Highfalutin Prostitutin

Interest piqued by that suggestive title? Well, it is my brilliant translation of the bubble tea flavor "贵妃" (literally meaning imperial concubine). Faced with the insurmountable task of ever topping this linguistic delight, I hereby retire from the world of translation with a perfect 100% flawless translation record.

If you are a faithful follower of my blatherings then you definitely remember my love affair with bubble tea last summer. With Emily here this time keeping an eye on me, though, we've had to cool things down a little bit, but we still see each other once or twice a week. Perhaps the real reason I don't go as often is related to my coworker telling me he doesn't touch the fake bubble tea stuff because nothing in it is real. All you are getting is a cocktail of flavor-modifiers and various other stuff that doesn't do your body good. I'm not sure I totally believe it, but apparently I'm wary enough to cut back on my consumption.

Now it is time for my serious, thought-provoking paragraph. In case you don't read the news, China has serious food quality issues. The most publicized examples are probably the "recycled" (read: fished out of the sewer) oil some restaurants use to cut costs, and the poisoned baby food scandal from a couple years ago. I asked my coworkers, and they said food safety is a top public concern, but the government still doesn't do much to improve things. They explained that the government is basically only interested in keeping the peace and growing the economy. Insignificant social complaints are not their concern (especially when they control all news outlets). I wonder how long the government can maintain this attitude and still keep the peace?

Novel Novels

Lately I've been reading a lot. It's not what you think though -- it's way awesomer! I read about a genre of Chinese novels a while ago on one of my internet haunts, and soon thereafter bought one of the so-called Kung Fu novels. I picked one of most famous ones by the easier of the two most famous authors. (By "easy" I mean the author doesn't employ as many historical allusions and other hard-to-understand techniques that make the more difficult author harder for foreigners to fully understand.) Back then I was still in the US, so it took the full 8 weeks to receive the book. I meant to start reading it, but, you know, I didn't.

Not until after we came to Beijing, that is. I cracked it open, and man, was it fun. It's like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon but with way more cool Kung Fu and intrigue. The genre also embodies some of the enjoyable elements from "Kung Fu Hustle", like never being sure who the real Kung Fu master is. It was slow going at the start, but once I got used to the writing and the Kung Fu lexicon, I powered through the book at a pretty good clip. Now I am on my third novel by this author, and I ordered online the complete set of books by the other, more difficult author. Everyone seems to agree the harder author's books are much better, so I'm excited to give them a try.

Beyond improving my Chinese and being enjoyable, these books serve a third purpose. I now have something to talk about with just about every Chinese male I encounter! You see, these books are kind of like their Star Wars or Lord of the Rings - most guys read/loved/watched them as a kid. I also hear that you occasionally runs into references to these books in modern Chinese culture. Won't that be fun to finally "get" something without having to look it up!