SHANGHAI COCKTALES (A Memoir)

It’s one of the gifts of China that there’s something to write about on every street corner. It’s one of the curses of China that expats keep writing about themselves instead.

That’s not to say there isn’t rich material in it. Somewhere outside the Fourth Ring Road, a nondescript borderline-alcoholic English teacher might be polishing off the manuscript of the China equivalent to The Sun Also Rises. Escape, reinvention, exoticism, disillusionment – it’s all there for a novelist or memoirist, plus baijiu, smog and as many happy endings as you can afford. There’s definitely a way to do it right, make it funny, and say something meaningful about how us foreigners (with nowhere else in particular to go) engage with China, or don’t. There’s also a way to do it wrong, and come across as a goon who can’t write his way out of a paper bag.

By now you should be getting an idea of what kind of a review this is going to be.

As a writerly sort and interested party, I occasionally read books which are memoirs – sometimes thinly veiled as fiction – of the expat in question’s China years. Some are entertaining, others as interesting as a concrete overpass. Many have weird hang-ups about sex. Most feature heavy drinking as a centrepiece. Almost all can be summed up in a single sentence: “Look at this crazy wacky time I’m having in China!” But I’ve never seen one which combines all of the things I hate in China writing between two covers until I read the self-published Shanghai Cocktales: A Memoir by Tom Olden.

Can we dwell on that title for a moment? Shanghai Cocktales. It sounds like some “friend” of Olden’s dared him to write a book based around that single, shitty 2am pun. I’m sure it sounded funny after five rounds at his local, but Olden woke up the next morning and still went with it. The chapters are called “Cocktale One,” “Cocktale Two,” and so on until you wish you were dead or drinking that sixth cocktail. Tom Olden (a pseudonym) has all the subtlety and ear for language of a horny, deaf-blind goat. If he ran this blog, it would no doubt be called Beijing Spunk.

The plot is more or less a blow-by-blow dirge of Olden’s nights out, sexual conquests and job interviews in Shanghai from his arrival as a twenty something year-old in 1999 (“the year of the Rabbit”, thanks for that) until now. It’s billed as a memoir but reads like bad fiction. The second sentence begins “As the only white male on a half-full flight, I gratefully enjoyed the extra attention the nubile air hostesses gave me,” and goes downhill from there. I would happily write off that half-full flight as collateral damage if the plane had only crashed and spared us the rest.

Promotional image for ‘Shanghai Cocktales’

At the airport, Olden meets his mate Alex, who wows him by giving an address in Chinese to their taxi driver. (“‘Whadde’fuck?’” … “‘You speak Chinese? Fuck me!’” … “‘Ching-chong, ching-chong, you’re the man.’”) There’s also some artful exposition when Alex quizzes Olden about why he left everything to come to China and asks about a girl called Marie. “‘She’s over and out. Bitch!’”, comes the reply. (“If it hadn’t been for her,” Olden delusionally muses later,“I could have spent my entire time on campus banging freshmen.”) It’s frequently revealed that Olden has “nightmares where I would wake up, bathed in cold sweat, panting from seeing Marie and Kurt in joyous copulation.” I’m on Team Kurt.

It’s not just snappy comebacks and scintillating interior monologue that Olden puts in italics. It’s every sentence he thinks is clever. On local eating habits: “How the fuck can they eat cold fish for breakfast?” On people he doesn’t like: “I’d party with anyone but her. Even French people.” On his soul-crushingly bland inner life: “You’re here now. In Shanghai. Ready for a new beginning.” His favourite refrain is “Whadde’fuck?” Sometimes he switches into italics for whole paragraphs, just for kicks. He also does that irritating thing where he writes the pinyin followed by the English (“‘Mei you wenti.’ No problem”) because ching-chong, ching-chong, he’s the man.

For someone who lived in China for sixteen years, it’s hard to believe how little of interest happened to Olden. He tries valiantly to keep things topical – the Belgrade embassy bombing, the Internet boom – but inevitably gets sucked back into the dull minutia of his sexpatscapades. In one meat market, he picks up a girl with the sparkling line “Hey – can I buy you a drink?” Her reply is “OK. First, toilet”, and I know how she feels. There are exactly two entertaining moments in the book – one where he is fleeced by the notorious teahouse scam into paying a huge dinner bill, the second where he is scammed by conmen posing as police when he’s with a prostitute. Finally, something worth cheering for.

Every woman Olden meets is immediately judged on her appearance. The idea persists among some foreigners – dare I say, especially in Shanghai? – that China is populated by porcelain dolls just waiting to jump into bed with them. Most of the time, it’s just run-of-the-mill Asian sexpot sophomoric dross, which isn’t worth quoting, although I kid you not that the first Chinese girl he runs into tells him he’s handsome and gives him an “exotic giggle.” Often it’s nastier, such as a bargirl who is “probably in her early thirties and had certainly been a pretty girl at some point in life, but now she looked pale and pinched, her slanted eyes rimmed by darkened circles.” I would give anything for a jacket shot of Olden so I could treat him the same.

