The Blithe Traveler

A Boy And His Halloween Costume

I know, I'm late. But it's not like that's unusual. Halloween weekend we took off for Huang Shan in a fab-o trip that is yet to be chronicled (I'm hoping the upcoming holiday break gives me a chance to catch up, and yet, the Korean DMZ Tour, Thrilla in the Manila, not to mention the Hawaiian Helicopter Experience might yet trip me up).

Anyway, the boy went as a Railroad Crossing. I won't even pretend it was my idea. He and I were trolling the internet late one night desperately seeking a costume I could manage to have created (he wanted to be a Chinese Dragon, which believe or not, completely stumped me and the host of people I queried about it). We stumbled on an exquisitely crafted costume by a mom who clearly had (a) too much time on her hands (b) access to western big box stores, and Tom was hooked. My humble best did not measure up, although I will say with great pride that his lights actually flash.

Happy Holidays!

The Faces of Jet Lag

Passport photos tend to be craptastic, but anyone who has their photos taken for a document that they are meant to carry around for the next ten years the day after spending 27 hours getting from one place to another is asking for this:

These photos are from almost a year ago (!!). We spent three weeks in the US over the Christmas holiday, arrived back and needed to immediately get photos taken for some visa something or another. I had sent the children to school thinking that getting them back into their routine quickly would be the easiest way for them to adjust. And let's face it, easier to send them off to someone else than for cranky me to deal with their crankiness all day.

I bring this up only because it's Visa Renewal Time and I needed to send photos of all of us off to Officialdom to have our visa's updated. The good news is that Tom, Jeff and I will have our visa's extended for another year. Hope is another kettle of cuteness. Unfortunately, her passport expires in September. Because we seem heck-bent on having our children grow up on airplanes, we ceremoniously had Hope's passport made when she was only a few weeks old. And for little ones, passports expire every 5 years.

The conversation went something like this:

Jeff: "Hope's passport will expire in September, so we can only renew her visa until then."

Me: "So, we need to get back to the US to get her a new passport??? We don't have any plans to go back this spring, do we?"

Jeff: "Actually, we can renew the passport at the US Consulate in Shanghai. The tricky part is that we all have to go."

Me: "All of us??"

Jeff: "Well, you can't renew a passport of a small child without having both parents. And, we need to provide sequential photos of Hope from a baby to what she looks like now to prove it's the same child."

Me: "We need a color printer then."

Jeff: "Why?"

Me: "She has red hair! It's her most distinguishing characteristic!"

Jeff: "Right, that makes sense."

Me: "Um, Jeff."

Jeff: "Yes?"

Me: But, aren't we leaving China at the end of school? So, like, why would she need a visa past September?"

Jeff: Silence

Me: Silence

Jeff: "Good point."

More silence.

Me: "So, when are we going to Shanghai?"

I will say that the topic of "Where Will Will Go" comes up every day or so. And we tiptoe around it quietly. As Jeff likes to point out, we have firm plans right through early January. And the children are meant to stay in school until the beginning of July. What next? Well, if anyone has any ideas, please feel free to express them.

Mulling Over the Holidays

Friends of our invited us to come spend Thanksgiving evening with them. After school and work, of course. The invite included our children's teachers from the British school, and the menu was to be prepared by one of the local 5-star hotels, so it looked to be a brilliant night.

The host asked me to bring adult bevies, and being the clever sort, I decided mulled wine was just the ticket. While I had never mulled wine, nor seen a recipe for mulled wine, nor, I think even consumed mulled wine, nor even have a clear idea of what it might be other than an adult beverage that is served around holiday time, it seemed like a very festive and appropriate thing to bring. Besides, I had heard one of the teachers mention that you can buy a "mulled wine mix" at Ikea (1).

Experience would tell me that announcing that I will do something that I have no idea how to do is a Very Bad Idea. This has never stopped me, but by now, it should. Seriously.

How To Mull Wine, by Moi

1. Take taxi (2) to Ikea. Arrive at 9:00am. Discover that Ikea does not open until 10:00am. WTF??? Am I living in, like Paramus, that stores don't open until 10:00am???? Proceed slightly ticked off on to day events.

