New Year's Competition part 2

After a couple hours of listening to a story about a wolf who terrorizes a riverbank and the coalition of thirsty animals who try to stop him, we were almost finished. I was given a chart and had to put a check mark next to the names of the 15 or so children who I thought had given the best recitations. We drove back to the hotel courtyard, where groups of children in various costumes and uniforms were milling around one building in particular. We went inside. To the right was a stage and a catwalk, on which four emaciated girls who couldn't have been older than 13 were awkwardly modeling skimpy dresses. In front of that were several rows of chairs, all empty except for four in the front that were occupied by the judges--including Aileen and Liu Xiao. Behind that, on the other side of a crowded aisle, were more seats, which were full.

Mary and I stood in the doorway for a few moments, and then a guy with a headset pushed through the crowd and beckoned us to follow him. He led us to the judges' chairs. Feeling a little embarrassed about this special treatment--I wasn't actually going to judge these models, was I!?--I chose a seat several rows back and on one side. Soon the modeling transitioned to dancing, which was mostly hip-hop and I thought pretty impressive. After about half an hour I decided it would be more fun to use the remaining hour or so until lunch to explore the city. Mary and I pushed our way back through the crowd of people--assailed with "Hello!"s from every direction--to the courtyard. After checking in with the woman in the neon orange coat--who I had started to think of as my handler--we left. We walked across one of the covered bridges and through some sunny open markets.





Influenced slightly by my throbbing head, I suggested we stop for tea. Instead of a traditional tea house, Mary took me to a black-and-white cow-patterned, narrow place across the street from her university. I ordered a hot green tea, and a black ceramic mug on a shelf behind the cashier reminded me to ask for it in something other than plastic. "Plastic is all we have," I was informed. "What about the mug right behind you!?" I asked. That was for display purposes only. With Mary's help, however, I prevailed upon them to serve my tea in it. The cashier called the busboy over and asked him to wash the dust out.

After tea we walked back toward the hotel and intercepted the other judges and organizers (including the woman in the neon orange coat) on the bridge. Together we walked to a nearby restaurant and feasted on foodstuffs. As we walked lazily back to the hotel, we passed an old man sitting at a little table with a camping stove, on which there was a bowl of shiny brownish liquid sugar. In front of him was a baking tray with a piece of wax paper on it. The man picked up the bowl and with deft motions poured tiny amounts of the liquid sugar onto the paper, soon creating a fish, which he mounted on a stick. Another of the judges paid the old man two yuan and asked me to choose an animal. The man had a wheel with twelve different animals on it that you could spin, and the arrow ended up pointing to a crane (sorry it's not the best picture).





Walking back to the hotel, Mary told me that the man was a local celebrity.

We were taken back to the school for another round of speeches. This second time, however, the contestants were the same (minus the ones I hadn't given check marks). And they performed the same speeches, recited the same stories. The only difference was that this time I had to give them ratings on a 10.0 scale, marked next to their names on another chart. As far as I could tell, I was the only one rating these children, and I found it a little disquieting that although I had no formal training and had been given practically no instructions, I was solely responsible for how they fared in the contest--for which most of them must have spent a long time practicing.

After the second round of judging, we had more time until dinner, so after watching the dancing again for a while--this time it was mostly large groups of children doing traditional ethnic dances, although right when I came in someone was breakdancing--Mary and I took off again. We walked toward the biggest of the bridges, which was lined with teahouses and tea shops.





We were sitting in one of the teahouses sampling their finest grades when Mary got a call. It was the woman in the orange coat, calling us back for dinner. So we went to another restaurant, where we had a private room on the second floor. This time there were about 15 people, and there were so many dishes on the table that they had to start stacking plates on top of the edges of other plates. One of the dishes was the famous "Ya'an fish soup". One of the reasons the fish is so famous is a bone in its head that looks a lot like a saber. The restaurant guarantees that any customer who orders the fish will get a saber bone to take home with them. When they brought the fish out, the orange coat woman and the waitress spent several minutes digging around in its head with a knife, but they were unable to find the bone. Fortunately, the restaurant must have kept a stock of extra saber bones just in case, because the waitress returned shortly with a little gift box. It was passed around for everyone to see, and then the woman in the orange coat gave it to me.