Something about food

It's been really interesting eating back in China. In Korea too, but
I think I already covered that. Being in Hong Kong, and especially
Shenzhen, there's a lot of seafood to be had. Of course, it's a lot
more obvious what it is than seafood at home. For example, fish will
usually be served whole (but gutted) in a plate of sauce, or we'll
have shrimp that you behead and peel yourself. And you know they're
fresh because you can see the guy pulling them out of the tank. It's
kind of funny to watch them swim around though, all these little
scampering legs. We also had some sort of scallops in the shell with
noodles and garlic, and little bitty clams that seemed to have been
stir-fried in the shell. Very tasty, but also very slippery, one
jumped out of my chopsticks and made a mess of my shirt last night.

Food elsewhere has been good too. It's strange, despite all the time
I spent in China, I keep getting to try new things. Pig's tail, for
example. Or buffalo stomach. Both very tasty, and probably very
unhealthy. Something came up (I hope I can use the past tense) with
my stomach while I was in HengYang, sort of like a bug I caught
before, so for a while I tried to avoid really oily, spicy foods, and
had some rice porridge. The salty kinds are a bit bland for me, but
there're also all sorts of sweet/fruit flavorings, which are really
good. It tasted kind of like breakfast food though. Hmm, I think I
must have had frog at at least three meals too. It's also really
good. It'd be nice if the meat came in bigger chunks, but it's very
tasty stir-fried with ginger and peppers.

A little about HengYang:
It's an interesting city, in that for all intents and purposes it
doesn't exist outside China, except perhaps as a sales figure. By
that I mean it doesn't really seem to serve industries outside of
China, there's almost no way anyone outside the country would have
heard of it. There are a number of boutiques that claim to be (may
actually be?) from other countries, but the management for those
branches is probably based somewhere in China. I only saw one other
foreigner the whole time, and that was on the train as I left.
Occasionally a few teachers end up there, but running into white
people is an extreme rarity. I'd always get looked at, and Echo would
usually bring me breakfast at the hotel so that we wouldn't have
everyone looking at us. (Right, if you don't know why I was there, I
was visiting my ex-girlfriend, now very good friend, Echo.) And yeah,
there's virtually no tourism to the city itself, so there aren't any
budget guest houses or hostels or anything.

It's a wierd experience, getting looked at. It's not really bad, it's
to be expected, but can be awkward when a big group of half-drunk men
start yelling hello. It's more fun with little kids, sometimes
they'll say hello or they might just try to sneak looks at you, it's
really cute. Several times while we were out we ran into students of
Echo's (she teaches at a few different schools, mostly lower primary
school-age children), and she and their parents would have them
practice with me. Usually they were pretty shy, but most of the time
we could get name and age out of them.

The hotel though was strange, a little dirty and seedy, although not
as bad as the place I stayed when I visited before. It seemed like
most of the people who stayed there were middle-aged men, occasionally
without shirts, often yelling in the hallway, with a few younger guys
and some young women as well. Most nights I'd get a call up to my
room around 10, 10:30 from a prostitute (I know because once Echo
answered the phone, and the woman thought Echo had gotten the job
first). One night Echo wasn't there and I answered the phone and
found myself unable to explain that I wasn't interested. (I've
recovered some of my mandarin, but not much, and I don't know if I had
that much anyway.) I thought I'd dissuaded her and started to go to
sleep when I heard a knock on the door. This being the night when I
felt most sick, a little feverish and a big stomachache, I answered
the door wrapped in my duvet, no lights on. I must have looked awful,
but she got the hint. After that I stopped answering the phone if
Echo wasn't around. Even if it was the front desk there was no way to
communicate, so why bother, it just frustrated everyone. Except for
once when a maid came in by accident while I was getting dressed, they
must have thought I was out after I didn't pick up. Anyway, I spent
most of my time there feeling vaguely like an extra in a gangster
movie. Towards the end of my stay I asked Echo about this, and she
explained that no, they weren't criminals, they were men who didn't
have a whole lot of education, but did have well-paying jobs. They'd
come to the hotel for a few days at a stretch to play mah-jong, a
bunch of guys sharing one room and just passing out as they felt like
it. Saved wear and tear on their homes and wives, I guess.

Just outside the hotel was a nice little park, which got a lot of use.
In the morning all the old people would be out for taiji (I
considered joining them, but I get stared at enough). After school
let's out lots of little kids and teenagers show up, and at night you
get big groups of adults doing folk dancing, playing badminton,
whatever. The dancers all bring their own loudspeakers for music
though, and it gets pretty loud. It's nice to see a place like that
really get used, but there almost wasn't enough space when it was
full.

Okay, it's just about supper time, Ben Liu (he was in level 2 at
Omeida right when I started and left at the end of January, so I never
taught him, but my friend/student Sheila knows him and he offered to
let me stay with him) is cooking tonight. Smells good, in that
peppery, smoky, burn your nose and make you cough way that high-temp,
spicy stir-fry does. Once it's all out on the table it'll probably be
easier to breathe.