I am Waiguoman and I come from the wonderful land of Macedonia. I am NOT a superhero, just a writer trying to make a name for himself… and that name is Waiguoman! Once upon a time I went to the Middle Kingdom, more commonly known as China, and now they can’t seem to get rid of me. In this blog you can read about the culture shock, day-to-day life and all the other small discoveries I have made during my time in this wonderful albeit quite weird country. I will share my experiences as best I can and give you some useful pointers about traveling and living in China… but mostly just talk about how something pissed me off or impressed me, like the narcissistic piece of shit that I am.
Speaking of China, the natives call us foreigners WaiGuoRen (外国人) or LaoWai (老外). So the first one was the inspiration for the name. I’ve been called many things in my life, but never have I ever been called a WaiGuoRen. WaiGuo (外国) means foreign country and Ren (人) means person in Mandarin Chinese. So unless you’re retarded or something, you get this WaiGuoMan business. LaoWai means old foreign… so… like… I am not a professional travel writer or anything, I just think that as a very introverted, socially inept dumbass from a tiny, almost microscopic, developing Eastern European country, I offer a different perspective on the whole expat thing. As I said in the Prologue of The Blog, this started as a means to connect with my friends and family. They would constantly ask for new photos and anecdotes, and it is often quite troublesome to upload photos because of the Great Fucking Firewall or even find the right time to talk online due to the time difference. So, it devolved from a full feature movie to a cliché blog about an illiterate non-native English speaker butchering one of the most beautiful (I think so!) languages on the planet
A few things before I finish this:
1. I will try to update the blog once a week!
Who knows how long it will take me to get into this groove. We are all “attention whores” so maybe if I notice that you’re noticing me, I might make more of an effort to be noticed.
2. My intention is never to offend anybody or anything.
I eat a lot of shit in this blog but like I mentioned in the Prologue, I think we are all messed up so we must be able to make fun of ourselves. That being said, if you notice that somebody is getting more of a beating than everybody else, let me know and I will correct the scales promptly.
3. Feel free to contact me for any reason at all!
Any comments, criticisms, compliments, corrections and other c words are very welcome.
4. I have also been known to focus on the bad things in life, so this is kind of an exercise to focus on the better things if I can. It will take time, but let’s go on this journey together and of course, friends, peace and mild annoyance!