2. Take taxi to Ikea. Arrive at 3:00pm. Discover that the Ikea "mulled wine mix" contains raisins and almonds. WTF??? Raisins and nuts in wine??? Is that what mulled wine is???? Sounds wretched!!!

3. Take taxi home and do what I should have done the first time around: check the internet for mulled wine recipes. Discover that one can mull wine by heating (cheap!!) wine, sugar, cinnamon sticks, nutmeg, all spice, oranges and cloves. (Cheap!!) wine we have by the rice bowlful, oranges, sugar, check, but the rest of the ingredients were beyond the scope of my kitchen.

4. Send "Emergency Kitchen SOS!" to friends: "Hey, who knows where I can get cinnamon sticks, nutmeg, cloves and allspice!" Hop on bicycle (3) and pedal off to local supermarket to purchase oranges and (cheap!!) wine. The Dynasty wine cost all of $2.50 US per bottle, so I got two. Oranges, not a problem, and then, what to my wondering eyes should appear! But cinnamon sticks!! In the produce section! Where they always are and where I have never noticed them before! I love it when a plan comes together. Pedal home.

5. Realize that since Thanksgiving is only 24 hours away, there is no chance of gather other ingredients. Begin frantically searching the internet for a mulled wine recipe that includes only wine, oranges, sugar and stick cinnamon. About 15 minutes into it, suddenly realize that if you only have wine, oranges, sugar and stick cinnamon, that is the recipe. 

6. On to the next problem. It will be a typical Thanksgiving meal, with all (limited!!) cooking surfaces and areas in the kitchen being used. So how will I mull the wine?? Ponder this while I start dinner, beginning as I always do by filling the rice cooker and getting the rice going. EUREKA!!! The rice cooker! Which has stood in for an emergency pasta cooker in days gone by!! The porridge setting is perfect for mulling wine!!!

7. On the day in question, unpack rice cooker, (cheap!!) wine, other ingredients and proceed to mull up some fine wine.

Our Thanksgiving was indeed lovely. We were surrounded by friends, had terrific food and some okay mulled Chinese wine (adding a little more sugar and maybe some nutmeg probably would have been a good idea). And maybe wine that was the tiniest bit less (cheap!!)). Jeff said the blessing and, since we were mostly surround by people from England, told the (real) story of the first Thanksgiving, and gave a bit of history as to how it became the holiday it is today. And we all over-ate turkey, mashed potatoes, fabulous bread from the German bakery and some terrific desserts from the French restaurant. Thanksgiving with an International flare.  

Happy, happy to all, and hope you had a blessed holiday with friends and family.

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(1) Yes. We have an Ikea. In many ways, our small town is growing up. There is now a Subway (the sandwich shop) and an H&M, plus several Papa John's and, as Hope likes to call 'em, Pizza Hunts.

(2) Continuity note: we no longer have a driver, but that's a story for another day.

(3) See above note.

If The Shoe Fits

It's starting to get cold around here. Being at a latitude similar to Atlanta, we bask in the late fall sunny weather a lot longer than we are used to in our home climate farther North in the US of A. As a result, we don't don our winter coats until fairly late in the game. Late for the locals, that is.

Tom and Hope basically refuse to put on coats until they can see their breath, and I have continued to wear shorts while playing badminton.
No, I am not cold. No, I will not put on a jacket.

It gets pointed out to us daily that we are under-dressed. Ayis come screaming for kilometers around shouting that my children are going to freeze solid from the inside out. Luckily, I can say "I'm sorry, my Chinese is rather poor" quite well and I stonewall the old biddies. However, last week, I was informed in perfect English by my badminton partner that it was time for me to get a pair of gym trousers (1) for playing. And that I should begin wearing them. Capisce??

Capisce. I went shopping. It's tricky buying things in the shops. Not so much because of the language barrier, but because the sizing is just not designed for the larger western butt. I know, those of you who know me in real life are like, "Your larger western butt?? Pu-lease." But this is a case where butt size is relative. Around here, small would cover about one cheek.
Random, unflattering butt shot. Courtesy of Jeff. Hmmm. Objects in the camera are bigger than in real life. I hope.