Besides his alleged close encounters with Shanghai’s beauties, the rest of the book is Olden’s job interviews and miscellaneous score settling, which is all about as fun to read as drinking melamine from the can. He does the rounds of early city magazine websites and paints thinly veiled portraits of various friends and foes using false names. The climactic moment of the memoir is Olden landing a job that pays twelve thousand yuan a month, presumably vindicating him to all his enemies. There’s a whole paragraph about how boring a meeting was. To quote the master: Whadde’fuck?

If you’re a masochist, you can buy the book on Amazon, where there are thirteen customer reviews, all five stars, many of which overuse his full name in the same way. Something tells me the IP log would be revealing. I can’t imagine it sold like hot cakes, as half a year later he started giving it away for free on Twitter.

@Bueller @Bueller @Anyone… @Anyone?

I had an email exchange with Olden – he knows this review is coming – who wrote “I am aware that many people will not appreciate the story, but I wanted to tell it as it was.” He changed the names of people and companies, but everything else is accurate “as I remember it” (unspecified after how many drinks). The motivation to write the thing, he argued, was so that “when someone picks up the book 20-40 years from now, they’ll get a true picture of Shanghai in 1999.”

Curious about this mysterious auteur (Olden’s author bio says he “grew up in a small fishing village outside of Malmo, Sweden”), I asked some friends in Shanghai and we did a half-hearted human flesh search. Eventually, with the help of RFH, I tracked down someone who knows him and was in Shanghai over the same period. “It’s representative of the mindset of foreigners in China in that era,” he told me. “It’s reprehensible drivel, but unfortunately it’s the best record we’ve got.”

You might wonder – I certainly am – why I’m bothering to do a hatchet job on a self-published book with a fundamentally unlikeable narrator that no one except a few of Olden’s remaining mates will read. It’s not the first piece of grot to be written by an LBH (Loser Back Home) who got shanghai’ed into China and thinks his story is unique, and it won’t be the last. Worse books and blogs have been written. As to the offensive sexist stuff, he’s just a minnow in the slipstream of trouts like China Bounder, Robert Black and Isham Cook.

Part of it, I’ll confess, is that writing this is one way to claw some enjoyment back from the hours lost reading the bloody thing. But more than that, it’s because with every tone-deaf sentence I’m reminded of what we might be missing. Again, The Sun Also Rises was also narcissistic foreigners drinking all day. Here’s Hemingway: “You know what’s the trouble with you? You’re an expatriate. … You drink yourself to death. You become obsessed by sex. You spend all your time talking, not working. You’re an expatriate. You hang around cafés.” And here’s Olden, via one of his dolls: “‘Many, many fun in Shanghaijj,’ she lashed on, shaking her head sideways. ‘Yo come anytime and we take care o’yo. Good time. Ayi-yaah. Many fun. Many, many fun…’”

Mostly, I’m reviewing this book because Olden told me that, after sixteen years, he is leaving China in a few months. I want to leave him a memento to remember us by. To borrow his own italicised phrase about a girl he doesn’t take a shine to: “You cannot let bitches like that go without a slap.”

Alec Ash is a writer and journalist in Beijing, and editor of the Anthill. Information and purchasing details of Shanghai Cocktales are on Facebook or Amazon (includes video). For a much more charitable take on this memoir, the Kirkus Review says it “gives readers plenty to think about.”

UPDATE, 6/4, 12:30 am: here’s our response to Tom Olden’s official response to Alec Ash’s review.

Below is a story by Alec Ash, editor of the writers colony the Anthill, our publishing partner for this event. This is a mirror image story in response to a story I wrote, “Mayonnaise,” which you can find at the Anthill. Both are exactly 808 words — which technically disqualifies them as flash fiction entries, but we present them as inspiration to get you writing. Think you can do better? Show us!

Red Bean Paste

Two expats, both English teachers, step out of their respective classrooms in a university district in northwest Beijing.

“Where do you want to go for lunch?”

“I’m hungover and I need meat. Let’s go somewhere close.”

“How close? There’s a Kro’s Nest up by Tsinghua East Gate.”

“That’s a whole fucking Chinese block away. How is that close?”

“There’s a baozi pu over there.”

“Oh shit, I haven’t had baozi in ages. Let’s see what’s steaming.”

“I went the other day. They had pork and beef.”

“Did you go with Lauren?”

“Piss off.”

“Pork and beef? The Chinese sure know how to pull out all the stops.”

“No, not pork and beef. Pork, and beef. And vegetarian.”

“I could teach those migrants a business trick or two. Location like this you got to hit that Western clientele. We have special needs. What if I want a baozi with pork and beef in it? Think they could do it?”

“You’re lucky to get the beef option, that’s rare. Mostly it’s all pig and chives. They make everything at like 4am anyway, then keep it hot. They roll a thousand or something in an hour. It’s like skyscrapers: one week and there’s a new one.”

