Actually I lie.
I live in Shanghai (which, if you ask the Shanghairen, is barely even China but rather its own magnificent autonomous kingdom of wealth and awesomeness) and oh, the shiny accoutrements of the festive season are out in a big way.
Have you seen the giant tree outside Prada on Nanjing Road West? The one that has been decorated with full sized Mini Coopers? You know, the cars? Decked with freaking cars?
Or the waitresses at the hotpot place we had our traditional Christmas lunch at today, wearing plush reindeer antler and Christmas tree hair bands. The red, shiny Merry Christmas signs plastered in the foyer didn’t clash at all with the silver mirror and purple tiger print standard decor.
Over the past month, at the various hotels I’d been shuttled off to for work, I was greeted by increasingly ornate and enormous Christmas trees. The one in Jinan was the hugest, but the one in Nanjing was pink and was next to a guy playing carols on a grand piano in the lobby. I’ll give it credit for that.
They had this one up in Jinan way back at the beginning of December. Couldn’t wait to start decorating for a festival they didn’t actually celebrate.
Or the plethora of seasonal attire in the boutiques along Nanchang Lu, should you feel a need to deck yourself in boughs of holly.
I fear I’d look like a snowbank if I wore this.
Or the Festivus Ducks down at Tianzifang, Â getting ready to deliver lake weed and grains to well behaved children all over the land.
Quack quack quack, happy Festivus to all!
Chez nous, things are low key for Festivus. I had been feeling very homesick and tired and frustrated, worn down by weeks of brutal cold (by Shanghai standards- remember we don’t do central heating here), 3 consecutive weekends of work away in other cities on top of my day job which was going through massive upheavals, and big fat general seasonal malaise.
And by malaise I mean some days I was ready to catch the next flight out to Mexico (or Morocco or Xinjiang or anywhere but here), though I’m not sure how many direct flights there are from Shanghai to Mexico City. Also, Doug might object. I’d have to bring him to the airport too. Â It’s hard to make impulsive decisions when you actually have to make, like, arrangements and stuff.
I just had to fight the burning, irrational need to escape, to climb out the window and just keep going until I would hopefully finally feel better.
The [completely fabricated] term ideated defenestration (defenestrative ideation?) would apply here, though given that we are on the 16th floor it would have been a very bad idea to follow through with it.
Shanghai can be horrible and grey and grim in winter, a perfect storm of all the things that can trigger brutal seasonal depression. Mine was getting pretty black and I grew to loathe that big black cloud that insisted on hovering over my head and leaching into my brainwaves.
I tried to battle that big black cloud by tentatively revisiting our neglected kitchen. Comfort food and all. Home and hearth. Nurturing, if only for self preservation.
I opened up a tab for Foodgawker.com again, long since closed in annoyance (I mean, for fuck’s sake- more goddamn cake-pops? Have you guys no imagination?), ready to daydream new and wondrous edibles that could transport me through their wafting smells into a warmer, gentler place.  I dusted off the oven after a long hiatus and in quick succession made a lovely no-knead spice bread, focaccia and my first round of Xinjiang noodle dough wok tortillas in ages.  We had spicy chicken tacos for Christmas Eve dinner.  I’m nothing if not traditional.
Om nom nom.
I decorated the flat as best as I could, trying to make it seem at least somewhat shiny and sparkly and celebratory. I hung tinsel and bobbles on the dead stumps of the old mini-palm trees I killed years ago (but kept because they were great to use as a vertical trellis for my experimental shrub cuttings).
Did you see the very successful experimental shrub cuttings in there? The leaves look like shiny purple-green ribbon candy, ever so festive.
Gerald the Bear and Kevin the Panda agreed to be decked, as it were, with Christmas bells and decorative stockings and tiny little fake presents that were significantly more elegantly wrapped than our actual gifts (see below: yes, we’re utilitarian that way. I gave Doug the red shopping bag; he gave me the box mine was delivered in). Sometimes I wish I could be motivated enough to actually gift wrap the gifts, but does one really need to gift wrap 300 kuai worth of imported chocolate? I think not.
The Festivus Fairy came! And no, Doug didn’t buy me a crate of Chardonnay, though I wouldn’t have sent it back if he had.
After weeks of grim, grey, cold, rainy days, Christmas has been lovely and bright and mild. We treated ourselves to a massive feast at our favourite hotpot place (the one where the waitresses wore little antlers or Christmas trees on their heads), then walked home the long way, enjoying the bright sunlight, ducking down quieter lanes and side streets. Lots of shop windows wished us a Merry Chlistmas or were brightened by Santa hats. There was tinsel and sparkly things.
I actually felt almost good again.
Nothing says Christmas lunch like a bowl full of raw greens ready to be dunked into a Sichuan hotpot.
On the way home, we popped into Yongkang Lu for French tarts and Oregon craft beers. Shanghai is forgiving that way: when you need to briefly step out of China (for your own mental health), it provides little side exits for you to pop into, to stock up on things that are familiar and comforting and which help you to feel just a little bit more connected to your former life back home, to your family, to your own particular cultural taste buds.
You can almost smell the evergreen forests of home!
That way, when you step back out again, you’re ready for another day full of salted eels and unheated classrooms. As ready as one can ever be.
