Maotai gets worse!

Unbelievably the evil fire-water beloved of politicians of all levels is under threat from pollution in its water source. The source of the pollution, 39 drinks factories that have 'appeared' upstream from the Maotai plant on the Chishui River in Guizhou province. Presumably many of those factories will have appeared on the tacit approval of local officals and celebrated with banquets and the odd glass of Maotai.

Accept for the moment that I'm not much of a spirit drinker and that Baijiu of any form is, in my mind, listed at the number 2 vilest alcoholic beverage (the Scotch Whisky Lagavulin making it to number 1 - tastes of peat? Apparently peat tastes pretty damned foul) but it's hard for me to imagine that anything could harm Maotai and make it less palatable.

I always assumed that Maotai drinkers survived largely because it killed any micro-organisms in the drinkers body, kind-of an antidote to the food served at some banquets, so whatever they're afraid of in the river water it must be pretty bad...

Mexican Excitement

At last! Apparently Hangzhou is now home to it's first ever Mexican restaurant. Also apparently owned and run by Mexicans.

Pancho's
441 Xixi road
西溪路441号

Even better, it's open at lunchtimes and it's easy walking distance from the office!

A review will definitely be taking place shortly!

On Branston Pickle

Branston Pickle, originally uploaded by mick y.

Woe. The Branston has run out.

I am, sadly, one of those expats who likes their 'old country' food too much to live without it in regular doses. The oft aforementioned City Shopper service does us proud for many items - Oxo cubes, Paxo, Colmans Mustard, Sharwoods Curry Sauces and Basmati Rice but... no Branston Pickle.

Branston Pickle is a food that seems to unite the British expats here for their fondness of it (we even felt the national twinge when the Branston factory burned down in 2004).

I don't know how long Branston pickle has remained an oversight to the expat shopping service. The services (and there are lots of them) that will ship British goods to hungry expats all stock Branston and for a markup of only 1000% to cover postage and packaging will ship worldwide.

So, British expats, time for the rallying cry.... "Bring out the Branston! Bring out the Branston!"

Gag!

I've mentioned my fondness for hotpot on many occasions and particularly for Chuan Wei Guan (川味观) hotpot restaurant.

That's all changed now thanks to this expose (in Chinese) about a recent health inspection that uncovered that the used oil from the hotpots (delightfully "口水"油 or saliva oil) was being filtered and reused.

Apparently the local manager has appeared on the 1818 reality news show appealing to customers to come back because everything's OK, now. Apparently this isn't working at the moment though which, given that it's the incredibly busy Chinese New Year season coming up, will no doubt cost the silly, silly man a small fortune.

When is a Turkey not a Turkey...?

So, Christmas is coming and I live in China which means, amongst other things, life without an oven. My lovely new apartment will have one capable of cooking a turkey but as of right now, that's not the case.

So I contact a friend of mine who works in the nearby 5 star hotel who assures me that I can order hot, fresh-cooked turkeys through their main bar. Approaching the bar I was greeted in English so tried asking if I could order a turkey. Reply was 'No'.

So, switching to Chinese I asked the same question. Turkey in Chinese is 火鸡 (huǒ jī - literally fire chicken - don't ask me how that came about!) to which I thought I heard a reply of "啊,大火鸡" (ā, dà huǒ jī = Ah, big turkey!) and started fishing around under the bar, looking for the order forms I assumed.

Not being a smoker, I didn't know the vocabulary 打火机 (dǎ huǒ jī) - cigarette lighter - so was surprised when she reappeared with a box of matches. D'oh!

You come across people who won't listen to you because you're foreign (to whit, I parked in my local Carrefour supermarket and to get free parking you're supposed to tell your licence plate number to the attendant when you arrive (don't ask why he can't just read it off the car when you drive past him). I waited while the two people in front told him their numbers and he wrote them down. I then told him my number. And then again. He looked at me as if I was speaking in tongues and then shoved the piece of paper in front of me and gave me the age-old 'jabby finger' to write my own number down. This in trickier than it sounds because it begins with '浙' - one of the many, many characters I can read but not write. So I have to argue with him to write it down - at some point during this process, he obviously realises I was speaking Chinese and acquiesces.

Other people treat you as if you're simply senile or retarded. I purchased a kettle in the local InTime department store and the assistant carried out the whole transaction as if she were a mime. I did, to be fair, let her continue to do so by not speaking to her until the end as it was quite amusing. My favourite bit as she unboxed the kettle was that she got the instruction booklet out and then pointed to part of a page that was all in Chinese that explained that there was a two year guarantee on the product. I had to chuckle that she's not said a word on the assumption that I can't speak Chinese but then assumes that I can read it.

I guess you need the odd "Turkey=Cigarette Lighter" incident to remind you that you're not easy to understand after all.