How NOT To Choose An English Name

You know what one of the strangest and oddly most stressful parts of my job teaching English in China is?

Having to give English names to new students.

(We always do this for new students – it makes it easier for us to remember and use names, and it encourages an “English Only” atmosphere once inside the classroom).

I mean, there I am, tasked with deciding what I, and many others, will call this person for potentially years to come.  Sure, it’s not a legal name, like their parents gave to them, so they can change it anytime they want, and they won’t use it in all facets of their lives, but sheesh!  And for all you parents out there, while you might have debated over names for just one or two children at a time, I’ve usually got to come up with twenty or so.

Oh, and did I mention they should be easily pronounceable and spellable?

Why not just let the students decide for themselves? you wonder.  Firstly, many of them are too young and don’t have much exposure to English to know any names.  And secondly, well…that’s what the rest of this post is about – what happens when Chinese people are left to their own devices to come up with one.

So here’s my list of tips for choosing an English name (all the examples are real, and come from just a handful of classes that I teach at one state-run school here in our city where their regular teachers have allowed them to choose their own names):

Tip 1:  Spelling and pronunciation are important.

Remember, if you yourself can’t spell your name correctly, you can’t expect that others will either.  We native English speakers look for certain sounding rules for letters when we see a word, so if you misspell your name, we’ll probably say it wrong.

Poor Maggie might find someone calling her "Magic" soon...

Poor Maggie might find someone calling her “Magic” soon…

I guess she expects me to shout at her every time I say her name?

I guess she expects me to shout at her every time I say her name?

And the odd time, misspelling your name will result in it becoming another word that is not a name, and is in fact quite unflattering.

Her name is actually Alice, and she's a lovely girl, so this is quite unfortunate.

Her name is actually Alice, and she’s a lovely girl, so this is quite unfortunate.

Being able to say your name is key as well.  I’ll close this tip with a cautionary tale I’ve told many others before, about a young boy I used to teach whose English name was Simon.  But since he couldn’t properly pronounce the vowel sounds in his name, soon his teachers and friends couldn’t either.  And eventually, the spelling of his name was even changed.  And trust me, it’s quite a shock for me as a foreigner to look down at my exam paper and see that I will be testing someone named Semen.

Tip 2:  Numbers are not names.

Shaking my head.

Shaking my head.

I know George Costanza and Victoria Beckham might disagree with me, but numbers (even Seven) are not really names, so please avoid them.

Tip 3:  Naming yourself after food is just silly.

I’ve run across a lot of this here, and I’m not sure how it started, but I’m going to blame Gwyneth Paltrow.  These names are most often constrained to fruit, although not entirely – I’ve taught several Gingers over the years.

There is also a Strawberry in this class.

There is also a Strawberry in this class.

Seriously, I wonder what people would say if I started telling them my Chinese name was 奶酪 (cheese)?

Tip 4:  Just because it is a translation of your Chinese name, or part of it, doesn’t make it a good English name.

The last character is the one for "fish".

The last character is the one for “fish”.

If my husband were to translate his Chinese name, I’d be calling him something like Forest of Poplars.  See?  It doesn’t really work.

Tip 5:  Animals are cool, just not for your name.

As with the above Fish, this trend is more common in boys.  The number of Monkeys, Dragons, and Lions I’ve taught would make your head spin.  With girls, I’d say Butterfly has been the most ubiquitous animal name chosen.

Tip 6:  Adjectives rarely make good names.Happy

Pretty

Strong

I also once taught a boy named "Windy" - I don't know what positive qualities he was trying to express with that one.

I also once taught a boy named Windy – I don’t know what positive qualities he was trying to express with that one.

Sure, I get that you want to let people know the good qualities you see in yourself.  But literally calling yourself these things as a name is a bit too obvious.  Better to find a way to show them, rather than just tell them.

Tip 7:  Naming yourself after someone famous means you have big shoes to fill.

First of all, he chose Jobs, instead of Steve. And secondly, yes, I found it funny that these two students were listed one after the other.

First of all, he chose Jobs, instead of Steve. And secondly, yes, I found it funny that these two students were listed one after the other.

Some famous names are less conspicuous than others.  For instance, I know a guy here whose English name is Carter (after Vince Carter, the basketball player).  It’s not as immediately apparent as some others I have run across.

But Obama is going to have to take some lessons from his namesake and work on his confidence. As soon as he finished answering the last question I asked during his oral exam, he simply doubled over and vomited all over the floor.

