Articles Written by Our International Teachers

Falls in Love With Yangzhou

by Suzy Hampton Ed.D
Joined since: 2003 - Present

Origin: Montana, U.S.A.

We met in the cafeteria and walked to just outside the school gates to catch the number four bus, they in their long, pointy-toed stylish boots and I in my square-toed flat-heeled comfortable ones, all three of us about the same height.

Pamper Day began with a visit to the Catholic Church in town. I went with Gyu, an Indonesian 23-year-old English teacher here, and Judy, a Chinese teacher of English and Headmaster Dr. Wang Xiuwen’s right hand, whose 25th birthday we were celebrating. The high-ceilinged church was lovely, recently refurbished, with all the interior structure elements painted a beautiful but surprising Chinese red. The priest chanted and sang with a pleasing voice, and the 40 or so worshippers didn’t stare too much at this foreigner. Toward the end, we all sang “What a Friend we have in Jesus,” everyone but me in Chinese, a hymn comforting to me because it was my favorite hymn when I was a young Lutheran girl growing up in Minnesota. At the back of the church, resting on the floor but about hand high, was a big red wooden box with a slit in the top and the words, in big letters, “ Feeling Box.” I meant to but didn’t slip some money inside. Next time.

Gyu wanted to get her hair cut, so we went to the head massage/shampoo place near the center of the town and the big pagoda in the middle of the wide street. I told Judy I would buy her a shampoo as a birthday treat, so we all took off our coats and put them, along with our purses, into a locker. Judy put the bracelet with the key around her wrist and we took seats in front of the mirrors. Many, many young workers in maroon long-sleeved, v-necked thermal t-shirts scurried around…more workers than clients it seemed, though most of the chairs were full. We were each given a paper-thin clear plastic glass of warm water to drink during the process. After tying a smock on me and putting several towels around my neck, my masseuse/hair-washer Rose got busy. She first squirted some shampoo in the middle of the top of my head and then began to work outward and down, adding water when necessary to work up a lather. Then she rubbed and stroked and pressed hard on certain points and nearly fondled my ears in a most satisfying way for maybe twenty minutes. I closed my eyes and wanted to purr. I might have slept, but Judy and Gyu and I continued to visit and giggle; it was difficult to hear, though, because of the loud popular Chinese music playing in the foreground. After I had been sufficiently lathered, I was moved to a reclining lounge chair where my neck rested in an indent just like at a salon at home and my head fell over a basin and more massaging and rinsing began. Back to the original chair where my glasses and earrings waited for more of the same, but this time I rested my head on a folded towel on a small counter in front of the mirror and the rubbing continued on my back and arms. By now, maybe forty-five minutes had passed. I was asked if I wanted to have my hair dried, and because it was still cold outside, I said yes. I later found that meant styled (and cost an extra five yuan), and I was led to another chair where Sam (the same name as my haircutter at home!) got busy with a dryer and a comb and made me beautiful. For Judy and me both, and she had her long hair styled, too, the cost was thirty yuan, or about $3.75 U.S.

The pampering feeling and being with two other giggling young women (well…the “other” part of this sentence applies to the giggling only, not the young) gave me the idea to treat us all for facials somewhere. I’d never had one myself, and it seemed appropriate to make a whole day of it. So to celebrate Judy’s birthday and Gyu’s, too, which won’t be until August, I suggested we do so. But first, we had to have lunch!

We three hailed a pedicab (the three-wheeled bicycle with the covered place to sit in the back with space for two, but Judy sat on Gyu’s lap and I held Judy’s heavy purse containing GRE preparation books she is studying at odd moments such as when we waited for Gyu to finish her haircut) to a restaurant, just down from McDonalds and the eight yuan DVD store and the dumpling chain where Martha and I had dinner the day before, so I could get sweet bean soup and the long fried pastries to dunk. We could order from a menu of photos, but Judy was treating (a custom in both Indonesia and China, I was told, the opposite of in the U.S. on your birthday) so Gyu and I each chose one item and Judy picked the rest. When the food came, I had my favorite sweet warm bean soup (like milk, only flavored with soy bean and a little sugar…) and pastry, along with some of the communal dishes of dumplings, fried noodles, rice with little chunks of flavored beef, a spicy soy-bean soup, another soup with little meat balls, tea, and I know I am forgetting something.

We walked to Times Square, an upscale shopping center, where I thought there might be a good salon for a facial, but Judy knew of another place, so we all three piled into a pedicab, same seating arrangement. The new place was just down from the small pagoda. (I’m beginning to know my way around down-town, though it’s not easy to tell one area from another when I can’t read any of the signs. Not being able to read really makes me sympathetic with adults who cannot. What a handicap.)

