We Use Salt, They Use Pepper

Hunan, China is best known for its spicy food. I am best known for not liking spicy food. Quite the match, if I do say so myself. Now, before discussing the food, I want to make one thing clear. When I say spicy, I’m not referring to Applebee’s Spicy chicken wings. That would be……heavenly. This food is made with the hottest peppers created by nature, then multiplied to the 10th power. The very first Hunan meal I had was some type of spicy cabbage and meat mixed together. Two problems: 1. I have NEVER used a chopstick in my life; 2. To reiterate, I don’t like spicy food. After 48 hours from flying, I was delirious and still a little out of it from the 2 beers and ambien. Luckily, this meal was eaten in our hotel rooms so only my roommate saw my inability to conquer chopsticks and my crying eyes. Shortly after, I passed out on the rock, which here is commonly referred to as a bed.

In the almost 20 days I’ve been in Changsha, I am very proud to report that I do in fact like spicy food and that I did master the chopstick. I can even eat rice and noodles with chopsticks!!! I have yet to use a fork for a single meal and I have only once ventured to the KFC down the street. I am also somewhat disappointed to report that I will NEVER return to the KFC because it is absolutely disgusting, but live and learn I supposed. The chicken vender across the street from the school on the other hand is absolutely amazing. The simplest way to describe this place is as a “walk-up drive-through.” It isn’t a restaurant, nor is it a cart. It’s basically a window with pictures printed from the KFC website. I usually get the chicken sandwich (which actually comes with mayo mixed with some type of hot sauce). It costs about 60 cents US or (4 Yuan/Kuai).
Breakfast is by far one of the most delicious meals here. It’s all fried, of course, so I only eat breakfast every few days. The most common breakfast food is bao zi. It’s an extremely thick role (all yeast here is thick because of the humidity, I’m guessing) stuffed with either pork or veggies. These cost about 1 yuan or 15 cents. My personal favorite is this fried pancake thing with onions and scallions on the inside. Best freaking food ever – and it’s probably about 10 cents.

BEST MEAL STORY THUS FAR:

Our lunch is provided by WorldTeach and for the first week they also provided dinner. Most restaurants have the same setup. It’s a large round table that seats 8ish people. On the table is a Lazy Susan on which they place about 10 different dishes for us to pick and choose from. Most often, the meal consists of tofu, cooked pieces of eggplants and green beans, a spicy meat dish, a fish (whole), shredded potatoes, some type of egg and tomato dish, and of course, white rice. Since most meals were provided by WorldTeach for the first week, I never had to attempt to order. On the first night we were sent out on our own most volunteers went to dinner with their Chinese teachers. Most – excluding me, and two of my friends. We are all horrible at Chinese. We walked around for about 20 minutes trying to find a restaurant and finally decided on an empty, but clean looking place with a neon sign (if you can afford glowing lights, the food can’t be that bad right?) We are given menus in Chinese characters, but luckily, we all had our handy food sheets which list the names of dishes in English, Pinyin, and Chinese characters. The 3 women working at the restaurant were looking over our shoulders helping us try to pick dishes they actually had. This went on for 20 minutes. I would ask for something, they would repeat, laugh and say it properly. As we were attempting to order the owners little boy (probably 6) was standing right next to my friend, Frank, just staring at him. This continued throughout the meal. He never once spoke. He just stared. We finally ordered 3 dishes which shared. 1. Cumin beef – simple; 2. Egg and scallion omelet – simple; 3. ?????. Ok, so we weren’t quiet sure what the 3rd thing we ordered was going to be but, what the hell right? So…we get our meat, our omelet and our rice…So far we are LOVING the meal. That omelet – freaking amazing. As we are discussing this “oasis” we have discovered, they bring the final dish. It’s a bowl of chicken bones and kelp. Yes, kelp. It was kelp soup. These weren’t little slivers of kelp; each piece was about 3 inches wide and 6 inches long. Let me just tell you, if you EVER have the opportunity to eat kelp DO IT! Freaking amazing!!!!!

So while we are enjoying our meal the little boy is still staring at Frank, the workers keep coming to our table speaking a language we clearly don’t understand, I keep pulling out my notebook from Chinese class, which makes the women laugh more and Frank and Sarah cannot stop laughing at me because apparently my southern drawl mixed with my slow Mandarin is hilarious. Over the course of 2 hours – which was how long it took us – it became a custom that when anyone in the restaurant saw me pull out my bright pink notebook, they ran over to read my Pinyin. It was really great because they practiced the tones with me, which of course I never understood. By the end of our meal the restaurant was a little busier. In particular, there was a large group of women seated behind us and a random heavy set man without a shirt eating rice from the street. He wasn’t sitting down or anything, he was just standing by our table watching us and every now and then saying something in Chinese to or about us. It was clear that we were all enjoying each others company even without a common language. Of course, we kept trying to communicate but it was practically impossible. That day, in Chinese class we learned a new phrase that my dear friend, Frank decided to try out: “We are foreign devils.” This might not sound very funny, but to the Chinese it was hilarious. Every person in the restaurant burst into laughter. The old man (the one without the shirt) laughed for 10 minutes. So after 2 hours of attempting to communicate and enjoying a few beers and some bi jiu (rice liquor – which tastes a little like rubbing alcohol) we departed the restaurant dubbed, “the Oasis.”