But Obama is going to have to take some lessons from his namesake and work on his confidence. As soon as he finished answering the last question I asked during his oral exam, he simply doubled over and vomited all over the floor.

Tip 8:  Random nouns are hit and miss as to whether they make acceptable names.

Ah...no.

Ah…no.

Again...no.  (The worst thing about this student is that he used to be called Ryan, but someone let him change his name to this!)

Again…no. (The worst thing about this student is that he used to be called Ryan, but someone let him change his name to this!)

I also used to teach a class with boys named Lamp, Stick, Try, and the infamous boy who called himself Refrigerator.  Sigh.

Lilac? Maybe. Grass? No. (Oh, and it's a girl.)

Lilac? Maybe. Grass? No. (Oh, and it’s a girl.)

Room

Most certainly…NO! (And I did clarify this was his name, asking, “As in classroom?” He said yes and looked at me like I was the crazy one.

Tip 9:  You might want to run a name past a foreigner before you settle on it, because some of our names have less than positive connotations, despite being actual names.

I’m looking at you, all you Candys, LuLus, CoCos, and the one GoGo I know (who is actually a boy, unfortunately).

Tip 10:  Anything like the following are just…What the…?  No.

Better than Lucifer, I guess, but still...

Better than Lucifer, I guess, but still…

Perhaps he has Irish/Celtic roots?

Perhaps he has Irish/Celtic roots?

Facepalm.FYI, his friends call him Bear for short.

Facepalm.
FYI, his friends call him Bear for short.

My final tip?  When in doubt, go with a simple, boring, run-of-the-mill English name from one of your textbooks.  I guarantee you no one will stifle laughter or look at you like you’ve lost your mind if you introduce yourself as Sally or Tommy.

But hey…I can’t tell you what to do, right?!

Posted in Things Other People Do | Tagged , , , | 60 Comments

Back From Hiatus, and Don’t You People Know Who I AM?!

Oh, hi there!  Long time, no see.

What’s that?

You don’t remember me?

No, no need to apologize.  I completely understand.  I mean, from your point of view, I pretty much dropped off the face of the internet (does the internet have a face? It does now) for three months.  And let’s face it, attention spans these days are pretty darned short, so I get why you’re struggling to place me.

Ok, this is taking a really long time and I’m feeling kind of awkward just waiting here while you search the darkest corners of your brain.  Let me help you out.  I’m that Canadian girl who married a Chinese guy and wrote a blog about all the funny things that happen to me while I’m living here.

Remember us?

Remember us?

Ringing a bell?  No??

Um, maybe this will help – I’m probably related to you (I mean, I don’t have that many readers, do I?).

Oh, there you go!  I saw the lightbulb go on.  Whew, that’s a load off my mind.

Now that we’re past all that, we can get back down to business again.

Oh, you want to know where I’ve been all this time?  Why didn’t I post anything?

Well, the truth is, that after my last post back in October, I basically laid in bed for three weeks.  Well that’s no excuse, you’re thinking, you had so much time to write and blog.

Ah, no.  Because although I had the time, I was pretty much stuck lying flat on my back trying to fix that pesky back problem that’s been hounding me for a very long time (spoiler alert:  It nearly worked, but recently is acting up again, I’ve visited another doctor, and have a pile of medications I’m taking to try to fix it).  And it’s really uncomfortable to try to type when you’re lying down.  Try it.  Not easy.  Plus, I wasn’t getting out of the house, so nothing that funny really happened to report.

My drug cocktail. I have to take all this twice a day.

My drug cocktail. I have to take all this twice a day.

And then, when I was finally released into the wild again, people I work with started taking holidays to visit their families (the nerve of some people!), meaning I had to work extra and different hours than usual.

And then, well, December happened.

What’s wrong with December? you ask.

December was insane.

You see, China observes Volunteer’s Day on December 5, and in the past, this has meant that our bosses have volunteered us to do our job (teaching English) for free that day, conducting promotions to recruit new students at various state-run schools around the city.  But this year, our local city government decided to declare the entire month of December “Volunteer Month”, which gave management the impetus to continue these promotions throughout the entire month.  In case you’re wondering, this meant, “Goodbye, free time.”

Hence the lack of blogging.

But, moving on, I am back now and hoping to be back into a regular schedule of posting.  Cue the applause!

What’s that?  You want to hear more about those wonderful promotional classes and just what it’s like to be a foreigner here in small-town China?

