There are several wonderful women my wife and I have met in China before whose teeth we stand in awe. From maids and shop assistants to teachers and restaurant managers, we have got to know some Chinese women who make us wince when their faces split into a grin. As their lips peel back in a smile the glinting treasure trove of silver and ivory jutting outwards makes me wonder about the original inspiration for arching roof corners in the East. The contents of these mouths can ward off the most ardent lover, never mind dragons.
Parents for a long time in China have put money into their children’s education, not their teeth. So some people, for some reason women in particular, have overlays of teeth, one behind the other, and the piranha effect is unnerving. Their mouthfuls give fresh meaning to castration anxiety and I am sure many courting men cringe when they watch those lovely lips reveal their formidable contents. Sometimes their teeth are so big that their closed mouths protrude as if there were a bone trapped behind their lips. Marion and I are wicked in our choice of nicknames for them. This ensemble includes Teeth the teacher, Jaws the shop assistant, Bear-trap the coffee shop manageress and a student who perhaps unwittingly calls herself Shark (many Chinese people choose their own English names, some weird).
The ayi, maid we had when we taught at a school near Shanghai, Xin Nan Zhong was no exception. Her name sounded like the Chinese word for Dong, meaning ‘understand’ or ‘East’, and she became known as the Dong. Her chops, when they opened, had several glittering items that were gold. We wondered at how she could afford this. But we also knew that some of these ayi came from extended farming families that were not at all poor, but who preferred Spartan conditions and lived frugally. Money was spent on necessities like food, amazingly cheap in China. They just did not spend cash on what Westerners would, knowing well the adage, “Less is more”. They lived simply, knowing no other way, or the destructive restlessness and craving that comes with the consumerist way.
To this day the Dong, to us, is one of those characters that are the backbone or the salt of China.
The Dong took great interest in my lunches. First there was the dazzling display of someone eating with two stainless steel utensils instead of kuazi, chopsticks. She would stop washing dishes or cleaning surfaces and walk up to our tiny dining room table and stare in awe at my awe-inspiring use of those two eating tools. The one with prongs skimmed across the plate to scoop up veggies in its curve, and then pirouetted ever so delicately across the plate to dab at some mustard. Then, somehow, I got the whole lot into my mouth without dropping anything. The closest relative in China was a pitchfork, one the Dong had often used in the fields. Now here was a miniature, which, of all things, was being used to eat lunch.
The other tool the Dong had more of a hang on. The nearest cousin in her world was a meat cleaver. But here there were no loud chopping noises to remove pig’s heads (the choicest item on a farmer’s table) or to slice up potatoes for the simmering oil. Food saturated in oil sums up most Chinese cuisine. This utensil was a miniature which whisked and scraped across the plate. At times it chiselled off a bit of meat that was a round tube in shape, or it nudged veggies or mustard onto the fork. The next wonder was that the food was going into my mouth with my left hand as I am a south paw. In China no one eats or writes with their left hand. If you had this ability you were regarded as very wise. Ahem.
Secondly, the Dong’s eyes would flicker to the actual creation on my plate. Potato made into a soft white porridge, not chopped up and thrown into a pot of oil; a brown substance oozing all over the top of that porridge; carrots and green beans on the side, almost dry, again not swimming in oil. And finally, of all things, lettuce and tomato on a side plate (in the name of Chairman Mao, why are they not cooked?), also not drowned in oil.
The Dong stood at my side, closer than a manservant, gaping at the simple scene of a large man scoffing bangers and mash.
She was only a few centimetres from my shoulder as I ate but I had by then become more accustomed to the relative non-existence of privacy in China: no “walls” between people. I liked the way my Westernised ego was diminishing, losing its hold on the alienating sense of me, mine and myself.
However, I drew the line when I saw that leathery hand of hers slowly descend and almost touch the lettuce. I think it was beyond her comprehension that I could be eating it raw. But at that point I abruptly rose, muttering “bu bu bu, no no no”, and put my hand on her shoulder to herd her back into the kitchen. She laughed either in embarrassment or confusion; her teeth somewhere between the piano keys of Teeth the teacher and the various metals in Bear Trap’s maw.
Like most ayi, the Dong did not understand drying washed dishes. We would come home to find all our plates glistening on the shelf, with a small puddle beneath them. Perhaps they just needed to dry naturally, under the slower arc of the sun, rather than a feverishly applied towel.
