Peter Green

Thanks, guys. I'm ready for the next fish. Cheers, Peter

The egg in the beer ended up looking like egg swirls in egg drop soup, so I assumed something happened to change the state of the egg. ← I didn't have this in China, but I have done it in Vancouver (a long time ago). My brother was putting raw eggs in everything. I can't say that it did a lot for me.

Funny you say that - I might have been imagining it because I wasn't all that keen on using it. Happier to go with the pure cow. ← We'd been discussing the cornstarch thing in another thread. Chinese cooking beliefs (okay, my cooking instructor in Chengdu and another person's grandmother) hold that using bean or corn starch makes the meat more tender.

A week? You're going to be gone for a whole week? Pictures! We want pictures of Kyoto, Osaka, and definitely of Universal Studios! What do they serve in the canteen there? Are they using Jamaican Blue Mtn in the coffee urns? Inquiring minds need to know.

Meat must be cooked. Pfah! A little bit of mad cow here and there, and suddenly you can't get anyone to do a tartare anymore. Similarly, I think the restrictions on pork are somewhat anachronistic. Mind you, I would probably still avoid chicken tartare in most places.......

Thanks, Baggy! I'd already got started on this before I'd read your post. It didn't go well. The problem lay in getting the skein away from the eggs. Now I'm trying to figure out how to use salmon roe juice. I think the problem may lie in the eggs having been frozen (no way around it. I have to bring the fish out here from home once a year). That may have reinforced the bond with the membrane. But, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Peter

