Being healthy in China (or, the only country where you can over indulge on cabbage)

Hey Kids,

As I’m down to my last couple of weeks here in China I wanted to write some more posts before I get absorbed back into the Western world. This is one that I’ve been meaning to write for a while, but it is also one that I’m glad I left to the end. I’m gonna try and keep this as observational and vaguely informative as possible.

So, you’ve just arrived in China.The last couple of weeks were spent partying and indulging on delicious home cuisine with tears in your eyes thinking about the next time you will get the chance to cuddle up with a hot chocolate and a cinnamon scroll. But that doesn’t matter, you’re in China now. The land of small waists and tiny, chopstick-sized mouthfuls. You feel a teensy bit excited about how easy it will be to get into that pair of jeans that were too small but you bought anyway cause they were on sale. Actually, they were currently lining the bottom of your suitcase in anticipation for that day to come.
The next thing you know, you are swept up in the gentle chaos that is China. Losing weight and eating well is the last thing on your mind, as so it should be.

When I got to Ji’an I realised that those too-tight jeans were even tighter. It got me thinking…what went wrong? When I was studying in Nanjing I was doing Taichi and Yoga weekly. I had tried to do some running, but was shortly put off due to the increasing smog levels. I felt like I ate pretty well at meal-times, always lots of veggies and very minimal meat.

It wasn’t until I started to notice my weight getting back to normal did I realise where those extra calories had come from.

1- A complete change in diet leads to cravings: In the west we eat a large amount of bread and wheat products, as well as A LOT of dairy. In China, these are two of the hardest things to find and the worst things to consume when you do find them. Whereas back home I would usually be found eating a salad sandwich with organic Rye bread or something, in China that wheat craving was replaced by Chinese bread which is NOT REALLY BREAD. I’m not entirely sure what it is, but the locals consider it a sort of confectionary snack, it is blindingly white and packed full of sugar. The same goes for dairy. I started taking calcium supplements because the lack of milk products was such a drastic change for my body, my fingernails were soft and cracked and I ate a lot of eggs because it was one of the only dairy sources I could find that seemed somewhat natural. China has a bad history of milk product poisoning (especially, baby formula, they always know about Australia because that’s where people buy their baby formula from) so I tried to avoid dairy as much as possible. However, when I did find it it was in the form of Bubble tea, drinking yoghurt and weird fruity flavoured milk drinks sold in convenience stores. All of these things are packed with sugar. So, you know, I couldn’t find that low fat Greek yoghurt I like so much.

Weird fruit milk. Looks like milk, tastes like apples. Probably has neither milk nor apples in it.

2- Communal meals don’t control portion sizes: A lot of the time when you eat out in China, you go to a restaurant with a bunch of other people and order approximately a dish each, which is then laid out on the table for everyone to attack with their chopsticks. If you have grown up eating a single serving on your own plate, like I have, then it becomes pretty tricky to work out how much food you need to eat before you are full. After a childhood of being told to ‘clean your plate’ it is psychologically hard to stop eating when confronted with a table full of food.

3- Chopsticks do not lead to taking smaller bites: Have you seen the locals eat? I think it’s even faster than a knife and fork because in China you just raise the bowl up to your mouth and basically pour the food in. None of this cutting, spearing, raising to the mouth junk.

4- Eating means you don’t have to talk: Sitting down with a large group of people to a meal generally means they will begin multiple conversations around you, speaking rapidly in a language that is hard enough to follow for you even without the background din of other rowdy diners. What do you do? You can’t just sit there, grinning like a fool while straining to hear the people on the other side of the table who may or may not have just mentioned the political situation in Xinjiang. So, you eat. Eating means you can smile, nod and generally look amiacable without seeming rude or so clearly out of your depth.

5- Vegetables do not equal healthy here: Yes, I will admit that I managed to raise my daily servings of vegetables from, like, three per day to ten. However, somehow I don’t think the health benefits count if said vegetables are fried in gallons of oil and seasoned with various amounts of white sugar, salt and MSG. The oil, salt and MSG also lend a very addictive quality to that innocent looking eggplant.

So, how did I overcome these problems whilst in Ji’an?

1- Cravings: Removed from Nanjing, I had even less options in a small city like Ji’an when it came to finding any substitutes for wheat and dairy. Also, I was more used to the diet by this point and didn’t feel that weird hunger after every meal anymore.

