Lordy, I must be radiating something. On the bus over the hill a curvy young blonde was staring at me and licking her lips. And less than an hour ago, a busty Philippina came over to where I was sitting in the bar and introduced herself.
These are promising developments. And yes, both of them were what a normal man would consider hot.
It's been years since such things happened. Maybe I wasn't aware of it before.
Or maybe, I wasn't broadcasting so well.
Whatever it is that I'm broadcasting.
Need to bottle this.... once I figure out what it is.
Back in the early nineties, while I was enjoying a nice quiet drink at the Edinburgh Castle - hard to do, what with the band playing 'Bang Me, Esmerelda' at full blast - a young thing with fabulous (!) mammaries tried to put the make on me. After several minutes of heavy breathing in my direction, she flopped out one of her endowments and started massaging it while making suggestive remarks. I did not react.
Honestly, what do you say at that point? "Young lady, put that AWAY!?"
Nope, you have to pretend that it doesn't exist.
Just say to yourself: "there is no pink fruit looking me in the eye, there is NO pink fruit looking me in the eye!"
Then repeat that like you really believe it.
After several minutes of pregnant play with a rosy part, she finally asked me if I was threatened by her femininity.
"No ma'am - not threatened. Appalled, yes, threatened, no."
Let's just say it was a bar-conversation that went nowhere, fast.
"THERE IS NO PINK FRUIT LOOKING ME IN THE EYE!"
But there just as well might be. Two young ladies were impressed by this old fossil. Oh my.
But the very best thing, by a very wide margin, was the young miss at the eatery in Chinatown. Not what you would call a sex-bomb. Just extremely nice looking. Very appealing.
She had an unstudied and unconscious charm - freshness and honesty, sincerity and warmth. When I ordered in Cantonese, her eyes just lit up.
Clearly I was as interesting to her, and conceivable far more so, than the young couple at the next table. That being a petite young miss with the look of a Teochew from Vietnam, with a blushing Caucasian gentleman. From my point of view, I really couldn't see what that little lady saw in him (well, other than his dewy unformed pinkness), but were I him I would very well understand her appeal. Moist fresh fruit, juicy looking, temptation mixed with vibrant girlishness.
They looked very sweet together. Very teenage.
But I had something that neither of those two had. Maybe it was my recent haircut (neat and distinguished), maybe my shy smile (very appealing, let me tell you). Perhaps my cleanly trimmed beard? It's dashing, in a pirate-like way. Or perhaps my ability to sound half-way civilized in a normal human language.
That may have been it. Yes. Along with a certain gentleness - I am vulpine, but not wolfish.
I really doubt that it was pheromones.
Wonton noodle soup, and Vietnamese coffee with ice and condensed milk. In the middle distance, a young lady with a very kind and expressive face, charming eyes. There's just something so adorable about a girl accoutred in a no-nonsense "I am just here to work" fashion. Especially when her visage has character, and shows an active intelligence and inquisitiveness.
As well as one of the most likeably smiles I've ever seen.
Probably the best lunch I've had in a long time.
I'll gladly toss over the Philippina and the blond. But I'm definitely going to that restaurant in Chinatown again.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Sunday, January 16, 2011
INSCRUTABLE ORIENTAL - DON'T BUG ME, I'M DISTURBED ENOUGH ALREADY!
It is very early in the morning. When I caught the bus there was a line outside of Bob's Doughnuts - all happy people. Pleasantly tiddly. The present fog presents yellow circles of haze around the street lights. Beautiful, yet immaterial.
Golden haloes in the mist.
Tonight I have listened to karaoke, and heard the very gates of hell. San Francisco, after closing time. Back to the office.
But no matter.
I wish to present a few youtube moments.
The first one is a classic.
Bus Uncle - Ba Si Ah Sook:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsYRQkmVifg
In this clip, a Cantonese gentleman shows both his most eloquent side, and represents the Hong Kong salt of the earth at its expressive best - vituperative, foul mouthed, wishing one primary action upon your maternal relative.
Oh, also completely off his rocker. Beauty.
Seeing as 'bus uncle' mentions reproductive acts several times, he deserves to be embedded:
BUS UNCLE
There then. Wasn't his insistence upon congressional action, in all of its parameters, totally charming?
The second video is a woman who wants sharkfin soup. Lordy, that desire fills her world. Whatever else may happen, she is intent upon that specific goal.
Please enjoy her persuasiveness here:
SHARK FIN SOUP
Having seen the video, we both feel for her, don't we? Surely sharkfin soup is the best thing in the known universe? Anything more soul-satisfying there cannot be!
This woman would agree:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ue1SAgWHygM&feature=related
As a third item, I would like to present the woman who missed her flight.
NO BOARDING FOR YOU!
Indeed, how could it come to this? Maybe you shouldn't have stopped for snackies? Damned shame in any case - they should have held the flight.
You cannot be blamed for being late.
And this wonderful clip shows the Cantonese interpersonal dynamic better than anything else.
MUNI BUS SMACKDOWN
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rm4SazjKsQ&feature=related
It's the only clip that needs no translation.
屌!!!
All of these embedded videos illustrate Cantonese people in action.
Really, whoever came up with the term "inscrutable Oriental" sure wasn't talking about this bunch. No one who operates at full volume deserves the sobriquet 'inscrutable'.
More scrutable than these people you cannot get.
How can you not love them?
They're operatic.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Golden haloes in the mist.
Tonight I have listened to karaoke, and heard the very gates of hell. San Francisco, after closing time. Back to the office.
But no matter.
I wish to present a few youtube moments.
The first one is a classic.
Bus Uncle - Ba Si Ah Sook:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsYRQkmVifg
In this clip, a Cantonese gentleman shows both his most eloquent side, and represents the Hong Kong salt of the earth at its expressive best - vituperative, foul mouthed, wishing one primary action upon your maternal relative.
Oh, also completely off his rocker. Beauty.
Seeing as 'bus uncle' mentions reproductive acts several times, he deserves to be embedded:
BUS UNCLE
There then. Wasn't his insistence upon congressional action, in all of its parameters, totally charming?
The second video is a woman who wants sharkfin soup. Lordy, that desire fills her world. Whatever else may happen, she is intent upon that specific goal.
Please enjoy her persuasiveness here:
SHARK FIN SOUP
Having seen the video, we both feel for her, don't we? Surely sharkfin soup is the best thing in the known universe? Anything more soul-satisfying there cannot be!
This woman would agree:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ue1SAgWHygM&feature=related
As a third item, I would like to present the woman who missed her flight.
NO BOARDING FOR YOU!
Indeed, how could it come to this? Maybe you shouldn't have stopped for snackies? Damned shame in any case - they should have held the flight.
You cannot be blamed for being late.
And this wonderful clip shows the Cantonese interpersonal dynamic better than anything else.
MUNI BUS SMACKDOWN
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rm4SazjKsQ&feature=related
It's the only clip that needs no translation.
屌!!!
All of these embedded videos illustrate Cantonese people in action.
Really, whoever came up with the term "inscrutable Oriental" sure wasn't talking about this bunch. No one who operates at full volume deserves the sobriquet 'inscrutable'.
More scrutable than these people you cannot get.
How can you not love them?
They're operatic.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Friday, January 14, 2011
CANTONESE OBSCENITIES
For twenty one years I've been the outcaste, the dark secret; now she wants to introduce HIM to her kinfolk.
For twenty one years, I didn't cheat on her, I held her above all others, I always came home to HER.
But HIM she'll include in the family.
Can you tell that I'm a bit bitter now? Do you perceive that for some strange white dude reason I feel a sense of betrayal?
I did everything right for twenty one years. I was a gentleman, and I'm still a gentleman.
I did not allow myself to take risks, I didn't tell my employers to go hump their camels, I didn't quit jobs and move to South America.
I turned down luscious young things in bars, I didn't stay out all night dancing with Babylonian whores.
I was, in every way I could conceive of, as decent a fellow as I knew how to be.
It counts for nothing. Because I somehow managed to not read the signs. She must've spent months thinking about it. And it no longer worked for her. Probably from early 2010 on, she reinterpreted, and obsessed about, our relationship. By spring she started to give up. And because of Aspergers syndrome, she vexed and worried, and could not even realize how much she meant to me, that our oneness kept me afloat - she couldn't see it, she couldn't understand what I should have communicated better - and she let it slide.
A normal woman would, after so much shared history, perhaps have talked about it.
Dammit.
She, instead, fixated on the aspects that didn't work for her.
It festered.
All through those last months it fermented, it rotted in her estimation. Her own secret tunnel vision hell. She should have shared.
She broke off a relationship of twenty one years in the summer. I didn't see it coming, she hadn't said anything. We're both on the Aspy spectrum - it excuses her entirely, she's worse than I am. But maybe a fully normal man might have noticed a few clues.
