So awhile back I wrote about how we have been having an unusual amount of luck ever since moving to China. Well, guess what? It looks like our luck is still holding.
Last night, somewhere between a wedding and our apartment Ryan lost our cell phone. (We both share one phone.) We knew he had it in the cab, because I gave it to him and he texted a student, but when we got home it was gone.
Which sucked.
Our phone has dozens of numbers on it, and countless students have our number as well. To lose it would be a catastrophe.
So using our house phone we called our cell in a vain attempt to possibly reclaim it. Maybe the cab driver had it, maybe he turned it into his boss, maybe a nice shop clerk found it on the street or something. Maybe, maybe, maybe.
The first time we called it we got a weird message. The second time, someone picked up and hung up, the third, a busy signal and the fourth, the weird message again. That was it. It was over. Our phone was gone.
Then the house phone rang.
Our house phone has caller ID and showed it was our cell phone calling. I picked up the phone.
“hello, er, wei?” I said. (That’s the way to say hello on the phone in China.)
Turns out some guy had our phone and he was very willing to give it back to us. Only problem was, being a Chinese person, he only spoke Chinese. I think I did an admirable job at understanding him, but my language skills came up short when he was trying to explain where to meet.
“Do you have a Chinese friend I can talk to?” he asked.
“Right now, no.” I said.
“Have a friend call me and I can talk to them.”
Good idea! Only problem was he had our phone and therefore all our friends numbers.
Luckily I’m kind of an organized super-freak and one day a month ago, fearing that we might lose our phone and all our numbers, I hand wrote every single name and number into a notebook. All 80 plus numbers. So I called up a student, explained the situation, and they called up the guy and arranged a time and place.
I have heard a lot of bad things about theft in China, and how Chinese people will take anything that’s not nailed down. Someone once told me that if workers were fixing a sidewalk with new bricks and left them out overnight, the bricks would be gone by morning. They said that Chinese people just felt anything left out in the open was fair game. I’m happy to put that rumor to bed.
So either we are incredibly lucky, or there are some good people in China. Or maybe, it’s a little bit of both. Â (And yes, I’m very aware that if it was a fancy phone, like an iphone, the story might have a drastically different ending. But it didn’t so. So there.)
There Goes Another Leprechaun
I’ve also been told countless times that the Chinese will take anything they find, but thus far I’ve found that untrue. Yes, there are pickpockets around, but it’s not as bad as people say.
Yesterday I got my first phone in this country and it’s good to know that if I lose it there’s a chance of getting it back. I lost three in South Korea. Admittedly, I was drunk in each case, but still no one called to give it back or answered when I tried to phone it.
Glad you found your phone.
The amazing thing was that the guy didn’t even want anything in return, even after we offered. I asked my student about the protocol when returning lost goods. We wanted to offer him something, but didn’t want to offend him. The student said offering him money might be offensive, and that if he wanted money he would have asked for it beforehand. So we brought him a little thing of candy as a thank you, but he walked away. I’m not quite sure if we offended him by offering the candy, but I hope he knows it was a goodwill gesture!