Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Century Mart girl

So I've now been in China for about a month and a half and I am starting to feel serious about making friends.  I have made a handful of friends but nobody I regularly do anything with (except for my roommates, who are American).  Basically...if I don't make 100 friends by next week I really don't deserve to be alive.

This girl I am about to mention was an employee of one of the stores in a mall that happens to connected to a Century Mart grocery store (otherwise I just might not be in the mall).  Upon exiting Century Mart and entering the mall, the girl I am now mentioning looked at me and smiled a very curious, welcoming smile.  I looked at her for a while and smiled back, naturally.  I believe that's what you do when someone smiles, but I smile at people here when they look at me for more than a few seconds, and often their faces remain frozen.  But let me now get back on task...

I went walking around some more and later on saw her walking and she looked at me and smiled again, following me with her eyes, repeatedly glancing back.  Her look was not one that I often see of the people here; it was much more warm than the usual bewildered look I get.  The bewildered look is interesting; it is a look that many people here seem to have when the thought first crosses their mind that there are actually people in the world that are not Chinese.

Anyway, since I saw her I knew I was going to go back and try to see if the moments we had were truly a case of friend at first sight??  I'll let you know...AFTER THE JUMP!

Over the past week I have somewhat devised a friendship attack plan; the gist of it involves me going to the store, buying gummy bears, finding the girl, asking her if she spoke Chinese, offering her a gummy bear, asking her to teach me Chinese and then...handing her my business card, thus sealing our friendship.  This morning I wrote my name and some random numbers on the back of a few index cards I chopped up and I was excited to be able to give one away.

When I woke today I realized had today had to be the day--today I needed to start making friends.  After breakfast I put my hair in a bun and put on the appropriate clothes for trying to meet new friends.  I got on the bus and headed toward the grocery store.  After getting off the bus I felt great--I was on my way to make a friend--look at me go!  Upon entering the mall I wondered if my idea was in fact foolproof and I began to feel slightly nervous.  Regardless, I was determined to go through with it because that is how you win at life, you have to push yourself.  I ambled through the store and picked up a few things ON DISCOUNT as well as a package of imported German gummy bears before heading out, ready to put my friendship heart on my short sleeve.

"Calm down.  Breathe.  It's just a potential friend."  Do you ever hear yourself saying those things to yourself? Don't worry, it's completely normal.  I tried my best to casually (read:  not awkwardly) stroll out of Century Mart and glance inside the little stores.  I didn't see her where I thought she would be, but it was at this point I realized that I didn't really remember what she looked like.  Wow.  All of my effort and goodwill was being betrayed by the fact that all I knew about this girl was that she was probably Chinese (I saw her in China) and she knows how to smile (that narrows it down a bit more).  At least, I thought, I could recognize those who smile from those who are not smiling and then I could calculate the friendship connection I felt with those who smiled.  Well friends...no such luck.  I walked around the stores a couple of times in search of a semi-mildly-familiar array of dental units but I failed.

Failure comes in all flavors and this flavor tasted like the green gummy bear.  To my credit I think I didn't find her because I don't think she was actually there.  I believe I will go back later and search for Century Mart girl.  I believe I can turn a green gummy into a red one with just a little more persistence and creepiness...all I have to do is find out where potential friends work, note the days and times they are working and then return incessantly until I give them my business card, which looks sort of exactly like this:


Take care and thanks for choosing to read my blog.  I hope you have a great day.

1 comment:

  1. Hey Brian we will be arriving in HZ next week so don't worry about meeting new friends! cheers,Piglet

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