China, Part 2

It's summer in southeast China.

This means that when you step outside it feels like you just stepped into a Bikram yoga class, but you're wearing more clothes and within 5 minutes, have sweated through most of them.

It also means mosquitos.

In an effort to keep us cool in the press check waiting room yesterday, our vendor opened the doors. Which let in a cool-ish (85 degrees compared to 95 of the standing air) breeze, but also the mosquitos. These little bastards are nothing like we get in the States.

They look just like the tiny, small mosquitos we used to see in summers in Michigan, a far cry from the giants of California. But they don't make the typical mosquito "hum"...they are silent, and brutal. Instead of the traditional itchy welt that progresses to a red bump by the end of the day, these bites itch with a fury, swell up to the size of a half dollar, then disappear and leave a huge bruise about the same size. It doesn't hurt, and once they're at the bruise stage they don't itch, but that doesn't take away the hours of itching agony experienced prior to the bruising stage.

So today I decided to get bug spray.

This was a bit more difficult than I had imagined. I have practiced the one phrase I can say without offending billions of Mandarin speakers, "Nee huay schwa yingwen mah?", which means "Do you speak English?" This, for your information, is practically useless, as most people in Shenzhen reply back by shaking their heads in the negative.

Fortunately, my drawing skills took over and I quickly drew a little mosquito with a very long proboscis and mean, beady eyes. I then drew an aerosol can and showed mist spraying out of it at the mosquito. I looked at the shop keeper and nodded, saying "Huay?" in Mandarin, which means "yes?". She nodded for me to continue, or just nodded to be polite. Whatever. I was on a mission.

Next I drew a big "x" on the bug and circled it, illustrating its' untimely death by undefined mist. She seemed perplexed and smiled more. I knew I was fucked.

A young girl of about 12 saw me drawing, looked at the illustration, and made the international hand signal for "I'm spraying my arm with bug spray" with her hand. Everyone who spoke Mandarin (note: not me) laughed and repeated something I couldn't understand, and the shop keeper handed me a box that had a picture of a little girl dressed in a suit of armor and a cartoon mosquito looking irked.

I took it gratefully, knowing now that not only are my drawing skills awesome, but that the real phrase I should have learned was "Do you sell bug spray?".