Nice Day for a Red Wedding

7.22.2008

For the better part of last week Tracy conveniently reminded me that she was invited to a traditional Chinese wedding by her language exchange partner on Saturday. By Thursday I had realized that her "reminders" were subtle "can you please be my date because I feel obligated and I desperately don't want to go solo" requests. I in turn made very subtle agreements to go, mostly because if the situation was reversed I would ask the same of her, but also because I was pretty curious to see a Chinese wedding. By Friday morning I inquired additional information about this gathering and learned that the wedding STARTED at 10:58AM. No, that is not a typo, 10:58 is the official starting time. In China people are very superstitious, especially when it comes to numbers. I don't quite have a grasp on how much they truly buy into these silly beliefs, or if it is simply tradition. The Olympics begin on 08/08/08, at 8:08pm, and that is not a coincidence: eight is the mother of all lucky numbers here. So 10:58? "OK, where is the wedding?"

"I guess it takes about an hour and a half to get there, it is just outside of Beijing" Tracy replies.

"Ummmmmm..." Now I realize that I have to wake up early on my precious day off. I ask Tracy for a confirmation, "Did I ever actually TELL you I was going?"

"YES!!" she proclaimed.

"OK. I hate you."

Knowing I had to be up early, I still stayed out very late exploring the hutong of Beijing with friends because I'm, well, me. After a hardy five hours' sleep I woke up cursing Tracy. We hurriedly threw ourselves together for the wedding (what do you wear anyways?), hopped on our bikes, and headed to the subway. We took the subway further north than I had ever been, which was quite eye opening for me: wow, Beijing is really, really big, and even out here, there are still a million people in every direction. After reaching our stop, our directions told us to take a bus. Yeah right, which bus? Which direction? We're running late. Let's catch a cab, it can't be that far from here. No cabs. Awesome. We reluctantly opted to take a "black" cab, which are essentially just old guys who are sitting idly at such locations hoping to profit off of poor saps like ourselves. We are particularly perfect victims for these characters, as we're foreign, naive, and don't speak the language. We point to out our destination written in Chinese characters to the driver, he seems to recognize it and says "Zou ba." (Let's go). We ask "Duo shao qian?" (How much money?) "San shi kuai," (30 yuan) he replies. We agree.

So here we are, deep in the outskirts of Beijing, in this strange man's unmarked "taxi," no air conditioning, stifling hot, stuck in traffic, with the future of our existence on planet Earth in this man's hands. Might sound a bit nerve-racking to the novice, but this is life in China-- doesn't even phase us. We finally break out of traffic and hit the highway. It is quite rural and pleasantly green. With faster speeds comes natural cooling, our moods are up as we curiously stare at our surroundings.

After a solid 15 minutes on the highway, he suddenly pulls off... and starts asking random people on bicycles for assistance to find our desired location. Great. He has no idea where he is going. Not understanding most of the language, Tracy and I have the pleasure of predicting our immediate fate through body language, facial expressions, gestures, and the few Chinese words we know. The shaking of the head is a universal "no." Combine this gesture with "bu ji dao" (don't know), and we become more unsettled with every attempt our driver makes to find our way. After more wrong turns and more questions asked, it seems like we're finally heading in the right direction. We are on small rural roads without many signs of civilization. Where is this freakin' wedding? Who gets married out here? I'm hot, hungry, and grumpy. Seriously, why am I in this car, in this field, in the back of this seat right now? How did 26 years of a life lived lead up to this very moment? Tracy, I hate you.

We finally find a road that the driver recognizes and drive into a large resort of sorts with a very large restaurant/special event center that is essentially a over-sized tin barn with some classically Chinese cheesy decor inside. We enter at 11:30ish-- well past ten fifty-EIGHT. Upon entering, Tracy and I simultaneously realize something via the look on the fuwuyuan's (waitress/service person) face: omg, we are going to be the only foreigners at this extremely large wedding. By now T and I are very used to standing out amongst a crowd of black-topped heads and dark eyes, but the dynamic would be very different here. How many foreigners have EVER been in this building? And how many foreigners ever go to traditional Chinese weddings? Making matters worse, we're late. Not only are we "those" people straggling in late to the most important day of your friend's life, we're also foreign. What should we do? What next? We tentatively approach the event area where we can see the bride and groom on a large stage, an MC of sorts having them perform random things in front of a large crowd seated at circular tables filled with food, beer, and liquor. Maybe we can sneak to some seats during a break in the procedures? Is there assigned seating? What should we do? Just then the bride spots Tracy and I and waves to us, giving us a "come in and sit motion" which causes a scene as all eyes were on her. 200 Chinese people simultaneously look our way, realize that we aren't Chinese, and stare curiously at us as the bride's sister escorts us to our presumably assigned seats. We're sat next to the bride's twin sisters, who speak some broken English to us. All eyes are still on us when they are supposed to be on the bride and groom. Awkward.

