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Published: April 9th 2005
Our mandarin classes are doing really well. We already know how to say specifically what kind of meat we want to eat (which turns out to be very useful in most restaurants that offer from pig ears to whole frogs, passing by snakes and fish we never heard of).
As part of the classes, we had a trip to Suzhou, a city not far away from Shanghai (only 1.5 hours away) which we were told was beautiful.
Omar could not come since he had to work but I joined the trip with 30 other students and our teachers.
In fact, Suzhou is a beautiful city, full of gardens, flowers, stores selling silk and traditional buildings. Exactly the type of city you expect when you come to China.
Our teachers suggested we should try the local food and we all gladly agreed.
We went to a well known restaurant that served traditional food and the principal of the school ordered for us according to her taste.
Of course, before starting to eat, we wanted to wash our hands and we asked for the toilet (xi shou jian). The toilet turned out to be the public toilet
Gardens
You can learn more about Suzhou here: http://www.travelchinaguide.com/cityguides/suzhou.htm
in the center of the market... We did not feel like squating in such a place so we asked for the toilet for disabled people.
It was a "western toilet" but it did not have any door... We still used it since we figured no one would remember us.
We came back to the restaurant for lunch and we were offered several plastic bowls of soup; or more accuratly, clear broth in which different things were floating.
The first soup had some roots and some silky tofu. It did not have any taste at all. Later we were told that people love that soup because of its texture (I personally think that if it is food, it must have some flavour!!) nobody finished it.
The second soup had some sort of meatballs made of fish and sweet potatoes. OK but nobody finished it (actually the french students hated it)
The third soup was pumpkin-rice soup. I guess I can say it was "good" since it tasted familiar... but still nobody finished it. It seemed like baby food and we started thinking that maybe going to McDonalds had not been such a bad idea...
The
main courses were dumplings, egg rolls (that were delicious) and the highlight of the day: "Stinky Tofu".
At the beginning nobody seemed to notice the smell, but after a few seconds, the smell over took our ability to pretend we were enjoying the meal. What the heck! (we thought) we need to try it. And we did... It was actually pretty good but it was a challenge to get a piece to your mouth. IT REALLY SMELLED! (like sweety feet for those of you that want more details).
Later we found out they make it by fermenting the tofu with other stuff for weeks and then they deep-fry it. The result is a taste similar to cheese with a sponge-like texture. Still nobody could finish it.
How bad can it get? Newspapers reported that a stinky tofu vendor was fined $1,538 for violating an air pollution ordinance in 2001.
Dessert was a soup (yes, a soup again) made of sweet wine with some starchy balls and rice floating that was pretty disgusting.
The funny thing is that the principal that ordered the food for us, did not eat any of the "delicacies" she had
noodles and brought KFC for her dog.
In our way back to Shanghai, 2 girls threw up in the bus....
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anonymous
non-member comment
Sorry I missed the STINKY tofu!
Heyy Gigi!Wow, Suzhou food sounds like it is not even good enough for the dogs(since the dog ate KFC!)I think for future trips;we should consider wearing Depends adult diapers and bringing our own food.Not so sorry I missed the trip,now.We were having fun working out a proposal for housing on Saturday.See you in class! Ally P.S. loved the idea for using the toilet for the disabled! - Ally