On Sustainability (and the Goodness of Mangoes)

Last week I was skyping with a friend and we had an exchange that went something like this:

Friend: My house is getting chickens! And I’m trying to figure out what to do with this week’s veggies from the CSA (that’s Community Supported Agriculture , not Confederate States of America).

Me: That’s so awesome. Man, I miss being sustainable.

Me:…. Except that I’m probably more sustainable here than I ever have been in my life. So I guess I miss being American-Hippie-Sustainable. Hmm.

The thing is, whether it’s a fad or a legitimate shift in people’s lifestyles and politics, American-style ‘sustainability’ can be quite fun. It’s fun to go to food co-ops farmers’ markets and to justify spending more than at a typical grocery store because you’re supporting local/ethical/organic/(inset other green adjective) produce/dairy/meat. It’s fun to make more and more food from scratch so as to avoid supporting big, scary corporations. It’s fun to walk and bike around during the non-snowy months in Minneapolis, availing oneself of the pedestrian highway to get to work/the store/the lakes/wherever. It’s fun to have power challenges where one finds non-electricity draining activities to consume one’s time for a day a week or the like.

Generally speaking, the practices that I think of as “sustainable” in the American context are also very pleasant ones, particularly during the warmer months, and indeed, during the winter months I would have killed for a car (my housemates from last year can both attest to this), and I kept the heat down only to save money. Basically, I liked sustainability when it was convenient.

This year, I am very, very sustainable, and not really by choice. I don’t use a flushing toilet more than a few times a month, on the occasions when we’re in Dali or Lijiang or one of Heqing’s “fancy” restaurants with other CEI folks (we’re TFC now, by the way—Teach for China). I shower three times a week at most, and with solar-heated water at that, and beyond that wash my hair once or twice a week in a basin with a kettleful of water I’ve boiled on my hotplate. I hand wash all my laundry, and it air-dries. And I obviously don’t have a dishwasher. Having running water in our rooms now means that I use more than I used to, but I’m still pretty conservative I’d say. I certainly drink less water than I did in the States, since I have to boil it first and more liquid means needing to use the bathroom more, which is something I’m less than excited to do. Frankly, life here is dirtier. I’m dirtier, my clothes are dirtier, my room is dirtier (dirt manages to make its way in regularly, no matter how much I sweep, since there’s no way to completely seal the door from the outside). You get used to it.

I don’t think I’m using all that much electricity—lights at night, and the hotplate several times a day for boiling water and for cooking. I also use the rice cooker at least once a day. My computer’s plugged in most of the time, and I charge my phone once or twice a week, but that’s about it in terms of appliances.

Generally, when I’m in a motorized vehicle it’s a public one, and even those I’m using less and less. Now that I have a working bike I mostly ride that into and around town, so I only end up bussing to Lijiang and Dali every several weeks. And once I’m in town I buy all my produce, eggs, noodles, and tofu from the market, so that’s all very local. I joke about the people at the supermarkets thinking that the only things I eat are oil, soy sauce, rice vinegar, sesame oil, sesame seeds, nuts, oatmeal, sugar, chocolate, flour, powdered milk, and instant coffee and bubble tea, because I never buy my “fresh” food there. And since I’m trying to cut back on sugar, flour, and chocolate my purchases at the supermarkets are getting smaller and smaller in nature. Even at the supermarket, many products are from Yunnan or neighboring provinces; it’s just the nature of China.

As I don’t have a refrigerator, I’m less likely to have food go to waste, because I buy it in small enough increments that it’s difficult to forget about it. (There are no crispers or “behind the big Tupperware of leftovers” spots for rogue veggies to hide.) I’ve also, shall we say, entirely dismissed any notions of food safety being based on temperature. Is this a mistake? Perhaps. But I remember being nervous, last summer, about having eggs and veggies out on the counter for a couple of hours. Now I leave eggs out for as long as it takes me to eat them (I buy six at a time, usually, about once a week), and the order in which I use my veggies/other fresh food is based mostly on speed of decay (tofu, greens, and fresh noodles, I’ve learned, should be used within two days tops). Generally, unless something smells or feels off, I consider it good to go.

And, aside from food, I really don’t buy much. I get toilet paper/napkins/paper towels/tissues (it’s a one-size fits all kinda thing—what we would consider four distinct products, with perhaps some overlap, under duress, between tissues and toilet paper, is simply sold as “sanitary paper” here and used for all four purposes). I buy yarn occasionally, and toothpaste and shampoo and the like even more occasionally, and I’ll get steamed buns and rice noodle spring rolls and bubble tea when I’m wandering about town, but on the whole it’s rare for me to spend more than 100 kuai in a week unless I’m mailing a package, adding money to my phone, or heading to the Western Food land of Lijiang or Dali.

Of course, this year I’m also taking two trans-Pacific flights, so how those jaunts alone impact my carbon footprint…well, it can’t really be helped. And, aside from the monster flights, I’ve flown (for me) seldom. Beijing to Kunming way back in July, and then Kunming to Bangkok, Bangkok to Hong Kong, and Kunming to Lijiang over the long break. None of those flights was more than three hours, and Kunming to Lijiang was just a baby hop of 45 minutes. I spent my last five years in the States living in Minnesota with my family in Georgia, extended family in California, and friends all over, so it was rare for me to go more than three or four months without flying somewhere.

As for how I’ll maintain my sustainable lifestyle, or not, once I get home, well, we’ll see. I fantasize about my bathroom in Georgia—the one next to my bedroom with a flushing toilet and a shower that always provides hot water. I’m sure I’ll buy more clothes and the like, because I’ll enjoy the fact that not everything in America is covered in glitter, and I’ll probably wash those clothes in a washing machine, and more often. But I’ll continue to buy as locally as I can, and as ethically as I can. I’ll be aware of the gift of a hot shower and a flushing toilet more than I ever have been. I’ll treasure ice and water that needn’t be boiled before drinking. And perhaps I’ll try to come up with ways to be American-style sustainable that are not only pleasant but also a daily reminder of the manner in which most people live in this world of ours.

On a different note, living in a farming community has given me a deeper appreciation for seasons of different crops. There are some veggies, like broccoli, that I continue to purchase regardless of the season, but a lot of the fruit especially that makes its way to my kitchen is based on what’s looking best these days. I’m learning more about the lengths of different crops’ seasons. Cherries, for example, were absolutely everywhere for about three weeks, and then they disappeared entirely. Plums have been around for a month or so and don’t look like they’re going anywhere (in fact, they’re getting bigger), and mangoes are now 4 kuai a jing, meaning that I got 3 large, ripe ones for about $1 USD. I pray that mango season is a long one.

I’m not sure there is anything quite so wonderful, in terms of fruit consumption, as gorging oneself on a perfectly ripe mango. I love fruit, and I’m not sure mangoes are my favorite flavor-wise, but they’re just so much fun to eat! Cutting around the seed, “popping” the cubes open, cutting around the seed some more, taking the seed with both hands and slurping mango pulp such that it gets absolutely everywhere and when all the orangey goodness is gone you’re left covered in juice, feeling six years old, fumbling for the faucet…good times.