The Dong also needed help with learning how to switch off taps. She struggled with turning them on and I would have to show her. Sometimes we would come home to find the bath tap dribbling.
One reason, typical of most taps in China, was that the taps in our home turned on either clockwise or anti-clockwise. You didn’t know until you tried. And some were difficult to turn off or on or were just plain quirky. You had to get to know each tap’s personality.
But the main reason was that the Dong was “tap illiterate”. Often in the extended family-and-friend communities of rural China there are only one or two taps to serve the clutter of concrete-block houses they lived in on the farmland. All that is needed is mastery of the character of one tap to fill the buckets, often a simple lever that you pulled downwards, and the leaking did not matter as this flowed into the nearby crops.
now i know this is all true, it actually happened to you and stuff, but…. how is this semantically different than the piece for which david bullard lost his job and got death threats?
I had 6 teeth removed from my mouth as a teenager to provide space for the new teeth. A much less expensive proceedure than the new idea of braces. All that is needed.
AND my parents favourite resturant where we went for all family birthdays was Chinese, in Cape Town. The owner had some political connection with my grandfather – I never knew what, but we were treated like royalty and always had had something special kept for us (usually undersized and illegal crayfish ).
AND the Chinese may fry everything in oil – but they fry it fast and it keeps its vitamin content better than boiled vegtables – ask any dietician.
Don, it is really good to read first hand observations about China in Thought Leader. Keep it up, keep it humorous but give please the respect that is deserved. Xi Nan Zhong is of a culture with a language and religion that often makes ours seem like a child’s game. I know enough about China to hazard that despite having a sense of humour it is doubtful Nan Zhong would write or tell in quite the the same way about you. I am also willing to be corrected.
I hope other readers of sufficient experience can contribute. It is of paramount importance to our future.
Ron,
“Food saturated in oil sums up most Chinese cuisine” – this is news to me! I guess you don’t try Chinese food often then? Do you eat Chinese food with chopsticks?
There are 8 different regional cuisines in China, and about 5000 different Chinese dishes in all, of which I have had perhaps 300 different types, mostly during a few trips to China and also at Chinese restaurants in SA. Some dishes are boiled in water or stock, steamed, grilled, roasted etc. and these have no oil at all, or very little (such as Beijing Duck, where only the skin is oily).
I see Mundundu read my thoughts.
I’ve read the last couple of pieces with a kind of distasteful feeling that I couldn’t put my finger on. They’re amusing but they just seem so…wrong.
Perhaps I’m merely sickening politically correct. I fear it’s a good tablespoon of both sides.
Mundundu – good point on David Bullard, but my piece is geographically different therefore I can “semantically” get away from it.Black are (more than understandably) sensitive, Chinese are a minority in RSA.
Lyndall – I go back to the map is not the territory thing. Chinese food in RSA, in the West in general, is not Chinese food AT ALL in China. What you eat is thoroughly Westernised. Try smacking your lips over a heaped plate of fish heads boiled in oil. Or try a whole raw pig’s brain freshly scalloped from the skull and put on a plate in front of you,then tantalisingly skewer off chunks of raw bleeding brain with your chopsticks and dip this into the bubbling hotpot of oil in the middle of the table. Oh, and boiled chicken’s feet is a tasty snack to be found in any convenience store.
My maid once wanted me to make me breakfast and she must have poured at LEAST a full cup of oil over the two eggs in the pan. I felt sorry for the eggs!Her meal, including the dumplings she made, had me on the loo for the next two days as I plowed through about five chapters of a novel.What you eat in RSA is not really Chinese food: some of the real stuff is repugnant to Westerners.(And some of it is great, like Beijing Roast Duck.) You telling me you like lettuce and tomato drowned in oil and cooked?
Midafo – thanks, but, respectfully, my name is Rod, not Don (unless you are speaking to someone else) and Xin (not Xi) Nan Zhong is the name for a specific high school, not a culture or a person. Sorry, but not having got those things right makes me wonder if you read the piece correctly. I don’t think you picked up the sheer affection I (we) had for the Dong. My observations – fortunately, unfortunately – are entirely true.Chinese are mostly not religious at all, though the “peasants” (note the inverted commas) still sometimes refer to Mao as the god-man, solemnly and reverentially pointing their finger upwards to heaven as they tell me this.
