Chengdon't

“There you go!”  Our cheery waitress puts the bowl down on the table. “Snake hotpot”.  The previously rowdy table suddenly falls silent, each one of us contemplating the pieces of Naja or ‘Chinese Cobra’ bubbling away in the metal cauldron in front of us.  The owner of the ‘Snake King Emporium’  Mr. A (阿), a jocular man in his mid 40s from Guangzhou seems to be having a whale of a time, and pours us some special ‘baijiu’ (Chinese white alcohol) from a snake-filled glass container.  I gingerly fish a bit out from the broth with my chopsticks and pop it into a bowl, still undecided about its final destination…

Most cultures around the world have at least one kind of food that calls for bravery from those who eat it for the first time.  London’s East End boasts any number of jellied eel stalls where hardy locals or adventurous tourists can try the slithering elongated fish for themselves, and most folk of the non-Gallic persuasion are still fairly bemused by how someone decided that the garden snail would go well with garlic butter.  I’ve seen Koreans swallow down live baby octopus with my own eyes, and have never really understood why the Japanese are so fond of seaweed.

China seems no exception to this rule – in fact to most Westerners it seems to boast more than its fair share of such ‘courage cuisine’.  Along with Chinese banquet classics such as birds nest soup, shark fin, stinky tofu, and ‘thousand year old eggs’, there are any number of other dishes that help to enforce the classic “if it has four legs and it’s not a table then they’ll eat it” stereotype many around the world have of the Chinese (although it is worth noting that the Chinese themselves apply this stereotype to Southern Chinese!).

Current chef du jour Fuchia Dunlop spends a fair proportion of her latest book talking about the importance of overcoming boundaries when it comes to enjoying Chinese food, and in particular certain textures that those of us with minimal exposure to real Chinese food find difficult to stomach.  Slimy objects such as abalone and ‘wood ear’ that disgust those unused to them can be an almost sensual experience to those born into the culture or who take the time to acclimatise to it.

Some Chinese staples which are found slightly repulsive by Westerners have also evolved out of necessity; pig trotters, chicken claw and duck gizzard were all born out of a desire not to waste any of the animal, and even in these times of relative economic prosperity have maintained a presence on the Chinese dinner table while other cultures simply discard them in favour of packaged, unidentifiable hunks of meat.  Whether this remains the case in the more Western-influenced years to come will be interesting.

Upon being informed of my choice of restaurant, a friend in Beijing who is vegetarian for religious reasons states her attitude to eating a select group of animals.  “Well you shouldn’t eat any of them, but if you eat pigs, cows and fish why shouldn’t you eat snake?  At the end of the day it’s all meat”.  While I understand her point of view, I’m not so sure I agree it’s so clear cut, especially with a full bowl of snake hotpot in front of me.

Back at the Snake King I’m still struggling.  One of the chefs stands in the door of kitchen brandishing a cage with another Chinese Cobra.  “Don’t get too close!” he taunts, “She can spit a long way!”  Surprising this does not help my appetite.  Mr. A seems keen to dish out more baijiu, and I’m really keen not to drink it.  Desperate measures are called for, so in an effort to distract him I pick up a hunk of snake, lift the chopsticks to my mouth and take a bite…

A baby chair with a difference…

Although Sichuan province is world famous for its hot food, it is not well known internationally as a hotbed of football, and the challenges the Chinese market presents the world’s favourite game are numerous.  Playing at the 42,000 capacity Chengdu Sports Centre, the Chengdu Blades are just one of many examples of the highs and lows of recent years in the Chinese Super League.

Formally known as Chengdu Five Bulls (after a famous brand of cigarette in the area), the club survived numerous changes in personnel, stadium and name during the 1990s, and even suffered a suspension and fine for match-fixing in 2001 before the Blades were bought by English team Sheffield United in January 2006, changing their name to reflect the nickname of the Yorkshire club.   2007 saw their second full season under foreign ownership end in success as the team was promoted to the Chinese Super League, and last season the Blades finished a creditable 13^th in the top flight.

On Easter Sunday 2009 the Blades, in partnership with the British Chamber of Commerce, ran the first of what will hopefully be many ‘egg-citing’ family fun days.  Participants attended a pre-match pitch side tour of the stadium, watched the game against Beijing Guoan and at half time children from the China Youth Football League were invited to have a kick around on the pitch.

Sadly the majority of supporters went home disappointed following a two-nil reverse at the hands of Guo’an.  It was always going to be a tricky home tie against the Asian Champions League contenders from Beijing, and to make things worse the Blades lost 1^st choice goalkeeper Lan Yi to injury before kick-off and never recovered from this blow, going down to goals either side of half-time from Du Wenhui and Australian loan player Joel Griffiths.

