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http://youtu.be/wTSLRbm8L9E

It's time. See you in 36 hours, America.

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Checked the weather back home in Lansing to find an alert for a "heat advisory" wherein temps *might* feel like they've reached 100F. Then I looked at the current Chengdu weather where the air temp is actually 95F, and also thought about that time I visited Beijing when it was 104F. I guess Summer Sweatfest 2015 continues...

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I know I’m looking at a two week backlog of posts, but you’ll have to hang in there for a little bit longer. I’m utterly swamped with grading 128 essays before I leave tomorrow, so I’ve spent the past two days at my Maan replacement, Caffe Bene. Apparently they’ve embraced a very descriptive slogan (see exhibits A-C above).

A quick synopsis of my last two weeks includes: a bunch of stuff about UIP, my trip to Chongqing, my trip to the world’s largest building located here in Chengdu (called the Global City Center), Wangjiang Lou park in Chengdu, Beijing (including Tiananmen Square, the Great Wall, and the Olympic Park), teaching 128 Chinese students writing in 3 days, and going to KTV (karaoke) with my students!

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On my way to Beijing this weekend and I'm staring down some pretty intense temperatures. I'm already sweating. The first half of next week I'll be busy teaching a writing class to 131 students (yikes). So, perhaps late next week you can expect a slew of posts catching up on all I've been doing. Zai jian!

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More to come from Beijing, but for now enjoy this photo of me looking totally flustered (it is 97F).

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I realize I kind of left you all hanging with that last post. Not to worry - the duck head didn’t kill me! I’ve just been quite busy since I last posted. 

The four week MSU course ended on Friday and since then I’ve moved from my old apartment (tear) to a hotel closer to campus. The impetus for the move is that now we’re all participating in something Sichuan University (SCU) calls University Immersion Program (UIP). More on that to come in subsequent posts, but essentially it’s a two week cultural exchange where SCU invites students and faculty from all over the world to come and teach and learn together. It’s actually very amazing and I feel really excited to be a part of it! I’ve been told that no other university in China is doing something like this, so that’s pretty neat.

Anyway, the photos above come from a dinner I had with Lulu (my Mandarin teacher) last week. The name of the restaurant is something to the effect of “weird taste noodle”. Obviously you know I was on board. This all came about because Lulu and I were talking a few weeks back about my love for food and food culture. She asked if I had tried a “fly restaurant” to which I replied “no, what is that”? 

Turns out it’s exactly what it sounds like - a place where flies run rampant, meaning it’s not necessarily up to code if you will. Naturally I was excited about this idea and understood I would need a local to take me to such a place. Hence “weird taste noodle” restaurant became a destination. She said it’s well-liked by locals, so we had to go early. 

It’s a good thing she was with me as the all-Mandarin menu was written on a board tacked to the wall and the employees spoke no English. I would have been at a loss if I tried to go by myself. We ordered two types of noodles, a cold soup, and dessert. My favorite noodles were the spicy ones (naturally) that had rabbit meat - very tender! The other noodles has pork meatballs, but the flavor was akin to chicken noodle soup. BOR-ING! My palate has heavily adjusted to the spicy, numbing flavors of Sichuan food, so I wasn’t enthralled by those noodles. The soup was made of mashed red beans and was decent, but I didn’t fawn over it. The dessert is a very traditional thing served here in the summer that you can find everywhere. It’s called liang gao, and it’s like a gelatin with black sugar. So tasty and refreshing! 

There were two tiny kittens wandering the noodle shop the whole time, and at one point we were joined by one of them. Definitely something not allowed in the US - cats in restaurants! 

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Yesterday I ate a duck head for lunch. End of story.

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-Du Fu, Tang Dynasty poet It's raining and 70F here today and I couldn't be happier. Heat relief!

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Things I never thought I would say until now, thanks to China:

“Our FaceTime conversation was only dropped twice in 5 minutes - this WiFi connection is pretty great!”

“It’s 84F and 73% humidity, that’s pretty comfortable!”

“I ate a really great lunch cooked and purchased from 7-11.”