The rest of the ceremony was interesting. We were practically force-fed large amounts of food and pijio (beer), the Chinese people at our table (and some from other tables) who could speak English curiously struck up conversation with us, we were asked (forced) to take tons of photos with people we didn't know, I flirted with a fuwuyuan or two, and Tracy and I assumed our usual roles as people of great interest. All was good-- until we met "that guy."

We all know "that guy" at the wedding. You know: the drunkard. Now we weren't particularly surprised to meet "that guy" because everyone inevitably has to meet "that guy" at every wedding. What made "that guy" particularly memorable was the fact that he was American. Yup, that's right: "that guy" was also "foreigner number three." As we met, I felt a bit of tension between T and I and him. You see, our existence at this gathering was mutually threatening. There is no way T and I are going to let some other dude steal our thunder. We are The Foreigners here, thank-you-very-much. It is one thing to have your thunder stolen, it's another to have it stolen by "that guy." Come to find out, "that guy" is from San Diego and both him and Tracy are UCSD alumni. Even in a city of 17 million, the world still seems small. Through drunken slurs we unfortunately learned a bit more about this guy's past, and even more unfortunately were constantly reminded of "how drunk he is" and "how the Chinese men made him drink the baijio (liquor)." From here we learned additional fascinating insights such as "English teachers get ripped off in China," "you should learn Mandarin if you live here," "there is a lot of money to be made in China, especially if you are a Westerner," "if you need a good job I can totally hook you up" (goes for business card, doesn't have one), and finally, the kicker: "I'm friends with Jackie Chan." Drunk Chinese men fight for our respective foreign statuses to get us in their individual and group shots. Here I am, extremely tired, in the middle of nowhere, smiling, posing, and throwing up peace-signs with a bunch of random Chinese people drunk on pijio, baijio, and love. Welcome to China.

When the photo requests began dying down and the crowds started to thin, T and I let the bride know that we wanted to head home. She graciously arranges a ride for us, a ride that is to take us all the way home into the city! Awesome. Finally caught a break... right? Nope, this is China. We quickly learn that one of our co-passengers for this journey is.........drum roll please: yup, you guessed it, "that guy." Just when things couldn't get any worse, we realize that in addition to that guy, our ride-home party has now recruited "that girl." Now this was the first time I've seen a Chinese "that girl," but for the most part, she was tame. As you could easily guess, "that guy" thought that "that girl" was attractive, and as we climbed into the back seat of the tiny vehicle, "that guy" thought it was necessary to let T and I know that he had every intention of taking "that girl" home. As the door slammed, locking T and I into the backseat with "TG and TGr," if you could be inside my head at this very moment you would hear "take me to a happy place, take me to a happy place" on repeat.

The backseat dialog was unfathomably less articulate than previous conversations. Aside from literally repeating everything he told us at the wedding a short half hour ago, "TG" went on to elaborate on how his friends know Jackie Chan and how important it is to learn Chinese if you live here. He then goes on to display his impeccable Mandarin skills by flirting with "TGr" in the front seat. She acts not interested; I want to die. However, we're well on our way home and we can almost see the light at the end of the tunnel. "TG" has successfully bummed and lit a cigarette (quite the feat) and we're temporarily relieved of his drunken rants. Just then, "TGr" motions and yells for the driver to pull over. She hops out and proudly re-displays all the fine wedding cuisine and liquor for all of 5th Ring Road to see. After involuntarily puking, she continues on by sticking her finger down her throat. "TG" rushes out to comfort her; she wants nothing to do with him. While she continues to projectile, "TG" and the driver hover around her for support. Meanwhile, I grab Tracy's camera and start taking photos of the scene-- at this point, I might as well have fun with the situation. After a nice zoomed shot of "TGr" puking, Tracy reminds me that I'm going to hell.

Ten minutes pass and it is now obvious that "TGr" is so sick that she is REFUSING to jump back into the car. I tell Tracy: "OK, I'm hailing a cab and if we get one, you're paying for the entire fare home." Without daring to disagree Tracy concurs. Luckily it takes only a few minutes for me to flag one down (we're on the highway still so there aren't many cabbies), we wave goodbye to our comrades, say insincere "nice to meet you's" to "TG" and we're off. We debrief in the back of the taxi and try to pick up the pieces. I remind Tracy of how much I hate her and that she is eternally in debt to me. Within minutes I've fallen asleep with my head against the back window. I awaken to see we are in our neighborhood and am a bit dehydrated and disoriented. Tracy pays the cab fare (50 yuan) and -- after all we've been through -- informs me that she "snapped some great shots" of me sleeping in the cab. Awww, yes, that's what siblings are for.

Another day, another yuan. Welcome to China.

-C