My 21st Birthday/Beijing Opera

I turned 21 this past Sunday. As my birthday is the day after St. Patrick's Day - which happened to fall on a Saturday this year - my 21st birthday was an experience of "some magnificence" (to quote JRR Tolkien). Some of my friends took me out to eat at this wonderful restaurant called Grandma's Kitchen, where our eyes feasted upon a menu full of savory words like "meatloaf," "New York strip steak," (real) "red wine," "salad," and my personal favorite: "milkshake." I gorged myself on the aforementioned steak, while we all split a bottle of Argentinian Malbec. For dessert, I ordered a chocolate-mint-baileys milkshake. Gastronomic euphoria. Afterwards, we headed to Wudaoku for 10 kuai (about $1.20) Guinnesses... and my first Irish car bomb. I didn't get drunk - thankfully - but I definitely had a good time.

Last night, my host family took me to see a Beijing Opera. Most Americans who have seen it will tell you to bring earplugs, because Beijing Opera involves a lot of high-pitched "wailing," but the opera (I should say operas) I saw was very enjoyable - or as they say in Chinese: haoting ("Good to hear"). My favorite part of the whole thing is definitely the costumes - especially the makeup.

There are many different forms of Chinese Opera. Beijng Opera is by far the most popular and well-known, but there are something like 370 other styles; forms and styles vary from province to province and are often sung in local dialects. Beijing Opera is rather spartan in its use of props and scenery, so the actors use body movements and facial expressions to convey action. The orchestra uses percussion and string instruments to provide a rhythmic accompaniment to the actions onstage. With a repetoire of some 1000 works, there's a lot of culture to be experienced by going to see a performance. That said, these things tend to be rather long - some performances last anywhere from 4 to 5 hours. The performance I saw was actually comprised of excerpts from two longer works: "Journey to the West" and... I forget the other one. And it was short - only an hour and a half. I'd like to see an entire production sometime. Hopefully I won't fall asleep.

And now for your viewing pleasure, here are some examples of the costumes of the Beijing Opera.


(Photo courtesy of jfchenier)


(Photo courtesy of hugoyu)

(Info about Chinese Opera shamelessly taken from this Wikipedia article.)