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1. Jean jackets are totally in. It’s getting warmer, so I haven’t seen them quite as much as when I arrived, but they are seriously everywhere. I’ve even seen a few “Canadian suits” (jean pants/jean jacket combo) walking around the city. We’ve seen jean overalls and VERY ripped jeans, as well. I’m not sure, but I feel like jeans are a symbol of capitalism and are therefore probably a status symbol. Personally, I’m partial to jeggings – they look like jeans, but the feel like stretchy pants! How could you lose?? Not positive the Chinese have discovered the beauty of jeggings yet, though. Judging by the current speed of trends, it should happen in about 25 years.
2. Ice cream everywhere: It is perfectly acceptable for grown adults to walk around in public eating ice cream. Along with cotton candy. I haven’t seen any children eating the clouds of sugar, but sometimes it seems like 1/20 adults are walking around with ice cream (and occasionally cotton candy). What gives? The only thing I can think of would be that maybe ice cream is also a status symbol, since it’s relatively expensive to buy it fresh in a cone. Seth would definitely say that I’m overanalyzing and ice cream is delicious.
3. Your life is made of Wechat: If you live in China, you know what wechat is (actually, in Chinese: we-xing). Wechat is magical, and I have only just barely scratched the surface of what you can do with it. Basically, it serves as a (1) Facebook, (2) Linkedin, (3) Meetup, (4) FoodieCall, (5) Apple/Samsung Pay, (6) Reddit,  (7) Strava/MyFitness Pal and (8) Whatsapp/Facebook Messenger/Skype all in one, and more. Networks are so important in China because people don’t really trust search engines. So if you want information, there’s a Wechat group chat for that. Want to know where the party’s at this weekend? Join the Creative Marketing group chat and ask around. It also is a way you communicate with everyone you work with, including your students. I’m in 9 group chats for work alone: 7 for my classes (where we assign homework so the parents know, and the kids will record themselves talking for pronunciation practice), one for the English teachers and one for the foreigner teachers. I usually turn off my notifications for my group chats, unless I want to be constantly interrupted by my phone more than I already am. Also, everybody pays for stuff with QR codes over Wechat.
4. 

   my metro card with a tiny QR code

   A plethora of QR codes: Speaking of Wechat, you can’t get by in China without scanning QR codes. Every cab, hole-in-the-wall restaurant, high-end restaurant, street musician, little fruit and veggie vendor, and hair dresser has a QR code on display that you can scan to pay them. You also get your own QR code with your Wechat (and whatever other social media) account, so other people can scan you to find you, or it’s another way to pay for things. I have seen them shrunk down on the inside of a bottlecap, and blown up the side of a building. They are everywhere.

5. 

   the security guard’s post outside my apartment building (also pictured: a grandfather pushing his grandson on a little cart)

   The security guard industry is so hot right now: This is something that I have only ever also seen in Mexico City, but security guards are seriously everywhere. Every apartment complex has a booth (or two) where a guard sits and is the keeper of the parking and pedestrian gate at every apartment complex, letting people and cars in and out. (You have to watch out for those gates too, because they don’t come down slowly.) Every subway station probably has at least 12 security guards manning it, or more: four at the baggage scanners, three for each direction of train, and a few in customer service. Sometimes, you’ll see them in their meetings, standing at attention like soldiers while their superior takes them through drills and fixes their ties. It’s all very serious. My school has two security guards at the gate. I really like the security guards at our apartment building. I tutor the son of one lady security guard, who is always very friendly! I hope to someday be able to say more than “hello!” enthusiastically to her, heh.