“One week? BullSHIT.”

“No man. One week. I promise you, I saw it on a blog.”

“All right, what do you want? They all look the same.”

“I don’t know, let’s ask what they have. This is what I hate about baozi pu, only the top ti is ever open, and nothing’s marked.”

“What tea?”

“Ti. It’s the measure word for those wooden cylinder things.”

“Did Lauren teach you that?”

“Piss off.”

“Next person. Watcha want?”

“What is this?”

“Pork.”

“One ti. What else do you have?”

“Vegetable.”

“Do you have beef?”

“No. Eat here or take away?”

“Eat here.”

“Five kuai. Next person. Watcha want?”

“I want pork and beef.”

“Only have pork.”

(“You’re such a twat.” “Shhh.”)

“That one. One tea.”

“Eat here or take away?”

“Eat here.”

“Four kuai.”

“Do you have four kuai mate? I only have a hundred.”

“You’re such an unbelievable twat.”

“Said the bishop to the actress. Thanks.”

“You’re paying for the next one.”

“I got you that Starbucks. That’s worth at least a hundred baozi.”

“That was three months ago.”

“This seat is filthy. They can’t wipe these off after the last lardass showing more belly than Britney Spears has sweated all over it?”

“Pass the lajiao.”

“Oh fuck!”

“What is it now?”

“What the fuck is this?”

“Did you choke on your own bullshit?”

“That. Is not pork in this baozi.”

“Let’s have a look. Ha. They gave you red bean paste.”

“Who puts red bean paste in a baozi?”

“They put red bean paste in everything man.”

“I’ve never had red bean paste before.”

“Really? How do you like it?”

“I don’t like it. I want pork. Can you give me another four kuai? I pointed at the pork one, it was their mistake, they should switch it for free.”

“Crap mountain. How is it their fault if you point at some random baozi without asking what’s inside it? Why don’t you like it?”

“It’s … sort of like chilli con carne, but with no chilli and zero carne. No, wait, it’s like clay putty mixed with flour and left in the sun too long.”

“Did you eat a lot of clay putty as a kid?”

“How would you describe it genius?”

“I don’t know. I’ve seen it all over the place but … I don’t think I’ve ever had it.”

“Ha! Well screw you, Mr. Let Me Tell You About China. You can shove your measure word for wooden cylindrical things up your arse.”

“I’ve only been here three months.”

“We don’t have red bean paste in Essex, that’s for sure.”

“They put anything in baozi man. Congealed duck blood, pig colon, turtle egg. I had a breakfast baozi with custard in it. Chilli bean is nothing.”

“Read bean’s not a chilli bean dumbnuts. It’s a type of kidney bean.”

“Give me one.”

“If I gave you one, they won’t switch it.”

“Just a bite.”

“Well?”

“It is kind of like clay putty. Less chewy than you think it will be.”

“Let me try it again. It’s a bit like a can of Heinz beans was opened after a hundred and fifty years and a radioactive apocalypse.”

“Give it here. Edible plastic explosive. Taco flavoured cement.”

“Processed plasticine. Quorn playdo.”

“Sweetened mud cake.”

“Marzipan, if it were red and made of beans.”

“Tastes like congealed spunk.”

“Is that what Lauren said last night?”

“Piss off.”

“Okay, enough. I’m going to switch it.”

Outside, the stall owner looked at the ti of cold baozi, six with bites out of them, then at the white man, who was waiting expectantly.

“Don’t want. That one. One tea.”

~

Alec Ash is founder and editor of the Anthill. Follow him @alecash.

Flash Fiction for Charity will be held July 13 at Great Leap Brewing’s Original No. 6. Please register in advance by emailing fiction@beijingcream.com. There’s a 50 RMB door fee (includes one free beer), with all proceeds going to the charity Educating Girls of Rural China.

On Tuesday the 18th, 8pm at iQiYi cafe opposite the Bookworm [Ed's note: the event sold out iQiYi, so it's been moved to the Bookworm; more tickets are now available!], I’m on the panel for Blogging China, part of the Bookworm literary festival. It should be a free ranging discussion of English language blogs about China, hosted by Anthony Tao from Beijing Cream, with Mia Li from Sinosphere, Tao Stein, and Jeremy Goldkorn.

George Orwell, in his essay Why I Write, said there are four motives for writing of any kind: (i) Sheer egoism, (ii) Aesthetic enthusiasm, (iii) Historical impulse, and (iv) Political purpose. I figured I’d do the same for why I blog. (By no means an original idea – Andrew Sullivan wrote one of the best pieces of this kind back in 2008.)

The Anthill is, I hope, a bit different from the pack in that it’s about narrative stories, not blogging the news. I also wrote another China blog before it, called Six, which followed the stories of six young Chinese from my days up at PKU and Tsinghua, 2008 to 2010. And I’ve been an RSS addict of China blogs since 2007, so I do have a few things to say.