Well, I don’t normally write about work, but since you twisted my arm…

I’ve said before that living here is a weird combination of being completely anonymous and being a celebrity.  I should also add that it is also a lot like being an animal caged at the zoo – everyone stares at you and expects you to “do something” to entertain them.

Something entertaining...like getting your hair cut.

Something entertaining…like getting your hair cut.

Let me give you an example of just what I mean.

On the first day that we conducted these promotions, the plan was as follows:  we were to teach four lessons lasting 20 minutes each, introducing ourselves, teaching a handful of words for different toys (a football, a yo-yo, a doll, a teddy bear, etc.) and the sentence “I want a ___” (Christmas-related content, of course).  I was prepared for all this.

This is what actually happened.

We arrived at the school, met their teachers in the conference room, and headed out to begin the lessons.  During my first lesson, in addition to one of the office workers from our school taking photos, there were also a videographer and reporter filming, and a newspaper photographer attempting to take some artsy photos with a student’s face in the foreground and me teaching the lesson in the background.  In order to achieve this look, he was practically laying on the floor amongst the desks.  Also, he switched the student he was focusing on three times (I guess the first two weren’t pretty enough) – no, he didn’t move from his position, he just made the students switch seats.

As we moved to the next classroom, my entourage followed, and the second lesson began the same as the first, though towards the end, they did leave to go and bother another teacher’s class.

A ten minute break followed the second class, so we headed back up to the conference room to warm up (I should mention that they had some heat on in that room, but the classrooms were [as they generally are at every school here] unheated).  Upon entering the room, our head Chinese teacher called my name excitedly.

HCT:  You have to come over here so they can interview you.

Me (stupidly):  Why?

HCT:  Because you’re foreign.

Ah, of course.  I made my way across the room.

HCT:  No, take off your coat.

I remove my coat.  The camera guy and reporter look me up and down and say something.

HCT:  Take off your scarf too.  Put mine on.  My purple one looks nicer than your black one.

I remove my scarf and allow her to style me.

Me:  Is this OK now?

HCT:  Yes, now go over there by the window.  Oh, and speak Chinese.

This is a favourite game of people here in China – to put foreigners on the spot and demand that they speak Mandarin.  And while some people can do it, I am not one of those people.

I give her a look.

HCT:  It’s OK.  Just say whatever and if it is not good, they can edit it out.

The interview commences with some basic questions about where I am from, why I came to China, why we were at the school that day, and what I like to do in my free time.  I thought I was home free.  And then…

HCT (to the reporter):  She has a Chinese husband.  Make her talk about that!

And so we did.  Shivering, I finally finished and put my coat and scarf back on (by the way, the footage was edited and a piece aired on the local evening news that day).

On to the third lesson.  I was pleasantly surprised to only have one newspaper photographer hovering in the classroom for this one, albeit a completely different guy than the first lessons.  But he had apparently studied at the same school, because he proceeded to attempt to take the exact same kind of shots as the other guy had done.

All was going well, until…the door opened and one of the other foreign teachers was pushed into the room with a confused look on his face.  From behind him, our head Chinese teacher again.

HCT:  They want pictures of the two of you teaching together.  (Never mind that we never do this)  Oh, and take off your coats – it looks nicer.

So, in he came, and down into the middle of the classroom we went (because that’s a natural place to teach from), so that we could be surrounded by students in the photo and it would be more “interesting.”

Obediently, we did the actions for the various toys we were teaching as part of this Christmas content, smiling and looking as happy as we could be.  After nearly three minutes of us saying and the students repeating the same words over and over, the photographer still wasn’t satisfied.

Our head Chinese teacher:  He wants you to do some other, bigger actions.

Us:  Like what?

HCT:  Um, do…happy (with arms extended and the ubiquitous two-fingered victory sign)!

Like this...but bigger!

Like this…but bigger!

After a full minute of that, he was still shaking his head.

HCT:  Uh, now do a scary monster.

We did, and by this time, we could see the students wondering what in the world any of this had to do with Christmas.  Still not good enough for our photographer.  Even our head Chinese teacher was struggling by this point.

HCT:  Do something else.  Like…uh…like…a bird (with arms flapping)!

That, combined with the fact that our time for that lesson was up, finally seemed sufficient and we left a sea of children thoroughly confused about Christmas behind.

“I think he may have been drunk,” our head Chinese teacher whispered to me in the hallway.  My fourth lesson was entirely undisturbed, thankfully.