Pengtun Cooking- Rice Noodle, Broccoli, and Tofu Stir-fry

So, it’s been a good long while, I realize, since I posted a recipe for a chocolate zucchini rice cooker cake and an intention to write up more recipes. However, better late than never.

This is not a rice cooker recipe. It’s not actually served with rice but rather with what is probably among my very favorite foods in China, 二丝 (ersi). The Dali area is famous for its ersi, thick and glutinous rice noodles that are often served in broth with meat sauce for breakfast but are also lovely stir-fried.

I realized this week that, at this point, for me to use a recipe for fried rice or a stir-fry seems as silly a notion as using a recipe for a sandwich. Aside from baking adventures and occasional pancakes and curry and the like, everything I make comes out of the wok. I no longer think about the order of putting things in, the temperature needed, or amounts of rice wine/vinegar/soy sauce/sesame oil/etc. And I can’t imagine a kitchen without a wok ever existing in my future.

Really, quite a bit’s changed about my eating habits this year, and a lot of it’s not for the better. I eat more sugar, fewer whole grains, and, I’m sure, a ton of pesticides. But I love the market and eat a heck of a lot of fresh produce. In fact, I imagine that the people at the grocery store think that all I eat is sugar and rice and oatmeal, because veggies, fruit, tofu, eggs, and noodles are all easily found elsewhere. My eating manners have also changed. We Heqing fellows joke about how we’ve turned into country bumpkins, slurping from our bowls. And I eat pretty much everything except oatmeal and baked goods with chopsticks. Those two get spoons. Yes. Baked goods too. I was skyping with my family about a month ago, and they were extremely perplexed to see me scooping banana bread out of a bowl, with a spoon. Oops.

Anyway, pretty early on in the year, I discovered that ersi stir-fried with broccoli, tofu, ginger, and garlic is a truly awesome dish, and I’ve made it probably at least once a week since.

Because I’ve never run into anything like ersi in the states, I’m not sure exactly how this should be replicated in an American kitchen, but I think a pad-thai type sort of noodle would work. Everything else is easily findable in American stores, although one of the things I’ll miss most about China is buying my tofu and noodles fresh at the market, along with huge hunks of ginger, garlic, and broccoli direct from the Baizu farmers. Amounts are, obviously, approximate, and really don’t matter—just use however much of each as you like.

Noodle, Broccoli, and Tofu Stir-fry

Ingredients

-A cup or so of broccoli stem and florets, chopped roughly

-Half a cup of tofu, moisture squeezed out and diced

-a large handful of fresh rice noodles (or an equivalent amount of dried rice noodles, cooked)

-about 2 cloves garlic, diced

-a half inch piece of ginger, diced

-a tablespoon of roasted peanuts, chopped or whole

-rice vinegar to taste (maybe a teaspoon)

-soy sauce to taste (1-2 teaspoons)

-a drizzle of sesame oil

-sesame seeds to garnish

-oil for the wok

-water

Procedure

1) If you want your tofu crispy, fry it first and remove from the wok. I’m bad at frying things, so no tips here.

2) Heat the wok over medium-high and add perhaps a teaspoon of cooking oil (I use peanut here, but I assume anything would work), along with a pinch of salt. Swirl to coat.

3) When the oil’s spitting a little, put in the broccoli, garlic, and ginger and stir-fry briefly, tossing about so it doesn’t burn. If your wok starts to smoke, you might need to add a touch more oil.

4) After a minute or two, turn the heat up a little bit and add a couple tablespoons of water. Stir-fry, letting the broccoli absorb the water and turn a lovely shade of green. Try a piece and add another tablespoon of water if it’s still really crunchy. You want it a little crunchier than how you like to eat it. Turn the heat back down to medium.

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5) If you haven’t fried the tofu, put it in now and stir-fry briefly before adding the rice noodles. Stir-fry for a minute or so and then, if using fresh noodles, add another tablespoon or so of water so they’ll soften. Stir in a circle to keep the noodles from sticking, and add your vinegar, soy sauce, peanuts, and sesame seeds.

6) Continue to stir until ingredients are incorporated and the noodles and tofu are cooked through.

7) Serve, topped with a drizzle of sesame oil and more sesame seeds, if desired. Sometimes, I also add chopped scallions, but it’s just as good without.

Hooray for Bubble Tea! (and other musings)

I have said, on many occasions, that a good number of my issues with living in China might be resolved if only there were a coffee shop closer than an hour away.

My dear friends, one of my most desired standard-of-living wishes (up there alongside “toilet” and “shower” and “oven”) has come true! Sorta.

It’s not actually a coffee shop. It’s a bubble tea shop. Really creamy, thick, sweet-but-not-too-sweet bubble tea. There are many CEIers relatively obsessed with bubble tea, but until January (when this place opened) Heqing didn’t have any that didn’t taste like plastic. We didn’t know about it until last week, when Arianne went and told Hallie, who went and told me, etc. We met up on Friday and ordered, settling at a table upstairs. While ambiance isn’t necessarily the shop’s strongest suit, that one table on the tiny balcony is a place where it will be absolutely lovely to grade or read or whatever in the future. Plus, bubble tea! They have a relatively large small cup, which goes for 5 kuai here and would likely go for close to 5 dollars in the states. The other awesome thing is that this gives us a place to hang out in the city, where, really, there aren’t places to just go and sit unless you’re at a restaurant. So, hooray on all counts.

As we set out from the tea shop, the workers there—young guys probably around our age—asked if they could take a picture with “the first foreigners to come to their store.” So we posed, Backstreet Boys blasting from behind the counter, as they took several shots. Such is life for Americans in Heqing.

At this point, all five of us are entirely accustomed to attention, desired or not. Most of the time it’s just fine. Sometimes it’s funny, like when little kids I walk or bike by stare at me as they would perhaps a UFO. Sometimes it’s embarrassing, like when my bike falls over as I park it in front of the yarn store and before I can right it myself I find a small pack of nearby shop owners coming to my aid. Sometimes it’s annoying, like when I’m walking along, having not-a-very-good-day, and teenage construction workers say “Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello.”…you get the idea. Or when I’m standing on the side of the road waiting for a bus into town and the cars that sometimes have seats in the back for passengers and sometimes have pens in the back for pigs slow down such that it’s quite difficult to tell whether they’re stopping to pick me up or simply pausing to gawk for a moment.

Sometimes it can be a source of entertainment, if I’m bored and engage just for the heck of it, like when folks in Dali take pictures of us (not subtly at all, I might add) and I encourage them, in my best enthusiastic and sarcastic tone, to take more. Sometimes it’s endearing, like when I take the scenic route back from town and end up pedaling randomly around villages trying to make my way to my elusive pepto bismol colored-home, which locals are more than happy to help me find. Or when I’m in the vegetable market buying ersi and ask a question of whomever I’m buying from, which all 5 of the noodle sellers try to answer at once.