I’ll keep this short and pithy, imitating Orwell with four bullet points based on his (he was a born blogger). Part of the point of this is to try and tease out if there’s a difference between writers (i.e. authors, columnists), journalists and bloggers, when it comes to why we put pen to paper, finger to laptop, in the first place. So … why do I blog?

(i) Sheer egoism. That’s right, no need to change the first and most powerful motive for any writer. Anyone who deludes themselves that what they have to say is of such interest to the world that they simply must put it down permanently is more than a touch vainglorious. When it comes to blogging, even more so – no one invited you to write, and likely no one’s paying you to do it. Hardly anyone will be reading it either, to begin with. Why bother? Because deep down you think you’re shit hot, and want other people to know that.

Blogging in China adds the extra incentive of expat status – something to set you apart, so you can show you’re not just another English teacher, that you know China, that you’re following the latest news everyone’s talking about, and you’ve met all the big name expats, and know all the cool bars, and your Chinese is crazy good. I should add that journalists, especially news reporters, who blog as part of their job are less vain and egotistical than your average garden blogger.

(ii) Community enthusiasm. Did I just make China bloggers out to be a pack of vain pricks? I apologise. That’s not what I think at all. The English language China “blogosphere” (how I loath that term) is one of the most vibrant out there, full of people who are contributing to our collective understanding of China in a very meaningful way. In that sense it’s a community effort, with blogs linking to and building on each other’s research and analysis in a form of crowd-sourced journalism. Whether that’s a productive conversation or a “circle jerk”, as some would have it, it’s something that writers want to be part of.

(iii) Journalistic impulse. Anyone living in China is confronted every day with things that just beg to be written about. It might be a conversation with a Chinese friend or stranger, a new piece of information that nuances your understanding of an issue, or something you found on the Chinese internet and want to share. One way to tell if you’re a writer at heart, for better or worse, is if when you see or think of something interesting, you feel a need to set it down in words for others – that somehow the experience or thought is incomplete until put into language.

In China, those interesting things are hitting you in the face every day. What’s more, most of them won’t get written if you don’t write them, especially if you’re somewhere other than Beijing or Shanghai. The country’s just too big, and professional journalists can’t be everywhere at once. So the journalistic impulse to record your impressions on a blog is especially strong here.

(iv) Corrective purpose. A lot of China blogs, I feel, exist in part to correct or add nuance to what mainstream opinion gets wrong. Maybe the press have gotten their facts mixed up, but you’re there on the ground with access and time to pick at the details. Maybe the mainstream narrative is over-simplified or single-sided, and you have something to say about that. Maybe, God forbid, Tom Friedman has written about China again. Whatever the spur, correcting the generalisations and misconceptions about China that are so legion is an important reason why we do this.

~

There you have it. My changes from Orwell’s wording are small. “Historical impulse” becomes journalistic impulse, because bloggers know they’re not recording for posterity, only for the moment. “Political purpose” becomes corrective purpose, because we also know we won’t make a difference, and are often only talking among ourselves. “Aesthetic enthusiasm”, i.e. the joy of crafted writing, plays less of a part in blogging, which tends to be more conversational and hastily knocked out – but bloggers enjoy the act of writing, too. Another big motive for keeping a blog, myself included, is to galvanise yourself to write regularly, and to write better and faster.

Talking of which, an early heads up for a writing challenge. The Anthill is putting on another event in Beijing, again in collaboration with Cuju bar (where we held our one year anniversary party last October). This time it’s a story telling night, with the theme of “Writers and Rum”, and will be sometime in April. If you want to participate by reading a story, get writing now – any short form piece, non-fiction, fiction or poetry, loosely based on the subject of booze (doesn’t have to be China related, but preferably so) is game – and email me with any questions or if you’re interested. There will also be a lot of actual rum involved. More details to come.

Alec Ash, a writer and freelance journalist in Beijing, is the founder of the Anthill, where this piece was first published.

“Festival Fever,” declares the cover of relentlessly upbeat Time Out Beijing. Coming at the end of what might just be China’s worst week in recent history – starting with a massacre in Kunming and ending with 230 people, including 140 Chinese, seemingly disappearing into the Twilight Zone – it’s hard to share their enthusiasm.

Symptoms of festival fever must include disinterest, lassitude, and a creeping sense of impending doom. The festivals themselves are even more lackluster than usual. The Bookworm’s International Festival barely includes any big overseas names; plenty of interesting people talking, but most are expat types you could run into down at the pub. M is also running a drastically reduced schedule in Beijing and Shanghai.

Nevertheless, there are a few good talks, including some that you may not have picked up on. Here are our picks:

Will China Dominate the 21^st Century? – March 12, 1 pm, Bookworm

One should avoid absolutist rhetoric on China, but this question is really aimed to sell tickets. Fenby’s worth a listen, but if you miss this one, you can catch it on Sinica later.

