It's Been a Quiet Week Here in Lake She-Be-Gone...

Yes, I do listen to Prairie Home Companion and yes, I have just lifted--and possibly mauled--the opening line to Garrison Keillor's weekly monologue (available as a podcast for free, even) but it sort of defines how I did this week. I was on a high coming back from Inner Mongolia (fabulous city) and now I'm sitting in my apartment in a clean-ish t-shirt going through more boxes of my daughter's crap, Star Wars on the big-screen, while I sigh over each item. There are moments when I miss my daughter acutely and when I realize that I really am on my own from here on out. Sometimes this is a good feeling, and sometimes it's just scary.

I have had a few moments of startling clarity which have enabled me to a) dump out a lot of crap such as old test papers and birthday cards and b) dump out a lot of crap such as an old friend who has not treated me well. It is the latter which I regret--the loss of friendship needs to be mourned, and intermingled with the feeling of loss is the feeling of "What the hell was I THINKING, letting that go on?" I can't go into details--not for fear of Old Friend reading the blog, but for other privacy issues, such as the basic fact that good manners dictate not saying too much. Oh, sure, I'll blog about the weird-ass orgy I was invited to (should I be flattered? Or insulted? FYI, I didn't go, because once you go to one, even as an observant non-participating journalist, word will get around and you'll NEVER meet a decent man in this town) but over personal relationships--sometimes there is a veil best left undisturbed.

So, on to Star Wars. I did not realize as  a teenager that Lucas cast a lot of people who can't act (Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher and a handful of magnificent others aside.) It wasn't until the OTHER trilogy came out that it hit me--why, some of the leads were terrible! (Actors who played Anakin--both the young kid and the teenager/adult, I'm looking at you.) And what the hell is it with this Boba Fett character? Is he integral to the plot? What the hell did I miss by watching bad copies on VCD filmed in Malaysian theatres by hand-held cameras? Why do I think "Boba Fett" is some type of cheese or a middle Eastern salad? (Fatoush--yuuuuuuum.) What was up with the Clone Wars? Do I really have to watch the damn cartoon to get the link? I sat and watched all of Star Wars 4, 5, and 6 yesterday while nursing that bad back (yeah, yeah, quit lifting boxes) and while I finally got how he links into the original trilogy (aka "The Good One") I couldn't for the life of me recall much of the plot lines of the other trilogy. Yeah, he has a clone. Yeah, he has something to do with the Clone Army. Yeah, Hayden Christenson grows up to be  Darth Vadar. All I could think of was, "So?" And another thing: I remember some of the tunes in "Return of the Jedi" as being distinctly different, particularly the final victory song of the Ewoks, where it sounded as if they were singing "Celebrate the Light." What was that flutey thing they were dancing to in this version, huh?

Star Wars 4, a New Hope, came out the summer I was thirteen and I remember every minute of that first viewing. The theatre was packed, the audience was enraptured and very vocal, and I sat next to my Mom and Dad and best friend, Cindy Jean Eichelberger, and barely understood anything. But I loved it, and went back as often as I could all summer, until I finally could understand their names and the plot lines. (Poor diction, bad acoustics.) It's 33 years later, more or less, and I'm watching it again, but the thrill is gone. This is a week of loss and regret and sorting and saving and determining what stays and what goes, both physically and spiritually. If I could keep that excitement and joy, I would, and I hope I have: but I am done with other people's bullying and negligence and if that means I'm as alone now as I was at 13, so be it.

Leopard Print Crocs, Nerds, Klingon, and Mamma Wheeze's Chili Cheese Dip

At my age and time of life, I do prefer comfortable footwear. Sissy has accused me at times of being gay, but this is not due to my choice of footwear, but rather as the result of having been born with what she calls "lesbian fingernails." (They're short stubby nails on short stubby fingers.) I've heard from her since the tender age of 11 that I have them, and since I don't know of any way to genetically reprogram them to grow differently, they'll just have to do. However, I do concede that my shoes might well give someone pause. I have short stubby feet, too, little flat things that look fine in a rice paddy but which look ridiculous in pumps. Remember Petunia Pig? (She's the one on the left.) Well, picture her trotters and you have my feet and legs exactly.