Yes, it’s true. My lunch today came from 7-11 and I don’t regret it one bit. Last week I was working at Maan during the day and kept seeing people walk by me with little take out trays. Like, a lot of people. Knowing that the only spots for food near Maan were Subway or 7-11, I assumed this was coming from 7-11. I recalled a friend of mine who lived in Japan once say that she would sometimes get sushi from 7-11 there, and it was pretty decent. Naturally I needed to investigate. 

I walked to the 7-11 and found a line snaking through the entire store. I frequent this shop as it sells all the life essentials one needs to survive. In all the times I’ve been there I had never seen it so packed. I had already eaten lunch, but took a gander at the food anyway. It seemed to look like the standard fare I’ve been eating, so I decided I would come back and give it a try.

Today was that day. I went a little after 11am, which was great because the lunch rush hadn’t hit yet. I was able to take my time looking at the dishes and decide what looked the best. This food is cooked on site from what I could tell, as there was a doorway where they kept bringing the food out. In no way would it surprise me that 7-11 here has a full sized kitchen. After living in China for 6 weeks, and seeing the fascinating things I’ve seen, I think it’ll take something really monumental to surprise me.

I chose some spicy green beans with chicken and a garlic potato eggplant dish. It came with a bit of rice and only cost 13RMB ($2.10). I carried it up to my apartment and felt like a real local. The food looked appetizing enough, and I figured if it was really gross I wouldn’t feel bad about tossing it out. Turns out it was delicious! Surprisingly great spice and sauce on the green beans, and a delicious garlic situation on the potato dish. The portion size was absolutely ample and I didn’t even finish my rice! 

I’d love to ask some of the Chinese students at MSU what their thoughts on 7-11 are. If I knew 7-11 was capable of producing cheap, delicious food, and then I end up with bupkis I’d be rather disappointed. 

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It has been noted (and appreciated) by some of my readers that I speak of food a lot on this tumblr. This should come as no surprise to anyone, as food and food culture is perhaps my favorite thing about traveling, and let’s face it - life in general. 

To show you that I sometimes get a little academic about it, check out what I learned in Mandarin class on Tuesday - how to read Chinese menus! It should be noted these are the first characters my teacher has given me since I’ve been here. So yeah. 

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Before I left for China, one of my main sources for Chinese intel said that Pizza Hut here was an experience and a half. Little did she know that my love for Pizza Hut and the PHut lunch buffet runs deep. Ask Eric or any of the guys he lived with senior year of college what we did every Friday for lunch. 

Anyway, I’ve gotten off track. So - I love Pizza Hut and felt I really needed to investigate. Turns out not only did I take myself there for a nice dinner on Monday, the students voted to go there for dinner on Tuesday, so I got a double whammy. This was completely fine by me because it meant I got to try even more offerings on the expansive menu. 

I would guess the menu was 30 pages, and it was conveniently marked with little green tabs (see photo above). They had E V E R Y T H I N G you could possibly want. It’s like they said, “hey this is a Western chain so let’s offer all the food a Westerner might eat.” I’m talking anything fried (shrimp, calamari, fries, Chinese stuff), large salads, pizza, pasta, Chinese rice dishes, and steak. About the only thing missing to complete this Westerner’s dream menu were burgers. 

On Monday I ordered myself a personal pan ‘Abundant Meat’ pizza. The crust tasted just like home and I was pretty stoked about that. The photo above lists the ingredients, but it was as close to the Meat Lovers pizza as they could get using Chinese encased meat products. I should also report that the sausage crumbles were EXACTLY the same as what we see at home. I was a fan. 

On Tuesday our group was so large we had to split into several tables. I was with three of the students, and thankfully it meant we would over order. We got a fried appetizer sampler that had things like calamari and butterfly shrimp. We also tried two pizzas - the Provencal Chicken and Bacon-wrapped Shrimp with Pesto. Both were pretty great. We opted for stuffed crust on the chicken pizza and I was delighted to find it was actual cheese! We also ordered Korean style and New Orleans style chicken wings. Not sure the flavor profile was a match for either, but both were delicious nonetheless. Finally, we ordered a beef mushroom spaghetti sort of thing. I didn’t try the beef, but I sampled the noodles and they were decent.

In terms of ambiance, it is certainly elevated from the PHuts in the U.S. in many ways. I actually went to two different Chengdu locations for these meals, but there are some consistent things at both: light jazz music, modern decor, decent art work, and heart-warming slogans hung on the walls.

