Most local Chinese are interested in foreigners they meet on the way. They want to be friendly, although they only know one English word : Hello/Hi. So sometimes some bold ones would say hello to a foreigner just to get his attention or showing friendliness. But to a foreigner, this is often strange and sometimes even annoying just as you described when someone says hello or asks for phone number or taking you into their photo. Also, Chinese do have a lot of bad habits like chewing snacks while talking, spit on the ground,etc....that's just embarassing and bad. But anyway, local people are mostly nice in heart. hehe...

Thanks for sharing, Shane. While I can't say I've ever had all that happen in one day, I have experienced just about everything you mention here.

I think that it would be very easy to be annoyed by any one of these events but it sounds like you have a good sense of humor about all of it. That is key to having a successful stay in China.

I don't know what's up with the whole 'give me your phone number' phenemenom in China. Like you said, it's not just girls either. Maybe it's kind of like a 'status symbol' to have as many foreigners' numbers in your cell phone as you can? :). Just a guess.

I don't think my students will like me very much after they receive their oral exam grades this semester. I was pretty tough on them but hopefully someday they'll appreciate it...

Asking for phone numbers is not a cultural thing but might turn into one.

The first few months I was in China I chose not to have a phone, except the land-line in my apartment, which I thought was sufficient for getting hold of me.  Sure enough, everywhere I went people asked for my "hand-phone" number and I didn't have one to give out.  Someone who happened to be near by when those times occured said, "Don't worry.  Even if you have a number to give them, they might never call you."  Today I know why they don't always call you after asking for your number -- phone calls go by the minute, except if they could call from their employer's business lines.  Whenever I get a call today, if not because friends who are really good friends, it would be because of a dinner, English tutoring requests, or other real needs or meetings.

Soon after I bought my own "hand-phone" nine months after I arrived (yep, I managed to hold out for that long!) I began that same curious habit of asking for phone numbers from first-time strangers.  In less than two years, I also lost my original lil' black book that had nearly 1,000 names and phone numbers in it.

Telephone tolls in China are at much lower rates now than years back, yet my phones are not ringing any more frequently than before.  Today I have two land-lines coming into my apartment, and two separate mobile phones that can handle three different numbers between them.  So, if you meet me on the streets and want my phone number, be fore-warned that you could have writer's cramps from writing down my phone number(s)!

About one year ago I moved into this new dig that the school feeds two separate land-lines in, providing two different telephone services.  Soon after my moving for two different nights the phone in my room rang almost at exactly the same time, round 1:30 after midnight.  The phone sits on the night-table next to my pillow and I picked up the phone quickly once but there was no sound.  The other time I wasn't closeby and by the time I reached to answer the ringing had stopped.  It was almost like someone was interested to check if I was staying there those nights.  The number for the phone in the livingroom was never called.

Quite strange.

I'm not a TV person, and most of the time I prefer to use desk-lights rather than the ceiling lamps in the rooms, except in the kitchen.  Maybe it was difficult to detect whether I was in or out, even after the cows came home?

Usually you get them with cell phones, it's a type of advertising.  They would give you a 1 second call to your cell phone, you'd see the number then call them back to find out what it was and you get advertisements at a very high phone rate.

LOL! Paul, I got the same thing at the last school where I taught. FTs had to sign in and sign out. We were to be in by 11:00 or so on week nights.

I'd get the creepy 11:00 call every night. Silence on the other end.

I figured that it was the FAO or her buddy, an FT from Germany. Both were way too interested in my nonexistent private life.

What was worse was that for the first few weeks there, I'd also get a call from a very distraught Chinese woman screaming at me (in Chinese, of course). One would have thought that after one or two calls, the woman would stop calling, but she didn't. The calls would come at any time, and sometimes twice a day.

Strange stuff.

Whom of you can relate to that?! My firsy experience at a Chinese dental surgery was one that I'll probably never forget in my life - just because of the horrendous pain he'd put me in. I had a bad tooth removed and as he could not get the complete root out, he had to use a kind of a punch which he honestly knocked in with a small hammer. He did give me anaesthetics, though, but I was in agony despite. The Chinese teaching assistant who went with me was a witness to this spectacle and was nearly in tears. At one stage she came to hold my hand! Fortunately the senior dentist arrived and helped the junior to relieve me of my painful burden! But that's not the actual dentist story I want to relate to you.

The next one was quite an enjoying experience (apart from the discomfort of working in your mouth, that is). I had to wait 3 months for the 'wound' to settle down before I could get a crown (artificial tooth). To my delight a new Red Cross hospital opened close to my apartment with a complete dental unit. And as it happened, I had to walk past there often and one of the security guards who could speak some English befriended me. I then got introduced to a very sweet old doctor of 71 who could also manage some English. The next thing was to meet the dentists! RMB9400 later and after about 8 or 9 visits, I had not only one new crown, but plenty (I kind of neglected my teeth over the years ...)! But my first visit there, was the one I'm still just smiling about when thinking back. After he's done the preliminary work on some teeth, and just before I could go, I was asked for a photo session! And that was so funny, because the nurse/dental assistant took pics from about any angle (open mouth with the dentisits hand inside, closed mouth, from the feet to close-ups, etc!). And then some of the nurses and a female dentist wanted a shot standing with me stil sitting in the chair, etc! And in the mean time I had about a clown's red nose from an infection at the tip of the nose. What a spectacle that must have been! I don't want to know what those pics were like; but they'd enjoyed the session. Yes, me too as it was fun! Only in China ...!

Your returning calls might have actually cost you a bundle each time!  If those were advertising calls, they would be from out-of-China locations, usally for gambling schemes.  But most often than not, those calls were to suck out telephone-tolls from your prepaid account!  Ask round and you'll get similar advice from other cell-phone users.

My calls were definitely not to advertise anything to me, and those land-line phones need a prepaid-card inserted before I can dial-out, and I don't leave any of my cards in the phones.  Only the school offices call me on those numbers, and a courtesy-period of two minutes without any cards inserted is more than I need to talk on them for.  So far, only two other people in my circle of friends have one of my land-line numbers.  One is a Christian friend and the second is a class-monitor.  They both picked up that number on caller-id when I called them a month ago.  I could not even remember my numbers when I first moved in, only the school knew, as the unit was vacant for a long time before I took over.

Well, I dunno, Beryl.  Your Samsung Fuzzy might really have a sister but didn't tell you...?  Or that duck lady told her friend and those calls were advice for dealling with those protruding yet broken ribs?  I still think you didn't do the right thing before you returned to the US of A ... the duck-lady should be told!  (For those who don't know what I mean here, check out Beryl's rich collection of China Travel encounters on TACA elsewhere.)  I pity the new FT living there now, trying to figure out why so many people like to call him/her all the time!

On a different note, at another school they changed the phone-lines one summer and gave me the new number to my apartment.  Except, the technician crossed the wires and my line went to the vacant unit next door.  Meanwhile, my sister called and wondered if I had moved to live in a church somewhere.

A couple of weeks ago, I started the epic story about The Duck Lady. I wrote it online, then decided to finish it offline, so I copied it from the forum and saved it. Now i can't open the file to finish it!