2- Communal meals: I was no longer in a big student body that wanted to go out for a communal meal almost every evening, so I had less instances of these. Also, when I went out I made sure to eat slower and to drink copious cups of tea-water-stuff. I also became more confident in speaking Chinese and made a point to start a conversation with the person directly next to me, thereby distracting me from my food.

3- Vegetarianism: I made the decision to embrace vegetarianism shortly after getting to Ji’an. I never particularly enjoyed eating meat, especially not the fatty, bone- ridden (dodgy) meat that you get in China.

4- Home cooking: With my own apartment and basic kitchen set up (*COUGH* a bucket as a sink, an electric pan, one bowl and a pair of chopsticks that the old woman downstairs gave me) I managed to work out how to make some pretty delicious meals using the vegetables that the villagers sold and no oil, no MSG and very minimal salt.

5- Exercise: It definitely helped that Ji’an has nearly zero pollution and that it was the middle of summer instead of the dead of winter. I bought a pair of rollerblades and proceeded to get insanely passionate about getting home from work in time to go for a skate around the university grounds.

Inline Skating with my friend. I’m the one on the right cracking up. (Photo: Emccall 2014)

So, in conclusion, losing and gaining weight is pretty common when dealing with such drastic changes to one’s circumstances. It isn’t something to be worried about and ain’t nobody got time to obsess over a pair of jeans in the middle of an adventure like living in China. However, I hope this might help some other foreigners in China who are wondering where they ‘went wrong.’ I also hope that people who have never lived in a foreign country for an extended period of time will be able to skip the scrutiny of someone’s outward appearance when they get home, and notice instead how much has changed inside.

Least favourite fashion trend

Let’s keep this one short (no pun intended).

So, it has come to my attention that maybe some women are quite self-conscious about their height and many take to wearing ridiculously high and uncomfortable-looking shoes (see this earlier post https://soaringredbucket.wordpress.com/2013/09/27/platform-thongs/)

When I had some time off I went to Ganzhou, a considerably large city located some time out of Ji’an. My friend decided to take me to check out the particular bulbous mountains and traditional Hakka fortified villages (See wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hakka_walled_village)

The bus ride was for four hours and was followed by another half an hour ride to get to the mountain base. The climb was steep although there were steps for most of the way and the day was hot and humid.

As I puffed my way up the mountain in my hiking shoes and sensible clothing, I was amazed at the amount of women who had insisted they dress up for the photo opportunity a mountain may present them with and complete the outfit with a remarkably high pair of shoes.

This particular woman needed her boyfriend to ensure she didn’t topple head first down that flight of stairs onto the rocks below.

Everyone should be free to their own choices in life. But really, shouldn’t high heels and tight dresses be reserved for…you know…flat, stable surfaces?

Just saying.

My favourite (optional) fashion trend

Hey Kids!

This is something I’ve been meaning to blog about for a while, but with the coming of summer and the surge in the amount of girls wearing tshirts and short(ish) shorts, this has really come to my attention.

Prepare yourselves, Western women (and men) for some shocking, radical and…earth breaking news.

Female body hair is optional.

[Shock, horror, women begin to hyperventilate and pass out at their desks, men walk away in stoic silence to mull things over in a faraway land. In the background, a child begins to weep piteously at this unknown assailant and its mother can offer no comfort because she is currently slumped over the computer with her nose pressing down on the keyboard jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj]

That’s right, for you who have not succumbed to the above. Here in China it is actually pretty common for women to simply let their natural body hair…be all, well natural. Why is this? Some may argue that it’s because Chinese simply have less body hair than their Western counterparts and therefore it is a non-issue because they didn’t have any to begin with.

Well, just like everything there is natural variation. True, on average, Han Chinese people naturally have less body hair than Westerners, but that doesn’t mean that every Chinese woman walks around with all areas of her body a smooth as the sale of donkey meat to ignorant tourists (which is to say, very.)

I can say this, because I have taken many a yoga class during my time here and let me just say I was enlightened in more ways than one during the Salute to the Sun pose.

I have to say that I found that tuft of black hair under a demure woman’s arm, and the shadowy look to the calf in those rolled-up jeans  at first confronting, then fascinating and finally enviable (always with the jeans and exercise, what is with that?).

Here I am, wasting precious time with a bar of soap and a sharp object in my hand veritably  hacking at my body hair to fit in with a societal norm which was pressed onto me at the unquestioning age of 12 and which I have been following ever since.