I walk a lot, averaging at this time about 9, 240 steps per day (Ipod tells me so) and I can't do this, on city streets, in high heels. As thrilled as I am that Cole Haan teamed up with Nike, I still can't wear their pumps comfortably, even the "wide" sizes, although I do try. They may have made Oprah happy, but so far, they haven't done much for me. So, enter The Croc. Now, I'm not talking about the Croc clog, which is frankly hard for me to wear  but the little slip-on Malindis. I own several pairs, and the most darling ones are in leopard print. In fact, I have two sets of leopard print Crocs, one in cotton candy pink, another in a slightly more tasteful taupe (if leopard can ever be considered tasteful.) As adorable as they are, however, they are not the perfect shoe for Beijing.

For starters, it's hot and humid here, and I frequently get my feet wet. Beijing humidity, water run off from construction sites, and the occasional brief downpour contribute to make the dusty streets slick with a mucoid sludge which immediate infiltrates all Crocs and makes them slimy, inside and out. To walk in Beijing in Crocs after a rain storm is to take your life into your own hands: that sludge, combined with God only knows what chemicals, produces the sort of sliding affect best left credited to banana peels. I walked into a hotel lobby yesterday, in search of an international fax line (yes, I know, SO 1997!) and slid and skittered my way to the reception desk, bored hotel clerks gazing sullenly at me all the while, just daring for me to fall so they could act even more disdainful. At that moment I had an epiphany: time to get back into my I-Love-Them-But-They-Go-With-Nothing Mint-Green Nikes.

Crocs are popular here, and I'm sure they make a wonderful change for the ladies who usually teeter around in sky-high boots with pointed heels jacked up to Jesus.     I adore them, and I will no doubt bring a pair to Inner Mongolia with me, but I'm just not sure the leopard ones will do. Leopard is just Too In, and I feel as if pairing them with my traditional cat-eye sunglasses (with rhinestones) is a little too twee and maybe even the straw that breaks the camel's back and sends me over that line from "Cute and Fun"  to "Has No Taste Crazy Middle Aged Lady."

As for people thinking I'm gay because I wear comfortable flats, well, obviously they don't know me very well. I have only one female friend who is gay and I did ask her once over a very late cocktail evening what she sensed about me on her gaydar. "Supportively straight," she replied, without blinking. "Not gay, but nice enough." Talk about being damned with faint praise. "Nice enough"? Not "intriguing" or "sexy" or even "so kind-hearted"? So I asked my friend Andrew, who shares my interest in linguistics and therefore Klingon. Did he ever, for a moment, think I might be gay? "Well you do wear flat shoes," he replied, "But then again, your eyelashes are like a mile long, so I guess I didn't really think about it. Naw. I've seen you hit on too many guys at bars." So there you have it: I am a short woman in comfortable shoes striking out on Quiz Night. Maybe I should take my mother's advice and take a class in Klingon, so I can meet nice nerdy boys who can't tell what age I am, but are simply grateful to have someone to make the Mamma Wheeze's Chili Cheese Dip on D and D night. 

Mamma Wheeze's Chili Cheese Dip is a hot dip made of the two simplest ingredients on earth, namely, a can of chili (no beans please) and a package of cream cheese, mixed together over low heat until hot. You can dump cheddar cheese on top if you must. I add some green onion and Tabasco for kick. Serve with corn chips--Fritos is the chip of tradition. For my dearest friends, I make this with my superb two-meat chili (again, no beans) and home made tortilla chips.  This recipe came from a friend from my "Let's Study Chinese in China" days, which were amongst the worst in my life. The chappy who gave me the recipe could recite verbatim entire episodes of Star Trek (Original, Deep Space Nine, and Next Generation.) He got the recipe from his friend Weasel (known as the Wheeze) who lived in his mother's basement. When the gang came over to play whatever game young bright nerdy boys play, she would trot out a platter of her famous Chili Cheese Dip. Hence the name: Mamma Wheeze's Chili Cheese Dip. It was years before I could afford the ingredients, or find the ingredients, here in Beijing, but I served it semi-regularly back in the days when my nerdy friends came over to watch Star Trek. Not one ever hit on me: a lack of interest, perhaps, due to my footwear? Or my young daughter buzzing around them like a mosquito screaming in delight, "Do Worf again! Say it! Say it! 'Captain, I object, I am NOT a Merry Man!'" Well, since they don't read this blog (who does?) I will probably never know.

