Food and eating

I was apprehensive about food in the entire first part of my trip, since I didn't see many restaurants, except for three in the basement of our office building. There is a cafeteria where most people go to eat, and it is good because we can just point at the food that sits in steaming piles.... It's quite cheap, as a filling meal can cost 3 Canadian dollars. then there is a chinese restaurant, a japense retaurant, and a 'western' restaurant. I put western in quotes because it is just a chinese interpretation of western food. Speaking of interpretations, one Indian colleague claims that Indian food served in China is identitcal to Chinese food served in India. Anyway, Labour is very cheap, because the restararaunts are open until 11pm every day, even though there is never anyone in them, as far as I can tell, outside of lunch hour. It's very interesting for me, as a few times, I have gone in, and been served by tree waiters, who do nothing but stare at me while I eat.

I ate lots of beef. i actually am afraid of beef, because of mad cow and not knowing the food standards here.. .but when it comes to menus, i haven't really learned to recognize many other characters other than 'beef noodle soup'. Luckily some places (like in the cafeteria) I can point, and in other places, there are pictures in the menus.

Luckily, I got some chinese lessons on MP3 to learn, but i'm only on lesson 25 out of 60... I'm waiting for the food section, which doesn't seem to be coming any time soon... However, I have thankfully picked up tips from local students on how to order. more lately, I have been feeling more at home. I think initially, my view of Beijing was severely distorted by only experiencing the path between my dorm and work, it formed my impressions of all of beijing, and I now realize that it was in an industrial area where, generally, there isn't that much that inspires.

Food here is actually terrific, as there is a huge variety of ethnic food, much of it amazing. It is always an adventure, and it seems like the rule that the dingier the restaraunt, the tastier the food. One example is food from xinjin province, (an autonomously governed province norht of tibet) is one of my favorites. In the province, it is muslim culture and the food, with famous spicy mutton skewers and naan is great. (only 20 cents per skewer!)

there is of course the stranger stuff, mostly ascribed to southern Cantonese cuisine, like the three squeaks. (live fetal mice. the first squeak is when you touch them with chopsticks, the second is when you dip them in sauce, and the final squeak is when you put them in your mouth). I have not tried that. However, in Hong Kong, I did have a dessert of some sort of fungus. It was crunchy and nice. then at a more fancy restaraunt we were served the same dessert, except this fungus seemed a bit different. Oh well. I started eating it... and when I was almost done, my uncle asked me if I knew what it was. I said, it's fungus, isnt' it? and well, although there is an almost identical dish with fungus, the one i had just eaten was... Toad Ovaries! yuummmmmm! i could hardly contain my joy as i downed the nearest glass of hot tea to wash down the ovary goodness. Apparently the estrogen contained in the ovaries is supopsed to be good for your skin. Next time get then chance, I will compare a female frog's skin to that of a male one.

My Beijing Haircut - March 8, 2005

i left work earlier than usual well (9 pm isn't that early). I was excited because I decided that today was going to be the day that I would get my first mainland chinese haircut!

I stopped by a rather large place with twin rotating red and white poles in front of it. Soon I would get the double wash, haircut, and massage i've been hearing about for 30 RMB (5 Canadian dollars). When I went in, there was a big knot of people doing gambling of some sort.
(The walls were also covered from floor to ceiling in tin foil, (!) but i didn't notice that until later!) They had money in their hands... I asked if they were open, but none of them spoke english or cantonese. I didn't want to interrupt them playing, but they made cutting motions and nodded. I asked how much? it was 20 RMB (a little over 3 dollars), but there wasn't any massage! I was dissapointed, but decided to through with it anyway.

Someone came out of the group and had me lie down, while my hair was washed. Then handed me off to another person who seemed like a 18 year old. Strange, you don't see many 18 year old males cutting hair, but he seemed well groomed, so I figured it would be ok. Well, to start off, I felt like any hair style would be fine, (I was being adventurous) but I didn't know how to say anything in Mandarin! I finally managed to say the equivalent of 'whatever you want' or 'arbitrary' in Cantonese, which someone understood and said it in Mandarin to the guy who was to cut my hair. Ive recently decided that asking someone to cut your hair "arbitrarily" is not the same as asking them to give you a haircut that they think would look good on you.

So the adventure begins....
The instruments of a hair cutting professional were kept in black cases. Many were on multi-level shelves, open and waiting, bright curlers along with dark brushes. In fact all the spaces were lined with these cases, except for where I was sitting. There was a small case, closed, in the corner. It was now to this case that my barber moved to. He crouched down and very carefully took out two of the three items inside: a comb, and a pair of scissors. (the case was only just big enough for the three things.

I was like... ok... he's so good that he doens't need any fancy stuff....well, perhaps i was wrong. I first started getting worried when I noticed that he kept his head tilted 90 degrees the entire time. I'm not sure why, one of his ears was always pointing to the ceiling, never straight up and
down. When he was cutting, His face would sometimes a few inches from his hands. I thought to myslef, well, he's careful. that's good! Just then, a mighty cheer rose up from the gamblers, and he looked at them to see what the cheering, but he didn't stop cutting! Yikes! Well, that only lasted a few seconds, and he was cutting so little each time, I figured that I was safe. However, I was getting nervous, because from time to time people would look up from the gambling huddle to see what he was up to, but trying not to let me notice them doing it.. sort of like he was doing something bad, but they didn't want to say anything. It didn't feel quite right....By the twenty minute mark, I was wondering how he was able to be able to judge how symmetrical the haircut was because his head had been sideways the whole time. So I put on my glasses to see....

He must have liked geometry a lot, because he had turned my head into a perfect sphere! The symmetry was amazing, it was a perfect ball no matter which way i moved my head! (It didn't matter how he he held his head either) It sort of looked like my neck blew a bubble, and even though it showcased the most symmetrical shape, i wasn't completely happy with it.

I indicated with my hands that maybe I didn't want this style of cut, and maybe it should be shorter on the sides than the front. He took out an electric razor and carfully lopped off the back and the sides. (this took another 15 minutes) I'm not sure which is wose, a perfect sphere, or a sphere with three sides missing!

Well, at least with the sides missing, my head no longer looks like a Q-tip or lollipop. -- It's also good because now I have an excuse to go to another barber -- one that hopefully gives massages!