Day 15 – Part 1 – The River’s Edge The weather had indeed turned foul. Windy, wet, and cold. Very cold. I suspect the hotel was smugly satisfied that they had kept the pool closed for winter. After a horrible breakfast, Pam picked us up on schedule and delivered us to the wharf, along with the rest of the mob. There’re something like 8,000 people a day being moved down to Yangshuo, which raised the question in my mind; “Why are we amongst them.” Well, the reason lay in the initial planning. When I’d looked at our possible itineraries, I’d been working from my existing reference books. One of my problems, of course, is that I’m cheap, and I really ought to buy some up to date books…like, maybe something from this century. Okay, here’s what the Lonely Planet 1994 Edition says about Yangshuo. It’s a tiny country town set amidst limestone pinnacles, and makes a great, laid-back base from which to explore other small villages in the nearby countryside. Give Guilin itself a miss, head down to Yangshuo, hire a mountain bike and find out what the Guilin landscape is really all about. To be fair, the boat trip was pretty good. It’s hard to beat the scenery that we were taken through, and the craft itself was fun, steaming downstream and taking the bends and twists with aplomb. Countering that were the incessant attempts to get us to buy stuff. Nescafe? 20 Yuan. Xing Ping? 20 Yuan. Playing cards? 20 Yuan. I was seeing a pattern here. Unfortunately, this inured me fairly quickly to their sales, and I didn’t bother even really listening to their offers of local dishes, which might have been pretty good (and then again….) With the PA system having been taken over by the tour leader for the crowd on the deck below us (“Hello? Hello?”) I fled for the top deck, away from the crowds. Yoonhi couldn’t get me down after that. I just stayed up there and watched the scenery go by, camera in hand. You’d think at some point it would all just become “Hey, look, a rock”, but I was content to just take all of it in. Yoonhi and I were bundled up in our jackets to counter the wind and the intermittent rain. Doofus boy, of course, was walking around in his t-shirt. Serena, always open to cultural enrichment, was downstairs plugged into her electronics and her panda chocolates. Why do we bother? It was a more-than-four-hour trip down the Li River to Yangshuo, and lunch was served about half way through. Although I had expected this to execrable, it actually came across as merely bad. The scenery was in far better taste, and I hurried back outside.\ Unfortunately, I missed out on the Osmanthus wine (20 Yuan), and the snake wine (20 Yuan). I had to content myself with some single malt I had in the hip flask (0 Yuan…at least by this point). The foreign tourist boats are all of one design. A lower deck, with the kitchen at the stern and navigation up front, bracketing a seated section for the rabble, with a second deck given over to more seating and the buffet table. On top of this is the observation deck, which is where I was spending my time. The kitchens actually looked pretty good. A fair sized galley capable of producing a fair spread. Like I said, maybe I missed out by not going for the local dishes? Talking with Pam a bit topside, we found out that the bulk of the boats do the trip down, and then come straight back to Guilin. They make the return trip empty, which seemed odd. Of course, going against the current, it’s a slower trip, but you’d think there’d still be people willing to do the ride (especially at a discounted price). Pam was recommending the beer cooked fish and duck. This was the local specialty, and he thought it was worth having here. He also talked a lot about how Yangshuo was the best of the best for Guangxi. We’d see. While we talked, we noticed one of the crew members (one of the two young ladies who were flogging everything at hand for 20 Yuan) dumping a garbage sack of food and Styrofoam over the rail, right beside the “Please do not pollute the Li River” sign on the railing. Things change slowly. Soon enough (or so it felt) we steamed into Yangshuo. The fellow on the PA informed us of this, oh….maybe thirty or so times. Scud was just about ready to have a go at him when we realized that we’d have the benefit of getting off first, while he tried to organize his herd. Yangshuo doesn’t make a bad first impression. The town is perched up above the river, with some shops and restaurants overhanging the cliff edges. The peaks do ram their way up from the town as advertised, and it is definitely green. We humped our hand carry up the West Street, home to hostelries, cafes, and trinket shops. There was the colourful array of stuff you associate with backpacker destinations, and it was novel enough after two weeks on the road. It felt a lot like an expanded version of the Western Street in Dali, where I’d had my shoes repaired a decade before (I’ve kept those Rockports, with their all-weather Hangook Tire tread nailed onto the bottom). I wonder what that looks like today? We weren’t in the thick of things, unfortunately. The Paradiso was packed out, and they’d decided to put us in the “Chinatown” hotel – a new hotel - which was up by the bridge going across the Li. This meant that we needed to use one of the little tourist busses to get our stuff over there. Luckily, the big bags were being hauled up by van from Guilin, so we didn’t have to contend with the eighty or kilos we were packing (we travel light…oh, yeah). The hotel was disappointing. They’d upgraded our rooms, which was nice, but we still felt sort of out of things. Still, it would only be for two nights. And we did have a good view. We were on our own now, which was fine by us. Yoonhi was going to go out for the sound and light in the evening, but that was hours from now. We walked back into town, past a few restaurants, past the porn shop, and down between a couple of the crags. The peaks look beautiful, but in a town like this they create a number of choke points, points where the noise reverberates back and forth between the limestone faces. In town, we wandered (as usual). I saw a sign for something called the Fiat Language Centre, and followed it a little way out of town. We actually missed it going up the hill, but caught it on the return. Besides – I presume – teaching you to converse with Italian automobiles, they also have cooking courses (and lots of other stuff). I toyed with the idea of another cooking course, but put that aside for the moment. We came across what might be the most perfect of shops for Serena. Everything Is Pleasant, jammed to the ceiling with plush toys. Hunger was setting in, as none of us (particularly I) had eaten much on the boat. We poked around some of the restaurants, and looked for anything promising. For want of anything else, we popped into the Music East & West Café (MEWC – I’m not spelling that out again). No particular reason, other than I could feel increasingly bad vibes coming from the family members, whom I’d had pounding the pavement for the last two hours. I hadn’t expected much from the MEWC. Music might’ve been nice, and I did suggest to them that this could improve the mood. They obliged with something that would play well in elevators anywhere (at least it wasn’t rap). I wasn’t thrilled with the menu, so I limited myself to a beer. Yoonhi tried a pear juice, and then decided that pear isn’t one of those things that works well as a juice. But then the moment was saved. Onion rings. These were some of the best onion rings we’ve ever had. The batter was perfectly crisp, no sogginess. And the onions themselves were softened just to the point where there was still a little structure to allow them to bite easily, not gone completely flaccid as happens too often. I wonder what these people could do with a Mars bar? Back on the street, I perked up when I saw signs for a laundry. Of the 80+ kg we were hauling about, perhaps 40kg of that was now dirty clothes. One thing you can always count on finding in backpacker spots is a laundry. The other thing was internet (the internet wasn’t connected in the rooms at our hotel). Yangshuo’s a ghetto. That really sums it up. And if you see it in this light, it can be a lot of fun. Lots of places all cast from the same mold, but more than a few spots that were showing original character. There was Le Votre Brasserie, with it’s micro-brewery set up in the front of an old Chinese Hall. And plenty of really comfortable looking bars that would be worth drinking in later. I checked the menu at the Blue Lotus, but it was lackluster. I’d really hoped they’d have a Snowy hot pot. And the dragon pots seemed to be popular. This street snake is full of a hot liquid (Is it just water?) which gets poured into a cup of something else. This then gels, and you get some nice technicolour toppings to go myopic over. And you get a plastic spoon, too. All this culture was taking a heady toll on us. We headed for food. My plan was to dine close to the hotel. This would, in the one instance, ensure that Yoonhi didn’t miss her show, and in the second instance made certain that I wouldn’t miss out on beer cooked fish, as the restaurants up here were considered a good source for this local item. We had a choice. There were about three ramshackle wooden shambles perched out over the cliff. For no particular reason, we chose Da Shi Fu. Maybe because of the picture of their chef? Maybe because I figured the middle building would be the last to collapse? (By the way, I’ve since checked out the website on the sign. It would seem that they’ve taken awards for their cooking. However, the restaurant pics they’ve got posted don’t quite look like this place, so I assume they have other outlets). Seeing as we were just across the street from the hotel, Yoonhi opted to take Serena and use the room’s facilities, rather than those provided here. As we were early, they were able to fit us in at a table on the verandah. Our first problem was readily solved. I was able to order a beer, and a coke for Scud. The beer was nice. I thought at first I’d hit upon a non-Liquan product, but when I checked the fine print it was “Ice Beer – Liquan – Yanjing – Guilin”. Still, after a few hours of walking, this hit the spot. It was also critical for our getting dinner. You see, at this point I had exhausted my store of Mandarin, and our waitress had used up her English before she even said anything. I think I saw the three waitresses run a quick game of rock-paper-scissors to see who had to deal with us. She lost. So, we wanted beer cooked fish. This was easy. I drew a picture of a fish, I held up my beer, she smiled, and we were in business. With the duck, I followed the same route. No problem. Then she hit us with a flurry of Mandarin. Scud and I looked at her for a moment, with that dull sheen of incomprehension. Then we just laughed. She fled. After about three minutes, she’d composed herself to the point where she could approach the table again. She handed us a menu, we looked at it, and then we burst out laughing. Another couple of minutes, and she was back. Drawing things was out, so I feel back on method B. Carefully, I put the menu down in front of me, raised my hand, closed my eyes, and dropped my index finger on the menu. It took a long time for her to finish laughing and come back to the table after that. When it was done – which took awhile – we had a total of three mystery dishes in addition to our beer cooked food. Then I grabbed my camera and went into the kitchen to see what was happening. At this point I was a complete enigma to the staff, so they didn’t worry at all about the fat crazy guy taking pictures. Heck, next thing he might even be taking pictures of his food. I liked the kitchen. Lots of elbow room, the usual three woks, and a large area for meez. He had the sauce started up, with chilis and the smell of garlic in the room, then he hit it with a liberal dose of Liquan, and dropped in a bunch of tomatoes. He went over to a bowl of precooked, dismembered, and dubious-looking duck pieces, and grabbed a large handful for the wok. This was followed by some MSG (“Gourmet powder”), a bit of sugar, some salt, and then a big ladle something dark to bring the colour up. On the side he had a selection of ready to go vegetables and greens. Yoonhi and Serena showed up as I was coming out of the kitchen. Serena wanted some milk, so I was getting geared up to do some interesting lactational miming (method C), when Yoonhi trumped me by pulling out an empty carton (method D). Relieved, our waitress ran off to one of the neighborhood shops to buy some more. Yoonhi was charmed by the ambience. “Is that a toilet roll on the table? Are we back in Southeast Asia?” But, she needn’t worry about anything. We had hygienically wrapped table settings. There’s a question. We hear many things about the cultural divisions in China, the big one being the Coastal-Inland split, but there’s also the breakover of the Far South. Is this the marker? Wrapped table settings and tissue paper? The fish showed up as I pondered this weighty topic. The fish was good. It was a very soft fish. The overall impression was tomatoes, the chilis and bell peppers giving a background to the overall sweetness of the dish. Lots of garlic in there that took you by the nose. I can’t say that I tasted the beer in any way, but that’s okay. This was a dish worth eating. The duck, in contrast, I didn’t care for. It tasted much as the popo duck we’d had in Beijing near the start of the trip. Part of the proble is that, jointed as it is, there’s very little meat to work with on the bird. As the fish was a very tomatoy dish, this was more brown. There were some chopped pickled chilis, and lots of chunks of ginger in there with the garlic, but everything sort of melded into “brown” flavour. Luckily for Serena, one of my random digit stabs had hit upon a soup. This was a fresh green in a chicken broth. Number two on the mystery hit parade was taro, which had been cooked for awhile along with pork spareribs. The spareribs were buried on under the taro cubes and chilis, and were really, really succulent. The meat just slid off of them in your mouth. More greens, these a celery that had been quickly cooked up with some oyster sauce. This was all pretty good for being stochastic. The only thing I didn’t really care much about was the duck. The fish was great, and I’ll try and deconstruct this back in my own kitchen. Oh, and as a sideline, we’d lost the “who’s on the can of coke” thread awhile ago. One of the problems behind this was that the kids were getting their cokes poured for them most of the time. But it had gotten pretty boring anyways by now, as the Chinese equivalent of American Idol seemed to be the main dressing for the cans. (“Bring back the Blood Elves”, says Scud). From here, Yoonhi was heading out for her show. This is the big thing to see, we’re told. Zhang Yimou’s behind the spectacle (House of Flying Daggers, Hero, etc), which has the usual cast of hundred strung out on boats on the river, backdropped by the hills, looking colourful. Okay, okay. I’m jaded. Spectacles are nice, but I can only do one every so often. But Yoonhi and Serena came back happy with the experience, and that’s what matters. One comment that Yoonhi did bring back, was the involvement of the local people in the tourist trade here. According to Pam, the primaries are, of course, outside ringers, but the bulk of the cast are Yangshuo natives. With a cast of hundreds, a lot of the performers are the locals, who are happy to have an extra income beyond just what they can bring in from the fields. While Yoonhi was out at the theatre, I went out in the quest for beer. I was interested in the small brew that Le Votre had going. They did two beers. I ordered the dark first. 22 Yuan for a half litre. As I waited for the pour, I contemplated the day. I found Yanshuo, not surprisingly, too touristy for me. A sense of tourism that isn’t just about targeting itself to be sold, but rather in giving up its character to be something for someone else. Guilin was touristy, but it felt that it had its own essence. If you were there as a tourist, then you were welcome to glide through, leaving little to no trace. But Yangshuo felt more like a foreign outpost that had sold itself out for every penny. Not a bad thing for the local people, who’ll raise their standard of living, but it saddens me, much like seeing Nepal. The dark was a little off. Too heavy on the chocolate malt for my tastes, and lacking a backdrop to give it complexity. Still, it wasn’t Liquan, so I could take some enjoyment from it. The blonde was an easier drink. A reasonable head when it arrived, and a good background of honey in the beer. Out on the street, there are three guys squatting and doing some business of some sort. One of them was making guppy like noises. Then, of a sudden, they grab their things and take off at a run. Moments later a group of police amble by. You wonder about the things you see. Still full from dinner, I paid for my beers and wandered about, heading down to the river to look at the tourist junk for sale in the stalls. While there I was set upon by a group of students out to practice their English; three girls and one fellow. We meandered through the stalls, but I couldn't shake them off, so I figured I might as well buy them a beer. We talked about the Water Margin, Three Kingdoms, the current wars, and life as a student in Nanning. When it was time for me to go, they all pull out evaluation forms for me to fill, critiquing their English conversation skills. I hadn’t expected that. But, it’s something I do often enough at work, so I ordered another beer, and gave them perhaps more of a review than they’d expected. At the end, I wished them well, and then got moving just in time to catch the rain. Not a bad day. But would I "give Guilin a miss" for this? Not likely. Next: On A Bicycle Built For Two