I went right to the size "L." Which were too small. I hemmed and hawed a bit, because they were *just* too small. But too small is too small, isn't it? Particularly when you are purchasing a garment in which you are planning to be jumping around like a rabbit on crack trying to avoid getting slammed with the birdie. And once in a while trying to hit it back, too, of course.

I sighed mightily over my new *slightly baggy* XL gym trouser at my next game, quietly complaining about how in the US, I am a size "T" for tiny, while around here, I'm an "H" for Heffalump. Monica appraised my new trousers.

Monica: "Hmmmmmmm"
Me: "What?"
Monica: "Hmmmmmmm"
Me: "What????"
Monica: "Well."
Me: "WHAT!??"
Monica: "You do know those are men's, don't you?"

Right. No I did not. 
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(1) I have officially been away from the US for too long. I can no longer say "pants" with out thinking I am refering to ladies undergarments.
 

I'm Dreaming Of a White

Christmas! Just like the one's I used to knooo--wwwww!

Or maybe not.

You have got to feel for this dude. If you will recall from our trip to see the Terra Cotta Warriors last spring, each individual warrior statue was created by hand, and they were ostensibly all made in the image of a real human. Somewhere in some ether world, there is a Warrior plotting his revenge. Be afraid - very afraid.

That said, Christmas is everywhere. In ex-pat land, the Christmas celebrations happen on an excelerated time schedule for the simple reason that most ex-pats flee for the actual holiday. Some  go "home," wherever home may be. Some just leave for warmer climes. But the vast, vast majority of foreigners in Our Fair City are out of here by mid-December. That means the Christmas festivities began a few weeks back, will peak in the next two weeks and will end by about Dec 15th. Only to start all over again when the expats land wherever it is they are going.

It makes for a long holiday. I will also say that without Thanksgiving as a marker, our Holiday Merry Making Timetable is just a lot free-er. I'm not feeling the need to sit around waiting for Black Friday to start thinking about Christmas. Black Friday is just another school/work day, albeit one that will have three or four bleary eyed children wandering about at school.

And in the general population of actual Chinese people (the 6 million-odd other people who live in Our Fair City), the holiday of Christmas is catching on. Not in a Baby Jesus' Birthday kind of way, mind you, but there is all kinds of embracing the gift giving bits as well as the secular symbols that surround the holiday. We saw it last year, of course, but it seems to have gotten a bit more wide-spread this go-round. I have to say, the bamboo and lanterns work for me.

 
Recipe for Christmas Tree: 1 Bamboo Sprout, 10 Chinese Lanterns, 1 bit of Garland

Cultural Definitions of "Amusement"

Quick, random post. We're heading to Hawaii to meet my parents for Christmas/New Year's in mid-December. Getting to Hawaii from China is not exactly a walk in the park, but we've decided to take advantage of the hop, skip and jump bits of the trip by spending a few days in Seoul (on the way) and some as yet undetermined place on the way back.

I've been doing some research on Things-To-Do When You Have a Few Days of Down Time in Seoul during the Deep, Dark, Winter Particularly When You are Really Jonesing For a Couple of Weeks on the Beach in Hawaii (so far, Hiding Inside and Staying Warm are topping the list) and I came upon the following:

Destinations:

Recently added/updated destinations (in the past 30 days)
Amusement Parks
	Seoul Foreigners' Cemetery Park
Buddhist Temples
	Bongeun-sa, Bongwon-sa, Hwagye-sa, Jogye-sa

The only amusement park is the Foreigners' Cemetery?? Perhaps it is time for some rethinking around our itinerary.

We are planning to go to the Korean DMZ (demilitarized zone; that line between South Korea and North Korea), though. The USO (United Service Organization; those nice folks who supported Bob Hope for all those years) runs trips to the place Wiki calls the "Scariest Place on Earth." That's metaphoric, I think, not literal. It's not like someone is going to let loose machine gun fire on the children. And whether we are standing in the DMZ or not when North Korea finally implodes, frankly, I'm not so sure it matters. At the end of the day, I think Korea is reasonably safe. 

