12 Years in China (R-rated)

TWELVE YEARS ago, I arrived in China with the determination to study first Sanskrit and Buddhism and then, expediently, the indigenous Chinese traditions such as Taoism and Confucianism. Plagued by precarious living conditions and academic poverty all around us (especially in the Chinese humanities), let alone constant Western media prejudices against China, we managed, largely because of our curiosity, discipline, frugality, and our bristling youth, not only to survive but also to make small careers of it. Overall fine memories of an extraordinary experience:

SHANGHAI - It's been a full zodiac circle. Twelve years ago in the Year of the Sheep 2003, I landed in China and I must confess that I knew nothing about the Chinese zodiac. 

In my country, Germany, we were taught little about the East, except that it was our cultural and ideological adversary. And where I attended university, in Edinburgh … boy, did the British entertain prejudices against mainland China. 

Registered as a Russian major at Fudan University in Shanghai, a metropolis of 20 million people, I found a small room near Wujiaochang crossings, only a 1 yuan (then worth about 12 US cents) bus ride down Siping Lu, passing Tongji University, to the famous tourist spot "The Bund" opposite Pudong. The very day of settling in town I bargained a gregarious Holland bike that was stolen barely 20 minutes later when I checked into a local store for bread and a glass of rancid nutella (chocolate spread) which, as if teaching a painful lesson in humility, caused the first and still most hideous food poisoning in my life. 

[Read full text at ASIA TIMES]