Quick, I've got some salmon roe on the countertop. How long should I brine this, and how much/what type of salt should I use in the brine!

Once I get through all of this, I may go back and do up a more technical version of post #131. The problem is that the chefs don't work in standard measures, it's a lot like cooking with your grandmother. A pinch of this, a bucket of that. So trying to quantify recipes is sort of down to the "cut it to about the size of your nose". But, let's see how exhausted I am of this trip by the time we get through Shanghai. Heck, we've still gotta do Yangshuo.

It is a Hot Pot menu Column one. Fragrant Dog Dry Fried Donkey Boiled Donkey Dry Fried Mutton Boiled Mutton Yellow Braised Chicken Boiled Chicken Sizzling Plate (Doesn't specify what is on the plate!) Column 2 Beer Duck Chestnut Duck Chestnut Chicken Snails and Chicken Beer Fish Delicious Tofu and Fish Hot and Sour Fish Head Hot and Sour "Hehua" Fish (sorry, I don't know the English for "Hehua". There is then a list of Li River Fish, most of which I don't know the English for. I'm not a fish linguist! ← Thanks, Liuzhou! Now I'm suffering from thinking about what I could've been eating (but what we had was pretty good, too). The chestnut duck sounds really good. And what's a yellow braised chicken? Cheers, Peter

