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Q: How do you deal with the things that anger you in China?
Do you let every line cutter get away, say something, do nothing? Do you call people on shallow lies? I can put people on about the weirdest things and make it believable. I tend to do nothing, and hold it in, something I wouldn't do at home, but I have headaches all the time. I was so mad yesterday that I couldn't sleep last night, even the therapist I called to help me work out my anger issues didn't come.
I retreat into my cave i.e. my flat. I buy a bunch of DVDs, chocolate and junk food and just stay there until I am ready to go back into the real world.
I let them have it on the Vent page here unless they are on the vent page then I curl up in a ball and cry till my plane leaves
TedDBayer:
I thought my line cutter was Chinese, some foreigner, didn't recognize the accent. I told him I expect this from Chinese but he is just an arshole. I was so mad at myself for not throwing his stuff on the floor,something I would've done at home. Yeah and he was smaller than me.
I try to be practical and somewhat smart about it. Be we know how anger makes us stupid. So if it's a lone queue cutter, smoker, asshat, whatever....I'll say something. If it's a big group of drunk girly dudes (usually the case) I opt to live to fight another day (even if I know I can take 'em, who knows how close their 20 other fabulous friends might be nearby).
I find alcohol and cigarettes help a lot, as do peanut butter and jam sandwiches, making a roast dinner and generally not leaving the house.
I found myself recently getting so annoyed with people on the metro that I joined in with the moshpit style agression. I usually don't follow the saying, 'if you can't beat them, join them' so I quickly realised I'd been outside too long and hurried home to make shepherds pie.
TedDBayer:
I started smoking in China last year after years of not. Peanut Butter, yum, all I've seen so far is Chinese and I'm afraid to try, where is the Skippy?
smoglife:
Foreign food supermarket is my go to. I suppose it depends what tier city you live in.
Scandinavian:
you can get Skippy in major supermarket chains, I usually get it in CarreFour
TedDBayer:
I'm staying in a hotel and don't shop except for local, can't remember which bus goes to Walmart
icnif77:
@Ted: can you get peanut or .......?(can't remember the seed's name=dark brown or black colour) 'paste'? Chinese on the outside market (Yingkou, Liaoning) with the 'grinder/mill' tossing peanuts or other 'unknown' seed and filling 'glasses' with peanut paste or 'brown/black' paste.
Chinese use 'brown/black paste' in hot pots, and for different sauces. I was eating it with the spoon. Excellent stuff, without added sugar and things as in Skippy.
mArtiAn:
Ted, try the local peanut butter, it's fine, and Smog, 'if you can't beat 'em join 'em' may be one way to go, but 'if you can't join 'em beat 'em' works just as well, so join the club, it's made of 'would' but requires 'will' and when the mosh gets you down, wrap someone over the head with it.
After 9 years here I don't get that mad about anything really. AA talks about the serenity to accept the things you cannot change and though i've never been to a meeting, I still think it's good advice and describes most of the things that might otherwise give me a headache. If someone steps in front of me in line I say so to them, but I don't get angry about it, i'd just come off as oafish. In traffic i'm able to laugh most things off as I mutter "monkey" under my breath, but I used to be a motorcycle courier in London and have nearly been in more major accidents than I could possibly remember; after four years of that, piddling around on roads here that don't usually move faster than 15mph is a walk in the park. The staring thing doesn't get to me anymore, it's 90% innocent curiosity and if you greet it with a smile you generally get one back in return. I mostly just ignore it. People trying to rip me off doesn't even bother me that much. But those screaming bitches downstairs who keep waking up my kid? I'm gonna fill a water-pistol full of urine and soak their washing line, I kid you not. Gonna send them all off to their checkout jobs smelling of my piss. Other than that though, i'm pretty Zen.
TedDBayer:
ha ha , good one, almost cheered me up, I still have a headache
I dunno Ted. Beer, I guess.
I really drink a lot of it. But then, it's not really beer, is it?
If I drink 20 beers, how many have I really had?
I reckon about 5, so I drink a gutful more.
Whatever....
Next morning I get on my bike, to clear the mind and exercise the lungs.
And what happens???....the bastard drivers do their best to set me free of life and I start to feel like I'd better get a beer into myself...
And so on...
TedDBayer:
I don't drink much alone, Baileys in my morning crappy coffee mostly. I've never been drunk in China.
I watch a sht load of comedy movies. Laugh that sht off. Broke up with my gf a few weeks ago, watch some funny movies. Her coworkers thought I did her dirty and wanted to threaten me before i threatened with the embassy and that scared them off, watched a Kevin hart movie. Lost breath at how funny that was man. Laugh the anger away
mArtiAn:
'I'm A Big Little Man' that's his funniest. His latest show at Madison Square Gardens doesn't touch it.
DumpsterDiver:
Oh? Gonna check that out. Need more funny material to lmao to. These Chinese people getting meaner with the winter. But the more I notice it, I laugh at them. Silly people the more they try to make my day worse the more I laugh. It's easy to anger a money who wants to anger you
mArtiAn:
Laughter is the best medicine, it is true. Kevin Hart, Louis CK, Jimmy Carr, Ricky Gervais, Richard Pryor, Bill Hicks; all great stand-up comedianes and they've saved me a fortune in doctors fees.