This week I’ve begun to appreciate a little more the non-academic impact I’m having on my students. Some of it connects with the “Oh my god, a white person!” thing. We had our midterms yesterday and Thursday, and, as such, every teacher was assigned 5 periods of proctoring (11 hours in two days. Oh joy, oh bliss.). Since the classes are shuffled for testing purposes, each room had three kids from my class. When I entered the room I was assigned to one evening (don’t you want to take exams from 6:30-8:30 PM after having already taken 3 during the day? I know I do), a girl in the corner covered her mouth and practically leapt from her chair. While her reaction was the most extreme, it was very clear that other students also took interest in my arrival. Then I saw one of my boys and greeted him in English with a “Hey, Kendall.” He looked up with a nonchalant “Hey Miss Emily,” and then went back to his geography textbook. Rowan walked in a minute later and asked me if I’d be proctoring. We chatted briefly about the test he was about to take and he went to his seat. Then Peter strolled by the window, yelling “Miss Ou!” (the first character of my Chinese name) on his way to his classroom.

My kids know me. And in 20 years, whether they’re working in Beijing or farming in Pengtun, they’ll have had the experience of knowing an American (and a left-handed one at that. I still catch kids trying to take notes with their left hands occasionally) at a very young age. I’m not saying it’s going to shape their lives, but it has value, especially for folks immersed in this homogenous community.

I’ve also remembered, this week, that I love them. They’ve been driving me absolutely bonkers, and grading their last big test made me want to break into the bottle of Jack Daniel’s I have in my kitchen, but I do love them. It helps that I’ve been loosening up more in the classroom, even as I’ve gotten stricter in terms of reporting to the principal. I like to have fun with my kids, and I like to be silly, but for much of this year I’ve been pushing and pushing myself to emulate my very stern local counterparts. All that’s really succeeded in doing is making me angry and my kids rebellious. So I’m trying to, for lack of a less clichéd term, be my normal teacher self again. Stay tuned on how that goes. It’s certainly put me in a better place mentally, so that’s gotta be worth something.

The weather’s changing again. We had nothing but blue skies, with some chubby puffy marshmallow clouds, for months. But over the last few weeks we’ve swapped all-day blue for blue mornings (mostly) and a gradual blowing in of big clouds and rain. But the thing about living in the basin here is that it can look like it’s about to downpour and not spill a drop, or it can be partly cloudy and pouring. Arianne and I discovered this last weekend, when we went biking in the hills around her school and got pretty darn wet when the seemingly more-blue-than-grey sky opened on us. Luckily, lushly green rice paddies look just as lush and green while wet, and my camera didn’t get messed up. Unluckily, my school doesn’t like rain, or at least thunder. The power goes out a lot—not for more than a couple of hours, most of the time, but a lot…like right now. At 8 PM on a Saturday night…. No, I am not making this up. Thank goodness for my lovely Mac’s ridiculously long battery life. Now where did I put my candles?

On Meat

I am a vegetarian, and, in the states, a fairly strict one. I engage some amount of “don’t ask, don’t tell” when it comes to broths in restaurants and at friends’ houses, and will sometimes pick around meat if it’s in big, avoidable chunks, but when I cook for myself it’s all veggie, all the time. In China I’m quite a bit looser. Although I still won’t eat straight up meat unless I think I’m in a position where refusing to do so would be quite rude, I’ll eat out of very meat-heavy dishes and order things with meat in them. My reasons for being a vegetarian range from health to environmental to ethical to just plain having lost the desire to swallow a steak, but I’ll say this: If I were only a vegetarian because of the way animals are treated, and, eventually, slaughtered back home, I’d be eating chicken in China .

A couple weeks ago, Malijun and I arrived early at a restaurant where we were going to have lunch with the rest of our team and some local teachers. After ordering enough to feed a small army (as is often the custom when we eat with anyone outside of our 4-person group), we headed to our table. A few minutes later, the owner’s small son (I’d guess he’s 7 or 8) wandered by, looking rather bored and holding a very alive and rustling chicken by its foot. The chicken, it would seem, outwitted the child, because a moment later we saw him chasing a running fowl. Eventually, feet beat out talons. I didn’t see the chicken’s throat slit, but by the time the owner was partway through draining its very fresh blood onto the cement floor of the courtyard, I had tuned back in. The chicken twitched a good bit, even after the owner dropped it to the floor and went to fetch a bucket of boiling water.

I found myself simultaneously repulsed and entranced as the owner dunked the still-twitching carcass into the bucket, sloshing it around like a rag, feathers growing heavy and grey. He plunked it down and plucked it—gloveless, as he had been since the beginning—a damp pile of fluff growing beside him. With a sharp knife, to took off the head and feet. Malijun, watching beside me, had long ago decided just how disgusting this whole thing was, but I found myself amazed. I wasn’t happy the chicken had just died, but the notion that this animal, alive five minutes earlier, would be gracing a plate five minutes later, made me just so very happy. This was exactly the way, I exclaimed to a rather grossed out co-worker, that meat should be consumed! But then, in China, or at least in rural China, that simply is the way meat is consumed. And it makes so much sense.

I’m a vegetarian. The idea of eating chicken grosses me out. But, if it didn’t, I’d be all over this stuff. Fish…perhaps not as much, as the preferred method of fish killing in these parts would seem to be throwing it from the tank to the ground and stomping on it. This sometimes results in fish flopping about for some time while cooks try to stomp properly. It can take 5 or 6 or 10 attempts. Oh…rural China.

New Year's Travels

Well, it’s been awhile coming, but I’m finally ready to sit down and write about the five and a half weeksish I spent on the road. I could do this in a couple chunks, but instead I’m just gonna post one heck of a long entry. It keeps things simple. Also, I've split pictures from break into four albums: Thailand, Cambodia, post-Cambodia, and Food. All are at http://anamericaninheqing.shutterfly.com. And on facebook too.

Adventures began on the evening of January 15^th, with my very first Chinese night bus. I have vague, drowsy memories of the driver and a passenger or two crouched over a panel on the bus floor that opened down to the engine. And as I recall there was dish fluid of some sort involved. Nonetheless, we arrived in Kunming bright and early.

After meeting up with my travel buddies (Emily Cole, Kristen, and Laura—Alex was already in Bangkok), we napped atour hostel for most of the morning to make up for the night’s lack of slumber, then enjoyed an afternoon and evening sitting at Salvador’s (best western food in Kunming). The city was chilly and wet. I found myself wishing I’d brought a scarf and mittens for the trip.

Then we went to Bangkok. Bangkok, where I was sweating in shorts and a tank top. Bangkok, where our guesthouse’s whole neighborhood smelled good. Bangkok, where public transit zooms about, where both the local and the western food are amazing. Thailand wasn’t love at first sight; it was love at first touch of tropical air wafting in through the gap between plane and jet way.

Our first Bangkok stop was a short one. We spent a day getting acquainted with the incredible weather, Thai iced tea (made thus with sweetened condensed milk—highly recommended), street food delicacies of all sorts, public ferry rides, wats, hot showers, and…the fact that we don’t speak Thai.