My obliviousness prevented me from recognizing portents, her major Aspergers kept her from seeing how it would, how it did, affect me.
Would I have done anything different?
Yes. And no.
She has been probably the best thing that happened to me. She kept me sane. She kept me from pursuing a weird and flaming finality.
She still does.
And oddly, I am now the stronger person in what's left of our "relationship".
She tells me about him. She weeps on my shoulder when her situation with THAT man is not evenkeeled. She reveals her frustrations.
She listens to me - I am the person she has known best for twenty one years, her entire adult life. I can finish her sentences, as she does mine. Who knows her better? And I comfort her when things get rough.
So yes, the fact that she has finally decided to do the right thing - no longer hide her life from her family, admit that she is not the perfect Chinatown daughter - hurts.
Dammit all, it hurts. Because I was there for twenty one years - I held her when she wept over the deaths of people she loved. I was the person who stood by her when she was frustrated with her brothers or angry at her sisters-in-law. I was there when her mom came down on her and made her suicidal. I explained her weird Chinese family dynamics to her - things that she experienced and should've understood, yet had not the exposure or reading to figure out.
And I never even met the people who always made her miserable - I know them vicariously, but they never heard about me.
Yet, when all is said and done, after twenty one years, I am the "roommate", the best friend, the wise elder - but HE is the son-of-a-bitch whom she wishes her family to accept.
It is as if I do not exist.
Frankly, this whole situation stinks for me.
I am happy that she is 'going straight' with her life.
But dammit, I deserved better.
Oh, and by the way - all of you Chinatown folks who kept saying that I should find a nice Cantonese girl, why heavens, a kwailo who speaks our language really should hook up with someone Chinese - except heaven forefend it would be one of YOUR daughters - go f*ck yourselves.
It is your g-ddamned subculture and biases that made this happen, your venomous attitudes that dominated our lives for over two decades and kept everything in the shadows.
It was your horrid preconceptions and miserably patronizing opinions of whitey, your sneering disapproval of Chinese-American women dating outside the tribe, that informed the secrecy that we kept.
Even if, ESPECIALLY if, the person she was attracted to was a clever white boy, "yat goh ho lek-ge sei-fan-gwai".
And every time you found out that I spoke Cantonese better than her, you treated her like garbage, and acted like I was some kind of misguided well-trained pale monkey - oooh, smart kwailo, why ARE you seeing this stupid girl?
Yeah, screw you, and screw your inability to value your daughters, screw your racism, and screw your sexist dominating bitch-ass insistence that whitey is just not suitable for a decent Chinese woman to associate with; and above all screw your idea that a Cantonese-American girl with TWO college degrees, a good person with sound values, intelligence, kindness, common sense, and a deep and abiding ability to grasp what is right and good in this world, has done something irredeemably wrong by hanging out with a lofan.
Do I blame Savage Kitten? No.
I blame her mom. I blame her brothers. I blame her classmates, her neighbors, her pissy sisters-in-law, her Chinatown relatives, her entire friggin' verkrampte golden ghetto background plus the Chinese-American teachers who thoroughly support and enable the rottenness, AND that miserable misogynist writer Frank Chin with his racist 'screw whitey' mentality, all the Chinese-American female authors pimping their 'we're so unique' ideology, priggish Chinese-American boys who look down their pudgy noses at chicks with Caucasian boyfriends, Hong Kong immigrants sneering that they (and only they) are maintaining the proper values, all the old-timers who refer to the American-born generation as jook-sing, and the entire Confucian paternalist value system itself - both the high-fallutin' antique inheritance and the folk-culture toxic virus that is its modern-day continuation - which insists that girls are inferior and not entitled to make their own life-decisions.
I blame the immigrant Toishanese peasants who enforce a rigidly narrow-minded social orthodoxy, I blame the ethnocentricism and boastful cultural superiority that permeates the Chinatown family associations and guilds, and most especially do I blame the humongously inflated sense of self-worth so characteristic of every single frikkin’ Chinese-American intellectual blustering that his or her own family’s personal history is miraculously unique and how the hair-shirt and barbed wire straightjacket of Chinese-American cultural tradition is beautiful, meaningful, and infinitely precious.
They're ALL maladjusted pissants.
Screw orthodoxy. Screw ethno-centrism. Screw poisonous tradition.
Screw those male-chauvinists and their spiteful brainwashed bitches.
Oh yeah..... screw her new boy friend too. Stupid dumb-ass white guy.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
For twenty one years, I didn't cheat on her, I held her above all others, I always came home to HER.
But HIM she'll include in the family.
Can you tell that I'm a bit bitter now? Do you perceive that for some strange white dude reason I feel a sense of betrayal?
I did everything right for twenty one years. I was a gentleman, and I'm still a gentleman.
I did not allow myself to take risks, I didn't tell my employers to go hump their camels, I didn't quit jobs and move to South America.
I turned down luscious young things in bars, I didn't stay out all night dancing with Babylonian whores.
I was, in every way I could conceive of, as decent a fellow as I knew how to be.
It counts for nothing. Because I somehow managed to not read the signs. She must've spent months thinking about it. And it no longer worked for her. Probably from early 2010 on, she reinterpreted, and obsessed about, our relationship. By spring she started to give up. And because of Aspergers syndrome, she vexed and worried, and could not even realize how much she meant to me, that our oneness kept me afloat - she couldn't see it, she couldn't understand what I should have communicated better - and she let it slide.
A normal woman would, after so much shared history, perhaps have talked about it.
Dammit.
She, instead, fixated on the aspects that didn't work for her.
It festered.
All through those last months it fermented, it rotted in her estimation. Her own secret tunnel vision hell. She should have shared.
She broke off a relationship of twenty one years in the summer. I didn't see it coming, she hadn't said anything. We're both on the Aspy spectrum - it excuses her entirely, she's worse than I am. But maybe a fully normal man might have noticed a few clues.
My obliviousness prevented me from recognizing portents, her major Aspergers kept her from seeing how it would, how it did, affect me.
Would I have done anything different?
Yes. And no.
She has been probably the best thing that happened to me. She kept me sane. She kept me from pursuing a weird and flaming finality.
She still does.
And oddly, I am now the stronger person in what's left of our "relationship".
She tells me about him. She weeps on my shoulder when her situation with THAT man is not evenkeeled. She reveals her frustrations.
She listens to me - I am the person she has known best for twenty one years, her entire adult life. I can finish her sentences, as she does mine. Who knows her better? And I comfort her when things get rough.
So yes, the fact that she has finally decided to do the right thing - no longer hide her life from her family, admit that she is not the perfect Chinatown daughter - hurts.
Dammit all, it hurts. Because I was there for twenty one years - I held her when she wept over the deaths of people she loved. I was the person who stood by her when she was frustrated with her brothers or angry at her sisters-in-law. I was there when her mom came down on her and made her suicidal. I explained her weird Chinese family dynamics to her - things that she experienced and should've understood, yet had not the exposure or reading to figure out.
And I never even met the people who always made her miserable - I know them vicariously, but they never heard about me.
Yet, when all is said and done, after twenty one years, I am the "roommate", the best friend, the wise elder - but HE is the son-of-a-bitch whom she wishes her family to accept.
It is as if I do not exist.
Frankly, this whole situation stinks for me.
I am happy that she is 'going straight' with her life.
But dammit, I deserved better.
Oh, and by the way - all of you Chinatown folks who kept saying that I should find a nice Cantonese girl, why heavens, a kwailo who speaks our language really should hook up with someone Chinese - except heaven forefend it would be one of YOUR daughters - go f*ck yourselves.
It is your g-ddamned subculture and biases that made this happen, your venomous attitudes that dominated our lives for over two decades and kept everything in the shadows.
It was your horrid preconceptions and miserably patronizing opinions of whitey, your sneering disapproval of Chinese-American women dating outside the tribe, that informed the secrecy that we kept.
Even if, ESPECIALLY if, the person she was attracted to was a clever white boy, "yat goh ho lek-ge sei-fan-gwai".
And every time you found out that I spoke Cantonese better than her, you treated her like garbage, and acted like I was some kind of misguided well-trained pale monkey - oooh, smart kwailo, why ARE you seeing this stupid girl?
Yeah, screw you, and screw your inability to value your daughters, screw your racism, and screw your sexist dominating bitch-ass insistence that whitey is just not suitable for a decent Chinese woman to associate with; and above all screw your idea that a Cantonese-American girl with TWO college degrees, a good person with sound values, intelligence, kindness, common sense, and a deep and abiding ability to grasp what is right and good in this world, has done something irredeemably wrong by hanging out with a lofan.