Day 14 – Part 2 – How Much Is That Puppy In The Window? Unencumbered with children (and hangers-on), Yoonhi and I grabbed a cab back to Solitary Beauty. This is the first (but not last) time on the trip that I realized just how touristic things could become (and how lucky we were to have avoided most of it). As we arrived at the site we had to fight past the usual congregation of tourist buses. But we’d seen worse. The TerraCotta Warriors had had more visitors. But there everything was on a scale that the crowds were swallowed. But at traditional spots, like this, the bottlenecks and constrictions make you realize how few people it takes to jam things up. At first it was fine. We made our way through the spacious grounds, stopping in at the confusing multi-media exhibits they’d set up in the old buildings. I say confusing, as they were geared for groups (very loud groups) and would only turn on the lights when it was appropriate for the group to move on. This had Yoonhi and I wandering off into darkened displays that weren’t actually open to the public. Embarrassing, perhaps, but Yoonhi’s used to being around me. But when we arrived at the hill itself, this was when we found out about crowded. Folded Brocade, the day before, really hadn’t had any groups, per se. A few scattered chain-smokers getting dragged up the hill, but no traffic jams. Here we were waddling our way up the hill, with visions of a mass of humanity jambling down the staircase as soon as someone slips in one of the puddles of sweat I was leaving behind….. Oh, the humanity. But, it worked out okay. We got to the top. We took our pictures. We admired the view. We tried to look at the spot where Sun Yat Sen had his picture taken, but there was no way on Earth we were getting close to the center of that scrum, and then we waddled back down in a single file. Down below was a lot more fun. First, we could ditch the tours or work around them. Second, they had the examination hall. We’ve all grown up with stories about young scholars going off to take their exams for the government. This was a chance to see what things were like. Little cloistered cells was the answer. Just the size to sit in, with a writing table blocking you, your pen, and your ink in. Cool! This was better than when we sat our exams. Looking at it, all it really needs for my comfort is a power outlet and a beer coaster (and someone to sell me cold beers as I write). And then, on the other side of the gate, we came across the music school. This wasn’t a tourist thing. It was segregated off from the “park” with separate access. There were two long, narrow buildings. Each was partitioned into little rooms just big enough for a piano, at least the one building whose windows we could peer into. From this building rose a cacophony of key tinkling. In the background we could hear the wind section. At the time, it seemed an idyllic existence, to sit in the small, well lit room, the sound of birds and water outside, cut off from the noise of traffic and the busy life outside the ancient walls. Now think of this idyllic existence when the summer temperature climbs into the mid-30s centigrade, and the humidity approaches 99%. Then you’ll think about your mother that forced you to take piano lessons because she said it would make a man of you……. Yoonhi whacked me over the side of the head and we moved on. We exited from the backside of Solitary Beauty (as I read this, it does have an odd imagery), which afforded us the opportunity to check out the third of the peaks; Wave Subduing Hill. Oddly, the approach to this (for us) was a street of beauty parlours. I shouldn’t think about such things too much. From there, a turn down the river side, and we were back on Walking Street. We didn’t see our friend from earlier, but there were plenty of others who wanted to be our boon companions. I ignored them, and feigned interest in the showing of Ice Age that was up on the giant screen in the middle of town. At first I thought maybe it was coming attractions snippets, but, no, they were showing complete movies up on the there. The Golden Arches had set up shop here, but not as I was used to it. This was the first time I’d noticed a McDonalds kiosk. They seemed to be doing drinks and ice cream. China has an insatiable lust for ice cream (doesn’t everyone), as I thought back to the snowdrifts of ice cream wrappers on the streets of Xi’an at night. My target, though, was the Paulaner Brauhaus. I figured it was time for a different beer. Paulaner isn’t my favourite, it’s something of a McDonalds of on-site brewery beers. That is, you get exactly what you expect. No less, and definitely no more. But, a crisp dark beer pulled from a tap is what I wanted. Paulaner’s on Walking Street in Guilin doesn’t have beer on tap. At least not when I asked for it. I was out of there. I put the menu down. I made my apologies. And I was gone. We walked a bit more, cut up through Central Park, and then meandered back home, stopping in at the Bon Bon Café beside the lake for a quiet, cold, inexpensive beer (or four). In the hotel we found the children still alive and happy. I told Scud that I should have translated the sign saying “Kidnap us” into Chinese before putting it on their door. He was amused. Yoonhi whacked me again. So, obviously, it was time for dinner. I suggested rat. Everyone else suggested the street we’d walked through the night before. I lost. We had grand intentions of working our way up the street. We also had a number of beers under our belt. We made it to the first good looking place, and settled in….for just one or two dishes. It was a great place. The plastic table cloth had cigarette burns here, there, and everywhere. There was a tank by the door with some dour looking fish floating about. And there were three mystery pots cooking by our table. I tried translating the sign with the menu based upon my limited knowledge of characters, and a guidebook that had some food items. I believe, given enough time (like five years) I could have managed to order an appropriate meal. (Anybody that’s interested, please let me know what they’re offering!) I began to prepare my old fall-back. Draw pictures of animals and hope for the best. I started to draw a picture of a duck, but Scud, the art critic, pointed out that it looked more like a pheasant. Then, Serena, the bright one, chimed up, “If it’s a cross between a pheasant and a duck, that would make it a….” We congratulated her on this, and told her never to use that word again. At least not until she started dating Tony Bourdain. My artistic skills belittled, we asked for a menu. The bemused looks we got when we sat down did not bode well. Nor did the looks of incomprehension (on both sides), but then everything became all right. They had an English menu. This is probably my favourite menu. I know, I know, there are plenty more of these hand written menus around, but this one had good stuff in it. And there’s something just comforting about being in a place where they’ve taken the time to hand-transcribe their dishes. We ordered a mushroom soup for the girl. This came packed with fresh fungus with a very nice, very delicate broth, contrasted with the sharpness of the green onions they were using. Also on the wet side, we ordered a hot pot of pork, vegetables, and bean curd. It was really the bean curd that Yoonhi was after. This came with a dipping sauce that was really heavy on the soy. I’d pull the pork and bean curd out, and let it rest for a minute or so to soak up the salt. One thing I had not done was pack salt for the trip. I suppose I could’ve managed a small zip-loc of the pink Himalayan I like, but I risked untold wrath if I was caught by Yoonhi. She was already making fun of me for having packed some metal chopsticks to bring along. When we were in Beijing, we’d managed to get in one bottle of wine, the pleasant Dragon Seal Reserve Chardonnay that we’d had at Fangshan. Their menu offered the interesting-sounding Guilin 3 Flowers Wine. It wasn’t clear exactly if this was a red, or a white, or what grapes they were using, but I figured at the price it was worth trying. I don’t think grapes had anything to do with this. Yoonhi was kind in comparing it, perhaps, to a sake. Soju maybe. After one cup, I suggested that it would probably do a good job of cleaning the paint off of our driveway. This was a fairly aggressive proof (but not Everclear), with a cheeky brutality (which means it was brutal to your cheeks). The mou tai afficionadoes will probably be out for me with drawn knives for this. I’ve had a lot of Chinese spirits over the years. Every business meal I’ve done over here has revolved around shot after shot of this. Luckily, volume lends capacity, and I can usually make it through these bouts still ambulatory. But I am wary of it. I made a mistake once with some of the Beijingerr stuff, and laughed while drinking. I was clearing blood out of my sinuses for a week after….. It’s not really all that bad. It kind of grows on you after a few cups….half a bottle…..I made certain we had some beer to wash it down. There was one taboo to be broken on this menu (the Chinese wine helped). Dog. They had dog in a hot pot, and fried dog. We were worried that it was going to be too much fluid, so we ordered the fried dish. It wasn’t bad. A little greasy, but it’s hard to tell if that’s just from the frying or not. I did not get a big rush of heat from it…..but that could have just been me, seeing as I was pretty much in water-cooled mode from the humidity (although it wasn’t too hot out, the weather was turning). Scud and I munched away happily on this. We tried to get Serena to try some, but it probably didn’t help that we were making puppy noises as we ate and singing “I do hope that puppy’s for me” as we chewed down. I’d mentioned earlier the mystery pots. There were three of them (overtones of Triads), and they were right beside us. We watched as the man of the shop slid a new yontan (charcoal – what’s the Mandarin for this?) into the form fitting tin. Yoonhi, emboldened by some of the turpentine she’d been drinking, had a look inside. Looking inside didn’t help much, so I did a Monty Hall and ordered what was behind door number 1. It looked interesting. The table behind us had just been taken over by a group of young ladies from Hong Kong who were happily taking pictures of their food. From this I deduced that they must be a good sort. We asked them what was in the pots. The one closer to us was duck cooked with plums, ginko and medicines. The one a little further back was another chicken, but this one had been stuffed inside a pig’s belly and slow cooked for hours. Of course I had to order it. The staff were happy. That was one pot they’d invested in that had paid off this night. Although I shouldn’t worry. All the tables outside (four) were full now, and there was plenty of activity on the street. When the soup came out, I was a very happy man. Not only did we have very tender strips of stomach, and comforting chicken chunks to gnaw on, but the broth was some of the best I’ve had. The mushroom soup, that I’d been admiring to this point as a very nice soup, faded away, her fragile beauty cast aside for this buxom fleshpot. Hey, somebody finished off a third of the bottle of wine. As we were slowing down, we offered bowls of the soup to the ladies’ table behind us. They were quite happy to take our offer, and immediately had their cameras out taking more shots of the food. My kind of women, indeed. We were full. Our tabearuite (walking about and eating) was a lost cause (what’s the Mandarin word to walk around and snack on things?). Still, there were things to do, so we pushed back from the table and I reeled out into the street. I was growing to like that 3 Flowers Wine. I had a destination. As we’d gone down the street the night before, we’d noticed an interesting sign. I dragged a protesting Scud in by his collar, while Yoonhi and Serena went off in search of a massage and a shampoo. Upstairs, we found a fine, fine pool establishment. It was a little confusing at first. I was trying to find out if they charged by the game, or by the hour. Finally, I pulled out 200 Yuan, and the folks behind the counter perked right up and handed me a rectangular, gold coloured card, about the size of my hand. I made point signs at a table, and everyone smiled. Reasonably good quality cues (in the interest of domestic harmony, I didn’t pack Scud’s and mine for this trip. After only using ours twice on the last trip, I knew better than to make Yoonhi try and fit them into the suitcases this trip). Cigarette burns on the floors, but not on the felt. Good quality chalk and some talcum powder. And old monster video arcade quality games littered around the place. And a bunch of very serious players. Scud said later, “You know, I was a little uncomfortable. All of these guys would come around to watch us play. But after a little while it was okay. They saw we stank and they went away.” We shot for around an hour and a half, Scud had a couple of cokes, I had a couple of beers, and when I went to pay, I was given change on the order of 170 RMB or so. I blinked. Obviously this place was not charging tourist prices. I contemplated staying longer, but Scud kicked me in the shin. From the pool hall it was just a hop, skip, and a stumble back to the Bravo. I dropped Scud in the room, left a note for Yoonhi, and headed back to the Golden Lake Bar to enjoy the evening. Enjoying the evening was going to be tough. The angry skies were now getting really upset, and there was a hard wind blowing through, the kind that has water behind it somewhere. Yoonhi met me at the bar soon enough, we enjoyed a Liquan sheltered from the wind, and then headed back up into town, regardless of the weather. The lakeside was quiet, the usual crowds blown away. But when we arrive at the far side of Banyan Lake we found the street lined up with crimson tents selling odds and ends. We window-shopped (stall-hopped?) through their wares, picking up some buffalo spoons (you can never have enough serving spoons) and some odd scrolls with tales from the Three Kingdoms (Guan Yu escorting Liu Bei’s wives to Cao Cao). I suggested we check out the night clubs over on Walking Street. Yoonhi suggested we check out the insides of our eyelids, seeing as we had to get up tomorrow and get on a boat. She always wins. That’s probably a good thing. Next: Mucking About In Boats P.S. – it’s hard to describe, but I felt very comfortable in Guilin. There are things I liked everywhere we went, but this town had a very nice feel to it. Even with its famous tourist sites, it didn’t feel like a tourist town. I’ll have to think on this more.