This became quickly obvious, as we all tried to speak Chinese when ordering food, buying tickets, etc. It was a bit hilarious, and somewhat embarrassing, and also very humbling. None of us would consider ourselves fluent Chinese speakers (heck, I don’t know if I’d call myself proficient), but we’re all so accustomed to trying to make do with what Chinese we do have, circumlocuting left and right and, usually,eventually, getting ourselves understood. In Thailand, we were helpless. The first time we wanted to order iced tea there was nothing to point at (except a Thai-alphabet menu), we didn’t know any numbers, and we couldn’t even say thank you. If some young, English speaking guy hadn’t come to our aid, I don’t think we’d have succeeded in acquiring our tasty treats. But throughout Thailand people were, in almost every interaction, so very helpful and accommodating. Those who spoke English (and there were many, no doubt due in great part to tourism) used it with us, and those who didn’t tried to help us anyway.

The evening after arriving in Bangkok, we took our first Thai night bus down to Krabi and then bought ferry tickets to Ko Lanta. Going into this trip, I expected the island to be my least favorite part. I’m not a huge beach person. But I’d also never been to a tropical island.

And what an island it was. Bungalows a minute from the ocean, beachside meals, water in colors I didn’t know existed outside of postcards and movies, tropical fruit everywhere, caving, snorkeling, mo-peding…. Ko Lanta is certainly a resort town, and hence there were a heck of a lot of European vacationers about (we all went into blonde haired/blue eyed shock) and a lot of expensive things.It could hardly be called the most traditionally Thai part of our trip. Still, it was an exquisite few days.

As we came to Lanta (by ferry), so we left, boating first to Ko Phi Phi and then to

Phuket. Phuket has a party town and an old town, and we opted for the latter. We stayed in a creepy old hotel (home to Phuket’s first elevator) and spent a night and a two days wandering the streets, appreciating the strange but enjoyable mix of Chinese, Thai, and European influences.

After another night bus, a quick stop at the Bangkok bus terminal, and a couple hours on yet another bus (a second class one rather than the first class one we’d been sold tickets for—oops), we arrived in Kanchanaburi, a river town that was

once the site of a WWII POW camp and now plays host to lots of backpackers. We slept in raft rooms on the river Kwai, visited a war museum moving in its simplicity, rode bikes about town, and bused out to a park with seven tiers of waterfalls and monkeys.

Laura, Kris, and I headed back to Bangkok a day earlier than Alex and Em. We stayed by Khao San road rather than in the less touristy area where we’d slept our first night. It was nice for the experience, and Khao San road is certainly a good place to shop, but I much prefer the quieter Ari neighborhood. We went to the Great Palace—which contained more gold than I think I’ve ever seen in one place—and met up with Alex and Em for one last night in Bangkok before Kris and I split off for Cambodia.

Going overland to Cambodia is complicated and full of potential scams, which I spent a good long time researching. We took the 5:55 AM, quite uncomfortable 3^rd class train from Bangkok to the Thai border (ash blew in through the window, and the seats jutted into our backs), rode a tuk tuk to the border itself, walked through, got a visa on arrival, immigrated, took a complementary government bus to the transit station, and got a shared cab to Siem Reap.

Siem Reap, so far as we could tell, was not a particularly exciting place. It was incredibly touristy, of course, and hence had a lot of western and Cambodian food options, and a few fun markets, but the attraction of the town was definitely the temples. There are lots and lots of temples to see, Angkor Wat being the most famous, and Kristen and I spent two days exploring. As many visitors as there were, most of the sites were not nearly so crowded as American and European tourist spots I’ve visited. So that was nice.
The temples were big and small, in various states of repair and ruin. I found myself, naturally, utterly amazed by the architectural feats of so long ago. Watching the shifts in religious allegiance was also fascinating. Buddhas hacked out of rock or turned into Hindu holy men with the addition of beards, broken statues of Shiva and Vishnu.

Cambodia also threw me for a loop by using the American dollar more than the Cambodian riel. I hadn’t had greenbacks in my wallet, much less used them, since July. This was made even more confusing by the fact that everything in Cambodia is very cheap in American dollars. Kristen and I decided to splurge in a major way when we bought 5-dollar plates of homemade, and very authentic-tasting, four-cheese gnocchi and tagliatelle with pesto.

The trip back to Bangkok was much simpler than the trip to Cambodia. We went to our original guesthouse in Ari and spent a relaxing night there before Kristen met up with her boyfriend for more beach time and I embarked on my first ever solo travel adventure.

At first, this just meant going across Bangkok, where I dropped my bags at the train station and explored. I walked to Chinatown to check it out, and then I walked swiftly away from Chinatown, because it was a bit too authentic. After wandering for most of the afternoon, I returned to the train station and got on my night train up to Chiang Mai. I happened to be sitting across from an American family living in Beijing and had the longest English face-to-face conversation I’d had with a non-CEIer since leaving the states. Thai sleeper trains, as opposed to Thai third-class trains, are a really nice way to travel—quite comfortable and with actual beds instead of just reclining seats like on the buses.

Chiang Mai was not as hot as down south or Bangkok, but warm and comfortable, with tons of cafes and pedestrian-friendly streets. The combination of my being a solo traveler and

wanting a bit of a break after being on the road for something like three weeks meant taking time to relax. I’ve said many times that having a coffee shop in Heqing would solve half my problems, because there’s nothing quite like that atmosphere (not to mention selection of beverages) to cheer up a mopey/uninspired/unproductive me. I spent a lot of time in Chiang Mai sipping mochas and smoothies and other treats. I also spent a lot of time in cooking school—three days, in fact. I knew I wanted to go for at least a day, but the first was so much fun that I signed up for the second, and the second was so much fun that I signed up for the third. I now feel fairly confident that, given proper ingredients, I can replicate some pretty authentic Thai stuff. I explored a lot of wats and markets as well, and my visit happened to correspond with the annual flower festival, so I saw a parade with rather incredible floral floats.

After a week in Chiang Mai, I night bused back to Bangkok and reunited with Kristen for our last couple days in Thailand. We went to Wat Arun (the Temple of Dawn), Wat Pho (home of the incredible reclining Buddha), Bangkok’s largest outdoor park, and Cinnabon. Yes, there is a Cinnabon in Thailand. Actually, there’s a Cinnabon and a bunch of other ridiculous places at this huge food court in this huge mall that definitely was a bit of cultural overload. I also went to the US Consulate to get pages added to my passport. It was American but not, and I was surrounded by perfectly nice looking folks and by some creepy old guys with their 20-something Thai girlfriends/wives.

Flying out of Bangkok was a sad experience, I must say, excited as I was by the prospect of Hong Kong. And Hong Kong was quite fun (and quite expensive). Mark surprised Kris and me by meeting us at the airport,and he proceeded to be our guide for our three-day stay.

We booked a room at the Chungking Mansions, not realizing until after the fact that, though its reputation has improved dramatically, the place is pretty darn sketch. That would explain the prices. Certainly I wouldn’t want to stay alone, but with Kristen it was fine. Our room was a shoe box but clean and secure, and the mansion itself had some amazing Indian food because many of the residents are Indian and Pakistani.

Hong Kong’s weather left something to be desired. I don’t think I would have been that bothered by it coming directly from China, but going from Thailand it was cold. Also wet. Very wet. So much so that when we went to see the Lantau Buddha (which is among the world’s largest seated Buddhas) we saw shapes rising from the mist. Still, we had a lovely time checking out different parks and neighborhoods and getting a sense of where Mark grew up.

