Welcome to China!

Recently, James had the pleasure of hanging out with a few State folks who came to China on a temporary basis to help out with stuff.


They'd never been to China before.


And now that James and I have been in China for something like almost eight months, it's interesting to see what folks that have newly-arrived notice that he and I don't even see anymore.


Before you move to China, people try to prepare you for some of the totally whacked things you will see when you get here. Except that I hate it when people say stuff in English that basically means nothing to me. For example, before we moved here we would read all manner of vague verbiage like "It is sometimes difficult for westerners to acclimate to some local Chinese practices." And I would think: What does that MEAN?!?! Use real English, please!


So I will. I will use real English for you, dear readers. Prepare yourselves.


Translate the above vague statement to: So, you will be walking down the sidewalk to go to lunch and then, on the sidewalk, there will be a human being that is pooping and you will be all HOLY CRAP, WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?!?! but you will keep walking while also trying not to step in phlegm/yellow puddles/poo, and you will remind yourself (for the zillionth time) that you will throw away all of the pairs of shoes that you've worn here in China at the end of your tour.


You see, babies/toddlers/young children here don't wear diapers.  They wear something called "split pants." (And this is a good time to tell you that I didn't take any of the pictures in this blog post - that I grabbed them all off the internet.)


Behold, split pants:




So, yes, you will be walking down the sidewalk/walking through the grocery store/walking through the museum/standing on the subway and then some kid will squat and out will come... the stuff you THINK comes out...and if you are with newly-arrived, visiting westerners who have never been to China before, you will very much have to tell them that yes, this happens. Constantly. 

Because that child? In this next picture? Is doing what you THINK it is doing:





Welcome to China.


If the child is old enough, it will squat on its own and do its thing, like the child in the picture above. If it isn't, the grandmother/mother will hold it in a certain way (yes, ANYWHERE), like this:




And when you walk by and you see a grownup/child combination in that sort of arrangement, you immediately look away unless you want to have to go home and bleach your eyes.


Sure, there are diapers here, but almost no parents use them. And no, it's not a money thing, at least for lots/many folks. At one point, James actually saw a Mercedes pull over on the side of the road (there's some serious money in China), the back door of the Mercedes open, two grownup arms extend out of the back seat holding a baby in the fashion like you see above, and a little penis flying about in the wind, doing its thing. 


Oh yeah, we're not in America anymore.


Chinese parents will walk down the street with their split-pantsed kid all holding them and playing with them and I see this sort of thing all the time:




And I think: isn't that sort of DANGEROUS?!?! For the parent, I mean?!? But, then again, I remember that it's really not my problem. 


I mean, it's my problem sometimes, of course. Because there we will be in McDonald's and I'll look over and I'll see some young child sitting in the chair all:




And I'm sorry - maybe this is totally Western Judgey McJudgerpants of me - but I can't help but think... ewwwwww.  


And then the same split-pantsed child runs into the little McDonald's playplace and slides down the plastic slide and I can't help but be grateful that my kids are basically grown and I don't have to forbid them from playing on the playplace equipment.


Or I'll be shopping somewhere and I'll look over at another shopping cart and I'll see:




And I'll inwardly roll my eyes and sigh. Not unlike what I do when I'm in the grocery store and there are little yellow puddles on the floor. 


NOTE TO VISITORS IN CHINA: Never step in the yellow puddles. It's not, like, canned pineapple juice that spilled or something. You will see them everywhere. After a while you will forget that they're there.


And yes, babies/toddlers/children will "go" ANYWHERE. Literally anywhere. 


Last time James was in the Chengdu airport flying out on a trip somewhere, he was standing in line at the ticket counter and - you guessed it - a child right next to him squatted and did its thing on the floor. 


OF THE AIRPORT.


So, yeah. I'll shut up now. I just wanted to prepare you, in case you ever came here. Because westerners may find it difficult to acclimate to some of the local practices.

Comments

[Jill]

Okay, I'm absolutely HYSTERICALLY laughing about this ... because seriously, I love little tushies as much as the next person. But those open crotched pants? Oh My! Just thanking my lucky stars that the adults aren't wearing them too!

[Bubba]

Thank you for a truly candid, instructive, and hilarious post! If you are considering a portable career, you might want to think about... travel/humor writer!

[hannah]

I don't... I mean... WHAT???? Oh god I need to go take a xanax to deal with this post.