On the ground floor, people were getting the same hairwashing/massage treatment we had already received (though a sign in the window for something, I assume this, said 20 yuan, twice as much as our other place). We climbed up the stairs, a little nervous because we didn’t know what to expect…well, I, anyway, was a little nervous. We were asked if we wanted a pedicure, too, and I decided what the heck, we might as well go whole hog, so we were shown into a very small room that conveniently had three chairs, rather hard, but sort of padded slightly and reclining a bit. We took off our shoes and socks and sat down. We were to be on the second floor of this salon for what turned out to be more than three hours.

Soon three women appeared carrying three big wooden buckets with heavy plastic bags in them containing very hot brownish water. I asked Judy what was in the water and she said Chinese herbs. The water was reheated throughout when a fourth woman would appear with a big thermos to add more very hot water. We soaked our feet for a spell and giggled some more, until a woman returned to give only me a pedicure (a “bonus” for me, Judy said…for them, the foot treatment was just a soak, a massage and oils). First one foot and then the other and the woman did something like maybe cleaning my toenails, I didn’t know, and then she put away her tools and was done, and I said I thought she was going to cut my toenails but there had been no clippers so I figured she hadn’t, but she reached down and held up a knife-like tool and also a toe-nail clipping. Unbeknownst to me, she had been trimming my nails the whole time with a knife! Yikes! I’m glad I didn’t know! It turned out that a pedicure didn’t involve polish, or at least not that day for that price, so I’m on my own there. Then came maybe a half hour of foot massage and some kind of snapping my toes with her fingers, and lots of oil, and then we put on our socks and some slippers they provided and schlepped to the next small room where the three beds were conveniently empty.

We each stretched out on a bed, our heads resting on yellow towels, and were covered with thick comforters. Additional towels were put over our clothes around our necks, and all tucked in we giggled and waited for what came next. What followed was about two hours…well, maybe not quite that long, but it seemed like it…of first washing, then oils and creams and steam and finally a clay or mud or something mask, covered with saran wrap for heating, and much massaging and rubbing and tender care. I woke myself several times with what I hope were only gentle snores. It all ended with massaging of my neck and upper back and arms and finally, another glass of warm water in a paper-thin plastic cup. The cost for all three of us was 480 yuan, or about $60 US, and that included one return visit for another facial for me. I am certain my face looked younger when I left, and I know I felt younger.

By now, it was five in the afternoon, the streets packed with people and bicycles and cars and pedicabs and busses as they had been all day. We decided not to end the day yet, but we weren’t quite hungry enough for dinner, so Judy suggested a movie. We walked back to Times Square and a theater where Mona Lisa Smile was playing, and luckily for us, just beginning. Gyu bought us each a black pearl sweet bean drink and Judy bought tickets (remember, it was her birthday!) and lightly sugared (no salt) popcorn, so we were ready. Only problem was that the movie was not in English with Chinese subtitles, as I had expected, but rather dubbed in Chinese with no subtitles. Although it was strange to hear Julia Roberts speaking Chinese, I could follow the general plot, especially with Judy filling me in every now and then. Later, I explained about how things were for women “in those days,” and about the main choices available for me, graduating from high school in 1957. The theater, by the way, was modern, comfortable, and beautiful.

But the day wasn’t over yet! Though it was now nearing 7:30 and Judy had a meeting back at school at 9:00, we hadn’t yet had dinner. (Sometimes, it seems all I do here is eat. If the school uniform for which I was measured last week doesn’t come soon, it will have to be altered!) We walked a block or so to have Judy’s favorite dinner of hot pot. The sidewalk in front of the first hot pot place was full of people waiting, so we went to another one just a door away. This is hot pot restaurant street! Judy ordered and bought…it’s expensive to go out with friends on your birthday! Our table had a big hole in the middle with a burner at the bottom. The waiter set in the hole a big divided pot filled with broth and various seasonings…one side really hot and spicy and the other not…and turned on the burner, and soon the broth was bubbling. Judy had ordered various uncooked foods…cilantro, another green leafy vegetable, thinly sliced rolled up pieces of beef and lamb, some wonderful little balls of maybe dough and mushrooms, and some things I’m not now remembering, all of which to cook in the broth and then pick out with chopsticks and eat. We also had dumplings (my favorite), they shared a box of liquid yogurt, and I had a Qingdao beer. Gyu took photos, and by resting her digital camera on a small tripod, was able to capture all three of our happy faces in one photograph. I treasure it.

We took a cab home, just in time for Judy’s meeting…(but she didn’t bargain with the cab driver, and it cost 19 yuan rather than the 12 or maybe 13 that Martha had bargained the night before…8 yuan equal approximately $1 US). And that was yet another perfect day in China…new friends, many laughs, great food and conversation, and a lengthy, exciting adventure!