Pizza! We've found pizza in China! Actually we found a Papa Johns and they deliver. The cast is all twitter-pated about getting pizza tomorrow on our lunch break. Our "hunting and gathering" has been quite an experience here. Rarely is there any English speaking person to help us. There is more than I expected but it's still a rare commodity when we find a menu in English.
Let's talk about the food first. There is no Chinese food as we know it. And everything tastes different, I think it has to do with the oil and water. They don't have cooking oil as we know it, it tastes different. And the water is a different creature all together. We were warned early not to drink the tap water but to get all of our water bottled. Were told that our systems will acclimate eventually. The more adventurous of our troupe have found interesting places to eat. We've all found that we should probably stay away from the KFC and McDonalds. It's not uncommon to walk down the street and see some sidewalk vendor throw a squid on his hot plate and sell it. Right now I'm munching on Lays Kiwi Potato Chips.
On one of our dinner hunts, we were walking down a street and some random Chinese man says "hello". We immediately stop and pelt him with questions about where to eat. He ran away. If you thought the word "Coke" was universal, it isn't. Even though the bottles and cans say Coke, that's not how you order it. Ku la (koo-la) is cola and that's the only word for it. Don't dare ask for a Sprite!
Our first night (the one where the man ran from us) we found a restaurant owned by a local merchant, Mr. Lee. He spoke some English and was very pleasant and helpful. We shared many dishes amongst ourselves but the hit of the night was the broccoli. We wiped him out of everything he had it was so good. Oh, by the way, I've gotten pretty good with the chopsticks. I had spaghetti today at lunch and totally used my chopsticks. I picked up some items at a convenience store. I picked up the Kiwi chips and something called Peach Juice Drink. It's not so good.
Across the street from our hotel in Suzhou is a Benihana kind of place. It's very tasty although I wasn't fond of the pickled radishes.I had chicken and broccoli and an amazing fried rice. Steamed rice thrown on the grill with some oil. Then they added a couple of eggs. After that they added beef and seasoning topping it off with sliced jalepeno looking peppers. Very tasty. I wish they were open for breakfast. Breakfast at the hotel consists of a buffet of dumplings, fruit and bacon. Yes BACON! I'm tempted to shove the stuff in my pockets.
Well, that's all about the food. Maybe I'll talk about the crazy traffic and the crazier drivers. Enjoy the pictures that we all put up at
www.flickr.com. Just look for famecast09. Now I'm insanely tired after a 12 hour rehearsal. We've got another one tomorrow. Until then, g'night!
P.S. - Skype me at richardseanevans I'm usually on around 10-11 am and 6-7 pm U.S. time.