Well, I say, it’s unfair!

I’ll tell you why women cringe, men snigger or girls blush when they see hair anywhere but on a female’s head (although, granted sometimes even even that hair isn’t completely real.)

Because the treatment of body hair is based on cultural practice. Why are 11, 12 and 13 years old girls  in the West shamed and handed a razor quietly by their mothers? Because some high class snobs thought that 15th Century french prostitutes were simply delightful to emulate. (And, of course because shaving companies enjoy making a profit.)

Well, it seems those french ladies didn’t make it to China. And those shaving companies were not exactly allowed into China until recently. Now, I know as China rapidly urbanises and globalises that there will be more of this Western cultural influence putting pressure onto Chinese women to shave (and, of course, for Chinese men to demand that it be thus) but for the time being I am so happy that a woman is allowed to choose what she does with her own body hair. That, like makeup, it is optional and can be adhered to in various degrees of ‘giving a shit’.

I’m just sad that my cultural programming doesn’t include an easy ‘opt-out’ function.

It’s summer, and as I rip open my packet of razors sent to me from home because they didn’t have any going for cheap in China, I shed a tear. Caught in thoughts of my Chinese friends outside playing badminton in short(ish) shorts, not even thinking about the shadow on their legs or the extra keratin under their arms.

 

Getting my point across Photo: Emccall 2014

 

Summer fashion in China

Ok, so remember kids that China is in the Northern Hemisphere and just as all you aussies are posting photos of snuggling up with hot coco, I’m in China, joyously looking forward to the opportunity to substantially decrease the number of Chinese women saying to me “你皮肤好白!” (Your skin is SO white!)

Of course, I’m sure most of you have heard about how aesthetically valued white(r) skin is in a lot of countries.

I have made sure to tell a lot of girls here how in my country, dark(er) skin is considered healthy or exotic and therefore is generally more aesthetically valued than white(r) skin. They find it most amusing and we spend a moment to reflect how everyone wants what they don’t have. It is also a subtle way for me to advise them that I don’t really appreciate that sort of commentary on my skin colour because of my own cultural background.

Summer is a time of fear for a lot of women (and men, although to a lesser degree it seems.) Chinese girls are usually seen wearing long sleeves and jeans in near 40 degree heat and often walk around with open umbrellas to guard against those sneaky UV rays. If a girl rocks up to work in shorts and without her umbrella she may be asked ＂怕不怕黑？＂(Aren’t you afraid of being dark?)

Hey, but don’t get me wrong, all this white-skin obsession means that China isn’t a place you exactly need to be preaching sun protection (unlike in Australia, a country with a hole in the ozone layer floating above it yet where many citizens seem to prefer dark(er) skin and therefore think that going onto the beach in a bikini and no sunscreen or shade in the middle of summer is a pretty good and attractive suggestion.)

But, of course some people can have a tendency to get carried away with this ‘white skin business’. Whitening creams (containing harmful chemicals), weird fake white-glowey-skin filters for all of their phone selfies and even…this.

 

Yes. This is a face-kini (see article: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2189877/Meet-Face-Kini-latest-craze-hit-Chinas-beaches-bathers-wear-masks-beat-suns-harmful-rays.html) Peace, ya’ll

Things China just does better

I have a lot of rants to do with China, so I decided it was time for a post about some things that China just does better than back home in Australia.

Playing

After work my Chinese friends usually ask me to  出去玩 (chuqu wan) However, when they literally translate this sentence into English and ask me whether I want to “Go out and play,” they subsequently ask me why I’m laughing. They get really confused when I say that children will “play” but everyone else just kind of…Hangs out. Chills. Has a drink or something. Which got me thinking…why is it unacceptable to ‘play’ back home, but here, I always ‘go out to play.’ ? And I’m not exaggerating either. Most of my activities here consist of games and sports. Like, after work we’ll grab a ball and muck around for a couple of hours. It doesn’t even matter that none of us are very good. Whereas I kinda get the feeling the only people who play sports back home are people who are actually somewhat decent at sports. It’s not really ‘playing’ it’s ‘practicing.’ I also run this theatre workshop in the office every Sunday, and it always surprises me how damn enthusiastic everyone is about playing theatre games.