Oh, and if you think for a second that this was a one-time thing, you are sorely mistaken.  Later in the month, at another school, I went had almost the exact experience again (nearly word-for-word, I promise you)…

…Only this time, they also made me dress up in a Santa outfit.

Which they published in the newspaper.

Which they published in the newspaper.

Posted in Things Other People Do, Things Other People Say, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | 26 Comments

On A Personal Note

This week’s post is going to have very little to do with China.  There.  You’ve been warned.  You can just close this window on your browser and go about your day if you wish.

Oh, you stuck around?  Gee, thanks, and have I mentioned that you’re my favourite reader?  No?  Well you are.  So anyway, now that we’ve weeded out the riff raff, I can get on with what I really want to write about this week.

“You’re not writing about China…but why?  What could you possibly have to write about that is better than another ridiculous anecdote from your daily life?  How about a goofy one-liner from that hilarious husband of yours?” you are grumbling under your breath.

Well, you see, Monday October 22 is a very special day and I want to acknowledge it.

It’s my parents’ wedding anniversary and this year, they will have been married for 35 years.  And I happen to think that that is worth celebrating.

Unfortunately, living overseas means that one often has to miss a lot of these important dates in people’s lives (weddings, births, birthdays, anniversaries), and the truth is, that sucks.  It’s always difficult to know that I can’t be with my family for most of these milestones, and even though I appreciate technology, emails and Facebook wall posts and Skype dates and having my brother buy cards and sign my name to them just aren’t the same (but thanks for doing it!).

To my parents,

Happy 35th wedding anniversary!  I’m sorry I can’t be there to tell you that in person, and I hope you know how much I wish I could be.

And thank you.

Thank you for everything you’ve done for my brother and I – raising us to be (I think) good, hardworking adults, providing us with as many opportunities as you have, and always encouraging us.  Thank you for letting us make our own decisions in life and supporting us, no matter what.  Thank you for your continued advice.

Thank you for the care packages you send me, and for coming to visit me in China.  Thank you for laughing off your kidnappings (each of you), and for traveling halfway around the world so that you could be a part of my wedding.

Thank you for showing us what a great, real marriage is, and for always loving each other, even when you were driving each other crazy.  I certainly hope that my own marriage is as successful and lasting as yours.

Have a wonderful day, and treat yourselves.  I think after 35 years, you’ve earned it!

Lots of love,

Kelly (and hilarious husband, too!)

Posted in Personal | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

Snap, Crackle, Pop!

I did it!  I solved the mystery of why so many Chinese men hold their girlfriend’s or wife’s handbag (and no, the answer isn’t “because they are emasculated”).

Now, I wrote about Chinese men and their propensity for handbags and fannypacks of all kinds here– and no, this isn’t an invitation for more comments about how I’m a horrible person who is reinforcing ridiculous gender stereotypes and blah, blah, blah.  I am entitled to my opinion, and that opinion happens to be that men do not need to carry a purse of any type.

This guy even brought his man purse to our wedding!

Moving on.

Another thing I touched on in that piece was how often I see men here carrying their lady’s bag for them – which seemed unnecessary and ridiculous to me before now.  But now I’ve figured out why they do it.

Let me remind you of my ongoing back issues – pain and discomfort dating back to about April.  I’d even gone to the hospital to try to get a doctor’s help, and when that failed, I relented to wearing some stinky Chinese medicine patches that were supposed to help (the pain lessened, by the way, but never went away, and in the process I developed a very itchy red rash where the patches stuck, so I’m noting that experience in the “loss” column overall).

Finally, in late August, after another particularly painful couple of days, I contacted one of my bosses to see if she could take me to another doctor.  I was in luck, because she knew of a “bone doctor” in our city who supposedly specialized in backs, and we made plans to visit.

For future reference, this “traditional Chinese bone doctor” turned out to be essentially a chiropractor, who felt around my back for about a minute and then informed my boss and I that not only was a bone from my spine out of place, but that my hips were out of alignment too.  He twisted and cracked me, told me to return another couple of times and not to lift heavy things or twist, and sent us on our way.

Dear bones, Please learn to stay where you belong. Sincerely, Me.

I returned for all the visits, and saw a lot of improvement, but as September drew to a close, I decided to visit him again to have him check that everything was still aligned, because I still had some pain (though nothing like before).  I’m sure you can imagine how thrilled I was then when he told me that everything was out of place again.  Sigh.  Let’s get crackin’ again, doc.  Another set of visits and a week of holidays later, still in pain and fed up, I decided to try a different tactic.