6. Aiees: what everybody needs. So the salary of our security guard is paid for in a “property management fee” which comes to about 8% of our rent per month, which we paid up front in a lump sum at the beginning of the year. Also included in the fee is a monthly “AI-ee,” (the ai sounds like “eye”) the Chinese word for “auntie” – you can see a British influence infiltrating the expat lingo here in this word. Anyway, on Saturday last week we had our first aiee experience. She showed up at 9AM, and scrubbed our apartment until it sparkled: mopping all the floors, dusting the countertops, wiping down the kitchen, and cleaning crevices I would have left to fend for themselves until the end of time. Yay for our aiee! I can’t wait until she comes back. It’s only been 5 days and I really miss her.
7. 

   getting ready for a day’s work. They’re not usually this blurry…

   City beautification gangs roam the streets: Everywhere I go, I almost always see someone cleaning up the city, and they’re often in groups of two to 20. They might be sweeping the streets, replanting the gardens next to the sidewalk, dusting tiny ledges on the walls in the metro (on second thought that might be the security guards), trimming the bushes, raking leaves, you name it. Shenzhen is a really beautiful city, and a lot of work goes into making and keeping it that way. I’m not sure how it is in Beijing or Shanghai, but I imagine that when you have almost 1.5 billion people, you need to make some jobs for them. Shenzhen also has a lot of migrant workers from all over China, since the minimum wage is relatively high here. And they work all day. I’m talking cutting up a tree outside my window with chainsaws after 10PM in the middle of the street. Hey, it’s not all rainbows and butterflies.

8. Nobody has siblings: this should have been a no-brainer for me, but I tend to forget, and, like an Alzheimer’s patient, am always surprised when I realize it. When I’m getting to know people (especially kids, but also coworkers) and there’s not a lot of vocabulary to work with, I’ll ask if they have brothers or sisters. Here, they’ll usually look a little surprised and say “no!” Like my coworker who just went home for a wedding. Something told me it was her brother’s wedding. So when I saw her again, I said, “how was your brother’s wedding?” and she said, “… not my brother, my friend.” The one-child policy is over, but not many people have started taking advantage of it (they haven’t had much time) and the culture is now more used to smaller families. That’s how a lot of little boys end up with “little emperor syndrome” by the way – they think they’re king of the castle, being an only child. Basically they throw a lot of tantrums. Anyway, my very gracious coworker didn’t seem to take notice of my mistake.
9. 

   “Grandpa is catching up to us, hurry!”

   Grandparents are often the main caretakers. It’s very common to see small children with elderly people carrying around tiny backpacks or watching them ride around on a little scooter. Since both parents often work, this is the norm here. It’s traditional for a new wife to move in with her husband and his parents, and then their job is often to make babies and continue working. (A quick note: maternity leave in China, however, is a minimum of 14 weeks but is often 6 months.) On our floor in our building, there are 3 apartments that our elevator goes to: one for us, another with a young couple with two kids (one is under 2), and the grandparents are in the 3^rd (Winston sometimes tries to escape into their apartments or the stairs. He is very adventurous.) It’s a good idea, but it can also be a bit treacherous, I’m sure. One of my students (who’s seven) has parents who work in the major electronics mall here, and they stay at work late. Her grandparents watch her and two other children, but her grandmother’s knee is busted and her grandfather is blind. When she told me this, I pictured three children running around producing serious chaos while a blind man and a woman in a wheelchair try to control them. What a mess!

10. Things are actually really nice here. This one is kind of corny, but every day I am pleasantly surprised by how easy it is to live in China. Yes, there are a lot of people, but Shenzhen was designed for a lot of people so it rarely feels super crowded. Yes, the potties are *usually* squatty, but that’s a fact of life that you come to expect and then get pleasantly surprised when they’re not. Yes, I need a VPN to connect to the Facebook, Instagram, and Google, and it’s annoying when it doesn’t work, but this website isn’t blocked in China and neither is Bing! (which I never thought I would use). And yes, it’s Asia, so there are really weird things that happen sometimes, like how a mom will help her kid with split crotch pants pee in the bush next to the sidewalk. But overall, I don’t get the stress of driving, remembering my keys (code door lock baby!), or working at a desk all day. It’s very safe and green here, I get lots of exercise walking 14-18,000 steps per day around the city, and the food is unlimited, cheap and good.