but...but....but....doesn't the alcohol kill the parasites?? ← It doesn't seem to have done much to Scud. Serena's a little young.....

You need to look under Men's Vogue There's an August issue on line, but that was all I could turn up quickly. When will they release a third collection, that's what I need to know.

While I'm saddened to hear of your wife, I'm looking forward very much to your blog, Hiroyuki. And my compliments on your choice for an opening picture, setting the stage for yukiguni. Peter

Day 14 – Strolling It’s nice to wake up at your own pace. Not to have an appointment or anything that needs to be done or seen. That’s when I really appreciate a town. Yoonhi and Serena can sleep happily until ten or eleven. Me, I get up at six. So I can write, go for a stroll, read a bit, wish I’d gone to sleep earlier in the evening instead of dropping into the Golden Lake Bar for a bottle or five of Liquan…… But that’s one of the many things I liked in this town. Close by us there were probably two or three little “bars” with outside tables, no hassles, and cold beer. I found these gave me a great chance to catch up on organizing photos and writing up some notes. I just wish they had more variety in their beers. Anyways, it was a morning of belligerent clouds. Still warm….sweaty warm, but something was brewing. After a breakfast that was just plain bad (oh, I will always miss the Dong Jiao Min Xiang in Beijing), we found out there was a Chinese breakfast in the other restaurant. We asked about changing, but were told “No!” We took it at that. Pity, as, among other things, they had a mountain formed out of roasted walnuts. Oh, and in the elevator the menu had changed again. For today it was Curry World Chicken Curry Lamb Curry Shrimp Pakoras Vegetables Curry Blanc-Manger Blanc-Manger? Outside, we tried to put aright our footsteps from the day before. We weren’t getting lost this time. Not with landmarks like the two pagodas to guide us. We tripped along beside the lake, taking in the overcast day with hundreds of others out for this Sunday noon. In one of the pavilions in the lake a church service was underway. One old fellow cheerfully came up and advised me on what pictures to take from what angles. I smiled and he bobbed off. Then four older women came by and told us he was crazy. I didn’t mind. At least he was happy. Nope, we weren’t getting lost, said I. We got lost. I was aiming for Solitary Beauty, one of the peaks in town, and we found ourselves at Elephant Hill. That’s okay, I meant for us to go there all along. Serena believed me. Of course, when I contested the fact that we might not be where we were, it was Scud that piped up, “Isn’t that the restaurant where we ate last night?” I probably mentioned in the last Day’s Notes that this was a pretty town. I reaffirm that: this is a pretty town. Confusing, but pretty. And it has a nice feel to it. Not quite as laid back as Xi’an, but almost so, and with a very sumptious feel. Elephant Hill juts out at the confluence of Peach Blossom River and the Li River, with one big hole running through part of it at the water line which earns it the name “Elephant”. There’s a small Buddhist shrine at the base, and the usual spectacular view from up top. This kept us occupied, draining the kids of some excess energy, and building our appetite back up. From here we walked back up the riverside, looking for some place good. I, of course, suggested we return to the restaurant of last night and have some rat, but this didn’t go over well. We passed a Korean place, but it looked questionable. There are so many Koreans on tour in China that you can run into the problem of Western menus, that is, really poor Korean food done up for busloads of tourists. I’ve had some really good Korean food in China (there’s a place by the Kempinski in Beijing that does a great kopjang), but Yoonhi didn’t like the looks of this. Further up the river I came across this great statue. I tried to describe it to Pam later, and we think it’s a statue of the poet who described Guangxi’s scenery as the first under Heaven (or something along those lines) but we could well be wrong. Amazingly, we weren’t lost. We were on Walking Street. An interesting place. Lots of shops with nothing I had any interest in. We were looking for a restaurant. Mind you, they did have bowling. I wasn’t too clear on this bowling thing. King David Bowling gave me a Weird Al impression of Hassidic pin boys. Maybe we should’ve looked inside after all? One thing that Walking Street has in abundance was the “instant friend”. The first one latched onto us as soon as we came onto the street. Normally, I figure that once you move out of their territory, they’ll lose track of you. I didn’t want to go into his shop, or buy anything in any of the other shops he was trying to get us to go into. Finally, he suggested we eat in this one place. All things being equal, I figured this was as good as any I’d choose, so we entered. The food was actually quite good. We had a “fried pork chop with salt and chili, which was actuall more of deep fried thinly sliced pork. This was good with the beer, and the kids appreciated it. And we ordered the stir-fry noodles with chili, which were wheat noodles topped with sauce, peanuts, and slivers of cucumber. Like Jya Jang Mian you (or rather Yoonhi) stirs it all together. It had a surprisingly good bite to it, as I’d been getting used to milder flavours in Guilin. We ordered some fried meat dumplings, just because we could. These were a very bread like bun that had been steamed and then fried. These were all good, but the highlight was the “steamed pork chop with lotus”. What arrived wasn’t like anything I’d expected. This was a big steamer basket of glutinous rice, with a layer of pork and lotus down inside, and what appeared to be a layering of yellow lentils on top (with some spring onion. You gotta have spring onion). There was a layer of banana leaf on the bottom to trap in the drippings. Our guess is that they separately cooked the pork, rice, and lotus, and then assembled the whole and steamed it. But we could be wrong. It wouldn’t matter, as it was an incredibly rich, and incredibly good, thing to have for lunch. Filling, but it was worth it. Oh, and lest I forget, chicken soup. Serena needed her chicken soup. A good lunch. But when we came out, our “friend” was just around the corner. This was getting creepy. We made our way up the street with him in tow, found the old part of town, and debated going in. Then we decided the kids were getting too hot and tied, so we decided to go home and dump them. So our “friend” insisted on getting us in a cab. I wish I’d known another hotel name, but I told the cabbie to take us to the Bravo. I’m paranoid, I know, and I worry about people thinking that. We returned the kids to the room and left them with the laptop. They were content. Yoonhi and I were now free to wander about on our own. Next: Climb Every Mountain

