what i missed (games 1 thru 4)

most of what happened before my arrival involves deception and trickery

game #1

the english language schools in guilin sends their students to yongsheng to practice their english with tourists, and my nunchucks* were getting accosted quite a bit. since guilin hadn’t flooded yet, and they couldn’t use these agglomerations of people to ford any overflowing rivers, they decided to turn this potential inconvenience into a fabulous game called ‘let’s see how many students we can congregate around us at once’. i think they maxed out at about 14. they then used the quick dispersal tactic which is game #2

* friends

game #2

though i haven’t been here very long, one sentiment that the chinese population seems adhere to almost to a ‘stick’* is an intense hatred for the japanese, largely due to that little tiff colloquially known as ‘the nanjing massacre’**. fuller and alex thought they would riff on this by sporadically introducing oker to the locals as a japanese tourist. announcing this to the group of english students in yangshuo elicited a deafening group gasp. this game lost favour however during their train trip to guiyang, when they told it to some cute girls sitting beside them as a joke. flirtation quickly evaporated, and cool stares and disinterest were all that remained on the train ride.

*chop

**http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanking_Massacre

game #3

in a very un-cultural-revolution-y way, its currently uncouth in china to talk, look, or do anything else like a farmer. bourgeoise appearances are especially important to maintain when hitting the clubs. oker took this as an invitation to totally confound the guilin bar scene by dressing in complete farmer garb (rolled up pants, brown shirt, wide brimmed straw hat), and accessorizing with an obviously expensive massive camera, and an entourage of white devils*. he then proceeded to dance with all the foreign tourists, another faux pas for the locals. when he finally tried to enter the ranks of his blood brother and sisters it apparently sent them into scatter formation. that he was humping the air probably didn’t help.

*friends

game #4

the boys became so enamoured with the idea of bucolic generousity, that they decided they would visit someone’s home and get fed in every village they went to, regardless of whether it was offered voluntarily. this can be achieved using various ‘coaxing’ tactics, such as striking up casual conversation with a villager, and then kind of loitering around until the offer is made, or if the offer isn’t made just asking outright if you can visit their home. where conversation opportunities are scarce, just knocking on people’s doors (if they have a door) seems to work.

@oker: coaxed entry #1, yangshuo

@oker: coaxed entry #2, ping'an