So my next question, upon being medicated, is whether adults do this too?

[Jen]

Yup, that's where my crunchiness ends. I can do just about anything else, but I tried EC (what these folks are doing) for about two days (with Nick, once I figured out what it was) and I realized I was going to be crunchy enough with cloth diapers.

You know, that was my other question about it...where DO the kids go (cause I know it's much bigger overseas) and voila, you answered it for me: everywhere! Yep, loved my BumGeniuses...good enough for me and my LG!

Canned pineapple juice...ha!

[A Daring Adventure]

hannah my dearest darling, the answer is NO. Thank GOD, adults do not wear split pants. They also do not poo on the sidewalks/airports/etc. I have seen one grown man urinating on the sidewalk, but I'm pretty sure he would be in the same parallel grouping as a homeless person in the US. It's certainly not done by 99.9% of the regular Chinese adults.

Once you are potty trained, you are expected to use the squatty potties, glorious as they are.

Bubba - thank you!

And Jill & Jen - as always - love you guys!

[DS]

I hurt myself laughing! Kolbi, I would suggest that FSI/OBC hire you to write a real guide to China, but then you'll probably write real stuff like the consequences of split pants and all that may turn off people heading there.

I'd also propose a detached mudroom by the entryway for all houses where all shoes live and socialize after exploring those er glorious streets.

[Mom]

AHA! Always wondered why Eastern people tend to remove their shoes before entering their homes. Even if it is religious in nature, it's also utilitarian. Now it all makes sense.

Wonder if that has anything to do with the one-child law? It's self-imposed because they can only stand to potty train once?

[TG]

So. . . who cleans it up? Do people just wait until the rain washes it away?

In Ukraine, the buildings/cities hired old babushkas to keep the sidewalks clean, etc... (not that Ukrainian kids have split pants -- and they wouldn't go just anywhere -- usually only near a building wall a bit more discreetly and out of people's way.) So, are little old Chinese ladies hired to clean this up? Or. . . is it just left out there?

(I already do NOT have China on my short list. . . but this verifies it is not a good fit for me!)

[Chelsea]

On the other hand, it's really handy (culturally) if you're potty training your toddler. I mean, the one or two (or more) times Penny had an accident in public, I don't think anyone even blinked. She did it once in McDonald's, and the lady at the counter just gave me some napkins and then called the lady with the mop. There was absolutely no freaking out. It's kind of nice.... like the one time we get less attention than we would in the US. ;) Great post!

[alex]

Just when you think you can't be surprised, you learn about something like this. Wow. Speechless. =)

[Ashley]

I no longer feel bad about my housekeeper sending my two year-old outside to play with just underwear on. At least there wasn't a SPLIT in it!

And now China is DEFINITELY off the list.

[shannon]

I am laughing so hard I am literally crying and David is looking at me like I have lost my mind. We are SO not bidding China.

Why do I have the feeling I have just sealed my fate and better start brushing up on my (nonexistent) Chinese?

[Kate]

I've led such a sheltered life that I've never heard of this. Many thanks for the, uh, enlightenment.

[bfiles]

you just totally blew my mind right there.

[Daniela]

Ha, loved the post! Here in India, perhaps because it's warm/hot almost year round many poor/homeless parents don't even bother putting pants on their little ones. So you often see babies/toddlers/children running around with no pants on. They may have a shirt on but not always. In India, unfortunately, adults do that kinda stuff in the street too. I have seen several men pee in public already and there's plenty of evidence as you walk around that they go #2 in public too. It's quite disturbing at first...

[iphone spy]

When the Chinese chldren is very small, their parents pay much attention to them, they treat them as their god, maybe it is different from America.

[Missy]

Um, WOW. That's all I can say. I totally thought I *knew* Asia after 3 years in Japan BUT I HAD NO IDEA.

HOLY CRAPPAGE.

Surely this is a health hazard? It makes the fact that I pick up my dog's poo in little sanitary bags even more ridiculous. Perhaps they should sell poo bags for toddlers there? With signs, like "Please pick up your child's poo!" and maybe a picture of a squatty baby?

Wow. Japanese people are super clean and super OCD - they wear different shoes just to walk into a restroom, and NEVER wear them out around the house, and usually wash their hands twice (they have nifty little water spouts above the toilets where clean water flows before it refills the tank). I knew China was different but I didn't know HOW MUCH different.

Holy crap on a cracker, I don't know if I could handle that.