Guns, skinned dogs, booty dancing, and dentists

Here's another random thought or observation about China or the Chinese children.. Working at a private English school for children, I am around young kids all the time. The number one thing about kids I think is interesting is their eating habits. They eat all the time, always have something in their mouths. They come to class with all types of snacks and 'finger foods', from a corn on the cob on a stick to chicken feet. There school bag is mostly filled up with things to eat and snack on. These kids are spoiled. We teachers joke about being babysitters instead of teachers and I think this is true. Some of the kids parents use this school as a day care bc they dont have time to be with their kids all day, they are turning capitalistic and want to make money where they can. So bc they feel bad about not spending time with their kids they spoil them with snacks and candy, making the students wired and hyped up for my classes. Thanks. It works out for me on weekends when I come to work hung over and hungry as shit, bc they love to share their food with me. Even walking around town you always see kids and young people stuffing food in their mouths, seriously. You wont walk around NYC and see more than half of the people eating something, never in school other than in the cafeteria. This might be why Chinese people arent as fat as us westerners, they eat a lot of stuff all through out the day. They keep their metabolism working all day, small meals, thats the key. The second thing that I notice about the kids in China is how the boys play with each other. Its very common to see a young boy walking down the street with a life size assault rifle or hand gun in his hand pretending like he is some kind of delta force assassin or some shit. These toy guns look soo freakin realistic too. In America I think they would be illegal to sell. This is how children get shot when approached by an officer in the States, holding one of these replicas and pointing it at someone. These Chinese children have no idea what kind of damage or change a real gun can make and they just see them as toys. I actually saw a group of about 5 or 6 boys walking down the street all with toy guns in their hands playing war and shooting everyone. Some of these guns make gun noises and the kids really get into it, they even shoot other random people walking down the street with no regard for where they point the gun. The problem is the adults or their parents dont tell the children not to point it at other people. Its somewhat disturbing. Even in class without a toy gun in their hand when the boy gets angry he will make his hand into a gun and shoot the person who made him mad with an evil look in his eye. They see nothing wrong with this. It makes me wonder if this is what the leaders of this country want, all the youth to be turned onto this army and combat attitude. Might come in handy the way the world is going, they could figure. Weird seeing it from my angle. I might not have paid that much attention to kids in the US or maybe I havent spent that much time around young children in the US but its waay strange seeing it here. These are just my opinions of course and I want to hear some of your opinions about this or your observations or insight of boys and their fascination with combat in your home country.

Im not going out 'clubbing' as much as I have been and Ive been hearing about it from certain readers of this blog, they want to hear juicy details. The other night I was invited for 'girls night out' by a couple of my friends to Joys Bar. Sounded cool and I was supposed to be the only dude invited, turned out there was another, he was cool though, less pressure on me right?? :) Well its tough work being the only guy getting down to the bump and grind hip hop dance music with all the females. Maybe not the only one, but the other guys cant really be counted. Im not complaining though. Go to the club get free drinks then get passed around like a piece of meat once I start dancing with one girl. It sounds like the perfect night out. Chinese guys cant get with the program or have any idea what the women want to dance like. You have to jump on their ass and move as they do. Its funny when you get a girl that cant really keep the beat with her hips and you have to be able to adapt, I can. Like I said its hard work sometimes but somebody has to do it and hold it down for foreign guys in China. It never turns out like it would in the States or somewhere in Europe though. By this I mean the aftermath of the booty huggin dancing. In America, from my experiences, when you dance with a girl like this and you both get into it like I find in China, usually you will hang out for the night and probably go home with the girl. At least the girl will show her interest and Ill be able to read into what she wants. I cant read them in China I guess thats what it boils down to. Here if you dont seriously pursue her and even buy her table a round of drinks it might not go anywhere. Being a foreigner its a little different, but thats when it seems too easy for me. Remember the clubs hire girls to go around meet guys and drink their alcohol, not going home with anyone. They will give their phone number out and meet you at that same club next time, doing the same thing, tricky bitches. Im onto it though. Thats when I move to a Chinese friends table with the girl and let them fall for it. Then you have the crazy ones like I talk about, they get obsessed and controlling right off the bat. One girl I danced with the other night left for the bathroom and came back 15 mins later to find me dancing with my friend. She got pissed and pushed her out of the way casually proceeding to dance with me. I laughed and pushed her aside making my way back to my friend. She didnt like that, but the guys at her table seemed to bc they cheers with me behind her back and laughed with me about it for a while. She finally got it that we were friends and I wanted nothing more with her after that and it was cool. Crazy girls though. Never the less I went home alone.