From Her Neighbours’ Eyes: Japanese, Indian and Russian journalists on China – March 13, 1 pm, Bookworm

A chance for a different, but no less important, perspective regarding China.

Translation Slam – March 14, 8 pm, Bookworm

Two translators pitted against each other. Watch out for the hecklers. (Disclaimer: this might also end up being the height of China Hand wankiness. But Alec liked the sound of it.)

Boom or Bust: Projection’s for China’s Economy – March 15, 4 pm, Bookworm

As far as we can see, this is the only panel that’s likely to see some major disagreements, and the topic should really be of interest to everyone. It’s the economy, stupid.

Blogging China – March 18, 8 pm, iQiYi Bookworm [Ed's note, 11:22 pm: high demand has necessitated a venue change, confirmed just this evening]

Four well-known local bloggers and Tao Stein rap about “protests [and] expat rivalries.” If Chris Devonshire-Ellis shows up, that RMB65 ticket will pay for itself. Disclosure: Alec and Tao are on this panel about the Chinese “blogosphere.” Jeremy Goldkorn and Mia Li are the others.

300 Shots – Derek Sandhaus on Baijiu – March 19, 6 pm, iQiYi

Derek Sandhaus is always amusing, and especially so when he’s drunk. Bring a bottle of erguotou and try not to throw up.

Killing Fairfax: Pamela Williams – March 20, 1 pm, Bookworm

Masochistic media types will be glued to the details of Fairfax media’s self-inflicted death throes. Interesting fact: Fairfax’s previous correspondent in China, John Garnaut,was probably the best foreign correspondent in China. Read his book about Bo Xilai.

Orwell, Burma & Literary Pilgrimage – March 22, 2 pm, Capital M

Emma Larkin on Orwell’s Burmese days and literary beginnings.

Timothy Garton Ash – March 23, 5 pm, Capital M

The Guardian journo has an hour or so to riff on China (hopefully) with Kaiser Kuo. Disclosure: he’s Alec’s dad. But that’s not all that’s interesting about him, promise.

Finally: if you have RMB250 to spare and are a struggling freelance hack (an admittedly rare demographic), former Time Out editor Adrian Sandiford is dispensing pearls on How to Pitch at a workshop at the Opposite House on March 16 at 2 pm.

That’s enough about festivals.

RFH is BJC’s editor-at-large. Alec Ash runs the Anthill and drinks whisky.

This week, the latest invaluable pensée from Global Times is “If you are the foreign one.” It’s about foreigners on the TV dating show Fei Cheng Wu Rao. “They are too frank and say things inappropriate for match-making talk, which makes them seem alien,” is one choice quote from a Chinese DJ in Beijing. Perhaps this is the reason why “the worship of foreigners has ebbed,” according the manager of a lubricant oil company in Qingdao (your go-to source for stories about frustrated love).

Meanwhile Zhou Xiaopeng, “chief marriage expert” at dating website baihe.com, reminds us that “foreigners have advantages in terms of the fact they don’t care as much about the age or job of prospective dates” (it’s true, we’ll shag anything that moves), before warning that “all they have learned is the old feudal culture, which says that women should stay at home raising children and doing housework.” Plus they don’t want the Chinese parents to stay over during Spring Festival.

I have little to add to this pinnacle of reporting and opinion, but I did dig up an interview I did a couple of months back with two of these heartless foreign monsters who were on the last series of Fei Cheng Wu Rao, Lauren Hallanan and Mark Pinner. Lauren’s last episode as one of the 24 female contestants on the show, who reject or vie for a date with a contender by switching off a light in front of them or not, is above if you’re curious (relevant bit starts at 48:40, no English subtitles).

I’ll let them give the laowai’s perspective.

Alec Ash: How did you both come to be contestants on FCWR?

LH It was actually the simplest thing ever. I was a big fan of the show, my Chinese friends would joke that I should go on it, and I’ve been single for a while, so I went along on a Saturday afternoon for an interview. I honestly didn’t think I would get on, I just wanted to see the process. The questions were about my personality, the ideal person I was looking for, and past relationships. It was a lot of fun.

MP For me, it was pretty similar. They were asking why I wanted to be on the show, what kind of girl I was interested in, my past experiences.

Alec Ash: Did you feel they look for a certain type of guy or girl?

MP I think they look for someone interesting. They were very explicit about who they don’t want. They don’t want people who are perfect. Because it’s boring. The dynamics of the show are designed to weed people out, and if you’re the perfect guy and [all] 24 girls want to go out with you, that’s not entertaining. On the application form, they ask if you have any weird pet peeves.

LH I think they do hope that the girls are good looking, but that isn’t by any means the main factor. A lot of the girls on there are extremely smart, with PhDs. Some of them have unique backgrounds or interesting jobs. There’s a girl contestant right now who’s a race car driver. They actively look for unique and interesting people. There are also a few who are there for their looks.