Hey, I've already got two parasites - Scud and Serena. What's a few more?

Alas, no beating hearts. I think I probably missed out on some opportunities by getting into the bargaining thing for a portion of the snake. They started by explaining that a whole feast could be done out of the 3kg, but, like I said, that would've been a lot of snake. No bile soup, either. I remember that from Taipei years ago, when they would hook the snake up, stretch it out, and milk it's venom out and make soup...... Tasty meat, though. This is something I'll be doing when I get back to China (with an expense account). Cheers, peter

Here's a Lao tip. Take your left over glutinous rice, the stuff that you didn't finish that day, and make flat cakes of it. Put this out to dry in the sun for a day or two, so the moisture gets pulled out. Then deep fry this and serve with a dipping sauce or some nice topping.

Day 13 – continued – Wild Thing What does a man do when confronted publicly with the fact that he’s been lost? Pretend that this was your plan all along, of course. Boldly I pointed at the restaurant and said, “This is where I wanted to eat all along!” Scud congratulated me on my strategy. “This is a lot like how you shoot pool, isn’t it?” We were seated readily enough, seeing as how the place was empty. I used my fluent Mandarin, which consists only of “Give me a beer”, and came up with a bottle of Liquan (which I have found out is part of the Yanjing group). Now, when you find yourself in an attractive, empty Chinese restaurant, you know that what you want to see as an assurance of excellence? You want all of your table setting to arrive in a shrink-wrapped package. This is the first (but not last) time I saw this on the trip. I suppose it’s meant to settle your fears about hygiene, but when you travel in the company of klutzes as I do (okay, there are only two klutzes – Serena and I) it can be embarrassing asking for replacements. The Liquan came in an attractive bottle, with just a bit of curvature to wrap your hands around (if they’re beefy enough). The beer, however, is undistinguished. Cold and refreshing, which is what I wanted for the heat, but not notable for head or bubbles. We perused the menu with the greatest of interest. When I had asked people in Chengdu and Xi’an about food in Guilin, everyone immediately popped up with “wild food”. And when I’d queried Pam on this, he’d said that “wild” ethnic food was what the town was best known for in other provinces (as well as for the green tea, which I find to be excellent, although I do prefer Yunnan pu’ers). So, as this was my first real menu, I wanted to see what they had. The menu would make Fergus Henderson salivate. Soft fried bee pupae Bear’s sexual organ with spicy salt Fried bamboo rat Fried mashed civet Fried bull’s sexual organ with gingko Given gingko’s perputed affect on muting Alzheimer’s, the last dish would be particularly memorable. Meanwhile, Yoonhi was babbling on something about SARS or some other acronym, and wouldn’t let me order any of the above. (Yes, I am a spineless cur of a man) What we ended up going for was a mixed bag. We made a safe choice with the cooked water chestnut in melted sugar. This came out as hard, sticky candy balls, with wonderfully fresh, crispy water chestnuts resting inside. This was a bit of a challenge, trying to pry one of them away from its cohorts, the sugar cooling quickly. And when you did get one, the water chestnut had been shielded well enough that it still retained a temperature close to what you’d experience on the surface of the sun. I’d liked the look of the snails in the market, and the ones in Chengdu had been excellent, so I went for an order of these. This didn’t work out to our liking. The snails were gritty to the extreme. Now, was this due to their not having been properly purged, or was it the result of their being “with child”? I can’t tell. Perhaps its preferred to have them with their young? For Serena we went extremely safe, and ordered a boiled chicken. She didn’t like this at all, and even though the hot sauce was very much like a Thai salsa, I couldn’t generate much enthusiasm for the dish. But we did have a lot of fun with the head. But what saved the meal was the snake. We got to pick out our own snake. This was cool. The staff were excited too, as this was probably their major income for the night. Snake isn’t cheap. We went through the restaurant (which now had two other tables) and into the cage room. Kind of like going into the basement of the pawn shop in Pulp Fiction. Cages with things. Things I recognized. So, these were bamboo rats. I remember being up in the Plain of Jars a decade or more ago, and my guide and his driver found a couple of these things in the market in Phonsavan. They got really excited, bought them, suffed them in a bamboo cage, and then they got loose in our vehicle. That resulted in about an hour of dead time while the lads tried to secure the vermin. Then they got loose again on the aircraft coming back. That was loads of fun. These things have teeth on them that’ll gnaw through most anything. Back to our snake. We were having Long Nosed Pit Viper. We had a problem. It wasn’t a problem with eating the snake, but rather with how much of it we were going to eat. I didn’t realize snakes weighed this much. What we had here was about a 3kg snake. Meanwhile, the prices they’d been quoting were for 1/2 kg increments. Three kg is a lot of snake meat, and (I hate to say it) more money than I wanted to spend. We then (I suspect to the dismay of the snake) started haggling. This could’ve been done easier if either party had shared a common language, but as was, we came out of it with a portion of snake, hacked apart for our dining pleasure. I suspect there was an immediate round made of the other tables announcing a special tonight on Long Nosed Pit vipers. This wasn’t bad (and no, it didn’t taste like chicken). It came in a brown gravy, with lots of fresh water chestnuts. Scud and I ate it happily, as, along with the other water chestnuts, it was the best thing on our table. Plus, it had a little carved flower on the plate, so you knew it was fancy. I suggested that we could try the bee pupae, but Yoonhi seriously questioned our ability to eat anything more. Normally, I’d take this as a challenge, but she had a good point (she usually does). It hadn’t been that long ago that we were eating at the little hole in the wall, and after that we’d been snacking on stuff in the market. I acquiesced, but made secret plans for the next night. Although disappointed in the chicken (my own fault for caring about Serena eating something, I should’ve made her order the bee pupae) and unhappy with the grittiness in the snails, the food overall in Guilin was very satisfying. It wasn’t exciting, not like the chili laced dishes of Chengdu, but it was satisfying, with a good backdrop of spices and flavours. Now that I knew where I was, we made our way back in the direction of the Bravo. This took us past the entrance to an interesting street. Interesting means there was food in it. The front of the street was blocked off by some lads in cowboy hats manning an open trench of grilling meat, and the rest of the street was filled up with the tents, woks, grills, and other stuff of a Chinese food street. Stuff on sticks, as usual, plus other stuff that had to be held down onto the grill with a trowel. I hadn’t thought of cooking with a trowel before. The stuff in this pot looked good. No idea what they were, but they looked good. They kind of remind me of fishballs. Any guesses? And I want that wok for my backyard! This was a great crab soup (I think). Little crabs that we’d been seeing penned in stalags all over the streets. Yoonhi gave in to her arborial desires and bought a bag of chestnuts. They just looked to good to leave alone (but do I get to buy a rat or some bee pupae??? Noooooooooo…..) And, as a grand finale, little umbrellas. Beautiful black glutinous rice steaming away packed inside of pineapples. You’ve gotta love anything that comes in a pineapple with little umbrellas! Suddenly, I have the urge to watch Tiki Bar TV. Next: I Guilin (no, really!)