Opened a bank account finally the other day. Took about 20 mins and 5 different girls to look at my passport and figure out the apostrophe thing. It was funny as hell, they had no idea what to do with it bc their computers didnt have it. The password for the ATM here is 6 numbers instead of 4. Over a billion people in the country makes the password longer I guess, thats all I can figure. So in 20 mins I walked out with a checking account, debit card, and didnt even have to deposit any money. Simple fast and easy, no waiting for the debit card in the mail.

I found an awesome fresh market the other day next to a Mosque in downtown area. It is the largest one Ive seen in Guilin and its cool as shit. Its got everything. Every vegetable you could find in China, every fruit, tons of fresh and live seafood, all the meats you find here, some live animals, turtles, frogs, and bugs. I even saw a booth with fresh dog! They had a dog the size of Roxie skinned and cut straight down the middle between the eyes. You buy one half of it. Really weird to see. They also had smaller dogs and even what looked to be puppies. Ill go back with my camera for sure. Might even buy some of the meat with Guo one night, I gotta try it while Im here. Sorry Roxie, I love you. Of course they had the staples like monkey brains, animal penis's, intestines, all the organs, you know the usual. Ill be back there soon for sure. I love walking around seeing all the weird shit and watching the farmers clean and get their products ready for sale.

Today Michelle and I had an appointment to get out teeth cleaned and checked at the dentist! I have been wanting to go for a while bc I heard they do great work and are cheap as hell, we will get to that though. The good thing about this one is the head doc speaks some English, I wouldnt go if he didnt. Lets start from my initial observations.. The place was small, dirty outside but clean looking inside. All the staff had the same surgeon looking scrubs, hats, and face protector masks on, even the reception. There was only one room for procedures with 5 different chairs in it, every patient is in the same room. The walls were glass so the people waiting could see you in the chair with the docs hands all up in your grill cleaning your teeth. Kinda weird, but what ever. Its fun to watch people in the chair, seeing their expressions when the doc does something, then again Im a people watcher though. They make everyone that goes into the glass room put on bags over their shoes to keep it clean in there I guess. Dont know if it works that good though. The equipment was pretty much the same, a little out dated, but you could find the same in a smaller dentist office somewhere in a smaller town in America for sure. The dentist tried his best with the English he knew to make us feel comfortable, I was totally cool but I heard Michelle say to him that she was a little scared. I thought the whole thing this far what funny, from the shoe bags to the glass room and how serious everyone seemed to be. I had to hold back my laughter. Before my lady started cleaning the dentist checked for cavities so he said. It was fast as hell and he only used the bent mirror. After about 45 seconds or looking he said I have great teeth, I think I have a cavity though. I didnt want to tell him bc Michelle knew she had one and she was going to get it filled so Ill let her be the ginny pig (however you spell it). The lady first cleaned around my gums with a high pressure water shooter, kinda like a water flosser or something. That took the most time. She was soo precise and accurate with it though, really took her time and did a great job. Then she polished them the regular way. The water shooter thing took some smoke stains I noticed I had behind my lower teeth that the dentists back home scrape off with the metal poky thing, I hate that. Back home its normal for the dentist to make your gums bleed and I think they try too with that metal weapon of theirs. They didnt bleed at all here, they were really careful. This visit was about 30 mins and seems so easy and simple. I can say they definitely were not as thorough as they are back home though. This brings me to my next point, I know teeth arent as important to Chinese people as they are to us westerners, but it makes me wonder if some parts of the procedure back home are smoke and mirrors or for show to make it seem like people are getting their moneys worth. I dont know but I am really skeptical about the health care system in America and China is reinforcing that skepticism. All in all this dentist visit was really pleasant and my teeth seem cleaner for sure. Ready for the total cost.. Good thing your already sitting.. 80 RMB!! Thats a little over 11 US dollars! Are you kidding me.. NOPE. Ill be back there again before I come home. Shit for that money Ill go once a week. He said they can fit me for professional tooth whitener for 300RMB or 45 bucks! Cheap. Or they can do the 2 hr laser one time thing for 1500 or 200 bucks. Back home that runs close to 1000 I think. Gotta love China and the communist health care.