Out with the Cleaning Lady & In with the Spaniard
Trip Start
Dec 2007
1
21
41
Trip End
Aug 2008
Beijing,
China
Friday, February 8, 2008
It was a day of many monumental challenges. The 1st, waking up to having no operating toilets. This is the first thing I notice, at 4:33 am. I know this because a clock in the bathroom mocks me every day from its perch above one of the dueling sinks. These are high tech toilets with a button on the top and high powered flushing mechanisms, except this morning, it is a poor clink and a weak splash. I check the sinks to see if the water is off, but the slashing liquid readily flows from every tap in the house. I really don't wait to disturb my real estate agent, Annie again during the holiday, but what can I do... Remember this is the first thing...4:33 am. At around 5:45, I decide to use the other toilet for a similar purpose, thinking it might work...um, no.
So I go back to sleep...only to be jolted from my sleep with a pounding on my door. At first it is a doorbell, which is a very light tinkle, like a muted wind chime inside a cloud. I chose to ignore this... Next is a soft, almost apologetic, uninspired tap of a single knuckle on the wooden door. Again, nothing to respond to... Then there is a real knock... The kind of knock that is often followed by the words, "Police Department." It is a rhythmic beat that resembles a Caribbean Calypso or Reggae, although a little more violent. This requires two immediate actions. The first is to check the most evil of all Chinese alarm clocks for a time reference and the other is to find a pair of jeans to pull on over the boxers. The clocks says 8:48, but the jeans aren't as eager to join in and help out in this situation...
Normally, the disrobed clothing of the day before heads to one of two places...the laundry hamper (sometimes) or the floor beside the bed (more likely.) Every two-legged garment, however, has found their way to hidden locations within the apartment. I scramble to the closet and find a pair of pajama bottoms hiding in the back. I wake them from their slumbers and quickly pull them over my feet and up my legs. By this time, the pounding is like a 25-hippy Burning Man drum circle beside the Hacky-Sack area. I have to believe both fists are now being employed on the outside portion of the entryway. I race to the door, and swing open the door to find a new, different cleaning woman standing there smiling. So much racket from such a small package. This isn't my super-model girlfriend, but a little older edition...probably in her late 40's. Attractive, but I have to admit I am missing my personal Hong Kong Film Star; a girl you might imagine being saved by Jackie Chan, back in the day when he made great films. You, know, the pretty shop girl from Police Story 2, (or is it 3 or 4), the one where he crashes through the room of the mall...something like that.
I retreat to my bedroom to make my bed now that I'm up, and she cleans. Then I suddenly remember both toilets are, well how do I say this, they are soiled...to extreme levels, if you know what I mean. She is dusting away in the living room, so I still have clear access before she gets to the bathrooms. I guess I shouldn't care that I had left a night deposit in both rooms, but I'd rather not have her think badly of me. I try the flush again, and still nothing. I hear her filling a bucket in the kitchen, so I know the water is working. As if a cartoon light bulb magically appears in a thought bubble over my head, I think...I can fill the toilets with tap water. So I start to dismantle the high tech toilets, which is quite a feat in itself...to find the reservoirs dry as a bone...a-ha! A quick fill with the flexible shower nozzle, and viola! Flush number one. Now I have to race to the other bathroom before she gets there. She is outside the door with a broom, I sneak in, as if I have to utilize the area, and she retreats back towards the kitchen. Now my dilemma is although there is a flexible showerhead hose in this bathroom, it is not long enough to reach the toilet. As I dismantle, I scheme... I figure, what the heck, there is a drain in the floor...I'll just try my best, and if water pours all over...it will dry. This nozzle has a switch that can turn the stream from a spray to pour, so I switch it to its "hose-like" setting and turn on the water. As the water pours into the tub, I do my best geometry calculations for angle and distance. I wish I remembered all those stupid Trig proofs... After a deep breath, I lift the showerhead and make an arch of water, and without more than three drops hitting a floor tile, the water finds its way directly into the top of the toilet water reservoir... I give at a good 15 second count and flip off the water. I take a look and the toilet is about three-quarters filled. I hit the super high tech flushing mechanism, and again...with a triumphant whoosh, great success. I celebrate wildly, with a nice "yeah!" until I remember that there is someone on the other side of this rather thin bathroom door. I'm sure she is now telling all her cleaning women friends..."Strange man...go bathroom...make shower go...then toilet go flush and he be cheering...Americans, so crazy."
