Food, etc

Since China blocks blogspot blogs, i can't read what i've already written... so if this is a repeat, too bad!  :P

My cousin wants me to update... with what i eat for meals.  In pondering this, I have realized that each time I come back to China, i have a new food obsession that I just can't get enough. 
In 1992, it was 小笼包 (xiao long bao; very shanghainese)
In 1995, it was 蚝油牛肉 (oyster sauce beef?)
In 1998 - no time to eat, busy with grandma funeral stuff
2002, it was 生煎馒头 (fried mantou; very shanghainese)
2006, it was the "Shanghai Breakfast Giants", i.e. 大饼油条，豆浆，etc, and Mushroom soup. 
2008/2009 winter, it was 煎饼.
and now, summer 2009, it is LAMB!  Lamb everything!  i love lamb!!!!

But BW, right now.... for breakfast, i either don't eat, or i eat a 大饼 from the 小菜场 nearby.  Its not very good, but its the closest thing to what i can get in Shanghai.  :(  Sometimes if we're out, I try to look for 煎饼, but its not nearly as good here as it is in Shanghai.  Have u noticed a trend?  That Shanghai food is awesome and Beijing food sucks ass????  well, it does.  Beijingers lack taste buds, i swear.  For dinner, if we're out, i always order lamb, even tho no one else eats it.  its just so good (relatively speaking).  One time for lunch, I tried the "mushroom soup" they had here.  it tasted like boiled water with some mushrooms in it.  SO SO GROSS!  UGH!  .... from now on, no more experimenting with Beijing food.  its too terrible...

So what have i been up to lately.... Well, we translated our files, yet again.   i added a few questions, added some numbers, and we figured out the scoring syste.  It sucks that my partner can't read Chinese cuz now the onus is completely on me to translate, make sure it makes sense, get the order right, etc etc.  Our supervisors aren't that helpful.  I think they only look for what they wanna look for.  :(

Amongst all this boringness however, the past couple of days have been semi eventful.

On Thursday, my mom and I went to the place where they used to hold Imperial Examinations, and where currently, the giant stone tablets bearing the names of those who did well on those exams are kept.  It was very cool.  It would've been even cooler if anyone in our family were on those stone tablets!  Next to this was China's ancient "university", and what i think was a Confucious temple, the latter of which was a giant tourist trap.  *sigh*

On Friday, my cousin called at 9:15AM to say that he was gonna pick me up at 9:30 so i could help him move.  My mom woke me up and i hurriedly got dressed, brushed my teeth, and washed my face.  ... at 9:35, my aunt called.  She said that my coz was NOT gonna pick me up cuz they were pretty much done!!!  ... so i got dressed for nothing.  :(  I ended up watching The 4400 for most of the day, AGAIN!  I'm almost done the series.

Later on that day tho, my partner in crime, MW, saved me from my now dressed boredom (as opposed to un-dressed/PJ-boredom), and we went to 后海 (Hou Hai).  HouHai is just north of (just 'hou' = behind) BeiHai Park, and its a touristy bar area for foreigners.  When we got there, we were greeted by the awesome sight of fat men in Speedos. Oh fun.  MW took a picture.  They were swimming in the disgusting water.  One dude wasn't even wearing speedos - he was just wearing his tighty-whitey underwear that wasn't as tighty as it was loose and dangly and semi-transparent!!!  *shudder* 

Anyway, we then made a beeline for the restaurant that my coz told me about - 烤肉季, which is supposed to be famous.  When we got there, the person at the front didn't pay any attention to me - prolly cuz i'm not a businessman who wants to sleep with her.  (btw, i think most women here are sluts or want to be)  We eventually got a table upstairs, after MW was super confused by his semi lack of Chinese.  I ordered a lamb thing (see above), and MW ordered a venison soup!  Both were pretty good.  The most amusing thing during dinner though was these 50+year old men and women who were acting like teenagers!  They were cheering each other on to CHUG their beer, and cheering REALLY loudly when they finally did.  This was one group of ppl.  Another group of business men were even funnier.  One rather tubby pale nerdy dude was "chugging" (more like sipping!) his beer, and when he was done, he yelled at the top of his lungs "SON OF A BEEEETCH!" ... and then collapsed into his chair, eyes glazed over and rolled into the back of his head.  He disappeared shortly afterwards.  We think he rolled under the table and puked.  heheheee... Before we left, i chugged the remainder of MW's beer.  I chugged faster than the pale tubby nerdy dude. ... Should've yelled "son of a beetch"!!!!

After dinner, MW wanted to burn off the calories and I missed out on peddle-boating at Summer Palace, so we decided to do that....
MAN!  its a lot harder than u imagine!!!  thank goodness Mike was there.  If he wasn't, i would've just been floating on the water.  cuz i wouldn't have been able to go anywhere!!  So he did most of the peddling while i looked around, in the dark.  It was kinda fun.  and I heard someone butcher one of Leehom's songs, but i sang along anyway.  We then stroled around the bar area and didn't go into any bars.  We did see a couple of bars with BONGS however!  odd... marijuana is so illegal in China.  You get shot if u're caught dealing!  *shrug*

and now its saturday and back to boredom.  I bought a 16G SD card (for so cheap! luv it!) so now i don't feel the urge to download pics into comp as often, so u won't be seeing pictures for awhile.  :P