My Chinese Friend, Joey

*** There is a picture above here in case you can't see it...click on it...

I haven't talked much about some of the people I've met here, so I'm going to spend some time now to talk about my friend Jiang. If you'll remember my post about trying to return the bad apples, Jiang was the Chinese person who came to the rescue at the end because he speaks some English and was able to help translate.

Well, it turns out that I am the first foreigner that Jiang has ever spoken to in person so to say that he was excited to meet me is an understatement. I didn't know this tidbit at the time when we met though so I didn't really expect to hear from him again. Well, he called me a day or two later and when I answered he was absolutely bursting with excitement. He told me that he was so proud of himself for communicating with a foreigner and that he had trouble sleeping because he was so excited to speak English again. He also VERY excitedly told me that he wanted to buy me some bananas, because after I was done with the apple business he accompanied me to buy some more fruit but I couldn't find any bananas. On the phone he was like "BANANAS, BANANAS, I WANT TO BUY YOU SOME BANANAS!" This really made me laugh...

Well I thought he was a little crazy so I had sort of been screening his calls and texts but finally I thought oh what the heck I'll meet up with him for 30 minutes and give him a chance. So we met up and got some street food and I realized that he wasn't really crazy...I guess it's just hard for me to understand how exciting it could be to meet a foreigner, especially if you are interested in practicing their language.

When we met he told me that he had bought me some bananas but that I hadn't called him back so he had no choice but to eat them hahahah. He also told me that he had been busy searching for a suitable English name...he finally landed on 'Joey' because he thought he was a little bit stupid like Joey from Friends. Haha, I think he is a very honest person, although I told him that in America we typically do not insult ourselves like that.

So Joey is a very special person- he's one of the most happy, excitable and friendly people that you will ever meet. The first time he met all of my foreign friends he literally had a compliment for every single one of them. He wished one couple great happiness and told them they were wonderful together, told another that he could be in the movies, and another that he had beautiful eyes (LOL).....I think he comes from a very traditional Chinese family and I'm not sure if this is related or not but he is also one of the most innocent people I have ever met, especially considering that he is 28. I think it will be easier to see this from the text messages rather than having me describe why...

So, here are some of the fabulous text messages that he has sent me. I'm not putting them up to make fun of him or his English, in fact I think he English is amazing considering he has never talked to an English speaker before, but rather just to demonstrate his character.
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The first messages he sent me:

"still remember me? have u got banana today?"
"i prefer to make friend than to practise eng heartly"
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the first time we met up:

me- "okay we can meet at 4"
joey- "no problem, i will be at 38square at 3, waiting for u, call me then"
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Now for a series of texts he sent me on the weather...........

"the weather is not well today, did u take umbrella with u, hope u not get wet. can u see weather report at home?"
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"doing what now? have u got home? so strong wind outside, i am on my way home by bus. good news to share with u, i made a deal yesterday, someone rent a house through me, it let me earn 200 yuan"
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"the traffic is heavy, the bus almost not move, it might take me some time on the journey, i think i should have a little sleep"
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"i guess it will still be cold the days after, wear more clothes. i met a korean who speak chinese well, his wife is a pretty chinese lady, and she is pregnant. but i did not find house satisfied to them"
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"i guessed wrong about the weather today, it is nice out"
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After I met up with him I thought it would be really good to invite him out to a foreigner bar to break him in a little bit and get him more accustomed to foreigners. So I sent him a message and let him know that we were going. He said:

"it is my great honor to be invited, i am very glad to join u, but i am not sure that i can afford the place u often meet, and i am afraid i may give you trouble, if u do not mind, tell when and where then, i will go"

He has told me at least a million times that he doesn't make a lot of money but I told him the point was to meet foreigners, not spend money. So then at 6:30 PM on Friday he said:

"is there any party? how can i find you?"

I told him that we probably would not go to the bar until at least 10:00 PM, so he said...:

"oh my god, i think i should go home, have dinner first. call u later"

I apologized for the miscommunication, he replied:

"don't say that, it's not your fault. i should think about that point. i rarely go to that kind of place like bar, which is high-paying for me. so i'm greatly eager to have a taste"

After going to the bar:

"it is great memory in my life, thx for your beer. nice dream"

I introduced him to all of the foreign teachers here and he was so happy to meet them. Since then, Joey has come to the bar 2 more times. I am afraid that we are stealing his innocence....the whole time we were there his mother was calling him every 10 minutes because she was so worried about him. Good lord...he's 28!

Side note on his mom, he said she is always bugging him about getting a girlfriend even though he doesn't really care for one that much. She often tells him that he is "unclean" as well and sometimes when we're talking on QQ he has to get off because his mom is making him wash himself or something. Very strange...he seems clean to me.....
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I decided that I would teach Joey a little bit about our culture when we were at the bar. Sometimes, when Joey would want to talk to me, he would call me like 10 times even though I wasn't answering and thus was clearly busy. So I explained to him that in America (and probably many other places lol) we just call each other once or twice and if they don't answer we just wait for them to call back. I have had other Chinese people do this to me as well, so I don't think it's just him. He was very surprised about this and said that he understood...however...the very next day he called me like 5 times in a row. I was like AHHHHHHH!!! But then he sent me this message, and again mentioned the weather, lol. I think I asked him if he was really interested in the weather or something haha:

"first, i want to say sorry for giving u so many calls in a short time. i remember your words. i was just afraid that u called me back but could not find me, my phone was power off, i left the battery charger in my office, so i wasn't able to contact u till now. the usb, it doesn't need to be hurry to return. though i don't want mention the weather, it is like winter today, so take care of yourself"
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random text, "mr. ben" is one of the teachers in the company and he is my age, so younger than joey hahah.

"have i expressed clearly? hoho. i know what kind of person u are, u are generous girl. same with me i think. if u come across mr. ben, tell him that i remember who he looks like. that guy's net id is "grubby", a popular star in electronic sports field. his wife is also popular, a beauty champion of singapore"
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So anyways, Joey has been a very good friend to me here, helping me out whenever I need it. When I went to Shenyang, he booked my hotel room for me there, typed up a bunch of stuff I could do there in Chinese and in English, and was even on call for me in case I ran into any problems. For example, I had some trouble with one of the buses so I called him and he told me what to do, talked to the station manager and helped me sort it out. He was very worried about me while I was there since I was alone- the first morning I was there he texted me at like 7:45 AM and I just happened to be up and in the shower so I didn't receive it. After I got out of the shower 20 minutes later, I got a call from him asking me what the matter was and all this stuff...I don't really understand why it didn't occur to him that I might have been sleeping but I appreciated his concern lol.

So, don't worry about me here, I have people like Joey watching my back!! To be honest, many people here watch my back I think. If I ever need help, there are many Chinese people I can call who are happy to do something for me. It has made my life a lot easier here....they can be very nice people.

Well, that is Joey.