The Li River winds through Guilin, puddling into many lakes surrounded on all sides by landscaped parks and ornate pagodas. The parks and the river are lit at night with colored lights everywhere, and in the mornings, mist hangs over the huge, blobbish mountains that surround the city, and it’s lovely really. My second night in Guilin, I was walking back to my hotel when a girl on a bike ‘hello’d’ me. She told me that she was Wan Chai Ling and that she was very excited (like everyone) to practice her English with foreigners. I asked her what I should make sure to see in Guilin, and she said I had to take the Li River cruise. I said it was expensive for foreigners, and she said she’d go with me so they’d sell me a ticket for the Chinese tour, which is less.
Well, I think we all see where this is going. I saw where it was going at the time, but yet…I got hosed, my friends. But not until the next day. Actually, she did get me a good price on the Li River thing (I knew what the ballpark should be), and I really did want to do that. She asked if I was going to hike up Solitary Beauty Peak, and I said actually I was going to do that the next day, and she said maybe she could come along. We arranged a meeting place for the next morning. I was pretty lonely by this point in my travels, so I looked forward to doing something with another person.
I met up with Ling the following morning. It was a sunny day, but cool, and the sweet osmanthus trees were full and shady overhead. I was all set to head off for the park. Ling was too, just as soon as we’d made a quick stop by the art gallery where she was a student, so she could drop off her bike.
Now. The art student scam is so old, it was actually described in my guidebook…and yet, I fell for it anyway. We went into a little gallery on a quiet street, and looked at the prints, and Ling proudly showed me all of her work, and I praised it. Then she told me I should really buy some, and I said no thank you. And then she introduced me to her teacher – a soft-spoken, thin, older man – and the two of them showed me a binder where all sorts of travelers had written their many purchases and how much they’d paid, and how impressed they were to find such unique and beautiful souvenirs. I said that was wonderful, but I wasn’t going to buy anything. The three of us went several rounds with this, and whereas in normal circumstances I would have been terribly alienated by the pressure, in this situation what with the language gap (and the fact that, compared to them, I was swimming in dough), and because they were so nice and seemed so genuinely proud of the work, I started to feel like a real heel.
So, I bought a damn print of a stupid piece of bamboo. It was $10, which is insane by China standards, and at that point, I resolved to shake Ling as soon as we were done seeing the peak. Off we went to the peak, Ling showing me the osmanthus trees and the outcroppings of rock in the Li that people say resemble animals drinking. She explained that the bun I bought for breakfast was a wife biscuit, which differs from a husband biscuit by the filling. She translated the lyrics of this Chinese song that had been stuck in my head for about a week. I enjoyed having someone around to explain things, and by the time we got to the park, I was feeling fairly relaxed. Ling gave me a tour of the Jingjiang Princely Mansion grounds, and when we arrived at the base of the peak, she said she’d wait at the bottom for me while I climbed up.
Solitary Beauty Peak has a natural rock corridor running up one side that has been hewn into steps. From the top, there’s a nice view, but I was mainly busy having my picture made with a dozen Chinese tourists. In the midst of this, I struck up a conversation with some similarly plagued kids from Ft. Lauderdale (who were all on a semester at sea), and lo and behold – they told me they’d met a local young woman who was giving them a tour and was waiting at the bottom for them right now! When we all arrived at the bottom (followed by our camera-toting entourage), Ling was seated at a cafe table with these kids’ guide.
I couldn’t shake Ling after that, though, I have to say, I was probably the most obstinate mark she’d ever had the misfortune to choose. I didn’t want a massage, I didn’t want a tea ceremony, or a name chop or to go to the minority theatre or on a bamboo boat, I didn’t want lunch or to try some snake. But I did let her take me to a crowded, smoky Internet cafe, where she got to watch me check my email and blog comments, and then I announced that I was going to my hotel for a nap, but she said I was going to have some tea.
‘No, I’m going to my hotel to nap,’ I said.
‘Yes, to relax and cup of tea,’ she said. One thing about not speaking a language very well is you can often feign obtuseness to get what you want. I’ve done this myself.
‘I have to have tea to get away from you?’
‘What, my friend?’
So I went to a freaking tea shop. To my credit, I went with her on the slight off chance that she really wanted to have a cup of tea at a cafe, and if it was a shop, I was going to walk right out. But when we got there, the Ft. Lauderdale kids were there having the Best Day Ever, and had just purchased hundreds of yuan worth of tea. I didn’t want to ruin their time by informing them they were being taken advantage of, and while I hesitated, I found myself seated with Ling at a little table, and the shop attendant began to pour out a tasting. ‘You’ll love this!’ promised the Ft. Lauderdale kids. The guy serving us was really attractive and charismatic. He made super cool small talk and lots of eye contact with me, while he pressured me to buy some tea. I refused. He persisted. Ling joined in, and explained how I really ought to buy a lot of tea. I refused. They both scaled back on what they were requesting I buy, but I flat refused to buy anything at all, resulting in the guy getting visibly annoyed at Ling, and both of them losing all interest in me.
But the weird thing was, the social niceties had to be observed and even after the whole thing had turned sour, the tea guy, his manager, Ling and I all sat around and finished the tea and chatted stiffly, even though everyone really just wanted to get away from each other. It was much like being back home in the South. They charged me Y30 for the totally unwanted tasting. I should have refused to pay it, but I kept thinking of Richard Gere crawling into a tiny cage, and just wanted to get out of there. I actually ran into the tea shop guy later that night in the street, and I tried to flirt with him, but he only wanted to sell me a ticket to the minority theatre.
I realize now that people don’t get necessarily get taken because they don’t know what’s going on. Rather, scams succeed because people are immediately so embarrassed about being duped that they will participate in full knowledge of what’s happening just to avoid the social awkwardness of calling it out. I, for one, colluded in my own scamming, because I was too polite to make a scene.
Really, there was no harm done, other than to my pride. But as far as I’m concerned, Wan Chai Ling of Guilin, China still owes me Y15 for her half of a tea tasting.