I made plans with my husband for him to take some time off work on Monday afternoon to visit this doctor with me (since my husband has seen all the hobbling and grimacing at home during this time, and my boss from school has not) and arranged to take this past week (Monday through Friday) off work to rest at home to try to allow everything to stay in place long enough to remember that that is the correct place.  As I explained to my boss, somehow I think climbing up and down 6 flights of stairs and in and out of a 9 passenger van a few times a day was not really assisting my recovery.

As we waited our turn on Monday, I couldn’t help but notice how many of the women who hobbled into the doctor’s little clinic seeking treatments for back problems were wearing…wait for it…high heels!  I even pointed it out to my husband, who just shook his head and shrugged his shoulders (I like to consider myself a fashionable person, but I gave up heels long ago in this sore back adventure).

The doctor cracked me again, and then sent me out to walk outside for a few minutes before coming back in, just to see whether everything would stay in place even that long.  As I meandered out, my husband took my bag from me so that I wasn’t carrying anything in either hand to potentially weigh me down on one side.

See, that’s not even a man’s bag. That’s a woman’s purse.

Cue lightbulb moment:

The reason so many Chinese men carry their wife’s or girlfriend’s purse is actually to protect them from re-injuring their back, since these women are already apparently seeking treatment for back problems caused by always wearing high heeled shoes!

Mystery solved.

Posted in Things I Do | Tagged , , , | 10 Comments

Shopping Mall Surprise

Sorry, folks, but you’re not going to get an awful lot of witty writing from me this week (frankly, it’s a miracle you’ve even got this post to enjoy, because WordPress has been very finicky the last few days, and it took me ages to upload these photos), because I really don’t even know what would be necessary to add to this story.  The pictures I took pretty much speak for themselves (and I’m never without my camera or cell phone because in China, the phrase “pictures or it didn’t happen” applies to almost everything).

You see, my husband and I went to a nearby city last weekend so he could compete in a hip hop dance match, and since we had free time one afternoon, we headed back to the shopping center where I realized I had forgotten how to shop so that I could look for a few new clothes (see, we’re figuring this marriage thing out:  give and take; something for him [dance match] and something for me [shopping]!).

Now, I am well aware that the words “subtle” and “China” don’t really go together, but this reinforced it even further in my brain.

We had more time on this visit than the last one, so that meant we were free to explore the rest of the mall that we hadn’t seen on our previous visit.

I did my shopping thing.

We found a shop apparently exclusively for my brother.

Though, I did a quick scan and didn’t see any super-large sized shoes.

And that’s when we stumbled onto the set of Avatar.

My first view, thinking, “Wow, that seems very detailed…what is it?”

Then we bumped into Neytiri (yes, I had to look up her name) under the Tree of Souls.

They even had the floating mountains and crazy animals hanging from the skylight.

Some of the other beasts of Pandora were there too.

And yes, the whole majestic set was over three stories high.

Why was it there?  Your guess is as good as mine.  But it kind of puts our Santa’s workshop displays to shame, huh?

Posted in Things Other People Do | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Talk This Way

One thing my husband does that always makes me laugh is to imitate speakers from different areas of China.  “Do Beijing!” I’ll exclaim, and he’ll natter away, ending all words with a pirate-like arrr.  “Now do Tianjin!”  “Now do your hometown!”  I rarely understand what he’s saying, but it makes me collapse in giggles every time.

If you’re not familiar with Chinese language, let me give you a very basic crash course.  Mandarin Chinese is the standard language, used by government across the country.  Cantonese is probably the Chinese more foreigners are familiar with from Chinese immigrants, and it is more concentrated in the southern part of China.  And there are other dialects within minority groups as well.  Oh, and there are local dialects in each city too, just to make things confusing.

People from Beijing talk like pirates.

But I’m not talking about dialects.  When he does this (or rather, when I make him do this) he is always speaking Mandarin Chinese, but with varying accents, if you will, depending on where a person hails from.  It’s very pronounced in some cases.  My husband can pick out when someone at a neighbouring table in a restaurant is not from our region, simply by listening to how they speak.  I even succeeded once in guessing a man wasn’t from our city, even though I didn’t understand a word of what he had said – I just knew he didn’t sound like the people I was used to hearing.

