This morning I got up and went to class, oh joy! It really is sad that I write off the half of my day for 5 days out of the week with a sentence or two, but there is really nothing terribly interesting to the outside reader that occurs at this time. I am learning an inordinate amount of Chinese, and sitting in chairs that were never meant to be sat in by someone my size! I got a little lunch at the make-your-own-soup restaurant, and then headed back to the dorm for by one-on-one class.
The, it was time for Bally. This place has really been my saving grace for the program. I don’t know what I would do if I couldn't exercise while here at the program, and I think that sentiment is echoed by the rest of the students in the program. It is also great to have somewhere that we can speak English unhindered. No teacher from our program would ever deign to pay money to do something so basal as exercise. We thus use the opportunity of being at Bally to hang around and talk after running on the treadmills, whilst we are working out on the machines or cooling off.
I returned to the dorm and finished Sherlock Holmes, finally. The Sherlock Holmes stories are simply brilliant. Then, I set to work writing and revising an essay that is due on the morrow about Nobel Prize. I worked until fairly late, around 8:30. No one wanted to accompany me on a dinner quest, so I took my supper at the dumpling shack. I didn’t know that the shack officially closed at 9:00, and I was the last customer there. However, I had the opportunity to talk to the owner of the shop, and he is a really interesting guy. He wakes up every morning at 4:50 to open the dumpling shack at 5:00, to a line of construction workers eager to get some breakfast.
He asked me what I knew about making dumplings, and I had to confess that I knew desperately little. “Who would you say has the best dumplings in the neighborhood?” He was boasting a little, but the owner was not lying when he says that he has the best dumplings around. I’m not kidding when I say that they are the best dumplings that I have ever eaten. “You only need to put four ingredients in dumplings: pork, green onions, joy sauce, and MSG.” I was a little appalled at the large quantities of MSG that I had been unknowingly consuming over the last 2 months, but that may have had something to do with the otherworldly tastiness of the dumplings. “And how does one get to make dumplings this good?” I was again in the dark. “You make them everyday from morning to night for 11 years. That’s how you make the best dumplings.” That is one way to do it.
While at the dumpling shack, there was a most peculiar incident in which a foreign-looking girl, who I presume was British, ordered 4 dumplings. One does not order dumplings by asking for one or two or three dumplings, but rather by the basket. This is a very essential part of dumpling culture, and people will look at you funny if you can’t order dumplings by the correct terminology. So the owner put on 4 baskets of dumplings, which was the closest thing that we could determine that she wanted. She disappeared sometime during the steaming of the dumplings, and we never saw her again. She must have thought that the owner said he didn’t have anymore dumplings or something… So, he had 4 extra baskets of dumplings, and I did the only humane thing to do in this situation: I ate another one, to the astonishment of the owner. Evidently ordering anything more than two baskets of dumplings is unheard of.
I rode back to the dorm, and studied for class on the morrow. When I was sufficiently prepared, I played some guitar. Then I caught up on some journal writing and got some sleep.
I’ll write soon!
Love,
Jamey
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