The Stories I Could Tell

Here are some of the stories I could tell: while I've never set a Hooters on fire, I have been fired by a group of pacifist Montessori teachers who not only let me know it was my last day via the sudden and immediate presence of Chinese cops in my classroom, but also by sending a parcel of attorneys to my house to threaten my maid and my kid. Yeah, that's a good one. I once went to a bar--in my hometown, if you must know--where I realized I had dirt on everyone there. I was a tofu-slinging waitress at the time being chased by the bouncer at the bar, a man who had served time for killing his mother, and who was now free and presumably full of regret. When I mentioned to my sister Sissy that he was after me, she sniffed and said, "Well, he always was  a Chubby Chaser."  I could write about the time I was leaving the set following the filming of my segment of a popular children's TV show, feeling very smug and quite smart in the best make-up job I had ever had, when a small child said, "Hello, Grandma!" to me. (I was not yet 40.) I could write about the poet who loved me and typed a manuscript of love poems with all eight fingers on the City Public Library over the course of one summer, but this did not end well, as I could not stand him and he, alas, felt The World Was Too Much With Him.  It was, but not for very long. I could write about the man who DIDN'T love me, thank God, but who made himself a knight's suit of armour out of a bunch of tin oil drums and dented pear cans, and who pierced his gypsy nipples way, way back in the 80's before ANYONE was piercing much of anything. I could write about a recording job I did last year with a born-again Evangelical pastor who wore a t-shirt of Christ's crucifixion with the following legend, "Body Piercing Saved My Life."  I could write about checking into a  Love Hotel in Tokyo for the night with a group of girls I sang with because we missed the last train home and the hotel was bigger, cheaper, and cleaner than the Hilton. We took baths and watched "Leave it to Beaver" on tv and that was it, swear to God, although my boyfriend at the time hoped it was a lot (a LOT) more.  My jobs have included: working tray line in a hospital cafeteria, a baker, a caterer, a spotlight operator, a dancer, a mime (please don't ask), an actress, a nightclub singer, a proofreader, a Wang Word Processing specialist, office manager, X-ray technician, dog sitter, Medical Assistant, Phlebotomist (I drew blood for a living) Textbook Writer, Script Writer, Poet,  Editor, Montessori Kindergarten Teacher,  Early Childhood and Elementary School Teacher, Reading Specialist, Realtor, Assistant Curator, Department Head, Tour Guide, cashier, waitress, dish washer, Intern to the International Education Department at a little university, Editor-in-Chief, Director of Education for a publishing company, Drama Teacher, Voice Artist, Model (Life Drawing.) Oh, yes, I grew up going to garage sales and helping my grandmother out with her table at the Flea Market, so you can add "huckster" to the list. The one career I really wanted--Housewife--has eluded me. So far nobody's hired me for the job, but I DID get to be a single-mother-with-world's-worst-divorce-attorney, a fact which is undisputed when you read the facts of the case. I have disappointed my mother tremendously by never working at McDonald's, which for some reason she considers a "fun" job. Well, it's too late for me to take up stripping, unless perhaps it's for the visually disabled (I wasn't going to be non-PC and write "the blind")   and I won't be going up any of those stripper poles either, even for a laugh. I'm about to start a new teaching job and as I do I'm thinking to myself, Is this really what I want to do?

Why All the Men In That Office Were Single

Chores and Cajun Meat Loaf

While I don't officially start work until the week after next, I have rather a lot to do this week. First of all, Monday I will do my Mysterious Jobs 2 and 3, namely work for a certain educational agency marking exam papers, then hop into a taxi and go to a recording studio and record something. With great luck, it will be a movie or cartoon to dub, but most likely, I will be reading dialogues for an English language textbook. As someone who wrote text books and worked in publishing for seven or eight years, I am familiar with the high quality of material that can be found in SOME texts: however, the ones I am given to record are cut-and-paste-off-the-internet affairs with a high percentage of recycled content, none of it quite correct in the first place. I have read about Mr. Brown and his clock collection at four different studios, eight different times for eight different clients over the past five years. I remember this dialogue very well because I can't get past this line without breaking into laughter: Mr. Brown likes it very much, but Mrs. Brown doesn't like it at all. (If you're a voice artist and you've read this line too, let me know. I want to trace its evolution.) I've also read the "You'll think we were mad!" dialogue about a weekend camping trip many, many times. So, that's Monday, a day spent on subways and taxis and hopefully with time squeezed in to go to Jenny Lou's to get minced beef (hamburger) so I can make my guest on Tuesday a Cajun meatloaf.