Do I blame Savage Kitten? No.
I blame her mom. I blame her brothers. I blame her classmates, her neighbors, her pissy sisters-in-law, her Chinatown relatives, her entire friggin' verkrampte golden ghetto background plus the Chinese-American teachers who thoroughly support and enable the rottenness, AND that miserable misogynist writer Frank Chin with his racist 'screw whitey' mentality, all the Chinese-American female authors pimping their 'we're so unique' ideology, priggish Chinese-American boys who look down their pudgy noses at chicks with Caucasian boyfriends, Hong Kong immigrants sneering that they (and only they) are maintaining the proper values, all the old-timers who refer to the American-born generation as jook-sing, and the entire Confucian paternalist value system itself - both the high-fallutin' antique inheritance and the folk-culture toxic virus that is its modern-day continuation - which insists that girls are inferior and not entitled to make their own life-decisions.
I blame the immigrant Toishanese peasants who enforce a rigidly narrow-minded social orthodoxy, I blame the ethnocentricism and boastful cultural superiority that permeates the Chinatown family associations and guilds, and most especially do I blame the humongously inflated sense of self-worth so characteristic of every single frikkin’ Chinese-American intellectual blustering that his or her own family’s personal history is miraculously unique and how the hair-shirt and barbed wire straightjacket of Chinese-American cultural tradition is beautiful, meaningful, and infinitely precious.
They're ALL maladjusted pissants.
Screw orthodoxy. Screw ethno-centrism. Screw poisonous tradition.
Screw those male-chauvinists and their spiteful brainwashed bitches.
Oh yeah..... screw her new boy friend too. Stupid dumb-ass white guy.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Thursday, January 13, 2011
URBAN LEGEND: YOUTUBE WILL REMOVE IT UNLESS YOU WATCH IT. YES, YOU. ONLY YOU. IF YOU DON'T WATCH IT NOW, THE WORLD WILL END AND PUPPIES DROWN!
Recently someone sent me an e-mail begging me to view something on Youtube, and tell others to do so, lest the poor deserving video be yanked for not generating enough hits.
Hmmmph!
Youtube does not take stuff down because it's unpopular.
Youtube takes down stuff because it sucks. For which the working definition is that it promotes hate or violence, shows and/or lauds breaking of certain laws, or infringes upon copyright.
Hits have absolutely nothing to do with it.
When you are viewing youtube, you will likely notice all the other stuff listed......... plus the advertising (usually in top right corner of your screen).
Plainly put, they want you to watch. They don't care what you watch. As long as you watch. You're bound to click one of the other videos sooner or later.
Or actually join their cult
There's stuff on Youtube of not even questionable interest to anyone, barely a few hundred hits......
Videos such as this one (473 views, uploaded 1 year ago):
http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7F_5-QasTA
['Sing a Long Leading to Balkan Sobranie']
Or this CLASSIC, showing a distinguished gentleman smoking a Falcon pipe while talking about a British tobacco that is heavy on the Latakia (298 views, uploaded 1 year ago):
http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=sLDp56iv18o
['Commonwealth Mixture']
Seeing as I doubt that my readers will actually click on either of those links, I'll embed the Falcon-smoker and his fine English mixture. Go ahead, watch it. You don't even have to leave this blog to do so.
Tempting, what?
MISTER HEILBUTT DISCUSSES SAMUEL GAWITH'S COMMONWEALTH MIXTURE
As he says, Commonwealth is "angenehmer, kühler langsamer Abbrand - leider nur medium und nicht full wie auf der Dose steht."
For more about Samuel Gawith, see this link:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2010/07/clean-wholesome-habits-only.html
For my own review of Commonwealth mixture, go here:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2008/08/good-latakia-dump.html
AND JUST AS WEIGHTY
Now, here are TWO videos that really should be watched by as many people as possible, lest for lack of hits they get taken down:
"McGahey Tobacconist in Exeter"
http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=oC2XRahqW_k
32 seconds, 128 views.
"My Pipes and other things that live in Tobacco Corner"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgTSfhxe7N0&NR=1
6 minutes 26 seconds, 85 views.
Fascinating stuff.
Please forward widely.
Thank you.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Hmmmph!
Youtube does not take stuff down because it's unpopular.
Youtube takes down stuff because it sucks. For which the working definition is that it promotes hate or violence, shows and/or lauds breaking of certain laws, or infringes upon copyright.
Hits have absolutely nothing to do with it.
When you are viewing youtube, you will likely notice all the other stuff listed......... plus the advertising (usually in top right corner of your screen).
Plainly put, they want you to watch. They don't care what you watch. As long as you watch. You're bound to click one of the other videos sooner or later.
Or actually join their cult
There's stuff on Youtube of not even questionable interest to anyone, barely a few hundred hits......
Videos such as this one (473 views, uploaded 1 year ago):
http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7F_5-QasTA
['Sing a Long Leading to Balkan Sobranie']
Or this CLASSIC, showing a distinguished gentleman smoking a Falcon pipe while talking about a British tobacco that is heavy on the Latakia (298 views, uploaded 1 year ago):
http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=sLDp56iv18o
['Commonwealth Mixture']
Seeing as I doubt that my readers will actually click on either of those links, I'll embed the Falcon-smoker and his fine English mixture. Go ahead, watch it. You don't even have to leave this blog to do so.
Tempting, what?
MISTER HEILBUTT DISCUSSES SAMUEL GAWITH'S COMMONWEALTH MIXTURE
As he says, Commonwealth is "angenehmer, kühler langsamer Abbrand - leider nur medium und nicht full wie auf der Dose steht."
For more about Samuel Gawith, see this link:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2010/07/clean-wholesome-habits-only.html
For my own review of Commonwealth mixture, go here:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2008/08/good-latakia-dump.html
AND JUST AS WEIGHTY
Now, here are TWO videos that really should be watched by as many people as possible, lest for lack of hits they get taken down:
"McGahey Tobacconist in Exeter"
http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=oC2XRahqW_k
32 seconds, 128 views.
"My Pipes and other things that live in Tobacco Corner"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgTSfhxe7N0&NR=1
6 minutes 26 seconds, 85 views.
Fascinating stuff.
Please forward widely.
Thank you.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
CHINATOWN BAKERIES: DOW SA BING AND OTHER BING THINGS
When I first moved to San Francisco I frequented a coffee shop and bakery on Grant Avenue.
Several times a week I ended up there, reading the newspapers, swilling coffee, and scarfing down ONE pastry.
Only one, because in those days I was rather low on funds.
Often it was a flaky red bean paste bun ('dow sa bing' 豆沙餠). Which is something the tourists may not like - European and American travelers are predisposed to scoff at local foods wherever they are, and Chinatown is the best of both worlds in that regards - no matter where you're from, the food in San Francisco Chinatown is NOT the real Chinese food you know.
[Examples of places with 'REAL' Chinese food: New York (USA), Bombay (India), and Schiermonnikoog (Netherlands). I've heard from numerous people that what we have here just isn't real. And you can't even find decent chopsuey in Chinatown!]
Other wonderful snacky things were the steamed chicken bun ('kai Bao' 雞包), lotus seed paste pastries ('lienyong bing' 莲蓉餠), wintermelon pastry ('lo po bing' 老婆餠 "old wife biscuit"), various mooncakes .......
Again, please understand that these things are NOT "real" Chinese food.
It's just stuff that Cantonese people eat.
[Wintermelon pastry (老婆餠): the filling is chopped candied wintermelon mixed with glutinous rice flour, shortening and water, and sugar. The crust is made by rolling an oil dough and a water dough together to make layers, after which the filling is enfolded, an egg wash applied, and the result baked for half an hour at 375 to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Each pastry is no more than palm size. When fresh, they are crumbly-flaky.
And very delightful.]
But, because my stand-by snack was the red bean paste bun, I acquired a nickname: 豆沙餠先生 ('Dow-sa Bing sinsang').
One of my friends was 臘腸包 - Steamed Sausage Bun ('Lap cheung bao').
His older sister was 'Coffee Crunch Cake miss'.
Some one else had the name 阿粽哥 ('Ah-Joong go').
[Joong (粽) consists of glutinous rice with fatty meat and peanuts wrapped in bamboo leaves and steamed for a long time till the filling has melded together. Ko (哥) means 'older brother'.]
There was also someone nicknamed 蛋撻 ('Dan Tat' - egg tart).
Every Chinatown bakery has a customer with that handle (except for the Golden Gate Bakery, for reasons which will become apparent).
I remember their names, because they were delicious.
There are, of course, many bakeries in Chinatown that are worth frequenting. The open-minded eater will find much that bears repeat visits.
[Wikipedia: Chinese Bakery products . And please note that there are a number of errors in that article, as well as in related (linked) entries.]