Baggy, Folks were bringing any which what to the guy, and he was working it up. The kit makes a really satisfying "Bang!" that you hear for blocks about. Domestic Goddess has seen a lot of these (check post #94) in Korea, so I'd guess that any Calrose type would work perfectly well. Plus, the ones in Korea come truck mounted, which'd be a way cool way to show up at parties. Domestic, any comments?

There was a good article in the Bangkok Post under Street Eats by Vanniya Sriangura on khao chae, a traditional hot weather treat of soaked rice. Beyond the khao chae part, what was interesting is that, in talking about good places to eat this, there was a list of traditional, older Thai restaurants. Here's the list I lifted from the article: - Dr Gothom Arya's Following a century-old royal recipe that has been passed on in the Bunnag family, homemade khao chae by Dr Gothom Arya and his wife Porntip has been one of the most sought-after delicacies of the summer. Priced at 160 baht per set, the Arya's khao chae is only available for take-away and delivery from their home on Nang Linchi Road in Thung Mahamek district. Call 02-286-1952 to place orders. - Lai Rot For many years, Lai Rot has been well known among Thai customers for its khao chae chao wang, using a recipe from Prince Chalermkhetmongkol's Palace. The price is 150 baht per set. The are two restaurants, one on Sukhumvit Soi 39 and the other on Khlong Prapa Road . Tel 02-391-3193 and 02-279-2895. - Than Ying This upmarket, well-respected royal Thai cuisine restaurant offers khao chae following the recipe of MC Sulapwalleng Visuddhi, formerly head chef of Queen Rambhai Bharni's Sukhothai Palace . The sets are priced at 275 baht and the restaurant is on Pramuan Road . Tel 02-236-4361. - Sa-nguan Sri For decades, this age-old Witthayu Road eatery in the middle of Bangkok 's commercial and financial district has featured traditional khao chae on its summer menu. The price is 150 baht per set. Tel 02-251-9378. - Ton Kreung This well-liked restaurant in the middle of Soi Thong Lo offers khao chae following the recipe used in Chaochommanda Kean's (a wife of King Rama VI) palace. The restaurant is located on Sukhumvit Soi 55. Tel 02-391-8703. - Baan Prachachuen Born into the Snidwongse family, 85-year-old ML Promsri Pibulsonggram, like any typical female member of the royal household, is an acclaimed culinary master, especially in authentic Thai cuisine. At her home-style restaurant, Baan Prachachuen, khao chae is one of the most popular dishes and is available year-round at 150 baht per set. The restaurant is on Prachachuen Soi 33 in Bang Sue district. Tel 02-585-1323. I have to admit, outside of ton Kreung, I don't know any of these. Can anyone make any recommendations or comments on these?