Tuesday, Lulu's best friend Spot comes over to "help me" with some things, namely finding out where I can plug in my phone (most of the outlets are just for show) and trotting me down to the local hospital to load up on my fill of the concoctions that keep me running. He's an omnivore, so with luck will stay for lunch so I can have the pleasure of watching him eat. He is what my mother calls "A Good Eater" which means that he will appreciate the wonder of my meatloaf, which has a nice crunchy top even if it IS made in the microwave. (Sugar--that's the trick. The sugar in the sauce on top.)

Wednesday, Thursday--finish cleaning up the wreck that is the back bedroom. Friday, take Duchess to Plato and Harry's to spend the weekend being spoiled in divine doggy fashion, while I hop a flight to Inner Mongolia on behalf of Job Number Two, The One Where I Test People. I'll be back Sunday, just in time to report on Monday to Job Number One, Full Time Teaching, and then off to Job Number Two, The One Where I Test People or Mark Their Papers.

Which leaves today, Sunday. Today's fun events include buying a bicycle, and finding my way by foot to the place where I'll start teaching next week. Trust me when I say it's more easily said than done. Roads are not clearly marked and I have never negotiated the way during daylight on foot. It's easy enough to think, "Right, got it," when you're being driven in a taxi at night, but on foot? During the day? Coming from the OPPOSITE DIRECTION? When you are not really literate? And there's no one there to hold your hand and guide you over the rough bits? Not exactly a piece of cake, but well worth the meat loaf if I do find it successfully on the first try.

Sometimes you just need a hand

Cajun meatloaf: There's nothing Cajun about this, except that like most people of French Canadian descent there's a spark in  me that lights up when I hear Zydeco. (There's also a picture of my great grandmother, one of two women in the shot. Dad claims we're descended from the white woman on the left, but we look a hell of a lot more like the black one on the right.) The recipe varies each time, depending on how much mince I was able to wrangle off the butcher, what sort of crackers I have on hand, etc. Basically, dump a half kilo (500 grams, about a pound) of ground beef into a microwave-safe glass bowl. Add one egg, half a sleeve of crackers, or four slices of bread, cubed and without crusts, or three or four  packages of Edo crackers, crushed, or some nice uncooked oatmeal (say, a half cup) and a healthy amount of milk. Also add catsup, chili sauce or Brown Sauce, a nice dollop. This gives it a bit of oomph as well as a bit of color: since you're basically steaming this in a microwave, you need a bit of help here. Season with Cajun Seasoning if you have it, or a combination of oregano, Tabasco sauce, chili powder, salt, and pepper. (You can get all of that here.) Mix in quite a lot, a good tablespoon or more. Don't overmix the ingredients, just blend until you have something  a little soupy and a lot of sloppy. If it's too dry and resembles Play Dough, add more sauce or milk. Too soupy? Add some more crackers, or bread, or even a bit of instant mashed potatoes if that's all you have on hand. (Note: don't buy instant mashed potatoes, they are library paste waiting to happen.) Smooth it nicely, then use your fingers to poke holes all over it. Top with a sauce of your choosing--say, ketchup with a bit of Tabasco, black pepper, and garlic salt (more on garlic salt later) or my family's favorite, a slurry of chili sauce, apple cider vinegar, Cajun seasonings, and brown sugar. (Taste this mixture until it seems right to you--I like it more vinegary, Lulu prefers it on the sweet side.) Shove into microwave: it takes about 20 minutes on full power to cook. It's done around 15-16 minutes but the extra time carmelizes the sugar in the topping and produces a slightly crunchy top that takes away from the  unappetizing fluffy grey steamed matter you'd get otherwise. If you're all fancy-schmancy and you have what we expats call a REAL oven (a toaster oven, for example) shove it in there for about 40 minutes. You may want to put tin-foil over the top for the first 1/2 hour, otherwise the top will get too brown. As for the garlic salt:  Lulu is allergic to garlic, and my sister disses anyone who uses it, but I like it on some things and even Sissy will eat something with a pinch of garlic salt in it provided I don't tell her it's there. I prefer to peel a clove or two of garlic and put it in the center of The Loaf, but to do so invites anaphylactic shock into the house, so I can't indulge unless of course Lulu is on another continent--which she is--and won't be around to help polish this off.  