Macau is about a one-hour ferry ride from Hong Kong, and Kris and I passed through on our way back into the mainland. While there we met up once more with Emily Cole, who was staying with her aunt, and she toured us around. What a cool city. Macau has a Vegas-like reputation in China, and it’s true that there were casinos, but all I saw was amazing Sino-European architecture and food. We visited a centuries-old church that had burned down, leaving only the stone façade, and a fort, and had Portuguese egg tarts and sandwiches at a café near the center square. All too soon, however, it was time to get on a bus and cross back into China. It was Valentine’s Day. I’d been out of the country for nearly a month.

After a one night stay in Guangzhou and a 26-hour train ride with the lights on and without a sleeper car (not recommended—after finally drifting off I got woken up by a young guy who wanted to know about what I put in my hair to make it curly. ‘Nuff said.) we got back to Kunming.

Laura was already there, and over the following days the rest of the CEI crew trickled in.We indulged in lots of western food, city strolls, and a day of hiking west of the city, before settling back into work with a professional development conference and a plane ride back to Lijiang. Flying over Heqing, I was struck, as always, by just how gorgeous it is. There’s a lot I don’t appreciate about this place yet and a lot that I think I never will, but the straight up beauty is a definite perk.

We’re three weeks into term now, and today marks exactly 8 months since my arrival in Beijing. I’ll be teaching (with a few breaks, I’m sure) until mid-July. I’m incredibly grateful for the opportunities I had during my time off and am working to make this new semester more successful (academically and personally) than the last. So you can expect a return to regular, rural, China-style blogging soon enough.

Grocery Run

This morning after class I went into town—Heqing City. I didn’t need anything special, so I was in and out within an hour and a half. A trip to town always begins with walking a block from the school gate out to the Dali-Lijiang road that connects those two tourist spots and goes right past Heqing. Actually, from what I understand (although I could certainly be wrong), today's two-lane highway more or less follows the path of the "Horse and Tea Road," which some folks might better recognize as the "Southern Silk Road." There are two kinds of vehicles, both costing one yuan, that shuttle people to the city: 19-seater buses that I would say hold up to 40 when things get really crowded, and what I think of as “Oregon Trail” cars—five seater cabs with an arched wagon-like piece of canvas covering two benches in the pick-up truck style back. These benches hold 3-4 people each, but often there are also 5-6 people (or 3 people and a couple bikes) crammed into the small standing space between the benches. Kinda hard to picture, perhaps. I’ll try to remember my camera next time.

You flag down either kind of transport by sticking your arm out, and it’s a short ride—5-10 minutes, depending on how many times we stop to pick up or drop off more passengers. This morning I had to wait more than 10 minutes before a bus arrived. Normally, they’re much more frequent, and it was kinda chilly. I was wearing my fleece and an excellently warm alpaca scarf, but I haven’t broken out my hat or mittens much. Gloves are pretty common here, but we’re talking cute little skin-tight gloves or motorcycle gloves, not my Norwegian snowflake mittens. And, for whatever reason, I don’t see a lot of hats except for those worn by the Bai women, and those aren’t winter-knit caps. However, I’ve decided that I don’t care. Minnesota-trained or not, my hands and head are chilly.

Anyway, when I go to town, I almost always need to go both to the market and to the supermarket. Today I go to the market first, which is on the far side of town (keeping in mind that the “far” side of town is all of a 10-15-minute walk from the closer side). Once off the bus, I first have to walk through the meat and fish sections. There are two wheelbarrows full of pig heads. I have no idea why. There’s a lot of blood on them. There are always pig heads (and feet and legs and everything else), but there are not usually wheelbarrows fully devoted to the storage (display?) of pig heads. It’s really quite upsetting. So glad I don’t eat pork. In the fish section I try not to look at the flopping and suffocating piles, but peripheral vision—what can you do? Again, so glad I don’t eat fish.

Once free of the animals, I move to the potato trucks. The first time I bought potatoes, I thought they were russets and only discovered after scrubbing them in my sink that they were, in fact, red-skinned potatoes. The (mostly) ladies who sell them sit by small fires to keep warm. I buy eight—it is Chanukah, after all—and pay 5 kaui.

Then, crossing over the piles of discarded, rotting scallions and cornhusks, I make my way to my broccoli lady. I started buying broccoli from her a couple months ago, and she knows that, although I often buy other things, broccoli is always on the list. Today I supplement my large crown of broccoli with two sizable tomatoes and an eggplant, paying 7 kuai for the lot. Produce is getting a little more expensive as weather turns cooler, but there’s still plenty of it, and since it’s not hot I can buy more at one time. When I first moved here, I could really only buy veggies I’d eat within a day or two. Now I can leave food by the window and it’ll keep much longer. It’s pretty awesome.

I’ve recently rediscovered onions. Not that I’d ever not known about or liked onions, but I hadn’t really been buying them. Today I look around for one of the onion-ginger-garlic sellers. They often have other things too, but generally if people have garlic or ginger they seem to specialize in all three. I grab two red onions (I don't know if I've ever seen white or yellow onions here, actually) and 3 bulbs of garlic and pay 4.5 kuai.

The tofu lady I go to today gets into a long (because I have major accent issues) conversation with me about whether or not I can tutor her high-school-aged niece in English during the break. As over the break I won’t be in Heqing, I say I can’t do that, but who knows? Maybe next time I’ll ask if she wants me to meet with her niece on the weekend or something. At least she doesn’t seem annoyed as she cuts and bags up my 1 kuai slab of fresh tofu (about 2/3 of the size you’d get in a box in the states).

My noodle lady knows that I’m always after ersi— fettuccini-sized chewy rice noodles. I pay 1 kuai for a nicely-sized handful before moving past the many varieties of ground pepper and into the fruit lane. Here I stock up, bagging 6 or 7 clementines, 5 bananas, and 4 apples for 12 kuai.

Produce total: 30.5 yuan, or $4.50 at today’s exchange rate.

I walk past stalls bursting with socks, slippers, DVDs, and all manner of other things out of the market gate. I’m kinda hungry, so I approach a steamed bun seller and hand her 5 mao (half a kuai) for a small but warm roll, munching as I walk to the store. The market is at one end of one of the main streets cutting through town, and the supermarket I like to go to is almost at the other. It’s maybe a 10 minute walk. I pass by restaurants, clothing stores, blanket stores, convenience stores and the toilet paper store (all it sells is TP—I kid you not), as well as stands hawking papaya slices (sour and dipped in salt and chili powder, so not really my thing), spam hot dogs, and french fries. When I reach the store, I hand my backpack to the woman behind the counter (it’s not allowed inside) and grab a basket. I need a few things here: soy sauce (5.9 kuai for a 500 ml bottle), salt (1.3 kuai for a 500g bag), sponges (2.9 kuai for 4), tissues (3.8 kuai for 10 pocket packs), and sesame oil (a bit pricey at 10.8 kuai for a 180 ml bottle, but so worth it). When I reach the sesame oil aisle, I realize that I’ve forgotten the characters for it. Scanning the many bottles, I experience a brief moment of concern before centering myself and letting the characters surface once again in my mind.