The University is about five minutes from my apartment and at all times of the day there are people utilising every bit of space with their activities. It’s about 6pm and students are out practicing a  dance routine together, teaching each other kungfu on the basketball courts or even rollerblading (I am so keen to get myself some rollerblades and join in!) And that’s just the students. The infamous ‘square dancers’ come out at about 8pm and proceed to take over the school grounds. These dancers are groups of old (50+) women who gather and spend hours dancing together in a strange pop/aerobics/traditional Chinese fusion dance. I don’t know how they get themselves so organised, but anywhere you go in China, the ‘square dancers’ will be there. So, maybe the community has a bit of a problem with them (think: noise complaints, see: http://www.chinasmack.com/2014/stories/residents-buy-speakers-to-yell-at-noisy-public-plaza-dancers.html)  But I think they are absolutely wonderful. Because this desire they have to get together, be outside and be active is so healthy! The phenomenon of isolated, lonely, unhealthy retirees happening in the West can be combated with this sort of activity. It would be great if I could start dancing in the park for the old people back in my town.

Overall, we could definitely learn from the Chinese attitudes of being outside, in groups, having fun. It is my favourite thing about China.

Also, to anyone who says that Chinese people are generally ‘shy’ or ‘quiet’ I will laugh in your face, because there is definitely a lot more noise and enthusiasm on the streets here than I’ve ever seen in Rundle Mall.

 

A pretty standard afternoon on one of about 20 University courts (Photo: Emccall 2014)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not giving a shit about what others think

I went to a theatre performance the other day and was pleasantly surprised yet again by people’s willingness to laugh. I say that, because, I dunno, if I went to a theatre performance back home people would feel that they would have to keep the laughs to a polite level, make sure that everyone else was laughing too, so as not to show that they were enjoying it too much and thus risk looking like a fool. At this show, people were standing up and laughing, guffawing, my friend was actually slapping her knee and tears were coming from her eyes. All from a skit that went for about two minutes and was somehow mocking Titanic. But it’s something I love about a lot of people I meet here, they’re quick to laugh and smile and don’t seem to care whether anybody else found it funny or not. They always seem to be looking for the next joke.

Also, I’ll add to this category with sneezing and burping in public. I have never heard one of those weird ‘stifled’ sneezes here. If you gotta sneeze, you gotta sneeze. And burping cracks me up. On a public bus? No worries. Nobody turns around or gives the perpetrator that squinty eyed look of disapproval. Everyone continues as normal and it’s only me, the foreigner, feeling like a should be offended. But somehow I can’t bring myself to care.

Recycling

Ok, so overall China isn’t exactly leading the way with this whole environmental stuff. But at the grassroots level, I would have to say that people are always looking for ways to reuse things. They don’t seem to like throwing things away (although as to where those piles of rubbish are coming from…?) I  bought a little convector stove top for my apartment and I put all my rubbish in the box it came in to throw it away later on. My friend comes over and she asks me whether I’m just going to throw that box away, didn’t I have any use for it? I said that I didn’t, so she took the box and gave it to the landlady who accepted it happily. I also give all my bottles to the landlady and she uses them for various things.

Those are just small examples, but my favourite instances of recycling usually involve gardening. Since a lot of people around here used to live in the countryside and farm, they are very good at growing things in the most seemingly inhospitable environments. I’ve seen a construction site with piles of slag rock and dirt which have been planted out with seedlings in perfect rows. They don’t seem to mind that ‘one day’ their little gardens will be destroyed for the next apartment block. They’ll just keep planting. In buckets on the street, on the nature strip next to the road. It is all fair game. And it is beautiful to walk past these flourishing little gardens everyday, old women harvesting their veggies from down the road while chatting to passer-by’s, old men sitting outside their homes in the evening selling bunches of organic produce for one RMB a piece.

I think the thrifty culture of China persists to this day, strangely in juxtaposition to the rampant materialism which also is very visible here. It’s funny how hard people try to be ‘environmentally friendly’ back home (paying through the nose for organic produce and setting up complex recycling systems), but here reusing materials and eating your own organically grown vegetables is just a way of life. I hope this way of life can persist as more and more Chinese are moving (either forcefully or by choice) into the big cities.

