TO READ IS TO EAT

Lunch, when I finally got around to it yesterday, was at a place where they know me, and automatically assume that a hot cup of Hong Kong Milk Tea will be required. And their HK-M tea is good. Not too sweet.
Served in a actual ceramic vessel, so that the man with Rainaud's Phenomenon in his fingers can finally get the circulation back.

The toes are another thing entirely, alas.

They would probably look askance if I curled my toes around my cup.

Gonna have to try that sometime.


If I had done so yesterday, I would not have been able to observe the tables to my right or left out of the corners of my curious eyes and ears.

To the left, in fairly rapid succession: 咖喱汁魚丸 ('gaa lei jap yü yeun'; fish balls with curry sauce), 涼瓜煎蛋 ('leung gwaa jin daan'; bitter gourd and egg) plus 飯 ('faan'; cooked rice), and 西吐司 ('sai tou si'; French Toast), which more properly should be called 港式西多士('gong sik sai do si'), "harbour (Hong Kong) style Western toast", that being a better term.
It's a peanut butter sandwich dipped in beaten egg and milk, sugar added, fried gold on both sides in butter, then dished up with a melting pat of butter and a generous drizzle of sweetened condensed milk. Your basic heart attack on a plate. Good for what ails you. Send you ten stories up on that rickety bamboo scaffolding for another eight hours, or back to the office till your twelve hour day is over.

Three different people. Washing it all down with 港式奶茶 ('gong sik naai chaa'; HKMT)，咖啡 ('gaa fei'), and another cup of 港式奶茶。

[Now pay attention. 咖喱汁 ('gaa lei jap'; curry sauce) is also called 葡汁 ('po jap'; Portuguese gravy). It often contains coconut milk, and starch, in addition to mild spices. Cooked rice (飯 'faan') is also spelled 飰, that being a variant that is less transparent phonetically. All terms like 咖喱 ('gaa lei'), 吐司 ('tou si'), 多士 ('do si'), and 咖啡 ('gaa fei') are 衍聲複詞 ('hin seng fuk si'; "spilling sound repeat words"); compounds written with characters that often cannot be used alone, may reflect onomatopoeia or rhyme, and should be read phonetically.]

The table to my right was occupied that entire time by a mother, her daughter, and her granddaughter. Grandma sounded normal, mom had a little girl voice, the child sounded quite grown up. I'm guessing that the youngest member of the party took after her dad, because cute femmie bleating from adult women makes them seem like complete idiots.
This bright five year old was distinctly not an idiot.
The cat ear hair thing would have been more suited to her mom.
But it did look restrainedly cute.



So for one table I got to participate by sight, one by sound.


My own lunch? 焗石斑魚飯 ('guk sek baan yü faan'); two smallish grouper steaks on a bed of egg fried rice, covered with tomato sauce (番茄酱 'faan ke jeung'), baked en casserole. It was quite tasty.




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