Alec Ash: Why do you think contestants go on the show? And why did you?

LH There are some who are just looking to be famous. But a lot more than you would expect are completely innocent and looking for a boyfriend. Some girls told me that their jobs are really busy and they don’t have time to meet people outside of their circle. There was one girl whose mum signed her up for the show. And when a girl [gets a date], the others will be really excited for her.

MP I went on because I was interested in the process of what it would be like to go on Chinese TV – and if I met the woman of my dreams, then that’s good too. Most of the guys are there to get a date with a girl. But when they prep you before the show, they ask you, what is the purpose of FCWR? And the purpose of FCWR is entertainment. You owe it to people not to screw it up badly by being fake. Just be yourself.

LH They say that to the girls too. If a girl goes on and doesn’t act like herself, they tell her we want the person that we interviewed. If you’re not that person, then we don’t want you. We assumed that the person in that interview was your natural self, and we want to see that person. Some girls are so much fun in the interview, and then just stand there.

Alec Ash: What’s it like behind the podium?

LH In general it’s pretty nerve-racking because you know that even if you’re not talking, they might still be filming you. And because there are so many other girls, you have to make an effort to make yourself heard. You have to be proactive and think of questions and raise your hand. It’s pretty exhausting. Also, we don’t get to sit, except for a tiny break [if a guy gets to the third round]. It can be several hours of standing, because once we start filming we just keep going and going. If we wear heels, we can put other shoes behind the podium and switch, but you have to stand on a higher foot block, so no-one notices the height differences. But some girls stand in heels for hours.

Alec Ash: How do you feel the experience is different for laowai contestants?

MP They’re curious about foreigners. From their point of view it’s just different, and they’re after different people. I do think they liked me because I fitted a stereotype of the English gentleman. One of the girls invited me to do a waltz on stage with her.

LH I felt that people had pre-conceived notions of what I should do or say, and that there was a give-and-take between what they wanted me to be like, and what I am like.

Alec Ash: What did they want you to be like?

LH I think it was difficult for them to figure out too. Because in a lot of Chinese people’s eyes, Americans are extremely outgoing. I’m outgoing, but not in a crazy party-going way. And I can be quite conservative in my dress and what I do on the weekend. That was a little difficult for them to get their minds around. On the show you can see I wear lots of different clothes all the time, because they couldn’t figure out what to do with me. They would say: “You’re so cute!” And I would say: “Please don’t make me wear bows in my hair.” So they would say: “OK, what about sexy?” And I would say I’m not super comfortable wearing sexy stuff either. You can also see it from some of the questions that I get asked on the show, especially from Le Jia [the resident “psychological analyst”]. He makes sexual references and asks me about past relationships, and I think he sometimes expects me to say one thing but I would say another thing. It’s all stuff that I’ve dealt with before, at a one-on-one level with Chinese people, but never on such a large scale.

Alec Ash: What have you learnt about Chinese attitudes to dating from your experiences?

LH Marriage is a lot more at the forefront. The girls are not just thinking about having a date.

MP Absolutely. A lot of them are thinking, will we get married in six months? Will we have a kid next year? That’s the kind of timescale you’re looking at. And that’s why there’s more of a tick-box thing.

LH That’s true about China in general, but it becomes a lot more evident on the show. Right through the interview process, and also on the show, they want to state clearly and exactly who you are looking for. You can’t just say, I don’t know, it depends on feeling. Back home it’s more about who you meet, and you know when you start talking to a person if you like them, then you find out slowly what his interests are. But on the show, it’s all laid out there. They want you to know who the exact person you are looking for is, and what your requirements are.

MP Tick, tick, tick, no, no, no, yes, yes.

Alec Ash: What are the key criteria, for both sexes?

MP The first thing guys are going to go for in a girl are her looks.

LH Whereas a lot of Chinese girls don’t like the really good-looking ones, because they have no anquangan [sense of security] – they’re afraid that if a guy is good-looking he’s definitely not going to be faithful to you. If a guy that is too good-looking comes out, he will likely get a few lights go out immediately, because they feel he’s going to have a million mistresses.

Alec Ash: So what are the positive criteria from the ladies’ perspective?

LH Money is always a big winner.

Alec Ash: That’s a long running criticism of the show, that it promotes money worship. Do you feel some of your fellow contestants are just looking for rich guys?

LH Oh, yeah. There’s a lot of subtle things that they look for. Because they’re never going to state how much money he actually makes. There’s a rule about that now, and it’s been toned down. But in the video spots [about the male contestant’s lifestyle], you notice how many guys are driving a car. It’s because they want to show you what kind of car they have. Or if there are scenes inside their house with friends, they can display things. Or a guy might say his favourite food is something ridiculously expensive.

MP Whereas in my video I was buying jianbing and riding a big scooter, so hardly a flashy lifestyle.

Alec Ash: Are there any other topics off limits for direct discussion?