I also tend to hold it in, the only real outlet is going to gym or going drinking (polar opposites).
Most of the time I just swallow the anger. Attempts to patiently suggest more civilized behavior is met with an embarrassed smile or incomprehension. Only exception is for cutting the queue in front of me, I always explain to the queue-jumper that he/she is not more hurried than the people behind me.
The headaches from the swallowed anger, yup, here too
* I go running. Lifts my mood, burns the bad emotions and some fat. The more anger, the faster I go.
* I listen to music that cheer me up. A bit like taking drugs, but harmless.
* Do something that is likely to bring me some small inner satisfaction once done. For me it's programming, can be anything else like trying to bake a cake, trying to play a tune with the guitar, etc.
* Planning my emigration to greener pastures 
Scandinavian:
TRYING to bake a cake. You mean SUCCEEDING in baking a cake right, nothing builds anger like failed cakes in a country where it is impossible to buy decent cake.
moparfan:
@Scand
Then maybe you should try wine tasting. Even if you screw up and get all the flavors wrong, you still end up drunk.
Uncivilized behavior from commoners does not bother me. The people that piss me off here are the wealthy educated ones who should have learned. 10 years in Canada and still behaving like an arrogant soulless crook...there is no excuse for such people.
Usually the normal day to day people here seem nice. For the ones that aren't, long walks in the calm cool night, and booze.
comedy: both on my pc and looking out the window, helps. Seriously, you can't write some of the things i see every day 
I park my anger at the source and then walk away from it, disconnected. About 20 meters away, I hear it implode, fizzle down and die.
My frustration I carry with me in a special little bag called my stomach. It fucking aches until I am (happily) distracted by something even more visceral: food, wine or pussy.
Taking life one day at a time in China is the best thing...
I secretly plan revenge. I have decided to blow things up. First on the list? Black Audis. KaBoom! That'll delay a few weddings I bet!
2nd on the list - traffic lights. Who needs 'em? Nobody, that's who.
3rd - the hawking spitter. A firecracker thrust into his trouser pocket. Spit that out buddy!
4th will be the little emperors that act like big emperors. Attach a skyrocket to their waist, light, wave bye bye and watch their parents chase their smoke trail.......probably still trying to feed them!
5th has to be horn blowers. From my apartment window, sniper rifle. Toot!? Boom! One less aggravating noise.
Oh yeah, planning this stuff is fun. Feel calm already.
Scandinavian:
Audi's are for corrupt officials not for weddings, so you do not have to feel bad about delaying weddings. The last wedding I was at, they used a Ferrari for bride and groom and a fleet of Mercedes S-Class' (the food sucked)
DrMonkey:
I read your post while listening to music, and then... I imagine a video clip of your average westerner, frolicking in Beijing streets. With some dreamy kind as soundtrack (I suggest something from Cocteau Brothers), he walks in the middle of the traffic, oblivious to the mess. Every guy who spit, go counterway, makes his kid poop on the side or in the trash, etc etc explode into a burst of flowers. Feeeeeeellls goooood man !
DaqingDevil:
Here they use Audis for weddings. Dunno who owns them but hired Audis at weddings is big business. Best I saw was about a month ago....21 black Audis following the bridal car.
The only cure I know involves a warm blanket (yeah I know, in summer the AC needs to work overtime to make that possible) my wife, the dog and a movie not starring Adam Sandler or Vin Diesel. Block out the world outside and enjoy the company of those I love.
After I understood that China and Chinese really grinds my nerves I decided to find a healthy way to let the tension out.. so I signed up to a gym and started spinning courses... It HELPS! thanks to the music and to the teacher it really helps....
Otherwise I also become a little green skin-free She-Hulk..
one phrase saves ma emotional stability
"This is Sparta"
DrMonkey:
Or, everytime I start to fall into self-pity, I think of Leonidas from 300 looking at me.
When I first came here in another century, my blood pressure was a rather normal 125/80. After a few years, it went up to 160/120. I was just holding it all in.
The remarks like : "look at the laowai".
like: "look at the big chested laowai"
like: "You are so big"
like: "how much RMB for blah-blah-blah".
and the like, mostly 3 - 4 times a day.
And then I asked a good Chinese friend how to say "go f&ck your mother" in Chinese.
And I practised and practised it until it was intelligble.
And now I let loose when this happens. I smile, show them my teeth, and then I scream it as loud as I can.
Since I have become known for doing this, the remarks have diminished.
I also did get a talking from my Chinese boss about anti-social behavior but that was four contracts ago.
mArtiAn:
I used to hear that phrase 'Diao ni ma' all the time (though never directed at me) in Liuzhou. Heard it said by an old woman at a bus stop, from one brother to another, it was like a nervous tick everyone had. Such a sweet sentiment.
Tonight.........I DRINK! F********king kids in tonight's class have driven me to it. I swear to God, you have not experienced the huge annoyances of teaching fully until you've wanted to punch a 7 year old girl in the face.
Where's my f**king beer?
Porn, alcohol, rage - they're the quick fixes. They'll make you feel better for 5 minutes. Buy in to some lame spiritualist bull and do meditation. I'm certain that's the only real cure.
