24 October 1997
Dear ;
Episode 2: "Now is the Winter of our Missing Tent".  I hope that my last letter reached you safely.  If it didn't, it's because I couldn't tell a Chinese mail box from a rubbish bin.  First, I went to the hotel concierge and asked her where I could mail my letters.  She said "I take them."  Then I saw her put them in a big brown envelope marked "Safe Deposit Box".  I said, "No, I take them!"  Language is a bit of a problem.  My first night, we had a Chinese guard working with us, who was supposed to be our translator.  He was bilingual: Mandarin and Cantonese.  For the first week, I worked with Chris on nights, managing to escape the back-breaking work of putting up the tent.  We're having a little difficulty understanding some of the symbols on the signage.  Chris has one in his room, somehow related to the safety drill, that appears to depict hanging a woman out the window.  Given the past history of this place, it may be instructions of what to do in case of a police raid.  I've discovered that the Chinese have an interesting way with English, but my favourite is a sign advertising the "Jungly New Pub".  Also, I saw a large, multi-story stone building with massive Grecian columns and a huge sign on top that said BARBER SHOP.  Apparently, Barber Shops are often fronts for brothels here.  Also, in a shop window was a sign in Chinese and English which said "To Do Business".  I went inside, dying to know what the other side said: "To Drink Tea".  We have a very international company.  The crew come from England, ad there are acrobats from Morocco and hand stand artists from Russia.  All pitch in to help with whatever needs doing, but there is an interesting blend of cultures and languages being spoken.  On Sunday, after finishing work, I attended an informal Christian Science service in the Chinese Masonic Temple.  On Monday morning, I didn't get back to the hotel until 10AM.  I put a "Do Not Disturb" sign on my door, and went straight to bed.  At 1PM my doorbell rings.  It is Vaughan, a big dumb beefcake of a northerner who was to be my partner that night.  Ignoring (or unable to read) the sign, he invites me to go out for lunch.  We found an all-you-can-eat buffet across the street, which cost me 350NT, or about œ6, by far the most I have paid for a meal so far.  Anyway, it was a chance to get to know each other before we begin work.  I began the conversation by remarking that many people had turned down our job, guessing it was appropriate only for a single person.  He, it turned out, had just broken up with his girlfriend of three and a half years.  Ah, something I could identify with, I thought.  "She was too old for me", he said.  Her age?  Thirty-nine (my age).  He said the sex was fantastic, very passionate, but he just couldn't go out with someone that old.  I didn't know they gave work permits to extra-terrestrials.  Meanwhile, things were going, as they say, pear shaped.  Typhoon Ivan was cutting a swath across south-east Asia, and we were in its path.  Moreover, and possibly more ominously, New Aspect, the Chinese producers, had failed to get planning permission for the site.  So it had to come down.  All of it.  Apparently, Phillip Gandey, the English producer, wiped the floor with them when he heard this.  The next day, we finished packing things away, but when the required fork-lift and flat-bed truck did not arrive, he ordered us back on to the bus, and to wait in our hotels for further instructions.  After waiting for several hours, I was sent back to the site, only to be sent straight home again.  Finally, I went to a film, Curdled. The next day we finished taking the tent down, then waited several more hours for the Taiwanese producers, New Aspect, to send al the right cranes and equipment.  Philip Gandey, the English producer, went to them demanding action.  They replied, "Your problem be solved in one hour.  In the mean time, please ask crew to keep emotion."  He told them he would have no trouble doing that.  After loading everything up, we knocked off about eight PM.  On Thursday, we arrived at the new site.  How do I describe it?  Cesspool?  Toxic waste dumping ground?  We unloaded the gear and sat around waiting for somebody to fix the compressor so that we could put our stakes through the concrete.  Greg, the company wit, remarked "The time is now 10:54 Daylight Wasting Time".  In the midst of all the construction and dirt, somebody began setting up a table with flowers on it.  A Buddhist monk came to bless the project, giving us incense sticks, which we were to hold facing the sun, bending three times.  Then they burned some "money for another world", and set off some firecrackers.  Finally we were able to raise the kingpoles before dusk.  When we collected our wages, we learned that our administrator, Louise Porter, was fired by New Aspect because she insisted that we be paid on time.  It seems like some sort of meltdown is in the offing.  We have little protection, because our return tickets are not valid until 24 April 1998.  Also, it seems we have become involved in somebody's election campaign.  We've been given golf caps with some slogan on it, and a loudspeaker is broadcasting propaganda.  I think the new site is their campaign headquarters, and they are using our tent for a rally.  Although it has been delayed for a week, we are assured that the circus will open.  Eventually.  We wait with baited breath.  In the meantime, the animal rights protesters await us.  They've already held up the arrival of our tigers.  I'll let you know what happens in my third epistle.