LH There are definitely some topics you’re asked not to talk about – politically sensitive things, like if someone is from an ethnic minority, or anything superstition related. You’re not supposed to talk about your astrological sign, or which Chinese year you were born in, because there are pre-conceived notions that if you were born in this year, this is what your personality is like and you and I are a good fit together. Also, you’re not supposed to talk about religion.

Alec Ash: Is there anything else you feel viewers don’t know about FCWR?

LH People do give tips and suggestions, and the show is structured, but a lot of people assume that we know everything about the other contestants, or that we’ve been given lines to say. It’s really not fake like some people think. From beginning to end it’s all real – they don’t even take a break in between guys. They just cut out little bits and pieces.

MP For me, I felt they hardly cut anything. They also tell you, don’t get phased if girls turn their lights off. They say, there are all kinds of weird reasons for turning your light off. So when someone says why they don’t like you, the Chinese reaction is just to say xie xie and move on, which is a dynamic I suspect you would see less on Take Me Out [the British version of the show].

Alec Ash: Are you allowed to date outside the show?

LH You’re not supposed to. We had to sign something.

Alec Ash is a writer in Beijing. This interview also appears on his group blog the Anthill.

I don’t generally post news on the Anthill, as it’s designed for narrative writing and there are too many China news aggregators anyway. But this is breaking news I discovered myself and have to share: the municipal authorities for the Gulou area of central Beijing have, as of midnight last night, made riding fixed gear bicycles in the area against the law.

I found this out last night when out on the town with a friend who was wheeling his fixie down Guloudongdajie. A policeman stopped us, inspected the front of my friend’s bike, then shook his head and said we were to come with him. At the police station on Baochao hutong, he pointed out a notice plastered outside, outlining the new regulation.

We couldn’t believe our eyes. Fixies have been made illegal due to “safety concerns,” and there is a 500 RMB fine for riding one in the Dongcheng district. We badgered the policeman for more information, and he (grudgingly) fetched someone else who told us that fixies were not safe (“不安全”) because of their simpler mechanism with no gears and no brakes.

This is patently ridiculous for so many reasons. For starters, it’s only a certain kind of fixed gear bike that doesn’t have brakes. But that’s beside the point. If you’re going to pass a law to protect cyclers, make it mandatory to wear a bloody helmet and have bike lights. It’s like addressing food safety concerns by outlawing eating while walking down the street.

Frankly, this seems directed at the expat population. Fixed gear bicycles are popular in this area of Beijing, and mostly among foreigners. There’s a store on Wudaoying hutong which specialises in them. Poor guys, I guess they’ll be “asked to tea.” What will Beijing’s hipsters be reduced to? Are they going to outlaw Fei Yue trainers next? Or maybe brunch?

I asked the policeman if there was anywhere else this regulation was in force. Yes, the policeman said. The French concession in Shanghai. If anyone is in Shanghai, could you confirm this?

My friend wrangled his way out of the fine by arguing he wasn’t riding the bike but walking it along the street. But this is disturbing news. Everyone please be careful, and leave your fixie at home today.

Alec Ash, a writer and freelance journalist in Beijing, is the founder of the Anthill.

UPDATE, 11:59 pm: 愚人节快乐!

Reflections on how China has changed in two years

As with dog years, so is it with China years – one here is equivalent to several most places else. They just fit more in. When it comes to pace of change, no-one else holds a candle really.

I’ve been out of China for two years. For a dog, that’s ten human years, and you could argue the rate for China is about the same. It’s like leaving London shortly after the millenium and coming back for the Olympics. Recognisable, but look closer and you notice all the new things.

It’s the same with people. In two China years someone will have moved town three times, burned through as many businesses, got married, had a kid, got divorced and become incredibly fat. That’s what I heard happened to one old friend I thought I used to know, anyway.

Blessed with this time-traveller’s freshness of perspective, here are my first impressions of what has changed – and what hasn’t – now that I’m back in town for the long run.

Merry Christmas to you all, and a happy end of the world …

What’s changed?

1. Yes, there are lots of new buildings

Let’s start with the obvious. If you go out of any Chinese city for two years, the skyline is going to look very different when you come back. There’s nothing like walking down a once familiar street to drive home that China’s growth rates are a physical thing, not just a percentage number. Even more striking than Beijing’s new high-rises was a return trip to Xining, capital of China’s Western Qinghai province. When I emerged from a newly built train station out to the west of the city, the taxi ride into the centre took me past row upon row of huge orange housing blocks, all glisteningly alike and no more than plans on a developer’s table two years ago. There must have close to a hundred of them. It was, frankly, awe-inspiring. If you haven’t heard of Xining now, you will have in ten years.

2. Higher prices

Twelve yuan for a haircut! Four yuan for a bottle of beer! You cannot be serious! Alright, it was only eight yuan and three yuan two years ago, but there are more punishing price hikes than paying a dollar more for a bowl of noodles. An apartment in Beijing costs 50,000 RMB per square meter and rising. The price of petrol, gas, water, electricity are all going up faster than salary hikes, while taxes are as various and burdensome as ever. Unsurprisingly, when I ask “the man on the street” (yes, taxi drivers) what he thinks has changed in the last few years, this is the one he moans about first.