Tomato Mint Salad

Well, I'm getting ready to run into The Big City to meet a friend for lunch, and as I polish off the last of the Tomato Mint Salad (which sometimes has cucumbers in it) I find I must add the following: don't let it marinate for more than six hours. It gets too soupy and the mint loses its flavor. The fact that I'm eating it now--at 9 in the morning on a Saturday--is not a testament to my thriftiness or its good taste but rather as example of how, when you don't have a garbage disposal and your toilet is temperamental, you will occasionally eat something rather than toss it in order to avoid lugging a big wet garbage sack full of drowning vegetables down three flights of stairs. Plus, as my mother points out, it's practically calorie-free, and I now have carte blanche to eat anything I can afford for lunch. Yippee.

I'm going to Inner Mongolia later in the week: with luck, I will have some good recipes to share. I'm working on some from Northern India and Western China--notably the naan I ate after a cab driver almost killed us because he insisted on showing me pictures of his Chihuahua on his cell phone while barreling down a highway at full speed, the men in the backseat (British, Australian, and Yank) screaming in terror--but they must wait. I am determined to get my false eyelashes glued in place and perhaps a foot massage before the sun goes over the yardarm. Or whatever.

Dinner with Gigolo, Part Two

Gigolo Boy never made it: evidently he was too busy flogging the latest Apple product on the streets of 'Beijing to hop on a subway and come all the way out here. The same paralysis that affects many people--the sudden inability to work their fingers and thumbs well enough to text a "regret" or even to dial and say those simple words, "Don't wait dinner for me"--apparently struck him as well. Such a pity. The Rose and I dined on baked potatoes, asparagus, and chicken.  (I forgot to put out the minted cucumber/tomato salad, and am having it for breakfast as I type away.)

This is my favorite way of cooking asparagus: after washing it and snapping off the yucky bits, I throw the spears into a frying pan which has a small amount of stock or water in it. They form a single layer and cook quickly this way. I cook them until  they're bright green and almost, but not quite, crispy-tender. I quickly drain out the water, then throw in a small lump of butter. I let the spears soak up the butter and brown a bit on medium-high heat until just about done, then throw in a squeeze of lemon juice, and a good grinding of salt and pepper. This releases a lovely juice from the asparagus: I swirl it all together to make a wonderful lemony-buttery sauce, then serve on a hot plate.

As for the chicken, I simmered it until it was barely done and still tender. After my guest arrived and was seated comfortably on the floor, bottle of Jameson's at one hand, remote control on the other, I slipped into the kitchen and browned the chicken in a mixture of butter and virgin olive oil. After a had a nice brown crust all over (I had breasts and drumsticks) I threw in a handful of dried cranberries and the liquid they had soaked it, namely, Cointreau, and made a quick and lively sauce by scraping up all the brown bits from the botton of the pan, incorporating it into the mix. This is quite nice, especially served with baked potatoes.

A hint on baked potatoes: electric circuits blow here quite easily, so to shorten the cooking time, I cut the well-scrubbed potatoes in half, and microwaved them until nearly done. Then fifteen minutes in a hot toaster oven took the curse off them, giving them a fluffy, dry interior and a crisp shell. The Rose asked plaintively if I knew how to cook them in aluminum foil and if I had ever used sour cream on them--I promised him that next time. Although I loathed foil-wrapped steamed potatoes, I'll do them for a friend, particularly one who serves as the contact person with my landlady: should she ever find me dead on the floor with Dickie fighting off the rats who are nibbling on my face, she'll know who to call. 

Consumed: Six potatoes, 40 spears of asparagus, three drumsticks, two sets of breasts, six raspberry Devil's Cakes, half a family-sized bottle of Jameson's, three trays of ice, 1/2 liter of Cola.

Viewed: Star Trek (The Next Generation, Season 7, some episode with Lwaxana Troi who is a favorite in our household) and The Danny Thomas Show ( aka Make Room for Daddy, Season 2, after they killed off the fantastic Jean Hagen) Also: assorted commercials from the 50's on a DVD I picked up at a supermarket in the US.

Discussed: New ideas for Chinese prime-time TV shows, early childhood education. Not discussed: although I kind of wanted a man's point of view about this bizarre date I'd had recently, it just didn't happen.We did, however, discuss the ongoing saga of a mutual friend's love life which makes anything on "I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell" sound like "The Total Woman." Ah, other people's sex lives----something to discuss when you don't have one of your own...

