Shanghai Vixen

I'm worried.

I'm worried about the riots. I'm worried that even if this is the end of this round, what will come will be worse.

Because, I'm worried that I live in the most unstable place imagineable.

I'm worried about the "expats" who cornered me at the for foreigners, by foreigners lit fest to crow that it's just like Old Shanghai - as if it was a good thing. (Sorry for the one of you who is taken out of context here.) Yeah, because neocolonial entitlement and oblivion while Rome - or Shanghia, or L!asa - burns is such a good thing.

I'm worried about the inflation, the cost of living, the spiraling food and housing prices, and especially the latter feuled by foreigners (including overseas Chinese) who have injected the American, European and Hong Kong bubbles into Shanghai. I'll take the brown air particles anytime over that sort of pollution. Walking home from an interview today, I glaced over property listings in several windows - rental prices are in many cases up 200-500% from a year ago. And maybe it's only coincidence the throngs of gawky-eyed whities with *mug me* on their foreheads that I simultaneously see wandering by - but maybe not.

I'm worried about the crackdown on visas that is particularly aimed at small-time, self-employed operators like myself. Deportation has me awake at night, almost as much as...

I'm worried about the mass slaughter of cats in Beijing, to "clean it up" for the oilympics, and especially that it might come here and claim my Silver Lining. Which would make me kill the people trying to hurt him, and thus be executed myself.

I am worried about my health, which has been a phlegmy mess all year, first the flu and bronchitis, now a chronic cold from the China lung.

I worry about my book, which is behind schedule, about my weight loss going slower than anticipated, that it may be easier and more probable that I will really truly fail than that I will ever really truly be as I want to be.

So I proceed to call up Gym Boy, for the first time this year. I...have been meaning too, and tried once before but his phone was out of range. But, I was meaning to finally formally break it off - in fact I want to set him up with my friends; instead, it is reassuring to have someone fussing that I have been sick - why didn't I tell him, he'd have brought me drugs and soup? It is nice to have someone who wants to come over, clean your house in his undies, and cook you things. Not to mention be a buffer and translator between the sometimes craziness that is China. The thing about Gym Boy, is even when we've stopped fucking, even if he's with someone else, he's a good guy and is there for me. Which - is nice, and which I'm not sure I could say for Jifu, let along Yaya or Ah Ren.

As I approached my lane just now, I spotted at its entrance a van...no, an ambulance. I could not see much of the person already loaded in, just shoeless nylon stockinged feet at the end of a flat, deflated looking body. The ambulance attendents seemed in no particular hurry, nor did the family climbing into the back. Was she already dead?

Which of my neighbors is it? There are a lot of elderly residents here, but most of them are as homebound as I am. Of the older neighbors, only a few stop to chat frequently, the rest may nod and smile but prefer to watch the neighborhood mascot than to engage.

Coming in, the aimiable Mr. Combover across and one door, 1F, over was shooing at the resident roof pidgeons with, prodding them with a long bamboo pool. "They're yours?" I asked. "I always thought they were wild," attracted by the birdseed spilled by the caged bird collection of directly across, 2F. They of the myna bird that yells "Hello!" at me whenever I head out, and I suspect is honing his "Wei!" into a "Wei, Laowai!" (Which, of course, is my Chinese name - Wei Laowai.) Also they of the propensity for late night nudity, which is way more than I need to see. Mr. Combover is the new boyfriend or second husband of the former Crazy Divorcee - rather crazy and bitter when her husband of thirty years took all the money and left with a younger woman a few yars back, but now she's quite calm and sane so I need a new nickname for her. She's one of my friendliest neighbors, invites me ballroom dancing with her. I would love to accept, but she goes at 6am. Err. They invite me into their cluttered, cozy courtyard to show me their pidgeon hutch and to chatter about their birds.

This afternoon had my second photo shoot of the week. Kinda...over-shot. This time at least they didn't want me in it, so I could ignore them and work. Tuesday was of me - for this American magazine doing a silly article to the extent of, "Omigod! Caucasians in China!" - but the photographer was quite good, and also pretty cool. She has a very painterly sensibility, and plays with the light amazingly, but does not flatter her subjects. I expect the shots will be beautiful, brutal and true...and will make me look like the pasty blob I can sometimes be.

Another interview last night for a French magazine story on "China" - oy - arranged by a contact of Yi's. Today was also an Yi set up, promo shots for a laowai musician friend of hers. Today's photographer was also quite good, I'm surprised I hadn't met or heard of her before, but her stuff is more an Annie Lebowitzy mix of glamourized and grit. She wants to come back and do a shoot of me and the entire house, and it will be interesting to compare her shots with Tuesday's.

Knowing Yi, I should have not been surprised that her foreign musician friend was a tall, cute, black guy. But I am always surprised by black people - they're birds even more exotic here than we pinkies. That, and I am a bit racist, not in a deliberate or malicious sense, just that I have never gotten used to being around black people. What with the SoCal and the Ivy League and the China combo. It's rather how I used to be around gays, uncertain how to act, having to remind myself to act normal, to not be nervous or gawk or say anything obnoxious. Which ensures that I act far from normal, and am nervous and gawk and say obnoxious things. Until I've gotten to know and used to the person, and viscerally adjust. And the gays, I'm quite used to now, after protracted exposure. While white folk seem odder to me every passing day.

The Chinese "stare at funny-looking people" factor doesn't help either. Granted, I do that to everyone now. Still, it's bad. And I don't know how to "fix" that, because the more I try to the more I invite the awkward. Hence, perhaps admitting it is the best way to deal with it.