Lessons learnt today…
- never trust a map in China
- Never trust google information in China
- Your VPN will only last so long before they block it!
- Always follow your nose when eating in China
- Do whatever you can to avoid using a public loo in China
I arranged to meet a couple of friends from the train last night for dinner, simple plan i thought. Meet at the train station a couple of blocks up from where my hotel is, i can walk that easy peasy. Google maps says it will only take 17 minutes… That was where my epic fail commenced with the walking plans in Beijing! Google maps are not accurate at all, China don’t really want you to know where anything is. So don’t trust google maps to get you anywhere on time in China. I managed to get to the rendezvous only a couple of minutes late after everyone else was a tad late too.
We headed to a really cute little hutong called Nanluogo Xiang, which was full of tiny shops and shop fronts selling everything from gorgeous traditional stationary, tea and handicrafts to funky cartoon memorabilia and freshly made noodles. It was a hive of activity, and was hard to pick somewhere to start our evening. We settled on the solubrious Wiggly Jiggly’s bar for a quick drink before dinner. Before we knew it, it was midnight! I’m not quite sure how that happened as we didn’t have much to drink, but were were starving. Randall and I opted for a pre dinner snack from the street food vendor just outside the bar (wiley guy!)
Nanluogu Xiang street food, perfect aperitif snack!
I went relatively safe choosing prawns, tofu, pork, and a couple of unidentified meat options. There was what looked like prawns from far away but was actually small intestine when you got up close… I wasn’t up for that. It was all cooked to order right in front of us and slathered in chilli sauce, quite a shock to the system after a couple of beers. But a very tasty aperitif snack as we went on the hunt for somewhere to eat.
After a short but fruitless hunt for “Ghost Street” including a wander down a dark alley where we were warned away by a very grumpy dog. We picked the restaurant that was busiest with locals (it was gone 00:30 by this point!) and we were quickly ushered to the back. Everyone else in the restaurant had these big trays of some kind of yummy looking seafood, i had no idea what it was but it looked good and these guys seemed to specialise in it. So i had to have it! It’s not with a little trepidation i might add, but i had to.
I was so pleased with my choice! It was a tray of beautifully cooked crawfish, swimming in a sea of chilli and garlic. The tray was jammed full of rich red dried chillis that the crawfish had been slow cooked in to give the crayfish a soft buttery taste. We had to work hard to get into them, fully prepared with plastic gloves and stacks of napkins. We tucked in and piled up all the claws etc on our plates. We stood out like a sore thumb then though as everyone else was just chucking them on the floor along with their cigarette butts, used gloves and dinner paraphernalia. It was worth the effort though as they were heavenly. Washed down by a local beer to take the edge off the spiciness of it all, it was a perfect late night dinner. By the time we wrapped up it was 2am, again! I really need to start going to bed earlier.
Buonanotte amici, a very full cake lady
x x x