Store total: 24.7 kuai ($3.71)

On my way back to the main road and my bus home, there are a few flower shops, a gaming den, and countless convenience stores. I drop into one and pick up 4 eggs for 3 kuai. Eggs are running pricey these days, but I'm a bit protein-conscious lately so I still like to keep a stock.

I wait for a minute at Heqing’s one stoplight but eventually end up jaywalking anyway, passing building supply shops, fruit and breakfast stands, and more restaurants before arriving at the seemingly arbitrary place where one can almost always find a bus waiting. Seats are already full, so I grab a handle, cushioning my eggs as best I can. This is always the scary part. I guess 10 AM on Friday is busy, because before long I find myself pushed far forward, directly behind a middle-aged gentleman and his cigarette. I'm forced to relinquish my handle in favor of the top of his seat. There are “no smoking” signs in all of the buses, but I think they’re paid about as much attention as the technical maximum capacity.

Three or four minutes after I step on, the bus sets off. We pick up two more people on the way out of town and let off a few before we get within range of my school. I yell “师傅，下车！” (Driver, get off bus!) which is, I’ve learned, the standard “Please stop” request. He pulls over and I step around people and baskets of produce to shove my not-at-all-graceful-but-at-least-efficient way down the steps. A dart across the street, a five minute walk, and I’m home again.

Pengtun Cooking- Chocolate Zucchini Cake with Clementine-Honey Glaze

It’s been awhile without a post, I know, but things have gotten suddenly super busy around here. This is one of the few lulls I’ve had for awhile. I do intend to write about my day-to-day stuff soon, but for now I’m just sharing this, since I started it a week ago and only need to finish it up.

It occurs to me that, as much as I’ve alluded to my various cooking adventures, I have yet to actually do any sort of cooking/baking-focused posts. When I got here, I spent a lot of time googling all things rice cooker baking-related. I didn’t find a ton. I haven’t found much info in general that connects to foodie cooking in limited kitchens. However, I’ve experimented, and while some experiments have been less than successful, others have been glorious. Thus, I’m beginning today the dissemination of said successes. Granted, I have neither measuring cups nor temperatures nor actual baking/cooking times, so everything is very approximate, but perhaps these recipes will serve as inspiration for others in my shoes. Rice cooker baking is possible, it’s not a disaster to experiment with, and sometimes it turns out quite well indeed.

I begin with this cake because it was, aside from banana bread, perhaps my most successful rice cooker endeavor yet.

Chocolate-Zucchini Cake with Clementine-Honey Glaze

• Half a large zucchini (about 1 cup), grated
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1/3 cup white sugar
• 1 egg
• ¼ cup milk (I used whole, ‘cause it’s what’s here, but I bet other types would work too)
• 2-3 TBS vegetable oil, plus more to grease the rice cooker (Note: I realize that this is very little oil, and if I were baking in a traditional oven I would likely increase it, but the steaming process doesn’t require as much. Plus, milk here is all whole milk, so there’s additional fat content there)
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• ½ tsp salt
• a scant ¼ cup cocoa powder
• dash cinnamon
• about 1-1 ½ cups flour. How much will depend. You want a thick but easily pourable batter.
• about 1 large chocolate bar (3-4 oz, maybe?) chopped. Or you could use ½-3/4 cups chocolate chips, if you’re in a place with such things

Quick breads and cakes are things you’re supposed to be careful with. You’re supposed to mix the wets and dries separately, combining swiftly so as to keep the baking soda from reacting before getting into the oven. I have never been so precise, but especially since entering my new abode all such procedure has gone out the window.

I usually start with the egg, because that way I can beat it before adding anything else. Then I throw in the sugars and oil and milk and mix. I would also have added vanilla extract if I had it at the time, but I didn’t. After that, it’s time for the dries. You can mix them separately, which makes incorporating the cocoa powder a bit easier, or just throw the dries into the big bowl one by one.

Finally, mix in the grated zucchini and the chocolate chips/chunks. You should have a thick but pourable batter. If it's too watery, add more flour. If too thick, add milk or oil. Transfer to your greased rice cooker (or, y’know, a loaf pan, if you are in possession of an oven), spreading to even out the batter if necessary, and start the cook cycle.

I usually end up doing two cook cycles, with period of maybe 15 minutes in between while the cooker cools down. Every rice cooker is different though; some even have cake cycles. Sometimes my cakes don’t cook through before the bottom burns, but I’ve found that flipping the cake, while yielding a more evenly-cooked baked good, is usually less than conducive to keeping said cake in one piece. Depending on whether the cake is one to be shared or to be gobbled in private the “to flip or not to flip” debate can lead to different conclusions. However, this cake cooked through so well that flipping was unnecessary. Luck, perhaps, or maybe it was just the zucchini thanking me for using it in such an utterly unexpected way (as far as Chinese born-and-raised zucchini are concerned).

Once the cake is done, flip it onto a plate. I usually do this by using the rice server to loosen the cake as much as possible, very quickly flipping removing the rice pan and turning it upside-down, praying all the while that the cake drops out.

Glaze:

• One small Clementine (or perhaps ¼ of a typical orange), juiced, peel reserved
• 2-3 TBS sugar
• 2-3 TBS water
• 3-4 TBS milk
• 1 TBS honey
• dash cinnamon

Combine the sugar, water, Clementine peel, and juice in a saucepan (or skillet, since that’s what I had) and simmer, adding the milk after the sugar is mostly melted. Watch it carefully, stirring to keep from burning (quite a feat, on a hot plate), and add more milk or sugar as necessary to reach a thin syrupy texture.

Use a toothpick to poke holes all over the top of the cake, then spoon the glaze on. Eat and be blissful.

So there you have it. If anybody out there is another budding rice cooker baker, I’d love to hear about it. We can swap horror/success stories. And hopefully the next time some poor displaced American foodie googles rice cooker baking, he/she’ll have a few more options.

A Trip to Dali

So my schedule’s a little weird this week. Wednesday was the Mid-Autumn Festival (a national holiday), so Pengtun got Wed-Friday off. Excellent, right? Five day weekend! No, no. We traded Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday for last Sunday and this whole weekend. I teach an evening class tonight and have my normal Thursday and Friday schedule tomorrow and Sunday. On Monday and Tuesday of this week, everybody was talking about the three-day vacation, but… I mean… we don’t actually get time off. Somehow most people didn’t seem to notice that fact. At any rate, it’s been really nice to have three vacation days back-to-back-to-back, even if it means having a seven-day work week starting tomorrow.

To take advantage of these three days, some of us Heqing folks decided to bus down to Dali. Dali is one of two cities in my area of Yunnan (the other being Lijiang) frequented by Chinese and Western tourists alike. Dali’s the bigger of the two, by quite a bit, and I’d say there’s more of a permanent expat population there than one would find in Lijiang. In fact, one of CEI’s American Fellows this year has lived in Dali with her family since she was twelve. (Her Dad works in agricultural exports or something.) There are a lot of Western restaurants and a bar street of sorts and little inns approximately every three feet. It’s a nice place to walk around and just chill out.

