Out on the Town: Beyond the Glory

Today is an interesting holiday here in China. While the US is celebrating Veteran's day on November 11th, China will be celebrating a more light hearted festival in "Bachelor's day." It is a holiday to honor all those who are single. After all it's 11/11 and with all those ones it's got to be for singles, haha! Am I right, eh? Get it!? Hehe, sighhhh...

There really is absolutely no celebration for bachelor's day. From what I can gather the only traditions surrounding the holiday are everyone laughing when you mention it, and single girls wandering off to the supermarket to buy pounds of ice cream to console themselves through another year without a man. The holiday does not, as I origianally thought, symbolize some sort of more open view towards the merits of being single, or a reflection on some of the problems that the institution of marriage faces in modern society. It is more just a game with numbers(11/11) in order to subtly let all the college students or people 24-27 know that their biological clocks are ticking and they should jump on the marriage train ASAP. Universities in China don't allow their students to get married, saying they are too young, and yet by the time you get to be my age (28) people are marvelling at the fact that your single and are wondering if you'll ever be able to get married(once you watch the video's below you might be wondering that yourself). I have been amazed to see a whirlwind transformation that has occurred with so many different young Chinese people that takes them from being one of my students, who can't cook for themselves, calls their mother for every decision they make and wear pants with glitter on them, to a woman(most of my students are girls) with a formal long black coat, dress shoes, a job, a husband, and a BABY in just two to three short years. Actually it's not so much amazing as it is frightening.


But anyway, I thought that I would embrace the lonely atmosphere surrounding bachelor's day and show everyone a different side to the night life in Shandong. The past few months I have been showing clips and pictures of rocking parties, crazy dinners, and marriages with thousands of people and lakes of Baijiu. But the truth of the matter is that not every weekend sees me performing songs, tossing ganbeis around with nameless bastards, or sitting next to drunken seventy year olds who won't talk with me. Actually there are many weekends where I barely interact with anybody other than superkmarket clerks. The truth is that at the beginning of the year everyone and their mother wants to get to know you, hang out with you, and introduce you to their 13-16 year old son who wants to learn English, but by the time old bachelor's day roles around, people are too caught up with their jobs, friends and personal lives, and just don't have the time that they used to in order to pretend to be your friend. So let me take you through a more common Saturday night routine that occurs every so often here, a scene that looks a lot like this...

How else do you think I perfect those silky smooth Chinese pop songs that keep the students swooning? Looks like I got a little bit of an itch there, can't figure that one out. Though after a while the scene turns rougher...

Oh YEAH, THATS RIGHT, I was just itching for my daily shot of soybean oil!! And for all those of you who don't believe that I just really took a shot of Soybean oil, you can all go straight to hell.

There it is, the raw truth of going out in these parts. Beyond all of the hype and glory of the Halloween parties, and television shows, there are the nights where I just sit in my computer room alone, drink crappy beer and soybean oil, and sing bad pop songs. Happy bachelor's day everyone!!! Remember, if you're ever feeling bored that vegetable oil is a great substitute for soybean oil.