(That’s Scarlett Johannson, for those who aren’t in the know.)… Because Lost in Translation has a new leading lady, that’d be yours truly! Remember how I said perhaps my Cantonese *might help me get by… well we can officially throw that, now outrageous idea out the window and bury it in rice patties 5000 meters deep. This Mandarin and Shanghainese business is way beyond, over my head. I might as well have gone to Tokyo, or Zimbabwe for that matter.

I will first have to say, I’ve only been here 4 days but it feels like well over a week. So much has occurred, with most of all being totally overwhelmed and confused. As another expat who landed just about the same time I did, recently said to me, “Still walking around with that dazed look of confusion on my face and wondering why there are so many Chinese around!!” - HA!! But seriously, I touche’d his comment. I’ve never felt so ignorant in my life. I mean at least during studies in Italy, and throughout all my travels, I have been able to read what was in front of me. Chinese characters, not so much. So here I am trying to understand based on sound., and I’ve concluded I learn visually, so if I can’t “see” the words spelled out, I turn quite pathetic. For a quick exercise, try saying: “Shirley Swanson surely should of sold sea shells at the sea shore” 10 times, and that’s kinda what Shanghainese/Mandarin sounds like! Good Luck!

But in any case, much to tell but I had to share just my first case of ignorance….(This was my “Welcome to Shanghai” moment…)

While on my last leg of flight from Hong Kong to Shanghai, I had the pleasure of sitting next to this older gentleman (probably in his 50s) who was traveling with his wife and teenage daughter. The man was fanatical about the window seat so he opted and asked to sit next to me, instead with his fam in the middle seats. At that hour, after having waited for an additional 4 hours on top of my already 3 hour layover due to heavy rainstorms in ‘Hai, I didn’t care, and really… what could I have said when all the man understood was Mandarin anyway. Plus, he was kind enough to help a tired girl (me) place her carry-on suitcase in the compartments up top before I took my seat. We had a little bit of cordial small talk - ahem smiling and nodding - during takeoff as since I mentioned before, the man was a big fan of the window seat for take-off/landing reasons. He was a giddy old fella, shouting over to his wife and daughter as the plane rose up to the clouds. After the take-off episode, I slapped on my ipod and passed out for the majority of the flight, and the man (very smartly) took care of me when food was coming around with a wake-up nudge.

Fast forward to us having to circle around for an additional 30min due to the weather, and we’re at the official Lost in Translation: Act 1. Somehow real conversation was struck between the man and I, which involved him speaking in straight Mandarin, me straining to pull some words to relate to Cantonese in addition to replying in Cantonese, him saying something or could’ve been asking me a question, me asking him to repeat, him repeating, me apologizing for not understanding and explaining that I can only understand Cantonese, he giving me the “ah, ok.” And this basically repeats itself for several times, however we did establish that I was from the US and from NY and that it was my first time in Shanghai and China at that and that I’d be teaching English (I let him look at my little cheat sheet card I had made of my school’s address in both Chinese and English). He seemed to be impressed and excited for my stay here for one year and told me Shanghai was massive and is the #1 city in all of China. ….Not bad for not a charades convo, eh?

So we land and he tells his wife and daughter of my scenario and by the expressions of their face, I saw that they were impressed. With what? I’m not quite too sure. Perhaps I was an American or from New York, or spoke Cantonese or will be teaching English. All shrug. (I think shrugs will come in handy for me this year, so get used to them.) Anyway, I instantly became a celebrity to these folks! The daughter was very excited to strike up conversation with me with her struggling English. She was apologetic with her level of English speech but I gave her the reassurance that it was more than fine. (To be honest, I was ecstatic that she spoke/understood English at all!) She told me she has always wanted to visit NY, but it was so expensive yada yada. The entire family became my guards for the immigration, baggage claim and picking up a taxi episodes. To be honest, their behavior was very of “typical” overly-welcoming hosts from a “typical” asian family. I could tell by the speech and tone of voice from parents to daughter etc to help me out in any way they could – from lifting my suitcases to making sure that I get a taxi.

As we are making our way out of the airport, I learned that the daughter is in college and I gave her the same cheat-sheet card with my school info. Her eyes grew wide opened and asked if she could keep the card. I apologized and told her that unfortunately that was to be my saving grace for how I was to get to the school from the taxi, but she was more than welcome to take down my info. That she did, and also gave me her mobile number and encouraged me to call her when I was settled with a mobile.

Now we’re walking out towards the taxi stand that had an uber-long line. I was approached by a Mandarin speaking lady who offered me to skip the line and get into one of the “unlicensed cabs.” I knew of course, no deal, but I asked just for fun, how much would she charge me. She said 200rmb without having even asked me where I was going. (I was advised that my cab ride should cost much less than that from my Dean.) Anyway, I told her 120rmb and she acted surprised and said not possible. During this time, the family was observing me since the lady was also trying to encourage the family to convince me get into her chain of “unlicensed cars.” I finally shook my head and responded, No, and pointed towards the long line. The daughter comes up to me and says… “Wow, you are very clear.” I smiled and advised her, “when/if you get to New York, you do the same thing.” But what I wanted to say was…. “Sweetie, I don’t F around.” :-)

And, not for nothing, but I’ve been pretty impressed with myself with my Cantonese; too bad it has absolutely no value here.

. . don’t burn the day. .