All in all it fueled my love of Pizza Hut even more. 

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After I left the walls of the monastery, I spent some time in the surrounding neighborhood. Certainly there were many (many) stalls and shops selling the same stuff I’ve seen everywhere else, but I did manage to barter on a few gifts and a bracelet I’ve been eyeing since I arrived. I wanted a photo of the woman who sold me the bracelet in her shop because she was just so adorable and I felt like we really had a connection, however when I asked to take her picture she insisted that I get behind the counter and hold up the bracelet. So alas, you don’t get to see my special lady friend and instead just me, sweating. Again.

Rather than take the metro the entire way back to my apartment, I got off a couple stops early to see how the Chengdu metro handles transfers. As previously mentioned, there are only two completed metro lines, so there is just one single spot where you can transfer. This happens right under Tianfu Square (remember the Mao statue?), which is pretty cool and uber central. Of course there is a mall underground, but coming up the escalator gives you a pretty neat perspective of the city.

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Earlier this week I had a free afternoon so I ventured up to the Wenshu Monastery. 

Before I go any further, I should mention that when I wander around by myself in most of these places I have absolutely no clue what I’m really looking at, or what the history of the place is. Most of the time I look it up on Yahoo (which kills me a little bit - I miss Google!) before or after I go. That being said, I encourage you to do the same if you really want to know the history of the place. For example, check out this link to learn about Wenshu: http://www.travelchinaguide.com/attraction/sichuan/chengdu/wenshu_monastery.htm. 

Anywho, it was absolutely beautiful and completely serene. Many people were there praying to the various deities and Buddha himself. I also found the architecture to be really enjoyable and such a nice contrast to the modern Chengdu skyline I see every day. Photography is not allowed inside any of the temples, which means you just get some photos of the outside. However, the statues and such were absolutely beautiful, so if you ever find yourself in Chengdu be sure to check this place out!

There was a tea shop inside the monastery, but I still haven’t been able to come around to the idea of sitting and drinking warm tea on a hot day.

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A bit of the Cliff of a Thousand Buddhas!

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Awesome tai chi dancers at the Cliff of the Thousand Buddhas.

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As promised, here is my complete review of potato chips. Given how long I’ve been here, I’m actually shocked my count is only at 5. I think I’m just really into the regular food and haven’t had much interest in chips. 

Anyway, here’s the countdown:

5. Mexican tomato chicken flavor: I don’t know what Mexican dish they were trying to hit with this combo, but in any case it wasn’t great. I did somehow get a hint of chicken, which impressed me, but nothing really screamed Mexican.

4. Italian red meat flavor: I would assume this comes from a Chinese taste tester, because I didn’t really get an Italian vibe. It was a little on the sweet side, which is saying a lot given the Chinese palate tends to avoid sweet stuff. Overall it was just meh.

3. Seaweed flavor: not bad actually. I wouldn’t say it hit the nail on the head 100% with the seaweed flavor, but it got pretty close.

2. Cucumber flavor: nice and somehow refreshing. Never thought I’d say that about a potato chip, but it delivers. 

1. Numb & spicy hot pot flavor: they managed to capture hot pot in a potato chip. I was quite surprised and delighted that the chip did, in fact, numb my mouth as promised. Definitely the winner! And I’m uber sad I can’t get it at home. 

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For lunch yesterday I decided to switch it up and go Japanese. As much as I really do love sushi, I was still a little reticent to go raw. I’ve been very careful to eat cooked everything here and so far I’m doing well on the digestive front. I wasn’t willing to risk it, and decided udon was a good substitute. 

That being said, watching the sushi pass me by on the conveyer belt was still entertaining. And enlightening. For example, one roll was stuffed with liver pate and another basically stuck a mini sausage on top and called it a day (pictured above). All in all a good time. 

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After the Giant Buddha, we got to see a Buddhist temple and I was able to hear the monks starting their prayers. So amazing!! 

We also took a quick jaunt over to check out the Cliff of the Thousand Buddhas in Jiajang County. Turns out it’s not a normal tourist destination, which I totally loved. It was absolutely amazing and not crowded (an actual feat in populous China!).