This defeat left the Blades rock-bottom of the Super Leagues, and after the game angry but organised Chengdu fans surrounded the team coach, chanting their disapproval at the tactics of manager (and former Chinese international) Li Bing.  Shortly afterwards Mr. Li was given his marching orders by the club, and technical director Don O’Riordon took the reins, drawing his first game against top of the table Henan.  With a new manager soon to be appointed, hopefully this will give the Blades a new cutting edge and signal and upturn in their fortunes for the season ahead.

In order to make the most of your match day experience, Chengdon’t gives you the (moderately) clean guide to vocally supporting your team in China.

Encouragement:

加油！- jia you! – come on! (literally add oil)

雄起！- xiong qi! – come on!  (local version of jia you, but be careful with this, as away from football it has a very different meaning…)

进一个！- jin yi ge! – get one in (usually chanted at corners or free kicks)

To the opposition:

踩扁—-！- cai bia—! – stamp on/crush (insert other team’s name, bia is Sichuan dialect for bian)

To the referee:

黑哨！- hei shao! – black whistle! (a reference to the infamous black whistle scandals in Chinese football during the 1990s)

To own team:

换人 – huan ren – change the player

—下课！— xia ke! – (player/coach’s name) class dismissed! (a way of expressing your extreme dissatisfaction with their performance)

Here’s a picture of a tree I found in one of the more well-off expat compounds in Chengdu.  It is hooked up to an IV full of plant feeder – the mind boggles…

Perhaps it needed some ‘tree’tment?

Zhang Shuping has been talking in rapid-fire Sichuan dialect for an hour and a half without so much as taking a breath. I’m completely exhausted just listening to her story, but she seems relaxed and full of energy, pausing only to take a sip of water.  She continues, recouning the tale of how herself and her husband, otherwise known in China’s southwestern Sichuan Province as simply the ‘Rabbit King and Queen’, started their company back in 1985 with just 2 rabbits, and built it into a business that has become one of the largest distributors of rabbit products in the province.

As the Rabbit King and Queen’s mantra states, “2 rabbits + 1 year (and a little love and attention) = 377 rabbits (on average)”.

Mrs. Zhang’s husband Ren Xuping began raising rabbits when was 13 to try and support his sick father, but it was in 1984, when they were gifted 48 rabbits by American organisation HPI and the Sichuan Provincial Government, that the company really began to take off and flourish. The condition of this gift was that the people given the rabbits must themselves help to lift up others also in need.

To achieve this task, Ren Xuping started “The Rabbit Research Center for Poverty relief” to work alongside his main company.  It’s a training centre where, for a nominal fee, rural farmers can learn how to raise rabbits and market their own rabbit products.  Yuping also provides a startup pair to those who cannot afford to buy them. Both Ren Xuping and Mrs. Zhang were happy with this arrangement that helped local people in and around their home county of Dayi, but all this changed on May the 12^th 2008.

Both Mrs. Zhang and her husband should have been in Yingxiu (the town at the epicenter of Sichuan’s tragic earthquake) on that fateful day, but had received a call the day before to inform them that a delegation from Thailand wanted to visit them, so the couple postponed their trip and stayed in Dayi. Mrs. Zhang remembers when the earthquake hit: “we were all in a meeting and the ground began to move. Everyone was screaming and came running out of the house, and minutes later the building had fallen to the ground”.

On May 13^th when the scale of the devastation became clear they made a decision – the enterprise was to be divided into 3 groups. The first stayed with the company; the second (led by Mrs. Zhang) was to find the whereabouts of all know farmers in the county. The third was lead by Mrs. Zhang’s husband, and went directly to the Dayi quake zone, bringing with them water and food.

Up to mid-June 2008, NGOs and individuals came pouring into the quake zone, but inevitably with a disaster of this scale they found that some aspects of the rescue operation were somewhat muddled, or as Mrs. Zhang puts it “they brought with them a lot of love, but some people did not know the best way to help people practically”. So those within the company who were familiar with the districts affected assisted the NGOs by playing the role of coordinators, helping to collect information about people’s whereabouts and needs and passing this data on to the relief agencies.

From June to August 2008, they devoted their time and effort on the reconstruction of Dayi. They realized that the victims needed hope to survive, so alongside the Provincial Government they began to help train those who had lost their livelihood, and give them skills that they could use to make a living in the future. Some of the skills taught were about raising rabbits, but others also assisted the farmers to make long term plans in order to ease their worries about the long term future.

Up till the present day the company has given out more than 20,000 rabbits and more than 30,000 technical books to over 17,500 families in Dayi county alone, and while some may criticise their methods and their treatment of the animals, Mrs. Zhang insists that it is a cheap, practical solution to help local people help themselves out of poverty without having to always rely on outside aid to get by, and anyone who believes the old adage that ‘one person alone can’t make a difference’ might want to check out how much of a difference 2 rabbits can make to people’s lives.