The Philippeans, however, well, that's another kettle of kimchee. Jeff has been working quite hard for many hours to plan this little trip around the world in 80 hours. Given how far Hawaii is from where we live, and how many options were available (Japan, Guam, Malaysia, Korea, etc, etc), we debated spending a few days in the Philippines. It's warm there, and friends of our spent ten days there this past summer. So Jeff googled it. And the first thing that came up was the CIA website suggesting that in countries where the national sport is "Tourist Kidnapping" the American traveler should be wary. So we decided against a few days in Manila.

But Jeff spent many hours locked in front of his computer today. And at the end of it, it seems that a flight through Manila might just be the ticket for the shortest, least costly route back to our Asian domicile. The conversation went something like this:

Jeff: "So, what if the shortest flight is through Manila?"

Me: "You mean the place the CIA said we shouldn't go?"

Jeff: "Yeah, that place. But, we arrive at night, and leave in the morning."

Me: "So we could just get a hotel at the airport?"

Jeff: "Yep."

Me: "They probably don't kidnap people at the airport, do they?"

Jeff and Me together (thoughtfully): "No, they probably don't kidnap people at the airport."

Manila, here we come!

Mona Lisa Smile

I am full of love for this CD cover. Kirsten Duns(t) might be offended by it, but I'm not Kristen Duns(t). The real pirate gold lies in the reviewer blurbs. Check out what Roger Ebert has to say. And I quote, "Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Eleanor Ringel Gillespie." It's code! Or maybe just pirate talk for, "Oops, someone copied the wrong line."
 
I do think the Boston Globe's Wesley Morris' comments were pretty spot on, "Beneath the sappy title, message is an absorbing and well-acted film." A bit of a confusing mess is how I would describe the film, too. 

There, aren't you glad I found a non-food related topic? We have done some interesting traveling over the last few months, which I think would be much more interesting than vaguely cultural troglodyte-ish posts about foods we find out of the ordinary. But finding the time to sit down and write about it is tricky. I shall endeavor to improve! 

Never Say Never

Hold the phone!! In a shocking turn of events, and what can only be described as a weird universe convergence kind of co-incidence, I had duck feet for lunch today. I know they were duck, not chicken, because they were (all together now) ...  webbed!

I consider this a great cultural hurdle overcome, so although I promise I'll start writing about something other than food tomorrow, I really felt like sharing my triumph.

I play Badminton once a week with my friend Monica, who is Chinese. Monica spent a few years living in the US, so she easily deals with my foreign-ness. I always enjoy hanging out with her and try to ask as many cultural questions as I can without being rude. She is not only a great friend, but a terrific resource, having grown up in Beijing and spent a few years in the US. We played at her compound today, which is much more interesting to me than playing where I live. In her compound, I am the only foreigner they have ever had show up in the gym, so I attract some attention. Nothing terrible, although Monica always frowns at people who she thinks stare too long. I just pretend I am Gwyneth Paltrow and go with it.

We play for an hour and neither of us are terribly good at the game, although she is a far better player than I am. We don't play for points (hello! she'd win every game and where's the fun in that?), but she tries to make it as hard for me as she can, and I do my pitiful best to return the compliment. Today, though, some random stranger started shouting at her that she should be more polite to the foreigner when she plays. She had just whacked me with the birdie (hard! - those suckers can work up some steam) as this fellow sauntered by, which precipitated his "you should be more polite" comment. *Snicker* As if. She whacked me a few more times just to show me, no hard feelings, foreigner.

Anyway, long story, we decided to have lunch at her compound after the game. For 10 quai (about a buck and change) we sat down at the all you can eat buffet restaurant; at this particular all you can eat buffet, the serving ladies dish up your meal and serve it to you. And there they were. Duck bits: two wings and the matching feet. I tucked into everything else on my plate, quietly avoiding the duck bits; but alas, I was too obvious. Monica gestured to the appendages lying untouched and asked, "So when did you stop eating meat?"

I picked up the wings and ate them, at first trying to eat with my kuai zi (chopstick), and finally giving up and reminding her that we eat wings with our fingers in the US. And as a foreigner who has clearly demonstrated time and again that I can use kuai zi, I was going to pick the dang wing up and eat it them with my fingers. Which I did.