Day 13 – The Beautiful South (or Here Comes Old Red Eyes) Out the starboard window, the scenery was excellent. It’s like Halong Bay, or maybe more like Hua Lu, except this is the more famous of them, the one that’s in every Chinese scroll painting you’ve ever seen. The one you admire as a kid when your parents put the clip-on tie on you, dress you up, and take you to the Varsity Grill for chow mein. You get the idea. This was pretty. And what a difference the distance made. Beijing had been freezing and dead. Xi’an was crisp, but budding. Chengdu was comfortable and covered in flowers and cherry blossoms. And Guilin was lush and hot, running about 30 degrees centigrade and moist. Guilin, the forest of Osmanthus trees. Gui sounds a lot better than Osmanthus. Our guide here was Pam, and his driver was Mr. Li. They’d fill us in a bit on the culture here, then leave us on our own for a day, then get us to Yangshuo, where they’d leave us on our own for a day, and then get us back to the airport. This worked for me. (But don’t get me wrong. Pam was pretty good. He worked well with the kids, knew the answers to the questions we asked, and was a keen photographer, posting his stuff up on the internet.) We were staying at the Guilin Bravo, which has a good location beside Banyan lake. Plus, it’s right next to the “Special Food Supermarket”, which sells “Famous Tobacco”, “Famous Wine”, and “Famous Tea”. And there’re a couple of bars outside, but more on them later. In the elevator going up, we admired the first of several bizarre menus in the hotel elevator. This one advertised their special menu of: Malaysian Chili Prawn Gently Simmered Prawn in a garlic and ginger flavoured Chilli Sauce with Rice Orange Coookie Chocolate Brawnie Thai Lamb Salad We ditched our bags and changed our clothes. This was shorts weather, the first we’d had. We eyed the pool off of the lobby as we zoomed through on our way to meet Pam for our bit of culture. I already mentioned that this place is pretty, didn’t I? Our first stop was Decai (Folded Brocade) Hill, one of the several hills in town that were good for taking in the view. We hiked up to the top of this (as opposed to those that were getting palanquins to take them up) and took the opportunity to admire the scenery. I had to admire the guys taking the palanquins up, too. It was hot and steamy, and these poor guys were hauling fat tourists up those stairs for a couple of bucks. And these were fat Chinese tourists. I’d hate to think how they’d do if they had to move me up those stairs. Pretty, pretty, pretty. But, we tire soon enough of pretty. We were down the stairs again, stopping off at the gallery where we watched a man blow a painting. He would breathe on the ink and spread it to where he wanted it to go. Serena did her mandatory pictures with the models (we have a large collection of Serena getting tourist pictures taken….I’ll spare you), and then we were down. If we had climbed to heights of Guilin, we needed to plumb the depths. Now, normally this would have certain connotations, but we had the kids along. So we headed for the Reed Flute Cave. We’d asked about this earlier, and had had the impression that it would be a long walk from the hotel. It was somewhat more than a long walk, and I was glad enough that we had Pam to get us there. A nice drive in the country, with more stunning scenery, and hordes of people out in the rice paddies getting their pictures taken in front of the stunning scenery. The Reed Flute Cave was worth the drive. Okay, some people will complain that it’s all fairy lights and such….big deal! It looks pretty. And this cave – with or without the tarting up – has fantastic (and I mean the fantastic) detail in the way the lime as accreted on the surfaces. Colour it blue and green and red, it looks good. And this place is huge. We’d been at the Pak Ou cave outside of Luang Prabang a few weeks earlier. That didn’t compare to even the smallest room in here. Yoonhi said the only thing that came close were the caves in Mexico she visited back in the 80’s. To borrow a term from some of my friends across the Atlantic, I was “gobsmacked”. Happy with what we’d seen, Pam and Mr. Li dumped us off back at the Bravo, with arrangements to meet the morning after to get the boat to Yangshuo. And we were on our own. First problem, and I’d written of this before, the hotel couldn’t come up with the info for me to get on the internet. What seemed like a crisis back then is a mere bagatelle now. Second problem. It was hot and humid enough that I could wring the bottom of my shirt out and get most of a pint mug back. This meant that (a) I obviously needed a beer, and (b) that this would be a good time for a swim. Yoonhi headed down to the pool with the kids, and tried to figure out how to get into the pool. Finally, after no success, she asked the gym attendants. What she got from them was “No!” After a little probing with the front desk, and someone with a wider English vocabulary, what she got instead was “It is winter still. We don’t open the pool until summer.” Can’t argue with that. At least not without learning some Mandarin. So, with no competition for our time beyond idling, I set us out on a death march! This one wasn’t so bad, as death marches go. We idled up the lake side, and then curved into town. I was getting sort of nervous about how long Yoonhi had been without food, and had a weather eye open to anyplace that looked halfways reasonable. I found it. Just past Zhong Shan road I found a high-class spot for the family. It was the snow peas with duck parts that had caught my eye, but there was a lot of fun stuff here in the trays. The soft tofu looked delicious, and we had to order some of it just because it was red. And how could I not indulge in the intestines? Stewed to softness, and with a mild, almost tomatoey sauce which reminded me of trippa Florentine….. We ordered some of the really soggy looking dumplings they had, too. These were meat filled, and wading in a brown sauce that was really good. And, as a note, the rice was better in Guilin. We were never thrilled with rice in China (I know, I’m a heathen, but I’m used to eating with Koreans), but this was a slight improvement. After this brief repast, which cost us all of 20 Yuan, we wandered a bit more. We were looking for the Central Square, which we were told would be where we’d find the Walking Street. We were nowhere near. Somehow we’d gotten onto Ronghu Road, and we were being curved down and away from the Central Square. But, this did cause us to find a fun little alley way market, which we set out to explore. First up was a crowd. Anytime there’s a crowd around someone selling food, I figure this is a good thing. I had Yoonhi muscle her way in while I took video, and she found some really good looking fried breads. These were sold plain, and stuffed with stuff. We had some, and it was magnificently greasy, leaving marks on everything. I came across some of the snails we’d been eating, sitting out for the afternoon sun. And we even found some cute little birds for Serena to ooh and ah over. But she quickly lost her interest in those once she found some pears. We love pears. Especially nice crispy ones. Especially when Yoonhi peels them for us….okay, Yoonhi’s not so keen on pears. I was keen on the dried goods, as they don’t use up a lot of my weight allowance in the luggage. These dried tomatoes caught my eye. And, trying one, I found them to still have a moistness, chewiness to them……so I bought a bag. And then I found the star anise. I figure I can always use this for something. There was another round thing of what looked like seaweed behind it, so I bought that, too. Yoonhi stopped me from buying the dried pod-things beside the anise, as she challenged me to give a purpose for it. I hate it when she goes all practical. Coming out of the market, we ambled a bit more. Then I looked at the map I had from the hotel. It was useless. I checked out my 1994 copy of Lonely Planet China. It didn’t help. Then I did something no self-respecting man should ever do. I took directions from someone. That hurt. However, we did now know where we were. We were by the river. And it was dark, we were getting hungry, and there were restaurants at hand. Restaurants with cages. Next: Where The Wild Things Are

They come runnin' just as fast as they can 'Coz every girl crazy 'bout a sharp dressed man. Hey, what can I do beyond quoting ZZ Top? (Actually, it's nice to see people taking pride in what they do. You get a good feel of China from this.....but I do like ZZ Top, too)

Here's a couple of my shots from the Ma Po Tofu place across the street from Sichuan University in Chengdu. Lots of oil. Think of a tanker crashed on a reef made of tofu. I'm getting hungry again.

DG, That is pretty looking rice. I can see why Icheon is famous for their bap (but I'd rather taste it!)