Mark, Ma LiJun, Arianne and GaoShan (two girls from JinDun, another of the Heqing schools) and I went down together on Wednesday afternoon. Buses leave frequently and take about two and a half hours. It’s a pretty ride, mostly through mountains. I took some pictures of the trip back up and will post them soon. Once arriving we wandered through the streets and found an inn. Since there were five of us, we split two rooms, with two of the girls kind enough to offer to share one of the double beds. While hardly fancy, the hotel was nice enough, with a fish pond and sit-down flushing toilets. There was even a shower in my room! Of course, the floor of the shower was kinda falling apart, but the water was warm and there was enough of it that it didn’t take me three minutes to rinse the conditioner out of my hair. Plus there was a big mirror. The beds were also a bit harder than what I would have liked, but they were perfectly adequate. And what did we pay for this place, you might like to know. Eighty kuai a room, or 32 kuai a piece. About five bucks. Not bad at all.

After dropping our stuff, we wandered in search of dinner. I was ridiculously excited at the prospect of eating something not Yunnanese—I’d seen Tibetan, Xinjiang, Indian, and Western places coming in. As we headed back towards town center, I suddenly heard someone yelling my name. Now, in the states, if I hear someone yelling “Emily!” I turn with half my attention, knowing that it could very easily be a different Emily. However, I was in Yunnan, China, and the two kids with American accents who’d come with me to Dali were standing right next to me. I turned around, and it was Kristin—my American roommate from the Lincang STP!! We had a rather epic, running-at-each-other-and-big-hugs reunion. I was so, so happy to see her. And as it turned out, she was far from the only one. There were like a dozen CEI folks who’d come up from Lincang for a couple of days. So many hugs, so many smiles, so much catching up (and I feel as though I barely got started in that respect. I wish I’d had more time with them). A lot of schools only found out they got Friday off on Tuesday night (thank you, rural China), so plans had been hastily made. Since the Lincang kids had already ordered, the Heqing folks decided to do dinner alone and meet up again later for some revelry.

We walked for quite awhile, trying to find a suitable restaurant, and eventually settled on a place that Ma LiJun and Gao Shan said was known for its pizza. They were not mistaken. It was by far the best pizza I’d had since leaving the States—thin-crusted and cheesy. We also supped on banana fritters and fruit salad, and I even got a can of seltzer water. I felt very indulgent indeed. Of course, Western food is more expensive than Chinese, but it still wasn’t that bad pricewise, and totally worth it considering the circumstances. The restaurant/bar is owned by a Scotsman and had expat bar tenders—something I’m not sure I even ever saw in Beijing. Bad Monkey, Dali, Yunnan, China. If you’re ever in the area, check it out. Bad Monkey, in fact, became CEI’s spot for the evening, which was a ton of fun. It was just so fantastic to see everyone and hang out American style. I really, really miss the Lincang people. Heqing is great, but it's isolated. I'm about seven hours from the nearest non-Heqing fellows, if I counted correctly.

A little after one, I was sleepy and decided to wander back to the hotel. An amazing thing about China is that I felt totally safe doing this. There are so many places in the States where, that late at night, I wouldn’t feel at all comfortable walking around alone. There are places like that in China too, but they’re far fewer.

The next morning, I strolled alone, wandering through the mix of stone and asphalt-paved streets that mark the city. I got to an area where there were suddenly no expats, so that was nice. Dali is a lot more integrated than Lijiang, in the sense that the “Old Town” is not just for tourists and entirely distinct from the new town. It feels healthier in that sense. That being said, there are definitely still areas more touristy than others, and it’s nice to have the option to meander away from them.

The Heqing folks (who’d gone to bed earlier than the Lincang folks—the other four all went back to the hotel at least an hour or two before me) met up for breakfast at the famed German Bakery—Bakery No. 88. Oh my goodness. I’d heard about this place from a bunch of last year’s fellows, so I was really excited to try it, and it was heavenly . just a little café, with IKEA-esque fixtures and tableware. (I know for a fact that the silverware is from there, because it says so.) They have a small collection of imported cheeses and other products, but the real treat is the bread. I had excellently chewy and flavorful ciabatta with cream cheese and homemade raspberry jam. I also splurged on a bottle of Italian olive oil and a loaf that turned out not to be the whole wheat sourdough I was told it was. I’m not crazy about the flavor, but still, it’s bread. I want to make friends with the workers there. They seem really nice, and I get the feeling I’ll be paying that place a visit at least once every time I’m in Dali.

After some more wanderings, including a stop by an English bookstore where I found a bilingual copy of “Horton Hatches an Egg” (Yay Dr. Seuss!) we ran into some CEI folks again and said our goodbyes. Then it was off to…well, Wal-Mart. Not a place I ever shop in the states but, unfortunately, one of the best places to find things in China. And find things I did! I got rotini and skippy peanut butter and ground cinnamon and dried black beans and a small bag of brown rice. No cocoa powder or chocolate chips could, unfortunately, but you can’t have everything in life.

We bussed back home after that, quietly content. Dali really was just a breath of fresh air, and I hope to get down there fairly regularly. It’s just far away enough that I won’t be tempted to go every weekend, but it’s close enough (and cheap enough to travel and sleep) that I can get there easily. I know that last year’s fellows had local friends (Chinese and otherwise) who lived in Dali, and I think that’d be really cool. It’s weird though. I’ve really never had to make friends without something major in common like school or a job. I don’t know how. We’ll see how it goes, I suppose.

Also, random moment of the day: I went into town to go shopping this morning, and I took one of the little cars that runs along the road from school to the town center. I was squeezed in next to two older Bai ladies, and one of them reached over and grabbed my arm, looked at it for a second, let it go, said something in her dialect that I couldn’t understand, and continued her conversation with the other lady. I don’t know if she was interested in my arm because it was white or because it was fat. I’m hoping for the former.

Emily’s First Yunnan Cooking Experience (and Some General Food Thoughts)

Here marks the last of my “backlogged posts.” It’s all new from here, folks! Also, as an addendum to this post, two days ago I attempted rice cooker corn bread. It turned out ok, but I really need to find baking soda/some sort of baking soda substitute/have baking soda sent from the US. Ma LiJun actually said it was the best corn bread she’s ever had, but I think that’s mostly because Chinese cornbread/cake and American style cornbread are very different animals. Today I might try to do tortillas, but, again, baking powder/soda would be nice…. I also plan to get lunch from the cafeteria this afternoon, just to try it out. I’ll keep you updated.

Also, check out my newest batch of pictures! http://anamericaninheqing.shutterfly.com

For lunch on Friday (today, at the time of this writing), I decided it would be a lovely idea to break into my cooking supplies and the food I bought in Heqing yesterday and try to make some lunch. I should explain that I really lucked out in terms of kitchen inheritance here. My room has a hot plate, a kettle, a wok, a medium sized pot with a lid, a steamer, a knife, a cutting board, and several cooking utensils, as well as a few bowls and a plate. Yesterday, I replaced the rice cooker that was already in here, because it was cracked on the bottom and generally did not inspire confidence as far as cooking safety was concerned. Now I have a new one (recommended by Ma LiJun) that came with a steamer of its own. Convenient indeed! I can’t wait to make mantou (steamed buns). I also bought some chopsticks, a glass mug for tea, and a trivet (which, in retrospect, seems rather unnecessary, considering that I don’t exactly have a dining table/chairs).