But where to start?
THE AA BAKERY & CAFÉ
永興餅家茶餐廳 ('wing hing bing ka tsa tsan teng')
1068 Stockton St
San Francisco, CA 94108
(415) 981-0123
Beautiful cakes ('dan go' 蛋糕) - angel food layers with fresh fruit and whipped cream - that demand a second and third slice. The birthday cakes ('sang yat dan go' 生日蛋糕) come in various sizes, and can be special ordered. At the end of summer, they have the largest selection of mooncakes (traditional fillings surrounded by a thin crust, often including a salted egg yolk for contrast and extra richness).
Tables and hot coffee.
This place is on my regular list.
EASTERN BAKERY
東亞餅家 ('tung ah bing ka')
720 Grant Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94108
(415) 433-7973
Coffee crunch cake, superb mooncakes, various small pastries. The custard pie is very good too. As are also the steamed pork and chicken buns. Many Manila-Town regulars remember this place, as it was a regular haunt before the International Hotel was torn down and they had to relocate. Their children still come here to pick up the cakes they remember from childhood.
Tables and hot coffee.
GARDEN BAKERY
嘉頓餠家 ('ka twun bing ka')
765 Jackson Street
San Francisco, CA 94133
(415) 397-5838
Pineapple buns and cocktail buns.
GOLDEN GATE BAKERY
金門餅家 ('kam moon bing ka')
1029 Grant Ave
(between Jackson St & Pacific Ave)
San Francisco, CA 94133
(415) 781-2627
The same selection of small pastries that most Chinatown bakeries have, plus the same cafeteria coffee machine. But honestly, what everyone lines out the door for are the egg custard tarts ('dan tat' 蛋撻), which are conceivably the best in Chinatown. Hot and fresh several times a day. Some people say that there are better ones, but that's a matter of opinion.
Golden Gate's little egg custard tarts are well worth your joining the waiting throng.
Tables and hot coffee - but good luck sitting down.
GOOD MONG KOK BAKERY
好旺角包餅店 ('ho wong kok bao bing diem')
1039 Stockton Street
San Francisco, CA 94108
Not only an extensive selection of bakery items, but also very good steamed snacks of the typical Chinatown variety. Chive dumplings!
PLUS: Charsiu bao (叉燒包), choi yiuk bao (菜肉包), kai bao (雞包), and Northern type steamed bread ('mantou' 饅頭) - all excellent.
And a line of people out the door.
Tables.
[Three SMALL tables, but at least two of them are usually covered with stacked boxes and stuff. So good nei ge luck. My ex loves this place, by the way.]
MEE MEE BAKERY
美美餅食公司 ('mei mei bing sik kongsi')
1328 Stockton Street
San Francisco, CA 94133.
(415) 362-3204
Mooncakes. Primarily mooncakes. Highly recommended..... for mooncakes.
It's a fortune cookie factory - were you really expecting to sit down?
NAPOLEON SUPER BAKERY
拿破崙餠屋 ('na po lun bing ok')
1049 Stockton Street
San Francisco, CA 94108
(415) 951-8133
Freshness and softness are two major characteristics of the Napoleon Super Bakery, though much of what they offer may not be familiar to you. Try the custard rolls and the egg tarts, and of course the chestnut cake. Much of what they do is 'nouveau' by Chinatown standards.
But they do it very well.
Tables and coffee.
YONG KEE
容記糕粉 ('yung kei kow fan')
732 Jackson St
San Francisco, CA 94133
(415) 986-3759
Charsiu bao (叉燒包), choi yiuk bao (菜肉包), kai bao (雞包), and Northern type steamed bread ('mantou' 饅頭). You'll have to stand in line with old ladies (really vicious old ladies!), it's that good.
Hole-in-the-wall with a counter.
[Update: Yong Kee no longer exists. There's a new place there now named Wong Lee Bakery ('hou wong lei' 好旺利). They have big chicken buns.]
Plus, as a lagniappe:
LITTLE PARIS COFFEE SHOP - 'FRENCH SANDWICHES'
小巴黎咖啡室 ('siu ba lei ka fei sat')
939 Stockton Street
San Francisco , CA 94108
Top-notch Vietnamese sandwiches. Also a variety of cooked food, but go there for the sandwiches and the cà phê sữa đá ('ga-fei nai bing' 咖啡奶冰 - Vietnamese coffee with condensed milk and ice).
There are of course other bakeries and dim sum counters in Chinatown. The list could be very extensive if I listed them all.
Just remember, there's more to Chinese bakery items than just the baked charsiu buns you can get all over San Francisco, and do not assume that it's sweet because it looks flaky - two of the best things are the curry puffs ('ka-lei kok' 咖哩角) and the charsiu turnovers (叉燒酥).
And, if you're green from too much partying the night before, glutinous rice sugar pudding ('pak tong go' 白糖糕 "white sugar cake") as well as steamed sheet-noodle roll ('chu cheung fan' 豬腸粉) are marvelous choices - tasty, and very gentling on the savaged digestive membranes.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Several times a week I ended up there, reading the newspapers, swilling coffee, and scarfing down ONE pastry.
Only one, because in those days I was rather low on funds.
Often it was a flaky red bean paste bun ('dow sa bing' 豆沙餠). Which is something the tourists may not like - European and American travelers are predisposed to scoff at local foods wherever they are, and Chinatown is the best of both worlds in that regards - no matter where you're from, the food in San Francisco Chinatown is NOT the real Chinese food you know.
[Examples of places with 'REAL' Chinese food: New York (USA), Bombay (India), and Schiermonnikoog (Netherlands). I've heard from numerous people that what we have here just isn't real. And you can't even find decent chopsuey in Chinatown!]
Other wonderful snacky things were the steamed chicken bun ('kai Bao' 雞包), lotus seed paste pastries ('lienyong bing' 莲蓉餠), wintermelon pastry ('lo po bing' 老婆餠 "old wife biscuit"), various mooncakes .......
Again, please understand that these things are NOT "real" Chinese food.
It's just stuff that Cantonese people eat.
[Wintermelon pastry (老婆餠): the filling is chopped candied wintermelon mixed with glutinous rice flour, shortening and water, and sugar. The crust is made by rolling an oil dough and a water dough together to make layers, after which the filling is enfolded, an egg wash applied, and the result baked for half an hour at 375 to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Each pastry is no more than palm size. When fresh, they are crumbly-flaky.
And very delightful.]
But, because my stand-by snack was the red bean paste bun, I acquired a nickname: 豆沙餠先生 ('Dow-sa Bing sinsang').
One of my friends was 臘腸包 - Steamed Sausage Bun ('Lap cheung bao').
His older sister was 'Coffee Crunch Cake miss'.
Some one else had the name 阿粽哥 ('Ah-Joong go').
[Joong (粽) consists of glutinous rice with fatty meat and peanuts wrapped in bamboo leaves and steamed for a long time till the filling has melded together. Ko (哥) means 'older brother'.]
There was also someone nicknamed 蛋撻 ('Dan Tat' - egg tart).
Every Chinatown bakery has a customer with that handle (except for the Golden Gate Bakery, for reasons which will become apparent).
I remember their names, because they were delicious.
There are, of course, many bakeries in Chinatown that are worth frequenting. The open-minded eater will find much that bears repeat visits.
[Wikipedia: Chinese Bakery products . And please note that there are a number of errors in that article, as well as in related (linked) entries.]
But where to start?
THE AA BAKERY & CAFÉ
永興餅家茶餐廳 ('wing hing bing ka tsa tsan teng')
1068 Stockton St
San Francisco, CA 94108
(415) 981-0123
Beautiful cakes ('dan go' 蛋糕) - angel food layers with fresh fruit and whipped cream - that demand a second and third slice. The birthday cakes ('sang yat dan go' 生日蛋糕) come in various sizes, and can be special ordered. At the end of summer, they have the largest selection of mooncakes (traditional fillings surrounded by a thin crust, often including a salted egg yolk for contrast and extra richness).
Tables and hot coffee.
This place is on my regular list.
EASTERN BAKERY
東亞餅家 ('tung ah bing ka')
720 Grant Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94108
(415) 433-7973
Coffee crunch cake, superb mooncakes, various small pastries. The custard pie is very good too. As are also the steamed pork and chicken buns. Many Manila-Town regulars remember this place, as it was a regular haunt before the International Hotel was torn down and they had to relocate. Their children still come here to pick up the cakes they remember from childhood.
Tables and hot coffee.
GARDEN BAKERY
嘉頓餠家 ('ka twun bing ka')
765 Jackson Street
San Francisco, CA 94133
(415) 397-5838
Pineapple buns and cocktail buns.
