotemptress parted the crowd and took center stage around a circle of teenagers. The boy had a basket full of props, which began with cups of live goldfish.

Into her mouth they went, tails flopping. Then down the gullet. Then another.

Out came a live snake, about 30 cm long. Into her mouth and down her throat it went until only five cm were sticking out and wiggling. She didn't swallow her friend.

Out came a longer snake, about 60 cm long and the snake dance continued. Then into her mouth went the snake head so the body writhed around her neck and head. Then out came another snake of the same length. Then another of over a meter long. She lined up the heads and stuck them all in her mouth. It was grotesque and curious.

For her finale, she lit two large votives and dripped wax all over her body. I think she should have done that first.

Not the candlelit ceremonies of my youth. Not by a long shot.