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“Where did you get this Arab from?” asked the bemoled man with the fierce eye brows of a Buddhist demon sitting behind a desk.  “What are you talking about?” exasperatedly questioned Ms. Wang, who had brought me into the realm of this man in search of the bike mechanic.  “It’s their religion,” argued the man behind the fierce eye brows, “they grow the beards in accordance with their faith.  Just look at Bin Laden.”  “Bin Laden is dead,” Ms. Wang tried to kill this strain of the conversation.  “He’s from the U.S.,” she continued.  “Well, I don’t know about Bin Laden,” said the man, who’s name was Yu, and he stood up from behind his desk.

Ms. Wang was the serious, thoughtful woman I’d encountered in the adjacent bike shop while shopping for a top front rack.  She had asked about our journey so far.  I explained our purpose, our route, and inquired if she or her associates ever went bike touring.  “To go bike touring you need time,” she said, “we just never have a chance.”  I concurred.

“This area is quite poor,” she continued, reflecting the sentiment many Chinese have towards any town that is not Shenzhen, Shanghai, or Beijing.  But Ms. Wang said more.  She talked about how Chinese people liked peace,  and that even if people were poor, at least they had enough to eat.  “All we want is a peaceful society,” she said.  “Peace is everything.”  She continued in this vein for some time.  I occasionally tried to clarify, but eventually the only thing to do was to curse my lack of Chinese proficiency.   Her conversation style was remarkable for it’s openness and seriousness, and for the fact that she did not repeat often touted sentiments with the same phrases I’ve come used to hearing.

Eventually she convinced me to allow one of her employees take a look at my bike.  We went to find the bike mechanics, who were repairing bikes in front of Mr. Yu’s desk.  She had one of them fix my bike while Mr. Yu, having established that I was not Bin Laden, explained the various types of pottery available for my viewing and purchase in the “World Famous Pottery City” of Jingdezhen.  “Pottery isn’t easily transportable by bike,” advised Ms. Wang, “but you could look at it.”  “Yes,” agreed Mr. Yu, and after I’d explained that I’d looked at many pottery pictures, he assured me the pictures weren’t nearly as pretty as the real thing.

“She’s the big boss,” said the well-groomed Mr. Yu, gesturing at the informally but stylish Ms. Wang.  “Because she had the money to start the business, just like it is overseas,” he informed me.  Ms. Wang stiffened and her tone sharpened.  “Not necessarily,” she snapped, “In other countries employees can sometimes work to become the boss, too”, she concluded, leaving her slightly ambiguous statement open for interpretation.  Mr. Yu retreated behind his desk.

The mechanic finished tuning up my bike, but Ms. Wang refused to accept any money.  “We enjoy having you here,” she said, “and if you go to other bike shops during your journey across China, you’ll find the situation is the same, other shops  will give you free service too.”  And indeed she’s been correct.

This entry was posted on Monday, October 29th, 2007 at 8:00 am and is filed under Jim's Posts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.