Peace Y’all

Reusing an old suitcase for some plants is really quite common (Photo: Emccall 2014)

Dystopia is PM 2.5

I look outside my window and I am blinded by the strange yellowy glow, the highrise buildings I can normally see are completely obscured. There is no horizon, I start to feel claustrophobic. I look away and down at my hands instead. I try and pretend that it is fog, but fog does not smell like petrol and dust. I jump as a guy walks into the elevator wearing a black face mask, the filter on it is creepy, not like the pink bunny ones that people normally wear. In class, we hear the news that schools in Nanjing and Shanghai have been closed. I understand why as we sit through four hours of dry coughing, my teacher has to drink water before she can speak. My nose is running, my throat is raw, I’m really tired, I know I do not have a cold because everybody else says that they are feeling the same. People with good jobs don’t have to go to work. The construction workers outside the classroom aren’t so fortunate, they continue to jackhammer the pavement into the night.

Like the dystopian futures predicted by Sci-Fi writers for centuries, we are being poisoned by the very air that we breathe.

People talk all day about the air quality, like commenting on the weather, but underneath every comment lies a modicum of fear. Afraid that it will only get worse as the years progress, China has not committed to improving their air quality levels, their stance is that high levels of PM 2.5 is merely the by-product of economic development (Particulate Matter size 2.5 microns is the main category of pollution monitored by government departments and is fine enough to enter the respiratory system.)

Recently, there was a report of an 8 year old girl living in Jiangsu province who died of lung cancer, it was linked to air pollution (see report: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/chinas-choice/2013/nov/07/china-air-pollution-eight-year-old-cancer, The Guardian, Duggan, 2013).

People are being killed by something which you can see, taste, smell, choke on. Where are the protests, where is the outrage, where is the anger? I see complacency by the people as well as by the government, just as predicted, centuries ago…is this the perfect sci-fi dystopian future?

Imagined Dystopia: Original 1982 artwork for the Sci-Fi movie “Blade Runner”

Dystopia: Industrial Jiangsu Province, China, 2013

The Laowai effect

The Laowai 老外 (laowai-foreigner) effect. I’ve probably mentioned before that being a foreigner in China means you will encounter many interesting, strange phenomena. It’s mostly limited to staring, photos (hiding in the background of your photos so it looks like you’re posing together.. ) random people wanting to make conversation with you more than they would at home, free drinks, overpriced clothing, shouts of ‘hello’ or ‘welcome to China’ without an attempt to converse any further, being discussed by people whilst they’re standing right next to you, being told “I don’t speak English” even when you’re already speaking Chinese and old people trying to pawn their son/daughter/niece/nephew/family-friend/that guy onto you.

So what can one do with this mix of positive and negative experiences, positive and negative attention brought on simply because of how you look? Everyone reacts differently; unphased, aggressive, embarrassed, amused, uncomfortable, etc. Some people glory in their new-found fame, and some people use it as an opportunity…

Today, I asked a 30-something Westerner guy in my class how his weekend was. He began to regale myself and the other students with a tale of his trip to a mountain village with a Chinese woman he had been chatting to for at least a week on popular IM service, WeChat. He told me how lucky he was that she didn’t ask him to meet her parents, because in China-speak that apparently means “we’re getting married!”

Or so he’s been told.

Anyway, so he goes on a wonderful hike up the mountain with her and her two young children. At the top, she tells him why the husband is no longer around. She was really upset and in tears after telling him of her tragic past. Leaning forward he taps his nose knowingly, a serious look on his face, “Chinese men are awful” He tells me “There’s something totally wrong with them and the culture here.”

That night he, like the model gentlemen that he is, decided to not make a move.

“It didn’t feel right after she told me about her ex.” he said with a frown. Suddenly his expression clears,”… I definitely had the opportunity…My mates were disappointed though when I told them, we all thought it would be a  more…interesting trip…ah, well, I have this date next week with a Chinese woman, she’s a fashion designer…”

Myself and the guy sitting opposite me shared equally bewildered looks, before turning back to our books without comment.

This is not the first time I’ve heard this guy say things like this, gloating about how many Chinese women he dates. This is not the first guy here I’ve heard say things like this, for example the 20-something who told me that he had so many women chasing him just because he was white, he dated some of them and his girlfriend broke up with him when he mentioned this (‘she wouldn’t marry me,’ he told me, ‘and now she wants me back because there are so many women here who will.’) Looking to the perpetuated stereotypes of Chinese women, some expat men say that they want a Chinese girl because they are ‘traditional women’ who know how to ‘treat men’, who are so much more attractive and more feminine than these gosh-darn Western women. Apparently, it is because Chinese men ‘don’t respect women like we do’ that Chinese women are so ‘crazy’ about Western men.

