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Date: March 9, 2005
Location: China
Everyone loves Chinese take away food, fried rice, spring rolls, sweet
and sour pork, all so delicious! However actually coming to China and
eating real Chinese food is an 'illuminating' experience. Dining in China
affords one singular opportunities, chances to eat plants, animals and
minerals you would never even imagine to be edible. Real Chinese cooking
lives by the motto 'waste not want not' and I feel this philosophy on food
is much more advanced than western culinary customs. But however correct
Chinese cooking is from a philosophical standpoint, however practical it
may be in theory, it does not guarantee that Chinese food is palatable.
Real Chinese food involves cooking and eating anything and everything you
can get your hands on and this leads to some amazing taste sensations for
anyone traveling through China. Any tourist who travels a little off the
beaten tracks of Shanghai and Beijing will find themselves often reminded
of the phrase 'there is a party in my mouth and everyones invited',
usually while spitting some part of an animal's digestive tract politely
onto the table.
I myself have had the delight to sample many exquisite Chinese dishes
while living in China. Since arriving here I've had the pleasure of
watching almost every anatomical region of a pig, chicken, cow, and sheep
pass my lips, all of them swimming in lethal amounts of MSG. On different
occasions I have eaten duck's tongue, duck's blood and duck's intestines,
and I'm on the look out for a bowl of duck's anus so I can complete the
whole set. I've nibbled on a diced frog complete with blotchy green skin,
munched on a jelly fish and quaffed the blood drained from a still living
snake mixed with wine.
But for me, the most memorable dining experience in China occurred late in
2004, during a seemingly normal night out with some friends. We went to a
hotpot restaurant, hotpot being a specialty of the region which involved
cooking your own food in a spicy bowl of broth at your table. The first
stage of eating hotpot is to order many small plates of food from a menu,
an easy enough task provided you can read Chinese. However all the guys at
the table that evening being illiterate morons, we were forced to stumble
through the ordering process, rattling off any Chinese we knew and hoping
to get a decent meal, in hindsight not the best policy.
Our mandarin served us well and we were able to order dumplings, beef
strips, potatoes, chicken, lettuce and many other delicious morsels, what
a feast! Suddenly one of us decided that one more dish was needed, a
simple plate of green bean sprouts, those small tasty balls of joy with a
moist tendril of white root protruding from the end. Bean sprouts,
delicious and healthy, what could go wrong? There was a pause... bean
sprouts, bean sprouts, bean sprouts... none of us could remember how to
say 'bean sprouts' in Chinese. In a moment of insight one of the guys at
the table grabbed a napkin and a pen and proceeded to draw a bean sprout,
from the pointed root tip to the long thin shaft to the ball shaped bean
at the end. 'Ah,' gasped the waiter, a smile crossing his lips, 'yan bian!
yan bian!' he repeated nodding. We nodded too, not having a clue what he
said but trying to pretend we were fluent Chinese speakers.
Everything was going fine, there was beer, jovial company and the promise
of a huge feast to come. Five minutes later it arrived, plate after plate
of delicious food which we scooped into the pot of boiling soup in the
centre of the table. There were strips of lean beef, rolls of pork,
skewers of chicken and sumptuous dumplings which we cooked to perfection.
So we feasted, and feasted and all was good with the world, and none of us
even noticed the fact that our bean sprouts were nowhere to be seen.
Towards the end of the meal however a strange vibe became noticeable
amongst the staff serving us, namely they were all crowding around our
table expectantly and murmuring amongst themselves. Then it arrived, with
much fanfare, a small white plate piled high with short round rods of grey
meat.
Realization hit me and I almost gagged in disgust in horror as I finally
realized what the waiter had said while we were ordering our beans. Yan
bian meant lamb's penis! LAMB'S PENIS!!! We grabbed the napkin which
contained our attempted rendition of a bean sprout, and sure enough upon
closer inspection it did look exactly like a long, thin sheep cock. So we
sat, four men, jaws agape, eyes filling with tears while staring at the
heaped dish of penis. There were over a dozen at least, some with
foreskins still attached, others bare and sweating, a grey shining mound
of animal manhood. We were being watched by the head waitress and all her
lackeys expectantly, they all waited to see if we would eat the expensive
delicacy they had prepared for us.
What were we to do? We each took a swig of beer, said a silent prayer and
feebly picked up four quivering dicks with our chops sticks. We held them
aloft at eye level for a moment, took a deep breath, and then 1, 2, 3,
down the hatch swam the pride and joy of one slightly less than male
sheep. My eyes bulged as the stiff, spongy rod caught in my throat for a
second, but, with a swallow it was gone.
The taste will stay with me the rest of my life.
Every ex-pat, tourist or backpacker who has been to this country has their
own Chinese cuisine horror story, so why not plan a trip here yourself and
join the club? In my opinion you haven't really lived until you've found
yourself staring at a pair of chopsticks laden with genitals.
- Robert
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