I love living here in China. I love the excitement, I love the change, and I love the chaos and commotion. I love feeling like the world is churning around me and I am a part of it, and for that I am truly grateful. Having said that, I think sometimes it’s easy to feel a bit defeated living in a big city and even China in general. There are certain things however, culturally, that don’t happen quite as often in Western countries. Most of the time we quietly adapt, but sometimes it’s annoying. Expats complain about things like queue jumping in stores. We finally learn, after a while, that if you leave more than 8 cm between you and the person in front of you, three people will squeeze their way in. I always find it hilarious how Westerners tend to relax a bit when going to places like Western grocery stores where they can stand back a tad and actually enjoy “personal space.” However, you learn never to let your guard down or you will quickly be taken by surprise.

The other day at April Gourmet, there were 6 of us standing in a line. I saw that there was way too much space in between us; we should have known better. We all have our grocery baskets on the floor and are patiently waiting for the register. Out comes this fifteen year old kid with some obvious sense of entitlement, who simply saunters up with his milk to the front of the register. The older French woman, being polite, simply huffs but says nothing, the lady at the counter says nothing, and the guy checked out first.

This happens so many times with the taxis in China that I have begun to lose count. As everyone knows, you can be standing in the rain for an hour, and have 10 people standing 5 feet away from you, after noticing by the sogginess and desperation in your eyes that you have been standing there for quite some time. In dog-eat-dog fashion etiquette, they will plow past you, knocking you over practically into the muddy trenches of the China streets to take your taxi.

But sometimes, just sometimes, you decide you will not take it anymore, and you throw all the chivalry and polite conduct your parents tried to instill in you to the wind. And it feels pretty good. This takes a few months of living in China before you can actually build up the courage to throw all good mannered behavior to the wind. But desperate times call for desperate measures.

Commuting during rush hour traffic 45 minutes away is, needless to say, an exhausting endeavor on a daily basis. Sometimes you can wait 2, 5, or 25 minutes for a taxi in the morning. Most of the time the taxis are full, or sometimes, as baffling as it seems, they refuse to pick you up by pretending they don't see you frantically waving your arms, briefcase in hand, sparkled eyes with muffled hope focused in their direction. But they pass on by.

 

This morning it was a crisp Beijing day, on many other days I had also been waiting for fifteen minutes or so for the taxi, only to have it blatantly hijacked by someone who came out 2 minutes earlier. When I flagged the taxi down, they would swoop in Jackie-Chan style into the front seat before I could protest, and sped away in my precious taxi. This morning I waited, and waited, watching hopelessly as the taxis passed by filled with other work bound people. I noticed out of the corner of my eye a couple emerges from behind me. It was painfully apparent I was headed to work as I had my briefcase and computer bag crumpling my left shoulder. The man crept up, not 3 feet to my left, and the woman ambled up from behind, and positioned herself not ten feet from my pervious taxi stakeout position. My eyes squinted into little slits as I realized what she thought she was going to do. No, I don’t think so! You, Missy, shall NOT steal my taxi that I have been patiently waiting for 15 minutes. Sure enough, several taxis passed, I held my arm out, and so did she. She looked back at me, I glared at her. In the distance a bit down the road we saw a taxi, shiny red “AVAILABLE” sign flipped down nicely in the center of the windshield like a light at the end of the tunnel. I stood out into the road, situating myself and ready to pounce. I held my arm out, so did she, and the taxi slowed to a stop in between us. I ran for it, she quickly tried to get in front of the passenger door and motioned to her friend to come over. No, I think not. With lighting speed, I leapt between her and the passenger side door as she stepped back, glaring into my eyes. “WO DI YI GE, I am first! I am going to work,” I snarled as I NFL-shoulder-butted her out of the way with my big bulky brief case. She yipped back, stunned at my assertiveness. Success! I ripped open the door and tumbled inside as the taxi driver watched in amusement.

I sat there cackling to myself as I tried to give him the address, not wanting to use my peripheral vision to see the griping woman gesticulating towards me in obvious discontent. The taxi chuckled at me, as I explained that I had been there waiting forever and I wasn’t going to let her just steal my taxi! He laughed, shaking his head and giving me the thumbs up, “hen bang!” - very cool, he remarked as we sped away. Yes, it is these moments when you unfortunately must stand up for yourself or you will get walked over. If not, you have no one to blame but yourself. And you can only pity and hate your own politeness to a certain extent before you fight back, and are victorious. He who quietly lyth downeth will beith loudly walked uponith!

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