Although
we live in Shanghai’s French Concession, the lovely downtown area in one of the
worlds most vibrant and sassy cities, I sometimes feel as though I am lost in a
stereotypical Jersey mall where long nails, over processed hair and gum
snapping teenagers abound. Many expatriate women struggle to live in Shanghai since
they feel a bit out of place. In order to create their pseudo bubble of safety, cleanliness and consistency, they organize
events throughout the week. In fact,
if one was inclined, one could attend events from morning to night every day;
every single day. Despite the best of intentions, many of these events take disastrous
turns, and a few of my favorite examples follow:
Charity
Luncheon:
My first
charity gathering in Shanghai was, by all intensive purposes, a liquid
luncheon. Held at M1NT, an exclusive (as least according to their marketing
materials) venue on the Bund, a few dozen expatriate and Chinese women passed a
shark tank that graces the restaurant’s main door to enter a private room. Here
they mingled with strangers, laughing and chatting politely yet awkwardly.
Found on
the 24th floor, the venue is understated and elegant in décor and the views
from the floor length windows are nothing short of spectacular. At the same
time, it is the embodiment of the worst
of Shanghai’s artificiality. As said by a friend “vulgar insincerity, commercial
dubiousness, and stylized excess.”
Renown for
Asian Western fusion dishes, the event had advertised that they would serve a
five-course meal. However, we were served tapas that were miniscule in both
size and quantity. Quite frankly, they could have minimized their carbon
footprint and served all 5 tapas on one plate rather than serving one after the
other on separate plates. While I had neither anticipated nor hoped for an
American style buffet with piles of mayonnaise filled salads or deep fried
chicken, I was hungry nevertheless
after devouring my 5 appetizers. As a
result, the disproportionately (and surprisingly) generous goblets of wine were
dangerous - especially for those who, ahem, had not eaten breakfast in
anticipation of a gorgeously decadent lunch. To illustrate my point, an hour
into the event a woman draped in jewels (the kind that are insured and not the
kind that are bought online at Gilt) came out of the toilet with her Chanel
skirt tucked into her silk Agent Provocateur black lace knickers. Unaware of
this faux pas and more focused on smoothing out her blond extensions as she
made an entrance, she walked towards us as though on the catwalk, hips jutting
from side to side and as she click-click-clacked her Manolo’s.
Knowing I
could not giggle, point or surreptitiously extract her skirt from her knickers,
I turned my attention to another woman in the group. She was the veritable
opposite. Her Southern drawl was deceivingly sexy until one engaged in
conversation. Did we really need to talk about the
sex-lives-of-the-rich-and-famous-with-a-dapple-of-what-she-misses-buying-from-Walmart?
The wife of an executive, her blinding and hefty engagement ring had clearly
been bought with taste and a black American Express. However, her fashion stylist
must have been on holiday since she wore a
tacky-sequined-strawberry-shortcake-sweater tucked it into high-waist khaki
pants that tapered at the ankle to create a ballooning effect, showcasing her love of chocolate. Her makeup artistry,
with its heavy hand and offensive colors, mimicked the age of Madonna and
boldly contrasted her middle-ages-mid-Western choices for clothing: glittering
yellowish eye shadow, powerful streaks of orange blush, eyelashes heavy with
mascara, and this was all complimented by pink lipstick on her teeth.
Networking
There are
hordes of frustrated expatriates in Shanghai who struggle to enter the local
workforce, despite their extensive professional credentials. As such, many of
these professionals (male and female) take a professional hiatus to enjoy-life-while-flittering-from-massage-to-lunch-to-pedicure-to-vacation,
while others redefine their professional trajectory. I know a female doctor who
became a food-blogger, a finance guru who became an online entrepreneur, and an
advertising executive who became a baker! As of yet I do not know any talking girls.
**
Some
people (read: A-type-MBA-touting-New-Yorkers) dedicate themselves to
networking, convinced that professional options abound. In fact, I initially
fell into this later category and naively engaged in project work for an
illegitimate-Mafia-linked
group-that-used-the-name-of-a-well-known-American-investment-group! (Refer to
my entry Rooster Decapitations and Con Artists
http://wwwemdsl-nica.blogspot.fr/2013/03/rooster-decapitations-con-artists.html).
With all fingers and toes intact, I terminated our relationship fairly quickly.
After my
unfortunate glimpse of the underworld, I attended networking events ad nauseam organized by legitimate
sources such as the Chambers of Commerce, multiple Embassies (inclusive of
countries I could not even locate on a map), my university Alma-Matter, and
friends of friends. My takeaway - both comprehensive and based on multitudes of
qualitative and quantitative research - is that networking events were
organized under a false pretense. They simply served as a way for match.com and
dozens of other matchmaking businesses to serve their own agenda.
How else
could one explain why a professional networking event boasted tiny Asian
cocktail waitresses balancing enormous trays of whiskey shots? Should my name
card read: Take—Advantage-of-Me and provide my physical measurements? Ahem,
34-24-36. Copious amounts of alcohol were served to nervous networkers and whiskey
shots left me giggling, stuttering and swaying rather than eloquent, articulate
and compelling to potential contacts or employers.
Going forward
I became cautious in accepting invitations. But then a few months later - Click:
you’ve got mail - I received a seemingly innocuous invitation for a networking
luncheon organized by a woman I knew. I accepted, encouraged by the possibility
of spending a few hours with like-minded professionals. I had a series of
misfortunes the day of the event and arrived only for dessert. I stood at the
door and, as I saw many fingers lingering on ever so so so many knees, I
realized there was more on offer than just chocolate cake.
Play dates:
Why do we
assume that we will become friends just because our children are the same age? Almost
all first time mothers fall into the inevitable trap of attending and
organizing play dates for strangers-in-their-home-with-babies-who-are-not-yet-capable-of-social-interaction.
Awkward and often painfully boring, we fall into the trap of assuming that play
dates are our maternal obligation. Much like learning how to bake glutton-free
gourmet muffins, knit baby booties with organic materials, purchase a plethora
of learning-educational-stimulatory toys, never raise our voice, and enroll
them in Chinese-French-and-Ancient-Greek classes.
Over time
I learned to avoid play dates where the demographics were somewhat alien. I
often took the initiative to organize them at home, creating finely thought out
invitation lists and serving Chardonnay as well as apple juice. I recently
received a phone call from my friend Carmen when she was a new mother. I had
warned her about the risks associated with play dates and my
email-phone-and-carrier-pigeon messages were not subtle. She wanted to see for
herself. The host had prepared a veritable luncheon with a display of gorgeous
sweets from her hometown. My friend Carmen happily (read: greedily) ate half a
bag of Japanese beans. Later that evening when she started to consume the rest
of the beans, she discovered part of a worm.
This begged
the question: where was the other half of the worm?
What is
the moral of the story? Pay dates are bad for your physical and mental health.
** One frequently sees
advertisements in restaurant windows for talking girls, or women hired to
accompany single travelers in the restaurant and talk with them.
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