I never liked the winter in Shanghai, not only cold but also wet. It sucks every tiny bit of heat out of you slooooowly. Then, with the lowest temperature not too far below zero, it wasn’t cold enough to get people to install heater in apartments and classrooms.

When I was in middle school, I rode my bike to school everyday, rode back for lunch and rode back to home, then to my swimming training. I had about 6 pairs of winter socks and somehow they all lost their elasticity on the top. My mom’s policy was if the socks didn’t have holes in them, you had to keep wearing them. When I was riding my bike, they would be pulled down into my shoes — which were also low ankle — and left my ankles bare. When it is freezing cold outside, you are on your bike doing 20 miles per hour and your ankles are bare? Next thing I learned was to jump off my bike slowly because otherwise, my feet and ankles would hurt so much that they almost felt broken. Unfortunately, I often had to jump off my bike abruptly to stop my bike since often my breaks didn’t work (because my rims were rusting and they ate though brake pads like butter).

Then if the road was wet or if the moisture was little high, it was even worse. My shoes were never waterproof, so they would get all damp inside. If I was at home, I would at least be able to heat up my shoe paddings on the stove to dry them up. If I was at my dorm, Man, I had to just wear the same pair of cold and damp shoes for several days.

My hands? I usually wore 3 layers of gloves riding my bike. 1 pair was the knitted ones without finger-tips. I wore them inside when I did my homeworks. Second pair was the knitted ones that my mom made. Third pair was actually stretchy athletic ankle protectors that some relative gave us. Don’t ask me why that was a gift. Even with 3 layers of gloves, my hands would still get so cold that my fingers would be totally numb. So once I got into my classroom, I still couldn’t write until 20 minutes later. I would get freezer burn every year. Fingers would all be red and swollen. I had always thought that my fingers could be skinnier if I didn’t have those freezer burn every year. The worse thing was when it got warmer, my hands would be all itchy. Very very annoying!

I did discover a very interesting sensation though. Usually, when you jump into a pool (even a heated pool) you feel cold all over. But in winter, my hands and feet would feel so warm but my body still felt cold. It kind of made the jumping-into-the-pool experience better.

Oh, let’s not forget the housework. All the vegetables, clothes and dishes had to be washed in water by hand. For vegetables and clothes, we always used cold water. For dishes, we had the luxury to use hot water for the first wash but then we had to use cold water to rinse the dishes twice. There was always a debate back then about which one was worse, using cold water for all 3 washes or using hot water first then immediately cool your hands off with cold water. My mom had freezer burns too. So whenever we were on a bus together, you would see us both rubbing our fingers constantly to work out the freezer burns. It was very nice when my parents finally got a wash machine.

Talking about freezer burns, there was a tragic story. My first year in the dorm, one of my friends suggested boiling some chilly pepper in water then soaking your hands in it. Supposedly, it would increase your blood circulation therefore heal the burns and even prevent it from happening the next year. So I did that. And … half an hour later, I put on my contact lens and went out to class. Oh my god!!! My eyes were so irritated even after I took the contact lens out. People kept asking me, “Are you OK”. What can I say? After telling the true story a couple times, I decided to just tell everybody that I was dumped and I was being devastated! 😎

Sadly, my freezer burn came back the next year as usual. 🙁