A Gigolo for Dinner

I cook the occasional dinner for my friend The Irish Rose, better known as "The Rose." He travels a lot, and he's not in town that often, but we do manage to get together every month or two for a bland dinner of creamy foods followed by an hour or two of Star Trek. I have always had nerdy male friends and cool male friends and somehow he combines the best of both camps, someone so side-splittingly funny that he can make me howl over his original lines but also someone who can imitate the best of Captain Kirk. What he can do with The Transformed Man will make you laugh yourself into a coma, not that Shatner needs any help with that.  I cook. He eats. We drink. We watch something, mocking it severely, our own version of MST 3000. He leaves. I wash the dishes and start planning the next meal.  Sometimes we meet up at swank hotels--the Raffles Bar is a favorite--and we are working our way through the cocktail menu at Paul's. After he's fully loaded he gets up and goes home to the wife and kiddies, who are all adorable and are probably used to Daddy coming home from Zanne's house full of cream sauce, potatoes, and bourbon. (At least he's smiling.) I have yet to see him vomit, but I do know he once got so drunk he couldn't walk, a story best told live.

So, we're having our monthly dinner, and he texts to tell me he's bringing a friend. Mild panic due to two reasons: first, I have just thrown out my back and am hobbling around using a cane for support, and two, I have just moved into a new unfurnished flat and while I have three kitchen chairs and a small table, I have no sofa and only one armchair. I texted back, suggesting we meet downtown. He replies that they're in the mood for home cooking and that they can sit on the floor.  This is what sweetens the pot: the other guest, someone I have met a handful of times over the past ten years, is a male gigolo.  (Why the "male" is added, I don't know: aren't female gigolos simply called whores?) He's gorgeous, he's British, he speaks fluent Chinese, and he's a London boy toy for the Mayfair set.

I'm not sure what to serve. The local market has chicken, but they don't have very good potatoes. I know The Rose was hoping for mashed potatoes and some sort of white sauce, but they don't have cream around here (I live in the sticks) and more than that, what DO you serve a gigolo? Isn't he used to champagne? Does pasta seem right to you? Surely beef steaks, filet mignon, foie gras, bleu cheese? Not here at the local Carrefour's. Plus, my back is killing me and I want to take it easy.

Well, the market downstairs has cucumbers and tomatoes, so I can make a simple marinated salad of fresh cukes and tomato slices splashed with Mint Sauce (really, just malt vinegar, mint, and a bit of sugar.) That will go well with just about anything and no one hates it (yet.) I'll make mashed potatoes, since I have a very good ricer, and I guess I can get chicken breasts and drumsticks (white and dark meat) and make a simple dish, chicken first simmered with a bay leaf with a bit of water until almost done, then fried in butter until it's golden all over. Easy enough to do on a two-burner gas stove (which I refer to as "cooking on blow torches".)  Starters? Screw 'em. The Rose doesn't particular like cheese and both of them will be into the family sized bottle of Jameson's I've kept for such an occasion the moment they walk through the door.  I wish I could get a loaf of decent bread--wish I had more butter, more cream, time to make a head of curried cauliflower...But I don't, and my back hurts, and the hell with them for making me cook. Plus, even if I had wonderful resources, I don't know what Gigolo boy likes to eat. I'm guessing that like many Brits he prefers the creamy and bland to a dish like my spicy Chile Con Carne, which uses beef and pork and takes two days to cook. I could make a killer curry dish, but  Rose has stated he wants "nursery food" and that's what he'll get. I do have one good thing going, however: I made my famous 1-2-3 cake last night, in chocolate, each cupcake with a secret filling of raspberry jam, with a discreet bittersweet chocolate glaze. There's a bottle of dessert wine too that my gay boyfriend Scott brought back from Paris. It should do, right? If only I had wine glasses (not yet unpacked.) Or better pain killers. Or...

Appreciative Males Exist the World Over

Some people think I'm VERY good-looking!

Mock Spaghetti

Being an expat parent can be trying at times. As a single working mother I never solved the dichotomy of being in two places at one time, even when I worked at my daughter's school. I also faced the challenge of keeping her Canadian-American cultural literacy intact--ie, she needed to know about poutine and candy corn and April Fool's and REAL Halloween (my favorite holiday.)