GOLDEN GATE BAKERY
金門餅家 ('kam moon bing ka')
1029 Grant Ave
(between Jackson St & Pacific Ave)
San Francisco, CA 94133
(415) 781-2627
The same selection of small pastries that most Chinatown bakeries have, plus the same cafeteria coffee machine. But honestly, what everyone lines out the door for are the egg custard tarts ('dan tat' 蛋撻), which are conceivably the best in Chinatown. Hot and fresh several times a day. Some people say that there are better ones, but that's a matter of opinion.
Golden Gate's little egg custard tarts are well worth your joining the waiting throng.
Tables and hot coffee - but good luck sitting down.
GOOD MONG KOK BAKERY
好旺角包餅店 ('ho wong kok bao bing diem')
1039 Stockton Street
San Francisco, CA 94108
Not only an extensive selection of bakery items, but also very good steamed snacks of the typical Chinatown variety. Chive dumplings!
PLUS: Charsiu bao (叉燒包), choi yiuk bao (菜肉包), kai bao (雞包), and Northern type steamed bread ('mantou' 饅頭) - all excellent.
And a line of people out the door.
Tables.
[Three SMALL tables, but at least two of them are usually covered with stacked boxes and stuff. So good nei ge luck. My ex loves this place, by the way.]
MEE MEE BAKERY
美美餅食公司 ('mei mei bing sik kongsi')
1328 Stockton Street
San Francisco, CA 94133.
(415) 362-3204
Mooncakes. Primarily mooncakes. Highly recommended..... for mooncakes.
It's a fortune cookie factory - were you really expecting to sit down?
NAPOLEON SUPER BAKERY
拿破崙餠屋 ('na po lun bing ok')
1049 Stockton Street
San Francisco, CA 94108
(415) 951-8133
Freshness and softness are two major characteristics of the Napoleon Super Bakery, though much of what they offer may not be familiar to you. Try the custard rolls and the egg tarts, and of course the chestnut cake. Much of what they do is 'nouveau' by Chinatown standards.
But they do it very well.
Tables and coffee.
YONG KEE
容記糕粉 ('yung kei kow fan')
732 Jackson St
San Francisco, CA 94133
(415) 986-3759
Charsiu bao (叉燒包), choi yiuk bao (菜肉包), kai bao (雞包), and Northern type steamed bread ('mantou' 饅頭). You'll have to stand in line with old ladies (really vicious old ladies!), it's that good.
Hole-in-the-wall with a counter.
[Update: Yong Kee no longer exists. There's a new place there now named Wong Lee Bakery ('hou wong lei' 好旺利). They have big chicken buns.]
Plus, as a lagniappe:
LITTLE PARIS COFFEE SHOP - 'FRENCH SANDWICHES'
小巴黎咖啡室 ('siu ba lei ka fei sat')
939 Stockton Street
San Francisco , CA 94108
Top-notch Vietnamese sandwiches. Also a variety of cooked food, but go there for the sandwiches and the cà phê sữa đá ('ga-fei nai bing' 咖啡奶冰 - Vietnamese coffee with condensed milk and ice).
There are of course other bakeries and dim sum counters in Chinatown. The list could be very extensive if I listed them all.
Just remember, there's more to Chinese bakery items than just the baked charsiu buns you can get all over San Francisco, and do not assume that it's sweet because it looks flaky - two of the best things are the curry puffs ('ka-lei kok' 咖哩角) and the charsiu turnovers (叉燒酥).
And, if you're green from too much partying the night before, glutinous rice sugar pudding ('pak tong go' 白糖糕 "white sugar cake") as well as steamed sheet-noodle roll ('chu cheung fan' 豬腸粉) are marvelous choices - tasty, and very gentling on the savaged digestive membranes.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
SURPRISING REVELATIONS, HERE FIRST!
As some of you know, Savage Kitten and I are no longer a couple. Yes, we still live together, albeit in separate rooms. But we are not romantically involved anymore. The relationship ended.
So, in the tradition of tacky celebrity break-ups and rich people betraying each others' deepest darkest secrets after the affair is over, here are two revelations.
Revelation no. 1.: She squeals!
Revelation no. 2.: Size matters!
Let me explain the second revelation first. Her blue jeans are boys' size fourteen, which is actually far too loose around the waist but just right elsewhere. She's somewhere between adult women's size two and four.
Her shoes are a large five and a half, or a size six.
Her ringsize is 3½ or slightly less.
If you don't know what any of this means, ask a woman.
Now, regarding that first revelation........
It's VERY irritating. She never squealed when she was still with me. Yet, when she listens to phone messages from her boyfriend, she squeals.
Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Yeah, yeah, I know - cute as the dickens. Darling, in fact. And rather mellifluous too, not piercing at all. Charmingly girlish.
Yet nevertheless it fair sets my teeth on edge. Can't figure out why.
Dang, that's irritating.
Why did I say size matters?
Well, both she and I have lost weight since the split. And while I realize that I now actually look better than I have in a long time, I do not make much of it. Without any one acting all excited over my appearance, or telling me what a fine devilish man I am, it just isn't that big a deal.
She, on the other hand..............
Positively overjoyed!
Never has needing to buy a whole new wardrobe been such cause for happiness.
I thought she looked totally fine before, but there may have been something wrong with me.
No woman worth her salt listens to a man anyhow.
The only time they ever even hear the dude is when he gives the wrong answer.
Between the squeals and the new clothes, it feels like I'm living with a giddy teenager.
I need a drink.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
So, in the tradition of tacky celebrity break-ups and rich people betraying each others' deepest darkest secrets after the affair is over, here are two revelations.
Revelation no. 1.: She squeals!
Revelation no. 2.: Size matters!
Let me explain the second revelation first. Her blue jeans are boys' size fourteen, which is actually far too loose around the waist but just right elsewhere. She's somewhere between adult women's size two and four.
Her shoes are a large five and a half, or a size six.
Her ringsize is 3½ or slightly less.
If you don't know what any of this means, ask a woman.
Now, regarding that first revelation........
It's VERY irritating. She never squealed when she was still with me. Yet, when she listens to phone messages from her boyfriend, she squeals.
Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Yeah, yeah, I know - cute as the dickens. Darling, in fact. And rather mellifluous too, not piercing at all. Charmingly girlish.
Yet nevertheless it fair sets my teeth on edge. Can't figure out why.
Dang, that's irritating.
Why did I say size matters?
Well, both she and I have lost weight since the split. And while I realize that I now actually look better than I have in a long time, I do not make much of it. Without any one acting all excited over my appearance, or telling me what a fine devilish man I am, it just isn't that big a deal.
She, on the other hand..............
Positively overjoyed!
Never has needing to buy a whole new wardrobe been such cause for happiness.
I thought she looked totally fine before, but there may have been something wrong with me.
No woman worth her salt listens to a man anyhow.
The only time they ever even hear the dude is when he gives the wrong answer.
Between the squeals and the new clothes, it feels like I'm living with a giddy teenager.
I need a drink.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT, WHAT YOU REALLY REALLY WANT!
Some hopeful Señor Anonymo has attempted to place a comment on my blog, in hopes that doing so would lure people to his site.
No, it was NOT underneath my little piece about the Chofetz Chaim (Rabbi Yisroel Meyer Kagan of Radin), which seems to have a boundlessly irresistible attraction for pornographers vending both 'opapizda' and "classic Russian" S3X - basically, prawn pictures - it was somewhere else.
The act was both no less hopeful, and no less futile.
I do not allow crustacean spam.
But part of his text was sheer poetry, beautiful and evocative.
Quote:
"Are you looking respecting an global dating spot that lists handsome Russian women and men from across the world?
Supranational dating milieu is a customary unfamiliar dating and personals place serving 1000's of singles find their destined long-term partners every day.
Our website features elegant women from Russia, Eastern Europe, Asia, Latin America & Africa looking to collect their blameless intercontinental partner for romance.
Be adjacent to disenthrall today and start interacting with like minded singles from all 'round the domain!"
End quote.
Handsome people of either gender, unfamiliar dating, and blameless intercontinentality?
And even proximity to disenthrallment!
I cannot tell you how enchanted I am by all this!
In point of fact, however, I am not looking for a blameless Russian woman (or man) - it's not a Slavophobic antipathy, please understand - but something far different.
Specifically, I want a person younger and shorter than myself, with smaller hands and feet than terminate my own extremities. Round-headed, with darker hair (mine is kind of medium mouse brown).
Highly desirable characteristics include lively sparkling eyes reflecting a keen intelligence and quirky personality - my eyes are battle-ship grey, deep-set, and somewhat cold and calculating; shan't tell you what they betray, as I haven't quite figured that out yet (this blog, however, may paint a personal portrait better than my own self-descriptive poofle can).