The girl who lived here before left containers of cooking oil, soy sauce, rice wine, and a couple other things I haven’t gotten around to translating yet. Yesterday I bought eggplant, broccoli, peppers(hot and not, although the hot ones weren’t actually hot), garlic, ginger, and sesame oil. For lunch I put together a stir fry of sorts. I don’t usually fry eggplant, so I used more oil than I intended to, and I didn’t bother to look up what each of the buttons on the hotplate means, but altogether I think it came out relatively well. I also over or undercooked the rice or something, but then, I almost never use rice cookers (or cook white rice—I use brown at home), so I think that’ll just take a bit of adjusting to

I will need to get better at cooking for one person; I made too much rice (which I saved), and a little too much stir fry (which I ate, since I have no real means of keeping it/reheating it). I’m so accustomed to cooking for 2-3 people, or at least cooking with the intention of leftovers, that I’m really not at all used to judging how much I’ll want to eat in one sitting. There’s no fridge here though, and no microwave. I suppose I could reheat things on the hotplate, but I need to get better at using it before I want to try that.

Veggies (at least the ones in the supermarket where I shopped yesterday) are cheap. My eggplant was 3 mao, which is less than 1 yuan, which is in turn less than 20 cents. My garlic was 1.2 yuan for 2 bulbs, my ginger was 4 mao for a knob about the size of toddler’s hand, my peppers (two relatively small red and two long and thin “spicy” greens) were 1 yuan total, and my broccoli was 1.5 yuan for a huge crown. So, I spent a grand total of 4.4 yuan, or 65 cents, according to the 6.75 exchange rate I saw last time I checked. In contrast, the “chocolate milk peanuts” (I had to try them—not bad, but they didn’t taste like chocolate or milk) were 1.9 yuan for a small package. Still cheap compared with the US, perhaps, but more expensive than my most expensive veggie. A chicken sandwich at the knockoff KFC-type place we passed by in Lincang was 15-20 yuan, which is pricy even by American standards, what with “dollar menus.”

In Lincang, I indulged in a lot of 2-4 yuan ice cream bars and 6.8 yuan packs of oreos, because CEI gave us “debit cards” of sorts to use at the school store, but I’ve decided that I want to avoid such purchases as much as possible here in Heqing (I have half a pack of oreos left from Lincang and will not allow myself to buy more). When I studied in Beijing, I lost some weight, mostly, I think, because I ate far less sugar than at home. I’d like to reduce my sugar this time too. It’s easy to see why prices like those above (1 dollar oreos and 22 cent broccoli) are one of the reasons there are far fewer overweight folks here in the Chinese countryside than in the US. I do wish they did more whole grains here though—not gonna lie. And, as always, I would like an oven.

On Food

Well, those of you who know me (and I’d be surprised if any of you readers didn’t, considering) know that I am a foodie indeed. I’m an avid cook, baker, locavore, vegetarian, etc. Thus, I’m sure that, as with language and culture, food will be a rather common topic around here, and I’m sure that getting used to Chinese food (and Chinese cooking) will take some time.

Last year, I did almost all of my shopping at a food co-op and at farmers’ markets, and my processed food intake dropped to near zero. I made all my own bread, sauces, curries, etc. Minneapolis made such a lifestyle relatively easy to maintain, even on an AmeriCorps stipend of $800 a month. China…not so much.

China has a huge culture of food, just as the US does (and, really, probably most other places). Everywhere you go there are outdoor fruit sellers, meat sellers, noodle sellers, etc. Bargaining is common, even expected in most cases, and most of what you can get is fresh. That’s the good part. The not so good part is the general lack of sanitation when it comes to food. Tap water isn’t potable here, and most produce must be washed in boiling water (and soap, to be safe) or peeled before it can be deemed truly safe. It’s not that eating an apple without washing it thoroughly would kill anyone, but it might not be so nice for your stomach.

Unfortunately, a lot of Chinese food isn’t necessarily so nice for your stomach—or at least my stomach. The diet is so different from what I was accustomed to in the States that I’ve gotten sick almost every day since arriving in Lincang. It’s fun, really. Don’t worry—it’s not like I’ve been throwing up or anything like that—but my stomach and digestive system as a whole just aren’t comfortable yet. I think most of that’s probably due to the high volume of MSG in the cafeteria dishes, and the rest can be tied to the amount of oil, specifically pork fat, much of the food is cooked in. Not so good for vegetarians with no meat-digesting enzymes. I’ve been trying to eat yogurt every day to get some local bacteria into my system, but straight up yogurt is harder to find than would be desired, and I can’t buy a large carton because I don’t have any means of refrigerating it.

My friends and I are pretty sure that what we’re eating here is, for the most part, not traditional Yunnanese food; rather, we think that these dishes are to Chinese cafeterias as pizza, hot dogs, and nachos are to cafeterias in the states. They are standard fare of not particularly high quality and are better than their American equivalents only in that they are cooked in a kitchen at this school rather than shipped to the cafeteria in frozen, individually wrapped servings. When I complained about the food to my dad, he raised the very good point of: “It’s a middle school cafeteria. Why do you think you always brought your own lunch?”

So what have I been eating? Well, for breakfast, I almost always have mantou (steamed buns, occasionally stuffed with red bean paste), and either yogurt (when I can get it) or warm soymilk—not my favorite beverage by a long shot, but nutritionally useful. Lunch is white rice and a mix of dishes from the cafeteria. Usually I end up with tofu of some sort, potatoes or eggplant, and some kind of green. The same goes for dinner. I used to eat a tasty tomato and egg dish pretty often, but I’m pretty sure now that the reason it tasted so good is that it was loaded up with MSG, so I avoid it. Actually, I avoid everything that’s super salty, because that’s a good indication it’s MSG-heavy. This sometimes means that the majority of my daily calories come from white rice. I’ve just bought some fruit for my room though, and I make sure to take a daily vitamin.

On the weekends, there’s more time and more motivation to eat out. We found a Thai/Burmese place nearby that’s got a lot of delicious, spicy food. This evening the entire CEI program went to a restaurant that specializes in food from the Wa minority. It was quite good—lots of potatoes, corn, and spice. There are also noodle shops everywhere, and when all else fails you can always buy oreos and oreo knock-offs and peanuts.

On one hand, I feel like I’m becoming nutritionally-deficient these days. On the other hand, China has the world’s largest population, and clearly this diet (however fiber and calcium and sometimes protein-deficient it might seem) works well enough for millions upon millions of people. I just need to figure out how to make it work for me.

On that note, I’m SO excited to see what I’ll be able to set up in terms of a kitchen once I get to my school. Every time I see rice makers and hotplates in the stores around here I think of more possibilities. Because the fact is, produce In Yunnan is awesome. I might not be able to get Italian-like semolina pasta, but if I’m willing to sub rice noodles I bet I’ll be able to make some tomato-basil primavera-like sauces, and I’m hoping that my Chinese coworkers will teach me how to cook more local dishes.

Generally, I’m pretty darn determined to put my future wok to work in ways it could never imagine. As for baking…well…solar ovens? Maybe? You laugh, but we shall see.