I think anyone who has spent any period of time in China has met at least one laowai who has said a combination of the above.

I raise it here, because it is shameful, inexcusable behaviour. These people and these sorts of statements manage to be racist as well as sexist and to offend both Chinese men and Chinese women…actually, all women everywhere!

So, yeah, I’m kind of sick of hearing this sort of thing.

I’d say ‘go home’…but I wouldn’t want anyone there to have to endure your bigoted attitudes either.

I’d warn the women here about you…but they’ll figure it out even before you refuse to see their family and slink off back to the WeChat ‘find-a-friend’ function.

What some Laowai must think happens in China… (Image: CharismaMan.com 2013)

地铁、外国人 (The underground and foreigners)

Please line up
(Photo: Emccall 09/13)

This photo was taken in the Xi’An underground station.

Is it just me…or is there something strange about this photo?

This is one of the most outstanding instances of white-washing that I have ever come across. In the world’s largest monoculture (China is made up of 92% ethnic Han Chinese) I want to know why there appears this instructional ad which is inclusive only of Anglo-Saxon, blonde haired children.
In China, this happens all too often.

Walk through any public area and you are bombarded with brand advertisements which are filled exclusively with Western models. They aren’t even the typical ads you would see in any Australian city, their Western-ness is more pronounced. Larger, shinier, more colourful eyes, whiter skin and too much bleach-blonde hair to handle.

Growing up in a commercialised society myself, I understand all too well the effects that models (tall, skinny, perfect smile) can have on one’s self-image. However, I couldn’t imagine what it must be like for people living in China, not only being shown that the ideal woman/man is taller or skinnier or prettier or more muscular…they are also being shown that the ideal woman/man (child…?) is of a completely different ethnic group than the large majority of their country’s population.

The same way that I argue for models who are have an average clothing size, I argue that China needs more images of Chinese people in their shopping malls…and in their underground as well.

Magical fantasy land

There is a tale you might have heard, it is of a wonderful, faraway land where the sun is always sunny and the people are always smiling and even the lowliest street cleaner is merrily singing a tune.

Well, kiddies, this place exists.

It was early morning, and I heard a familiar tune drifiting from outside, Greensleeves tinkled through my window and put a warm smile on my face from thought of childhood memories. An icecream truck! What was it doing here? I had to catch a glimpse.

Rising from my slumber, I leaned out of the window expectantly. But….where were the groups of children begging their parents for one more yuan? Where was the happy icecream vendor handing out these frozen treats of joy?

Instead, all I could see was a man smoking as he drove a street cleaner past the building.

Confused, I shrugged and started my day.

Whilst in class, again I heard (at first, I thought I imagined) the tune of happy birthday from somewhere nearby. Maybe a musical card being opened repeatedly in the room adjacent?

The next lesson, I hear Greensleeves playing again. Standing up suddenly I stride to the window, “Where is that coming from?!”

After telling me to kindly return to my seat, the teacher explained that, for safety reasons, street cleaners, trucks and other machinery play music so that people know that they are there. Most trucks even have a woman merrily repeating “Going backwards, going backwards” as they reverse.

I dunno, the standard ‘beep beep’ might seem a bit dull, but at least it doesn’t get you confused about whether or not you can buy frozen confectionery from your local street cleaner. Actually….I wonder what tune Icecream trucks play here…

Platform Thongs

OK, so this is my first post related to fashion in China.

The sun is shining, the weather is delightfully warm, time to whip out the summer clothing!

For Chinese guys, this means forgoing the need to wear a t-shirt normally. Most men, as they walk around in the middle of the day, will flip their t-shirt up to expose their belly and chest. It’s the ultimate act of sunshine frivolity.

For Chinese girls, summer time gives you a couple of options. Either, you will be wearing ridiculously short-shorts, but if that’s not your thing, then go with jeans on this balmy 35 degree day with 90% humidity. Whatever you choose, the platform shoes are a definite must to give you that sneaky height advantage over the other girls…who are also wearing platform shoes. Since it’s summer, platform thongs are a fashion yes.

Once you notice the shoes, you can’t stop staring at girl’s feet, thinking “Platform thongs….whhhhhhyy is this a thing???

ED: 24/10/2013

Please help, the disease is spreading…

http://www.blueisinfashionthisyear.com/2013/10/in-fashion-stella-mccartney-aw-2013.html