Ability to speak some Dutch or Cantonese is an asset, but not a requirement.
Thrallment is optional.
Precisely like elegant intercontinentality.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
No, it was NOT underneath my little piece about the Chofetz Chaim (Rabbi Yisroel Meyer Kagan of Radin), which seems to have a boundlessly irresistible attraction for pornographers vending both 'opapizda' and "classic Russian" S3X - basically, prawn pictures - it was somewhere else.
The act was both no less hopeful, and no less futile.
I do not allow crustacean spam.
But part of his text was sheer poetry, beautiful and evocative.
Quote:
"Are you looking respecting an global dating spot that lists handsome Russian women and men from across the world?
Supranational dating milieu is a customary unfamiliar dating and personals place serving 1000's of singles find their destined long-term partners every day.
Our website features elegant women from Russia, Eastern Europe, Asia, Latin America & Africa looking to collect their blameless intercontinental partner for romance.
Be adjacent to disenthrall today and start interacting with like minded singles from all 'round the domain!"
End quote.
Handsome people of either gender, unfamiliar dating, and blameless intercontinentality?
And even proximity to disenthrallment!
I cannot tell you how enchanted I am by all this!
In point of fact, however, I am not looking for a blameless Russian woman (or man) - it's not a Slavophobic antipathy, please understand - but something far different.
Specifically, I want a person younger and shorter than myself, with smaller hands and feet than terminate my own extremities. Round-headed, with darker hair (mine is kind of medium mouse brown).
Highly desirable characteristics include lively sparkling eyes reflecting a keen intelligence and quirky personality - my eyes are battle-ship grey, deep-set, and somewhat cold and calculating; shan't tell you what they betray, as I haven't quite figured that out yet (this blog, however, may paint a personal portrait better than my own self-descriptive poofle can).
Ability to speak some Dutch or Cantonese is an asset, but not a requirement.
Thrallment is optional.
Precisely like elegant intercontinentality.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Monday, January 10, 2011
LAMENT FOR THE SOUTH - BRIEF BACKGROUND
Among the works I am currently reading is the Ai Jiang Nan Fu (Oi Gong-Naam Fu 哀江南賦) by Yu Hsin (Yu Seun 庾信 b. 513 CE d. 581 CE).
[哀 OI: sadness, mourning. 江 GONG: river. 南 NAAM: south. 江南 GONG-NAAM: the area south of the great river that bisects China. 賦 FU: give, endow. By extension a missive to the emperor regarding moral issues, and hence an ode, elegy, or rhapsody. 庾 YU: storehouse for grains. A surname. 信 SEUN: trust, believe. A missive. 庾信 YU SEUN: surname and given name of the author, in a format no longer quite so common, in that it is but a single character as given name. Literati families often gave their sons names that had a radical (character component) in common, later generations semi-copied that with two syllable names of which each generation would share a first syllable (the 'generation name'), and each subsequent generation then another first syllable. The second syllable (more or less the actual given name) was unique to the person.]
In 557 CE the Liang Dynasty (Leung Chiew 梁朝 502 CE to 557 CE) fell to the Chen, and Yu Hsin, Liang ambassador, was held captive in Chang An, (Cheung On長安) capital city of the Western Wei (Sai Wai Chiew 西魏朝 535 CE to 556 CE), for the rest of his life.
During that time three of his children were executed.
[Liang was succeeded by the Chen Dynasty (Chan Chiew 陳朝 557 CE to 589 CE) in a small part of the former domains. Western Wei (Sai Wai Chiew 西魏朝 535 CE - 556 CE) was taken over by the son and the nephew of warlord Yuwen Tai (Yuman Tai 宇文泰; also known as Heita (Hak Tsat 黑獺 'black otter'), a barbarian later posthumously honoured as founder of their dynasty) who had founded Western Wei with a Han proxy - in their takeover of the state they established Northern Chou (Pak Chou Chiew 北周朝 557 CE to 581 CE). All of these petty kingdoms which vied for power in the fragmented world of the fifth and sixth century China were superseded by the Sui Dynasty (Tsoei Chiew 隋朝 581 CE to 618 CE), which prepared the way for the glorious Tang Dynasty (Tong Chiew 唐朝 618 CE to 907 CE).]
It was during the latter period, after the fall of both Liang and Western Wei, that Yu Hsin composed the Lament for the South. Probably one of the greatest single pieces of pre-Tang poetry ever written, densely evocative of the lands from which the author was an exile, the society that had been destroyed, the cities laid waste. Heartrending.
Beautiful stuff.
I first read it back in the nineties. I had forgotten how good it is.
Around six hundred lines, mostly of six characters each.
At some point I will go into further detail, perhaps presenting passages and translations.
There are a number of literary allusions I don't get, but it shouldn't be too difficult to present a word-portrait of a poem-painting.
Yu Hsin was a typical man of his times - exceedingly literate, well-versed in the classics, a scholar made official. As such he was one of the best representatives of Chinese culture at that time, at any time.
The literati were expected to be men of probity and high ethics, besides being able writers, with a depth and breadth to their knowledge. As such they were examples to be emulated. Upright men, righteous men.
And, in Yu Hsin's case, also homosexual. But that isn't why we remember him.
NOTE: Mandarin and Cantonese pronunciations differ considerably, as you may have shperred from the two different styles above. This is not surprising - they are in fact two separate languages, though derived from the same source.
It was during the Northern and Southern Dynasties (Naam Pak Chiew 南北朝 420 CE to 589 CE) period – the very same era during which Yu Hsin lived – that the Chinese language started showing serious regional separatism, eventually leading to the many splintered tongues of the South. Cantonese is the closest to the language of Sui and Tang of all the Sinitic "dialects", but even Cantonese has deviated.
Evenso........
The poetry still rhymes in Cantonese. In Mandarin it sounds off.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
[哀 OI: sadness, mourning. 江 GONG: river. 南 NAAM: south. 江南 GONG-NAAM: the area south of the great river that bisects China. 賦 FU: give, endow. By extension a missive to the emperor regarding moral issues, and hence an ode, elegy, or rhapsody. 庾 YU: storehouse for grains. A surname. 信 SEUN: trust, believe. A missive. 庾信 YU SEUN: surname and given name of the author, in a format no longer quite so common, in that it is but a single character as given name. Literati families often gave their sons names that had a radical (character component) in common, later generations semi-copied that with two syllable names of which each generation would share a first syllable (the 'generation name'), and each subsequent generation then another first syllable. The second syllable (more or less the actual given name) was unique to the person.]
In 557 CE the Liang Dynasty (Leung Chiew 梁朝 502 CE to 557 CE) fell to the Chen, and Yu Hsin, Liang ambassador, was held captive in Chang An, (Cheung On長安) capital city of the Western Wei (Sai Wai Chiew 西魏朝 535 CE to 556 CE), for the rest of his life.
During that time three of his children were executed.
[Liang was succeeded by the Chen Dynasty (Chan Chiew 陳朝 557 CE to 589 CE) in a small part of the former domains. Western Wei (Sai Wai Chiew 西魏朝 535 CE - 556 CE) was taken over by the son and the nephew of warlord Yuwen Tai (Yuman Tai 宇文泰; also known as Heita (Hak Tsat 黑獺 'black otter'), a barbarian later posthumously honoured as founder of their dynasty) who had founded Western Wei with a Han proxy - in their takeover of the state they established Northern Chou (Pak Chou Chiew 北周朝 557 CE to 581 CE). All of these petty kingdoms which vied for power in the fragmented world of the fifth and sixth century China were superseded by the Sui Dynasty (Tsoei Chiew 隋朝 581 CE to 618 CE), which prepared the way for the glorious Tang Dynasty (Tong Chiew 唐朝 618 CE to 907 CE).]
It was during the latter period, after the fall of both Liang and Western Wei, that Yu Hsin composed the Lament for the South. Probably one of the greatest single pieces of pre-Tang poetry ever written, densely evocative of the lands from which the author was an exile, the society that had been destroyed, the cities laid waste. Heartrending.
Beautiful stuff.
I first read it back in the nineties. I had forgotten how good it is.
Around six hundred lines, mostly of six characters each.
At some point I will go into further detail, perhaps presenting passages and translations.
There are a number of literary allusions I don't get, but it shouldn't be too difficult to present a word-portrait of a poem-painting.
Yu Hsin was a typical man of his times - exceedingly literate, well-versed in the classics, a scholar made official. As such he was one of the best representatives of Chinese culture at that time, at any time.
The literati were expected to be men of probity and high ethics, besides being able writers, with a depth and breadth to their knowledge. As such they were examples to be emulated. Upright men, righteous men.
And, in Yu Hsin's case, also homosexual. But that isn't why we remember him.