13 Responses
On our only Christmas in Shanghai we celebrated the day by buying an air purifier, more to drown out the construction noise from the site outside our bedroom than for its purification abilities. How your description of Shanghai in the winter rings true. How I remember fighting those urges to escape, anywhere.
Unfortunately, in 1996 the city offered no place to “step out of China”.
Merry Christmas, here’s to a fantastic 2013!
Robyn recently posted..Dreaming
It’s kind of funny being here for Christmas and having more of the festive trappings of home available. It was so different in Turkey, though near the end, Istanbul started offering up Christmas decorations, neatly labelled as new year ones. I kind of liked that, even though they often didn’t go up until AFTER Christmas…
I can only imagine how much has changed here since 1996… a lot has changed since 2009!
I don’t think Turkey would be any better than Asia. A friend living in Istanbul FB’s that she went to midnight mass to get into the Christmas spirit, but was totally dispirited by all the Turks talking loudly through the ceremony. Let’s face it, countries that don’t have a Christian tradition will never do Christmas well. The Philippines is a great place to spend Christmas. Those folks know how to do the holiday right!
Robyn recently posted..Dreaming
Was that Jen Hattam, by any chance? I remember her mentioning that on FB. Oddly, she came to Istanbul just as I was leaving so we never met… but her group of friends there was my group of friends so we met online by proxy. I still keep seeing photos of her with people I know, in places I used to spend a lot of time. It’s such a small world!
And it’s funny about the Christmas spirit thing, because I’m not actually religious and am only tenuously culturally Christian (as in, my ancestors were, and I have no direct family links or traditions to, say, Judaism or Hinduism or whatever). I do crave it though. I crave the idea of family, warmth, certain evocative songs, specific decor and iconography, a certain elusive yet very specific (and almost sacred) vibe. I think what I crave most is the idea of connections, of roots. As I get older, it grows in importance.
Must consider the Philippines…
Yes, that’s Jen. I am also a Christian culturally only. Nonetheless, I don’t think the vibe can be conjured in non-Christian places. Kerala is another place, and Goa, where Christmas is supposed to be good … bec of the Christian population.
Robyn recently posted..Dreaming
Mmmm. Salted eels.
Breakfast of champions!
Hi Mary Anne!
While reading your post I remembered an Xmas season in Indonesia (during times when such trips were still part of the job, if that can be an excuse): Staff in a 5* hotel resto serving people while forced to wear fluffy green clothes (yes, the classic Xmas green) and huge beanies made from plastic fibres… at 38°C in the shadow. Poor sweating kids, looking like small Santa-Gremlins doing their best to bring a strange version of holy spirit to some arrogant, pampered Westerners. Hard to bear, all the more if you actually planned to leave any such spirits at home or as far away as any possible… Not to mention the very special, just slightly overdone or simply daft adoptions of Chistmas decos we all have been innocently chosen to enjoy during one or other Christmas season in Asia (or somewhere else)… In my experience, fleeing the Xmas spirit is usually not as easy as one might think. However, in Asia it’s also quite hard to find it if you’re looking for it…
Wish you a Merry Christmas, some relaxing days and whatever it is you and your cultural taste buds need in Shanghai during this time of the year! 😉
PS: The ducks aren’t too bad, are they?
Oh, my- I’ve never had to have one of those surreal 5 star Christmases, though I did see ads in the lifts for such things at the hotels I stayed at in Nanjing and Jinan recently. I’m very wary of contrived celebrations, especially when they involve people who have been roped into celebrating someone else’s festival… I still haven’t figured out what the Chinese think of Christmas, aside from gifts and shiny decorations.
For me, the decidedly non-religious, I just miss the concept of coziness, possibly snow, comfort foods and seasonal baked goods, family gatherings, decorations hauled out only once a year that evoke strong memories of childhood. I guess I kind of miss that. It’s been years.
So far the breads and the beer have helped, as well as the festively decorated bears! And yes, the ducks! They’re impressive!
I always kind of liked Christmases in Asia… probably because I got all the sparkly lights and a reason to eat lots of cake but without all the religious stuff or the pressure of having to buy gifts or send cards. That being said, it has been nice being home for Christmas for once. Although, I’ve already totally failed at the card-sending and gift-giving. Luckily, my family is celebrating Christmas late this year. So I have a couple more days to make good. Or not.
Sally recently posted..Weeklyish Challengey Thingie: Indiana Family Road Trip
Whenever I actually go home for Christmas (um, last time was 2008?), I’m actually shocked by the idea of having to do the Christmas shopping or sending out cards or having to plan and cook a proper Christmas dinner or preparing for festivities. Here we do such a minimalist, half-assed job that I forget that’s not how the folks back home do it… I kind of want all the good bits without all the stress and hard work!
Here’s hoping for a better and less gray 2013 for you! We made our Christmas as Christmas-y as we could here with our friends in Istanbul. The city is actually fairly festive for New Year’s – though it all looks like Christmas decor to me. I decorate a bit, bake a ton of holiday cookies and re-created my husband’s traditional Feast of 7 Fishes with some Turklish flair. We enjoyed making our traditions this year in our first Christmas abroad.
Joy @My Turkish Joys recently posted..A Successful Turklish Feast of 7 Fishes in Istanbul
I must say, I miss the Turkish new year decorations! I had a look through your posts and felt terribly homesick for Istanbul- I used to live in Osmanbey, just across from Nisantasi. Nice!