“I’d like to order a Hawaiian pizza with no onions please?”
<insert garbled incomprehensible response>
“yes, I realize that you don’t put onions on your Hawaiian pizza. I also realize that the last 3 that I have
ordered from you have had onions on them.
I don’t want onions on the pizza, I want to make sure you don’t just
assume that I need them, and that it doesn’t happen again.”
<garbled language>
“repeat my order”
“1 hawaiian pizza, medium.”
“what did you forget?”
“I don’t understand, you want a Hawaiian pizza.”
“yes, but with no onions”
“I will get supervisor.”
“hello supervisor, I want a Hawaiian pizza with no onions”
“that pizza does not come with onions.”
“yes, I realize that, but every pizza that comes from your
luohu location comes with onions. Is there
some sort of crazy Chinese superstition that states that all baked bread with
cheese on it must come with onions?”
“I don’t understand.”
“me neither. Can you
please get me a Hawaiian pizza with no onions? “
“let me repeat your order:
you want a hawaiian pizza, medium.”
“yes, with no onions.”
While I realize that it sounds like an Abbot and Costello
skit, I find that it’s far more like a Monty Python episode.
I’ve decided to start hanging out more with people who are
not completely paranoid. It’s been a
breath of fresh air. If you concentrate
on all the crazy things that are going on around you, and the possible reasons
for those crazy things, you tend to get very paranoid. It doesn’t help that there’s cameras
everywhere, what looks to be a strong military presence everywhere (truth is
that the military uniforms are the cheapest and easiest clothes to get so, they
may be military, they could be security guards, they may just be random guys),
and that when you move, you have to register with the police, so that the
government knows where you are at any given time. The other choice to paranoia is to just
believe that that’s the way that things are, accept it, move on, and ignore the
bureaucracy. The government in China is
huge, they probably need something to do, whether they’re paid to watch
cameras, or monitor where all of their citizens and visitors are at any given
time. Besides, it’s entirely possible
that it’s for your own protection, and to make sure that you get assistance
when you need it. Perhaps they even make
sure that there are policemen in your area who speak English to render
assistance based on how many foreigners are in your neighborhood. There’s always a couple of different ways to
look at things, and while I prefer to remain positive, I also have to admit
that I don’t have the slightest clue as to what their reasoning is, because I still
think like a western American and not the Chinese, who have an entirely
different history, theology, and system of values.
I was talking to someone the other day about how the
thinking differs between provinces in China and the differences in attitude
between the North and the South of China in particular. Chinese are indoctrinated as to what is most
important at a young age. It’s something
like: Party, Country, Company, Family,
Self. In addition to this, the northern
Chinese have, in the past, used the southern provinces as slaves, and that
attitude is still ingrained in them. If you
have enough “face”, and the right attitude, you can just about make someone do
anything down here, although they will hate you a great deal for doing so, they
will follow direction even while doing so.
I haven’t really experienced that, so I have no idea how true it is or
not. I do know that the Chinese tend to
be non-confrontational, and will do many things to avoid that possible
confrontation. I have to wonder if this
is true, or if this is another case where I don’t have a good frame of
reference and thus can’t understand the actual concept.
My pizza has arrived.
Turns out, that Hawaiian pizza’s are made with onions. Who knew?
I’m still trying to figure out if I will eventually get a pizza with no
onions, and how far along the road to fluency I will need to be….
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