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Laowai in China

About the Author

Name: Nicholas Alexander Reay

Hometown: Cape Town, South Africa

Location: Shanghai, China

As an English teacher, I have lived many places like Brazil, Japan, Turkey, and Sweden. But none of these countries compare to China.

作为一个英语老师，我在巴西、日本、土耳其、瑞典等许多地方居住过。不过这些国家都无法与中国相比较。

I have been living in China for six months now and I love the people and the customs. I would like to tell you about one of my first impressions (1) of this great, and at times, daunting (2) country.

我已经在中国住了半年了，我喜欢这里的人民和风俗。我想告诉大家我对这个伟大的、有时又令人畏惧的国家的第一印象。

I went to Beijing with my friend Mark. Mark is a punk (3) from England. Everyone looked at him because of his appearance (piercing and tattoos).

我与朋友马克一起来到北京。马克是个来自英格兰的鬅客乐迷。因为他的打扮，每个人对向他侧目(穿洞、纹身)。

After a short stay in Beijing, we went to Xi’an, a beautiful and historical city with many tourist sights. One of these is a mountain called Hua Shan.

在北京住了一小段时间，我们又前往西安，一个美丽又古老的城市，旅游景点众多。其中一处便是华山。

Mark and I decided to go to this mountain alone. We were tired of (4) all the “special tours” offered to laowai. They were in fact far more expensive because they were for laowai! Mark and I don’t speak Chinese but we were confident (5) that we would be okay.

马克和我决定单独游华山。我们厌倦了所有那些为老外准备的“特别游”。它们实际上非常昂贵，就因为是为老外准备的！我和马克都不会说中文，但是我们相信一切会顺利的。

The bus took about two and a half hours from Xi’an before finally leaving us at a small village at the foot (6) of the great mountain. After we got off the bus, we sat in a rather dirty room with many excited older people. We didn’t know what to do. Then out of nowhere (7), two young Chinese people appeared. To our blind luck (8), they spoke a little English. They told us that this was a tour group going up the mountain by cable car (9), not by foot. We wanted to walk. So, we joined this young couple.

我们从西安出发，乘坐了两个半钟头的汽车才到达这座名山脚下的一个小村庄。下车后，我们和很多兴奋的上了年纪的人一起坐在一个很脏的房间里。我们不知道该怎么办。接着不知从什么地方忽然冒出来两个年轻的中国人。很幸运，他们能说一点英语。他们告诉我们这里是一个旅游团，他们准备乘缆车上山，而不是徒步。我们想爬山。所以我们加入了这两个年轻人。

For the next 48 hours we enjoyed the hospitality (10) of these young Chinese students. We only communicated (11) basic things but the warmth of friendship was there. My friend and I were a little nervous at first. We thought that these students wanted us to pay for everything, but that was not true. In fact, they saved us 600RMB! This is what the hotel manager wanted us to pay to sleep in a room because we were foreigners! Our younger friends were embarrassed by this blatant rip-off (12) and told the manager that we would only pay 25RMB each for the night, which we did.

接下去的48小时，我们一直享受着这些年轻中国学生的友好、好客。我们只作了一些简单基本的交流，不过友谊的温暖确实存在。我的朋友和我一开始有些紧张。我们以为这些学生会让我们承担所有开销，但是他们并没有。事实上，他们为我们节约了600块人民币！那是一个旅店老板让我们付的住宿费，就因为我们是外国人！我们的朋友让这种明目张胆的敲诈弄得很尴尬，他们告诉老板我们只会按每人每夜25元的标准付费。我们也的确是这样做的。

Going up the mountain, local people stopped us many times. Mark was stopped several times for photos. Chinese people also stopped us to practice their English. This was a refreshing (13) change from the usual “Hello, Hello!” It was nice to talk to these people. They showed real interest in what we had to say.

上山途中，当地人多次拦住我们。马克被拦下好几次与人合影。还有一些中国人拦住我们练习英语。从通常的“你好”“我好”中，这一变化可谓令人精神一振。与他们交谈很愉快。他们对于我们要说的话很感兴趣。