Ding Ding Dang

My daughter learned the Chinese version of Jingle Bells this year for our school's Christmas Concert. Imagine twenty-fine little babes all under three shaking their little bells and singing, well? humming and awing, to Jingle Bells in English and Chinese. Of course each of them was also decked out with a little Santa Hat, like the cherry on the cake. Precious!

I remember back to my blog last year around Christmas Time and I had been feeling really lonely and far from family and friends. That feeling was amplified knowing that Christmas was in full swing back in North America where as my China experience consisted of tacky cardboard Santas found on the second floor of shopping markets. This year, after living a year and a half in Beijing, Christmas felt more festive. In our school lobby there were Christmas Carols happily brightening the mood. There were all the appropriate whispers of Christmas presents and stockings and Santa Claus. We had a Show for a Christmas Eve Party, and we even hosted a Christmas dinner for friends. There was something else? oh, right; it's freezing cold, which oddly enough puts me in the Festive Mode.

About that Christmas show?
I've been doing my best as a promoter here in Beijing. I've been promoting our small performance company consisting of my husband, myself and two of our friends. We do Children'?s parties and Fire acts and Stilts shows and Feicha shows (you remember, the kung fu stick), and recently we've added Black Light Shows to our repertoire. Well, Pancho, my husband, and I had a big show on Christmas Eve. It consisted of three mini shows, each about six minutes long. The first was Stilt Angels where we are two angels complete with wings and we come out among the guests and dance together. It's very elegant and we added a nice touch by giving out roses to the guests. It went well. The second show was Pancho's Feicha act, which is always great, and the third act was a Black Light Flags show.
To explain a little more, a black light show works with UV light tubes that glow purple, the light makes everything white and fluorescent colours glow brightly. Anything black will disappear, provided the background is black. Pancho was going to be clad in white for the show while I would be dressed in black and invisible, part of the black light trick. When we arrived at the venue we noticed that the curtain behind the stage was a glowing white. Uh-oh. I had been clear about the need for a dark curtain, but it didn't seem to matter. In the dressing room they kindly provided for us (a dirty storage room under the stairs) I set to cutting open big black garbage bags and taping them together to create a huge black plastic curtain. It worked, but the hanging of the curtain was nothing short of a disaster, with an entire tray of drinks spilling during our rushed preparations. The Black Light show went nothing as we had practiced and at the end I was mortified and stayed hidden behind the curtain for a lengthy period of time in order not to show my face to the guests and the man in charge. When I finally slinked my way back to our storage room Pancho and I fought about whose fault it was that the show had gone so badly. Again, I slinked out of the storage room to find my contact for payment. When I saw him I could only keep my head down for fear of conversing. We went to get payment and after a few moments walking he turned to me and in his broken English he said, "Black Light Show Best! Very Good, Amazing, I like very much Black Light Show." I couldn't believe it. I thought he was joking. But he wasn't and in an instant all my suffering ended. He happily paid me and even accompanied me to congratulate Pancho on a show well done. Christmas was saved!

After the show we went home to drop off our props and check on our little daughter Denya, who was being looked after by a friend. After a satisfied peek we went out with some friends to the Christmasiest (that is an actual word) place in town, a Reggae Bar. The bar is in a beautiful setting, right on the edge of Hou Hai Lake, in the heart of Beijing. We ate and drank and even did a little fire performance for the other Christmas patrons. It was fun, I only remember having one other Reggae Christmas when we were living in Mexico.

The festivities didn't stop on Christmas Eve. Christmas morning was full of cheer at opening the presents Santa left behind for us when he arrived very, very late the night before. Then my friend Dulce and I began our plans for Christmas dinner. The wonderful thing about living in a place where nobody celebrates Christmas is that everything is open Christmas Day and there are no inflated prices. So we went about gathering our food from the fruit and vegetable market and then to the foreign supermarket to get some special ingredients. What would Christmas Dinner be without quesadillas? To say it best, our dinner was fusion style. A taste of Mexico (the quesadillas), a taste of China (pre-roasted chickens with a hint of Anis), a taste of Canada (that's where I learned to make a Garden Salad), a taste of Italy (Fettuccini with pesto sauce) and I honestly don't know where Cream of Mushroom Soup comes from, but we had that too! We were nine adults and one munchkin and we all ate and were merry. It was a lovely Christmas.

This will be our last Christmas in Beijing, at least for a while. New Christmas traditions aren't the only things I will miss about my time here. I'm concerned that we will lose our Chinese hybrid ways. I will miss our nightly showing of the 'Intelligent Tree' Chinese Children's program that my daughter loves and sings along with; I will miss our Chinese vocabulary that we've all adopted into our everyday conversation (cat is mao and garbage can is la ji kwong); I will miss visiting Ms. Lee, my Chinese Paper Cutting Teacher; I will miss (and so will my husband) the 24-hour a day Peking Opera channel; I will miss cheap markets and generous people and safe streets and construction dust, okay, not that last one. Beijing has become a part of me and a part of my family. We are now a mixed, mixed family and at my daughter's February Birthday I'm not sure what will come first, presents, cake, piñatas, or little red bags inscribed with the Chinese Character for Happiness and carrying twenty yuan, or pesos, or dollars.

Our time in China has been unforgettable and everyday has been about learning and growing. Working and living in another part of the world has been amazing and it has left it's mark on me and my family for the rest of our lives! Go out, discover, take chances. You'll be amazed at what you find.