3. Higher expectations

Along with a higher price of living come higher expectations of what to get back from your society and government. This is noticeable on a large scale – “n.i.m.b.y” or anti-corruption protests are only getting more frequent, bold and urban – and on an individual level, where a new middle class and online commentariat is versing itself in the jargon of rights and democracy with a small d. This might sound vague, because it’s an impression more than an observation – especially among China’s young generation, whereas their parents grew up learning only what they can give to their nation, not what their nation can give to them.

4. People are getting angrier

Tempers are running higher along with skylines, prices and expectations – partly as a result of the last going largely unmet. Take the anti-Japan protests last summer, in the wake of the Diaoyu islands curfuffle. What began as nationalist outrage at Japan’s gumption ended with Chinese trashing Hyundais on the street, regardless that they were driven by other Chinese. That’s not focused protest, that’s directionless anger finding a pressure valve. Without political representation, and with certain topics off limits, flash protest, hopeless petitioning and the ever-ubiquitous Sina Weibo are the only outlets for a population increasingly mad as hell and not going to take it any more.

5. Yunnan food is in

And Sichuan food is out. Long time ago. Honestly, get with it. Yunnan food is possibly also out by the time this is published. Maybe baby cucumbers from Guangxi are hot now. Has Beijing (and presumably Shanghai) always burnt through trends this quickly? Quite possibly. Part of it is that before I was living in an “uncool” student area, and am now in the heart of the hutongs, where sports bars and wifi cafés sprout and die like snowdrops. But it’s clear that China’s international cities are only getting trendier and more modern, attracting foreigners – they’re everywhere! – and creating ever more Chinese hipsters.

What’s the same?

1. The bloody internet

Again to begin with one of the first things you notice having been out of the country – getting onto Facebook is still a pain in the ass. In fact, this could sit in the first category, as it’s become even harder. Many of the VPNs (virtual private networks) that are the easiest way to “climb the wall” have themselves been blocked, especially during the 18th Party congress – and incoming propaganda chief Liu Qibao is talking of further tightening the noose, making a morning’s procrastination a real ordeal. Still, internet control is just one symptom of the next big thing not to have changed.

2. Erm, the government

By which I don’t mean the Party still being in power, but that its character is unaltered. The same instinct towards suppression over candour. The same tin ear for public communication. The same bureaucratic mindset. More officials who take bribes and keep mistresses than you can count. Also the same steady, technocratic and efficient approach to improving conditions in China – albeit with certain no-go areas that might threaten the Party – against a rack of challenges. For those who think China’s new leadership might bring new things, including political reform, there isn’t much to base that hope on.

3. It’s still all about me

It might strike you that between rising public anger, the intractability of the system and new communication platforms such as Weibo, something could be brewing. Indeed, all it would take is one of those thousands of mass protests to take place in Beijing and it’s suddenly a nationwide crisis. But listen to people’s complaints and they are all solipsistic – unaffordable property prices/miscarriage of justice/corruption/local environmental degradation is a bad thing if it affects me, but if it doesn’t why should I worry about it?

4. People still spit in the street

And drop trash anywhere. And smoke inside where they’re not meant to. And cut queues. And jostle others aside in a crowded bus. And bike the wrong way down the street. And drive the wrong way down the street. And (while we’re here) the air pollution is just as bad. And the food can be just as unsafe. And attitudes in the countryside can be just as backwards. And life in the city can be just as merciless. I could go on. Don’t be fooled by the bright lights of Shanghai’s skyline – most of China is as much a messy smorgasbord of unlivability as it ever was, and will be for a while as it continues to develop.

5. But we still love it

Or I do at least. China as it goes into the twenty teens feels as much a new frontier as ever. It’s precisely this pace of change that makes it such an exciting place to live in and write about – which is why it attracts such a vibrant community of foreign journalists, bloggers and authors. It’s a cliché, but a true one: there’s a story around every corner here.

And yes, the noodle soup and dumplings around the corner are as tasty as they always were.

Alec Ash, a writer and freelance journalist in Beijing, is the founder of the Anthill. His previous piece that appeared on Beijing Cream was “A Thangka of Blood,” about Tibet.

In this first piece, “A Thangka of Blood,” originally published November 11, Alec Ash sends a dispatch from Tibet that is devoid of politicization or sentimentality, one of the best that I’ve encountered. “In particular I dislike the term self-immolation, which is widely used,” he writes. “’70 self-immolations’ does nothing to inspire the fitting emotional response, and as such is no better than Orwell’s vilified euphemisms. Call it what it is – killing yourself with fire.”

A thangka of blood

Alec Ash is a writer and freelance journalist currently living in Beijing. He is the founder of the Anthill.