So I go out to the living room to check emails, and she continues cleaning. After about 20 minutes she comes out to the living room and tries to make conversation with me. She says some things quietly in Chinese, and I obviously don't understand. She leaves and comes back with a calendar, and motions at the floor and then the calendar...this pantomime continues until I understand she wants to know how long I'll be staying in the apartment. I turn the pages to September. She then grabs my arm and pulls me into the second bedroom, and points at the bed. She looks into my eyes and smiles, pointing at the bed. I'm thinking, oh, how I wish this was the other super-model cleaning girl, as she makes the universal sign of sleeping, two hands, palms together pushed to the side of her head with eyes closed. I shake my head and point to the other bedroom..."I sleep there." She points to the bed...and then herself. Finally I get it...she wants to move in. She points at money and then makes sleeping motions again. I say no...which in Chinese is "are you freakin' kidding me?" She returns to her cleaning duties disappointed and me to my emails, then just few moments later I hear the pathetic sound of a the clinking toilet flushing mechanism. I hope she is only trying to flush away the cleaning suds, but unfortunately...no, she too must have had a big dinner. We're now at about 9:15 am...do you have time for this?
At roughly 10:00 am, I figure I have to call Annie, the real estate lady, and disturb her Spring Festival celebrations with her family. She answers right away, and is happy to help...as a matter of fact, she was coming over later anyway...yes, coming over to meet up with my new roommate when he arrives later today. What? Yes, she'll arraign it so the toilet repairman will be arrive in 15 minutes, and then she'll be by around 12:30...and my roommate should be in around 1...have a good day. The strange thing was I didn't even know the roommate thing was a done deal. I had emailed my HR department the day before regarding the empty bedroom in my place, but Elisha, my lovely HR contact was at home in Central China with her family and wouldn't be back until February 18th. I did expect to have a roommate, but I thought I might get some warning... Oh well, this way, there is no chance to stress about it. Now it is my turn to tidy up...trying to get all my stuff put into my room, and that there would be plenty of space for my new "roomie..."
Well, it turns out the toilets needed a water card update to operate, and that our reader was mistakenly swapped with the vacant apartment next door. So when Annie deposited our water credits (only the toilet water is paid for...is that strange? Perhaps it is a sewage charge?) the money went to the other apartment's account....so the workers flipped the card reading devices and now we have tons of water credits...literally. The water is paid for, not by the gallon, but by the ton, and a ton of water costs 1 yuan, which is about 16 cents.
Annie, arrives all dressed in a very fashionable winter outfit you might expect to see on Carrie Bradshaw, and is very happy to see me. She explains the toilet situation (which I already know), and then says she will be right back as there are three other people moving into apartments today, and she is meeting them in other buildings. Annie says, "I gave your roommate your cell phone number, so call me if he has any problems," and she leaves. Okay... About an hour later the door opens and in comes three guys...all three with suitcases. I hop up and say hello...everyone is very friendly, but I not sure who is who here. There are no names to go with the greetings. I say, "Hi, I'm Dick, nice to meet you." They collectively say, "Nice to meet you!" No clues what so ever. Which one is the roommate, which is the driver, and which is with the Apartment Complex, and no one is volunteering this information. All I know, suitcases are rolling in, and this group all seem to be best of friends... About 30 seconds later, Annie arrives and shakes everyone's hands, but none of these hand clasps seem any more meaningful, or any more introductory than any other. I do my best to stay out of the way and still try to determine who is who (is it whom is whom?). Annie, says, "this is your room..." and all three go in, and only one comes out. This one, a very tall light skinned, seemingly Scandinavian waves to me as he leaves, and I figure he is out of the mix. This leaves two possible contestants. Annie talks to them briefly and then they all reemerge into the living room. Annie while in mid-sentence motions towards me, "....and you have meet Richard?" They nod, and I try one more time to break the ice, as I over hear Annie say, "...oh, he is your brother? Nice." Brother? Two roommates? Okay, hold on. All this hits me before lunch...
I turns out Natxo (yes, it is pronounced Nacho...) is here helping his brother move to Beijing and will be staying for...well, at this point we don't know. After a few intros, I show the boys around the neighborhood. Both are roughly college aged. My Roommate, Fran, just graduated from University last May, and is from Madrid. He spent the last year in London learning English, working for a Telecommunications Company. Natxo is a University student who is studying Architecture. Both are incredibly nice, and incredibly jet-lagged. They are determined to stay up as late as possible to acclimate to the Beijing time zone, so we walk and walk, all around our Chaoyang District. I show them the grocery stores, the restaurants, and the bars, but they don't drink. How can you be a college student and not drink? We stop at the DVD shop and I pick up some movies to watch that night.
I'll cut this short (as you say, "too late for that, my friend...") but it is incredibly interesting to watch Michael Moore's documentary "Sicko" with a person from Spain, where they have universal health care and even University educations are guaranteed to every student at a very low cost. They can't believe what they are seeing, and they are shocked that my health insurance payments are what they are. Like children just discovering there is no Easter Bunny, these guys just can't comprehend that a country like the United States with its wealth and influence doesn't provide, what they consider basic, necessities to their people. We talk about the Spanish 40 hour maximum work week, their health care options, and I quickly find myself apologizing for my American pedigree. It isn't such a wonderful or appealing pronoun these days. Even more reason to hang the red banner, light the lanterns and set off the fireworks next February, or to work full time for a candidate next October...