NOTE: Mandarin and Cantonese pronunciations differ considerably, as you may have shperred from the two different styles above. This is not surprising - they are in fact two separate languages, though derived from the same source.
It was during the Northern and Southern Dynasties (Naam Pak Chiew 南北朝 420 CE to 589 CE) period – the very same era during which Yu Hsin lived – that the Chinese language started showing serious regional separatism, eventually leading to the many splintered tongues of the South. Cantonese is the closest to the language of Sui and Tang of all the Sinitic "dialects", but even Cantonese has deviated.
Evenso........
The poetry still rhymes in Cantonese. In Mandarin it sounds off.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Sunday, January 09, 2011
PRISON ON FIRE SONG
The movie 'Prison on Fire' with Chow Yun-fat isn't the greatest movie in the world. But it's a pretty darn good movie, and as excellent a representative of mr. Chow's oeuvre as any.
That alone should make it worth borrowing from the local library.
[Prison on Fire: (gaam yuk fung wan 監獄風雲) made in 1987, directed by Ringo Lam. The movie features three stellar performances: Chou Yun-fat as Ching, the inmate of rather common antecedents, who befriends Yiu, played by Tony Leung Ka-fai, both of them versus Roy Cheung as the sadistic prison guard. It's a buddy flick, but one that speaks to the Cantonese welt-anshauung, and especially the sense of loyalty to ones friends in the hardest of times. In one sense, it's about chivalry - being gallant and righteous from the very fabric of one's character. In quite another sense, it's also about biting the ear off of a sadistic prison guard.
So there's something satisfying there for everyone.
Ringo Lam: 林嶺東 born 1955, director of many exciting action movies, many of which have an undercurrent of elements familiar to any aficionado of Cantonese operas and Gong-wu (江湖) novels. Chow Yun-fat: 周潤發 born 1955, Hong Kong actor of Hakka origin. If you haven't heard of him, you may have been living in a cave for the past twenty years. Tony Leung Ka-fei: 梁家輝 also known as 'big Tony', to distinguish him from someone else. Very good in roles that require a polished or scholarly image. Voted 'man you would really like to see in a tuxedo' by this blog. Roy Cheung: 張耀揚 often cast as a villain or sadist, partly due to his psychotic performance in Prison of Fire. Can be described as intense, even obsessed, in many of his roles.]
FRIENDSHIP'S GLOW
But what really anchors the movie in the viewers mind is the song 'yau-yi ji gwong' (友誼之光).
In this link, scenes from the movie are the background to the recording.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmcXSrgIkFw
The brassy female whose voice starts singing the song as counter point at the fifty second mark is Maria Cordero - also known as 'Fat Momma Maria' (肥媽瑪俐亞) - the Macanese songwriter and singer who wrote the lyrics.
Sut yau man lei san, gak-jo leung tei yiew;
Pat seui kien-min, sam-tsong ya chi-hiew;
Yau-yi goi pat liew!
For a cool video with the lyrics superimposed, so that you can sing along, see this;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpM21PR5Jfc&feature=related
No, I don't know why this video shows famous European sights (including Keukenhof and the Arc de Triomf). The visuals are entirely baffling, and decontextual. That's common with karaoke numbers, but more often than not they'll feature some almond-eyed cutie-pie ambling along a tropical beach, with birds, water, palm trees, and icecream shakes.
Or something equally inane and stirring.
人生於世上有幾个知己
Yan-sang yu sai seung, yau gei ko chi kei ?
多少友誼能長存
To-sieu yau-yi nang cheung-chyun?
今日别離共你雙雙两握手
Kam-yat bit-lei gung ney seung-seung leung ak sau,
友誼常在你我心里
Yau-yi seung tsoi ney ngoh sam leui!
In the span of a life how much mutual recognition? How many friendships will long survive? Part today warmly shaking hands, With friendship that remains strong within both of us.
今天且要暫别
Kam-tien che yiu jaam-biet,
他朝也定能聚首
Ta-chiew ya deng nang jeui-sau;
縱使不能會面
Jung-si pat nang woei-min,
始終也是朋友
Chi-chung ya si pang-yau.
Today we mark this moment, Another time we shall meet once more; If we're never again face-to-face, From beginning to end we'll stay friends.
說有萬里山 隔阻兩地遙
Sut yau man lei san, gak-jo leung tei yiew;
不需見面 心中也知曉
Pat seui kien-min, sam-tsong ya chi-hiew;
友誼改不了
Yau-yi goi pat liew.
Myriad mountains, and obstacles beyond measure; No need to actually meet, the heart still deeply knows; this a bond which shall indeed not change.
Like all song lyrics, the cohesion it has in its own language is lost in translation. Forgive me for not being adequate to the task, I cannot do it justice.
Go ahead and watch the movie. Let yourself sink into a Cantonese-hued world for a while, in which universal values will resonate in slightly less familiar ways than you know.
Friendships made in adverse times are annealed by hardship, made stronger by the flames.
NOTE: Previously I have mentioned this song in relation to some other matters - that post provides more framework in which to comprehend it.
This post:http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2010/05/kiss-me-you-rebel.html
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
That alone should make it worth borrowing from the local library.
[Prison on Fire: (gaam yuk fung wan 監獄風雲) made in 1987, directed by Ringo Lam. The movie features three stellar performances: Chou Yun-fat as Ching, the inmate of rather common antecedents, who befriends Yiu, played by Tony Leung Ka-fai, both of them versus Roy Cheung as the sadistic prison guard. It's a buddy flick, but one that speaks to the Cantonese welt-anshauung, and especially the sense of loyalty to ones friends in the hardest of times. In one sense, it's about chivalry - being gallant and righteous from the very fabric of one's character. In quite another sense, it's also about biting the ear off of a sadistic prison guard.
So there's something satisfying there for everyone.
Ringo Lam: 林嶺東 born 1955, director of many exciting action movies, many of which have an undercurrent of elements familiar to any aficionado of Cantonese operas and Gong-wu (江湖) novels. Chow Yun-fat: 周潤發 born 1955, Hong Kong actor of Hakka origin. If you haven't heard of him, you may have been living in a cave for the past twenty years. Tony Leung Ka-fei: 梁家輝 also known as 'big Tony', to distinguish him from someone else. Very good in roles that require a polished or scholarly image. Voted 'man you would really like to see in a tuxedo' by this blog. Roy Cheung: 張耀揚 often cast as a villain or sadist, partly due to his psychotic performance in Prison of Fire. Can be described as intense, even obsessed, in many of his roles.]
FRIENDSHIP'S GLOW
But what really anchors the movie in the viewers mind is the song 'yau-yi ji gwong' (友誼之光).
In this link, scenes from the movie are the background to the recording.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmcXSrgIkFw
The brassy female whose voice starts singing the song as counter point at the fifty second mark is Maria Cordero - also known as 'Fat Momma Maria' (肥媽瑪俐亞) - the Macanese songwriter and singer who wrote the lyrics.
Sut yau man lei san, gak-jo leung tei yiew;
Pat seui kien-min, sam-tsong ya chi-hiew;
Yau-yi goi pat liew!
For a cool video with the lyrics superimposed, so that you can sing along, see this;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpM21PR5Jfc&feature=related
No, I don't know why this video shows famous European sights (including Keukenhof and the Arc de Triomf). The visuals are entirely baffling, and decontextual. That's common with karaoke numbers, but more often than not they'll feature some almond-eyed cutie-pie ambling along a tropical beach, with birds, water, palm trees, and icecream shakes.
Or something equally inane and stirring.
人生於世上有幾个知己
Yan-sang yu sai seung, yau gei ko chi kei ?
多少友誼能長存
To-sieu yau-yi nang cheung-chyun?
今日别離共你雙雙两握手
Kam-yat bit-lei gung ney seung-seung leung ak sau,
友誼常在你我心里
Yau-yi seung tsoi ney ngoh sam leui!
In the span of a life how much mutual recognition? How many friendships will long survive? Part today warmly shaking hands, With friendship that remains strong within both of us.
今天且要暫别
Kam-tien che yiu jaam-biet,
他朝也定能聚首
Ta-chiew ya deng nang jeui-sau;
縱使不能會面
Jung-si pat nang woei-min,
始終也是朋友
Chi-chung ya si pang-yau.
Today we mark this moment, Another time we shall meet once more; If we're never again face-to-face, From beginning to end we'll stay friends.
說有萬里山 隔阻兩地遙
Sut yau man lei san, gak-jo leung tei yiew;
不需見面 心中也知曉
Pat seui kien-min, sam-tsong ya chi-hiew;
友誼改不了
Yau-yi goi pat liew.
Myriad mountains, and obstacles beyond measure; No need to actually meet, the heart still deeply knows; this a bond which shall indeed not change.