But the feet. Back to the kuai zi. Which was kind of a bad sign. I mean, if you're too ooked about something on your plate to touch it, it's hard to make that leap of actually getting it into your mouth.

I finally confessed to her that since we don't often eat duck and chicken feet in the US that I wasn't too keen on eating them. She gave me a look. A, "well, whatever" kind of look. Which I translated to, "so you are going to leave perfectly good meat on your plate?" So, I picked one up (with my fingers) and ate it. Not a big deal, really. There wasn't much in the way of meat on it, and most of the flavor was from the marinade on the feet skin and webbing. So, all in all, not a terrible experience. I don't think I'll be buying the ten Pack 'O Feet for snack time at home, but if I am ever faced with Feet on a Plate again, I know I can tuck in without too much trouble.

And Now For Something That Tastes Nothing Like Chicken

Chicken Blood Soup.

This soup is also fairly popular in parts of Eastern Europe, so as a culinary delight, it is not at all  isolated to China. The chicken (or duck; actually, Duck Blood Soup is a Nanjing specialty) blood is collected when the chickens are processed (D'oh! Like, when else would it be collected?? It's not like the hens are lining up to donate at the local Red Cross, are they???).

When you pop into the local wet market (so called because the floors are wet, often because they are being sluiced pretty frequently for reasons that will be quite apparent after the next close parenthesis) and buy your live chicken for dinner, the chicken seller processes it for you on the spot (now raison d'etre for frequent sluicing is clear, right?). And will collect the blood should you so desire. I'll be honest, I haven't quite worked out how it gets so "cakey," for want of a better word. Polish Duck Blood recipes call for vinegar, but some sources say that in China, it gets refridgerated and it congeals (wait, maybe "cakey" really was a better word) from refridgeration. But, while there are a few Chinese specialites that I can now easily whip up in my kitchen, this is not one of them. So, there's not a high probability that I am going to figure out exactly how to make it. I'm guessing you're okay with that.  

Whatever, however you slice it (ha! I use chopsticks! ha!) the stuff isn't that bad. It tastes a bit like you would imagine cakey chicken blood would taste (if you were thinking iron flavored Jell-O, you would be heading in the right general direction), and it strikes me as something kind of interesting to eat. I mean, American's are often iron deficient, and one imagines that something like this would be rather iron rich. And talk about waste not want not! I really do love that mentality (...says she who leaves the chicken feet Every. Single. Time! For shame!), although I do confess that I haven't eaten a whole lot of Chicken Blood Soup. Jeff has had both Duck and Chicken Blood soup and claims that Duck is better. I've only had Chicken, so I can't offer an opinion. And, truthfully? I think he's kidding. I'm not sure he could really tell the difference in a Blind Chicken/Duck Blood Test.

It Tastes Like Chicken

Mostly because it is. This is what happens when you have a very limited vocabulary. If you look closely, you can see it's little head peaking out on the right side. Or if you can't see it, just imagine it. 'Cause it was there, promise.

I tried to order my favorite Chinese chicken dish. It is the only dish I can name from memory, and foolishly, we were out and about in the middle of Anhui province without bringing a translated list of possible options. They didn't have my favorite dish (not a huge shock, as it is generally a regional favorite in a completely different region), so I shrugged and asked for "chicken." Which, clearly, we got.

The good news is that we did end up with a terrific local fern dish. I would say it was a bit like fiddleheads, but I've never actually had a fiddlehead, so I'm not quite sure the analogy is solid. But I can assure you that the ferns did not taste in the least bit like chicken. They were quite yummy, and the chicken was reasonably good, too, for a plain boiled chicken. The children were pretty keen on it, mostly because it is not often that the get any kind of meat sans spices or other flavorings.

We did leave the feet, which always makes me feel a little bad. Chicken feet are snack food, so I always wonder what people think of us when we leave them behind. But I didn't feel bad enough to try to eat them, just to clarify. I am sure they would taste just like chicken; how could they not?? And yet, I hesitate.

The restaurant was clearly one of the nicer one's in the area - it was very crowded. We were escorted to the third floor, and so had a private room (with our own private loo).
Not to mention a view of the not-so private laundry, probably belonging to the restaurant owner.