One of my traditions is to make "mock" food on April Fool's Day. Sure as shit, every year my daughter would forget that those weren't real cupcakes being served at breakfast, but rather mini-meatloaves frosted in blue mashed potatoes. Spaghetti was sponge cake (not Twinkies--you can get excellent fresh sponge cake here pretty much everywhere at any time)  with frosting piped all over it. The sauce was strained raspberry jam, thinned with a bit of brandy. To assemble:  Freeze the sponge cake, pipe the frosting all over it (I prefer home made cream cheese frosting) and freeze that solid. Strain the jam, thin with a bit of brandy, and warm gently. Let it cool, then pour over the sponge cake. Add malted milk balls as "meatballs" (I work them over with a little screen first to give the right texture) then serve to a child who is thrilled to have spaghetti and meatballs--and then starts wailing when she realizes mean ol' Mommy tricked her AGAIN.

Note: I have pulled this stunt every April Fool's Day since she was three, and she still forgets. And she still cries.  The third traditional trauma prank is a simple "fried egg" which is really a pool of whipping cream, half a tinned apricot, and "salt and pepper" made up of grated nutmeg. I traditionally serve the meatloaf cupcake at breakfast (WAAAH!) with the egg chaser (dessert) and the spaghetti is served as dessert after whatever reconciliatory meal I have been forced to whip out of my ass to keep her from going ballistic again.

Semi- Homemade my ass! That's real cream cheese frosting!

Why, do you ask, why do you TORTURE your POOR DAUGHTER like this? Simple. Because every 2nd of April, she stops crying about it and says, "That was pretty funny, huh, Mommy? Will you do it again next  year, PLEASE?" And lucky little Mommy takes taxis all over town the last week of March to find Whoppers and cream cheese and all, spends hours in the kitchen mixing it up in secret, only to be greeted with fresh wails and "OH, not AGAIN! WAAAAHHHHHH!"

Getting Around in Beijing

Rad, bad, and dangerous to know

As I have mentioned before, I am NOT here on some swanky ex-pat package and in my 18 plus years I never have been. I don't get a car and driver, and I can't afford a car. In fact, my respect for Beijing traffic being as high as it is, I didn't even have a bicycle the first fifteen years. Then I moved onto a university campus, stuck straight in the middle between the major gates, and I found I had to have a bike. First of all, taxis were not, at that time, allowed to enter, so I had to be dropped off with all my shopping and hike into the campus, gallon jugs of milk cutting off all circulation. Second, visitors who are too much of a pussy to bother to learn a few words of Chinese had to be picked up at the gates and escorted in least they get lost. No laughing, here--I have field phone calls from frantic would-be visitors who sobbed, "Tell the cab driver where I am! Tell the cab driver where I am!" to which the reply, "Uh, well, where ARE you?" seemed incendiary to say the least. Third, I developed plantar fasciitis AND a bone spur in my heel at the same time and gained about 40 pounds in a month from the combination of lack of activity and heavy-duty steroids shot one agonizing cubic centimeter at a time into the ball of my foot. A bike meant freedom and some mild cardio and it felt wonderful to feel the moist air ruffle through my badly cut fringe.

However, not all visitors have a bike of their own, and Lulu found herself, more than once, either in the driver's seat of her tiny bike, or perched daintily on the back. This is a photo of our friend The Rose with Lulu in the back. They are pretending to flash gang signals which are, perhaps, really gang signals in the Emerald Isle for "Where's me fewkin' pint, laddie?"

Hint: if you DO have one of those great ex-pat packages that come with car and driver, remember that your driver is NOT a baby-sitter and he gets time off. And for God's sake, when he attends his weekly English lesson, let him finish the damn lesson before you call  and ask him to buzz you over to the other side of the compound where you live. It's always the ones who interrupt their driver's lessons who complain about how bad his English is...

Duck! (And Proud of It!)

The title of this piece, Duck! And Proud of It! comes from the ill-fated Howard the Duck  movie which, quite frankly, I thought was funny at the time and would like see again sober and with the vantage of my 20+ years.

This is a shot which I am putting up to deliberately humiliate the asshole who, on my last trip to the US, claimed he had made Peking Duck for dinner for himself, the wife,  and the two kids. "Oh, it was hard," he said, "I spent hours in the kitchen, and used a ton of ingredients. But it was delicious."