And I don’t like so-called intellectualism. That’s what has got our planet into the sorry mess it is in. Einstein said something like “the significant problems we face cannot be solved at the level of thinking we are at when we first created them.” People hide behind big words (I know the big words) and big concepts. I want to try and keep my anecdotes simple and honest.
China is a vastly different culture, going through huge changes.I insist on keeping my observations at grass-roots level.Somehow more genuine – for me.
Personally Rod, I just wanna say: Keep up the good work. Perhaps readers in South Africa find it impossible to break free from their racially-based thinking to enjoy your pieces on Cracking China – but i find your contributions like a breath of fresh air. As a fellow gweilo, albeit based in the southern Cantonese-speaking part of the country, I’m rapidly getting accustomed to your perceptive recollection of aspects of life in this often weird and wonderful land, forever laced with humour and a warmth for the individuals you encounter.
Kit’s comments on my pieces as being potentially distasteful reminds me of the British response to Madam & Eve when it was first launched. They were horrified. They could not understand the South African humour and how politically “incorrect” the jokes were.My anecdotes are honest observations (umbrella ladies really do try and sell to foreigners brollies when they already have one etc.) it is the kind of behaviour we ex-pats here in Shanghai can’t help talking to one another about – and laughing about. I love China and have good Chinese friends, not all my posts will be along the lines of Madam & Li etcetera. But I won’t become an apologist for them.
Oldfox, there are quite a few forms of Chinese cuisine that I love, including Sichuan and Hunan style, which is really spicy. We used to live in Shaoxing which is two and a half hour by bus from Shanghai and ther eis a Hunan style restaurant there that is worth the trip back to go and eat there again.Beijing duck if it is done properly? Hell yeah! But the other side is all the – to us – gross dishes I have mentioned from other parts of China which I wont eat, but most of it my wife will as she grew up in Zimbabwe.
Kit
I agree with you – he does appear to be sneering from a superior culture.
Rod
I don’t know about pig’s heads – but when my grandmother and her sisters got together there was always a baked sheep’s head for the brains ( all grew up on a Karoo farm ). If you have raw anything – hot oil is the best to cook it in. Ever heard of fondues?
And the Chinese may not have what you call a religion – but they do have a philosophy. Ever heard of Confucius ?
I agree with Kit!
Rod,
So you’ve been to China hey!
Well Non, that obviously hurt and given the nit- picking response from you I say jolly good!
The chaps at that university in the Free State best forgotten also thought they were funny.
Sorry fellow but you are asking for it so, although I do not think you meant harm, it needs to be said that what you wrote is not a refreshing breath of air. It is simply in foul taste.
Hey Dimafo, I just love your self-righteousness! All politically correct people are. Their stance is ironised by a sense of superiority to honest people making honest observations and at the same time that superiority is simultaneously constantly denied. Emphasis on dim in Dimafo. Keep it up.
Gerrie – I have lived in China for nearly four years, it’s lekker here boet.
Lyndall – the most important words (and the most honest) you said in your comment were the words “I don’t know”.You need to meditate on those three words deeply and for a long time at least four times a day.Try meditating on your new mantra on waking up and after meals and before going to bed. I am tired of telling you the map in your head is not the actual territory in China.
Asking people if they have heard of Confucius is akin to asking Catholics if they have heard of the Pope. Same with fondues. Some “Chinese” people hate raw pig’s brains which they then put into the equivalent of a fondue, other “Chinese” people love it. I put the word Chinese in inverted commas as there are about three hundred different languages (erroneously called dialects, in my opinion, as one person from one city does not understand at all the person living in another city when they speak in their “dialect”). There are also loads of different cuisines. I like Shanghai and Hong Kong cuisine, some dishes I drool over, but hate Shaoxing food (as do many Shanghai “Chinese”). My wife loves pig’s brains, pig’s ears, chicken’s feet, tripe and so forth. I shake my head when I watch her gobbling down these marvels – oh I suppose I am sneering and coming from a presumed superior culture when I speak of my own wife like that.
There there Rod… I’ll buy your book *pat pat*
Seriously people, stop being such overzealous censors. If you’re offended, don’t read the book. Its not like he was inciting violence.
Why do people need to be so sensitive?