But as familiar as my husband is with the concept of regional accents in Chinese, hearing them in English apparently baffles him from time to time.

I mean, he knows when certain people are from, say, England, because they speak in a different way than I do, and he’s been exposed to that accent through school.  But regional differences within North America had him stumped.

And some of the people from the south of China speak an entirely different language!

One day, after chatting with the guy for a while, he asked me where one of my colleagues hailed from (it seems he’d had a tough time understanding him at first).

“America,” I replied.

“Are you sure?” he responded.

Uh…yeah, I am.  There may be a lot of things I don’t know, but the countries that my fellow foreign colleagues come from is not one of them (heck, there are only ten of us!).

When I asked him why he didn’t agree with me, he told me that it was because this colleague did not speak the same way as another of my coworkers who is also from America.  I tried to explain that it was probably because one was from the southern United States, while the man we’d originally been talking about came from Michigan, in the north.

“But…the north of the US is near Canada, right?  And you’re from Canada, but he doesn’t sound like you either!”

Wait, wait, wait…explain this to me again?

After a long conversation about how a large portion of the population of Canada lives near the US border and how we have a very “wide” country and there are more pronounced difference in accents from east to west, while the US is more of a square, with people living throughout the entire country, he threw up his hands and shook his head.

“But why can I understand all of you Canadians, but sometimes I can’t understand Americans?!”

Posted in Things My Husband Says | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Killing Them With Kindness

I spend a lot of time on this blog talking about things I find strange about China, from my perspective as a person born and raised in Canada.

But this week, I want you to put yourself in the place of a Chinese person who has never left their country and never known anything other than what they have experienced here.  Because that would be my husband and a lot of his friends.  Even though they’ve watched movies and television shows from abroad, the strangest things often surprise them about life in other countries.  Most people know about a lot of the big differences between China and the west (most of us eat with a knife and fork instead of chopsticks, we say please and thank you much more often than Chinese people do, and so on), but not so many know about the smaller details.

See? He’s got the fork & knife thing pretty much down.

For instance, we recently discovered that my husband didn’t really know what a disc-man was (you know, the portable CD players), because they didn’t actually have them here (China just skipped right from the Walkman to mp3 players, apparently).

He never had a graduation ceremony for high school or university, because there are just too many people.

He was perplexed when we were watching a movie one night at home, even stopping it to ask me if teenagers really did have big house parties with alcohol when their parents were out of town (uh, yeah!).

Just the other day, he showed me a video of some kids clinging to the old hood of a truck being pulled through the snow by another vehicle, thinking that I would be surprised (uh, duh, I know all about this – I’m Canadian and we have snow for like, half the year so we have to find something fun to do in it!).

That snow is just waiting to be Ski-doo’d!

And lest we not forget the sheer awe he felt when he experienced fitted sheets for the first time!

Then, when my husband and I met up with a couple of his colleagues for dinner the other night, an anecdote from one of these friends made the list too.

This friend recently got married and just returned from his honeymoon, and I was surprised to learn they had gone abroad, to Thailand.  He spent a good portion of dinner telling us all about their trip to a Thai island, making us supremely jealous of even their sunburns…until he confessed that they had gone as part of a typical Chinese tour group (see here, here, and here for my experiences), and that their days had been fully scheduled and they’d had to get up at around 6am every day – not my idea of a relaxing, island honeymoon.

MY idea of a relaxing honeymoon? Sitting here all day every day for a week or so.

As always with my husband’s friends and colleagues when they tell stories over dinners, I did my best to politely listen and be appropriately amused at the right times.

But when it came to his biggest anecdote, I just couldn’t do it.  I stared blankly as if to say, “And…?” and thought I had missed the punchline.  Turns out, I didn’t; he, as well as my husband and the others at the table, were all truly, utterly amazed, while I was left scratching my head.

The thing that he will remember most about Thailand isn’t the food or the scenery.  It won’t be a romantic trip spent with his new wife.

What will it be?

It will be his amazement that when his wife bought a wide-brimmed sun hat in the morning and later in the afternoon they discovered that they had each paid for it (paying double) and they then returned to the shop with their tour guide, prepared for a battle (as is necessary in China), that the owner immediately and happily returned them their money, and even apologized to them for the inconvenience.

That’s right – this simple act of doing the right thing, of not taking advantage of someone, was something he felt was so memorable about his trip, that he tells everyone he knows.

Posted in Things Other People Say | Tagged , , | 8 Comments