I'm terribly fond of Peking Duck and eat it as often as my missing gall bladder allows. However, it is a tricky dish to "fill up on" and I can't imagine any child willing to sit and roll slivers of duck meat and duck skin into crepes when they could just as easily have French Fries. It is the grace note to a meal, not a hot dish like Tamale Pie which can BE the entire meal. "Really," I said, warming up to the task of goading a jerk, while my mother shot me warning glances that resembled not so much disapproval as trans-ischemic attacks, "You didn't have a problem with the plum sauce?"

Final step in three-day process

"Nope," he said confidently. "It was tricky, but I did it."

"What about the part with the pancakes?" I asked innocently. 

"Waffles," he replied hesitantly. "Like chicken and waffles."

"Wow! How did you get it to roast over a fruitwood fire? I don't recall that you have a fireplace,"  I asked.

He replied, "Any more coffee in the pot?" and headed off to the kitchen.

No Pooh

Some people just can't read (or wait.)

A lot of people ask about the toilets here. I must say, due to the careful planning of the Olympic Committee, the number and cleanliness of the public toilets in major cities shot up about 1000 percent, and it is  possible to find a clean place to pee just about anywhere. In fact, many places have state-of-the-art Totos which shoot clean water at your bits followed with a gentle blow-dry and final misting of deodorizing droplets, thus rendering the need for toilet paper obsolete. However, in older buildings, such as long-established restaurants, the standard squatter with limited ability to handle solid waste is not unknown, even today. One of the biggest shocks of my life was going to a fairly well-known and hip joint and seeing a sign in the ladies' which said, "No Shitting." I thought they were kidding. They weren't. A sieve was thoughtfully set into the toilet just in case.

There are many parts of the world--hell, even parts of California--where the plumbing can't handle toilet paper. But solid waste? And by that, I mean poo. I guess you just have to hold it. But considering the large number of tourists who, at any time, might explode into spasms of gastric distress, you'd think  the touristy restaurants would make more of an effort to handle the effluvia.

The above picture was taken one delightful summer evening last year at what is arguably Beijing's most famous Duck Restaurant.  No shit. 

I don't look like my father's side of the family...

Why I don't go home that often.

Back But Not Bitter

Well, first of all, I have to say that I have returned to my tiny apartment in one piece, although my love affair with United Airlines is definitely over. Yes, I know it was a flight to China filled with Chinese people but really---do you HAVE to lock up the toiletries before the flight even begins? And the food--disgraceful. One flight attendant, seeing my moue of distaste as I rolled back the aluminum foil, said, "I know what you mean, honey, we have to eat that too." Shite, badly seasoned, in small portions. This does not make me happy.

What did make me happy: The Dick's wild joy at seeing me. (Again, folks, that's the dog, not the boyfriend.) What did NOT make me happy: my landlady putting nails in the wall and "hanging" my artwork for me. But what the hell, she did fix the leaking air conditioners, so I should just be grateful. Another unhappy: my cell phone charger died, and since I couldn't find a replacement, I had to buy a new cell phone. And the little f@*ker at Carrefour sold me a phone WHICH TEXTS IN CHINESE ONLY. So today's triumphs will include marching down to Carrefour and making him eat it, while also picking up a lot of wire shelving. Did I mention that my new pad has no furniture and no storage--not even a closet? I am consolidating two big apartments' worth of crap into one much smaller place. I never realized before the importance of a linen cupboard to my sanity. Since I have seen--or spoken--to no one since I returned, the only thing keeping me half human is the DVD my sister thrust into my hands at the last moment. Yes, folks, I have watched half the first season of Here Come the Brides with deep enjoyment. I watched this show as a child with Sissy and she, in her eleven-year-old wisdom, would throw hissy fits about the women's hairstyles. "They didn't wear their hair like that!" she'd scream. Oddly, she never mentioned their heavy black eyeliner--it was the backcombing and bangs (particularly on Bobby Sherman) that made her insane.

Sissy has always been like that, a bit of a critic with an eye for anachronisms. Her comments on The Student Prince once made my father leave the room screaming in outrage, which I remember clearly as his screams of outrage usually made us scatter like leaves before an evil wind. But in this one case, he did the fleeing. It's just something that's in her, a deep-seated need to make sure everything is properly labeled. Upon seeing the first episode of the second season of The Partridge Family, she commented judiciously (again, age about 11) "Well, THIS particular episode was funny, but overall, the script still lacks depth." If you wonder where I get it from, well, I've just revealed the source.