Like all song lyrics, the cohesion it has in its own language is lost in translation. Forgive me for not being adequate to the task, I cannot do it justice.
Go ahead and watch the movie. Let yourself sink into a Cantonese-hued world for a while, in which universal values will resonate in slightly less familiar ways than you know.
Friendships made in adverse times are annealed by hardship, made stronger by the flames.
NOTE: Previously I have mentioned this song in relation to some other matters - that post provides more framework in which to comprehend it.
This post:http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2010/05/kiss-me-you-rebel.html
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Saturday, January 08, 2011
LIGHT AND DARK
The house is unbearable empty every time she goes to be with him. When she rushes out the door, she is vibrantly alive, glowing, radiant.
This is not, you will understand, conducive to a good mood for the man she dumped.
It reminds me of how painful our last weeks as lovers were.
When she has gone, the sunlight fades and a cold darkness fills our space.
This is an indication of the insanity of our still living together after the breakup.
I will continue to live with her - this is our apartment, home and refuge for both of us, her and me - and I still enjoy her presence (see suggestions of light and warmth above), but her absence is a howling void.
In the past, when she came home, it was to us. To me.
Since she found him, when she returns it is from somewhere else.
It has been a very long time since we ate together, and it has been far too long since I ate with someone whose eyes sparkled at me.
Now when I eat, the emptiness across the table diminishes the taste of every bite.
Food is black alone, it brings no joy.
The company of a loveable woman is like a drug.
Withdrawal is not easy.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
This is not, you will understand, conducive to a good mood for the man she dumped.
It reminds me of how painful our last weeks as lovers were.
When she has gone, the sunlight fades and a cold darkness fills our space.
This is an indication of the insanity of our still living together after the breakup.
I will continue to live with her - this is our apartment, home and refuge for both of us, her and me - and I still enjoy her presence (see suggestions of light and warmth above), but her absence is a howling void.
In the past, when she came home, it was to us. To me.
Since she found him, when she returns it is from somewhere else.
It has been a very long time since we ate together, and it has been far too long since I ate with someone whose eyes sparkled at me.
Now when I eat, the emptiness across the table diminishes the taste of every bite.
Food is black alone, it brings no joy.
The company of a loveable woman is like a drug.
Withdrawal is not easy.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Friday, January 07, 2011
MAYBE IT WAS NOT THE RIGHT TIME
It is fortunate that I am not normal. A normal person would probably think about killing himself right about now. I am not that weak.
Far too stubborn and ornery, in fact.
I've always thought of self-murder as being, besides being impossibly comedic, a fierce statement against an un-understanding world, a final act of resistance, a defiant and definite rude gesture to everyone and everything.
Except, what would I be rebelling against?
Her having dumped me?
Screw that, I am more resilient than that.
Her having, for some strange and twisted Asperger-meets-terminally-shy neurotic reason have fixated on my imagined failings?
I've been gallant and gentlemanly for nearly 22 years, if she cannot appreciate that, someone else will.
Perhaps her having concluded, after months of obsessive Asperger-type misinterpretation that our relationship was an old rag that should be dumped rather than kept?
An old rag?!?
IF ALL YOU WERE WILLING TO TALK ABOUT IS HOW YOU DISLIKED YOUR JOB, FOR SEVERAL MONTHS, HOW DO YOU EXPECT ME TO REACT? YOUR FRUSTRATIONS AT WORK WERE ALWAYS MORE THAN ENOUGH REASON FOR ME TO LOOSE INTEREST IN SNUGGLE-BUNNIES.
SWEETHEART, BRINGING THAT TO BED WAS RAIN ON THE PARADE.
Do you tell Wheelchair guy about those things? Have you started sharing that with him yet?
Yes, I know he's totally insensitive - his Aspergers is worse than yours, far worse than mine. But even thingboy may eventually find it somewhat less than stimulating. Dis-inspiring even.
Perhaps, just maybe, certain conversational gambits are NOT bedroom appropriate.
And yet, you blamed me.
Thank you.
I feel so important.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Far too stubborn and ornery, in fact.
I've always thought of self-murder as being, besides being impossibly comedic, a fierce statement against an un-understanding world, a final act of resistance, a defiant and definite rude gesture to everyone and everything.
Except, what would I be rebelling against?
Her having dumped me?
Screw that, I am more resilient than that.
Her having, for some strange and twisted Asperger-meets-terminally-shy neurotic reason have fixated on my imagined failings?
I've been gallant and gentlemanly for nearly 22 years, if she cannot appreciate that, someone else will.
Perhaps her having concluded, after months of obsessive Asperger-type misinterpretation that our relationship was an old rag that should be dumped rather than kept?
An old rag?!?
IF ALL YOU WERE WILLING TO TALK ABOUT IS HOW YOU DISLIKED YOUR JOB, FOR SEVERAL MONTHS, HOW DO YOU EXPECT ME TO REACT? YOUR FRUSTRATIONS AT WORK WERE ALWAYS MORE THAN ENOUGH REASON FOR ME TO LOOSE INTEREST IN SNUGGLE-BUNNIES.
SWEETHEART, BRINGING THAT TO BED WAS RAIN ON THE PARADE.
Do you tell Wheelchair guy about those things? Have you started sharing that with him yet?
Yes, I know he's totally insensitive - his Aspergers is worse than yours, far worse than mine. But even thingboy may eventually find it somewhat less than stimulating. Dis-inspiring even.
Perhaps, just maybe, certain conversational gambits are NOT bedroom appropriate.
And yet, you blamed me.
Thank you.
I feel so important.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Thursday, January 06, 2011
I DEMUR!
On an e-mail list, I mentioned that I was up to my eyebrows in alligators and going insane.
This as a way of demurring something which required both time and effort.
By alligators I meant uncollected accounts, and by going insane I meant that I was still growing up – it has taking several years longer than expected.
I’m on my way to becoming an adult.
That’s an ongoing process. As I’m sure everyone will agree.
Early rumours of mental health may have been an exaggeration.
Especially given events last night.
Bourbon, Scotch, Liqueur, Fruity Drinks, Maraschinos, Beer, Bitters, Biscuits, Goat Cheese, Blue Cheese, Dried Fish.
A friend and colleague was in town, so some of us went out for drinks. Later we ended up at a notorious cocktail establishment, and I remembered fearfully what had happened there before with the same people. Seeing a good friend suck onion dip up his nose with a rolled slice of luncheon meat is not pretty. And I can also tell you that stale taco chips and canned pork are NOT the breakfast of champions, even if it has become morning.
There’s a little convenience market two doors up from the low dive.
Folks tend towards peckish after a few drinks.
So, while on a well-deserved smoke break, I pre-emptively purchased cheesy comestibles. Didn’t want to see the Spam experiment again, let alone that nightmarish scene with bologna for a coke-straw, and onion dip as a line. Which was, if I recall correctly (and darn that’s hard right now), a spur of the moment speculative demonstration of what an ex-coworker was probably doing at that very minute.
The exhibition put everyone else off the onion dip.
Onion dip looses a lot of its appeal once you see it flying from a nose.
Thank heavens it didn’t hit the remaining bologna, or some of us wouldn’t had had any dinner that evening.
Had I been entirely sane yesterday, I might not have bought any cheese, given what happened to the onion dip, and considering how similar in hue and texture dip and cheese can be.
It was an unconscionable risk.
Fortunately, matters did not get out of …………………… hand.
An hour later, elsewhere, I gesticulated energetically with a pungent dried fish at a bar tender. This in lieu of vocalizing my appreciation. Very keen appreciation.
Shortly afterwards I came home, where I gesticulated with the dried fish at my roommate.
Fortunately, matters did not get out of hand.
Yes, I have waved a large smelly thing at a woman.
It’s part of growing up.
I’m more mature now.
As I’m sure everyone will agree.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
This as a way of demurring something which required both time and effort.
By alligators I meant uncollected accounts, and by going insane I meant that I was still growing up – it has taking several years longer than expected.
I’m on my way to becoming an adult.
That’s an ongoing process. As I’m sure everyone will agree.
Early rumours of mental health may have been an exaggeration.
Especially given events last night.
Bourbon, Scotch, Liqueur, Fruity Drinks, Maraschinos, Beer, Bitters, Biscuits, Goat Cheese, Blue Cheese, Dried Fish.
A friend and colleague was in town, so some of us went out for drinks. Later we ended up at a notorious cocktail establishment, and I remembered fearfully what had happened there before with the same people. Seeing a good friend suck onion dip up his nose with a rolled slice of luncheon meat is not pretty. And I can also tell you that stale taco chips and canned pork are NOT the breakfast of champions, even if it has become morning.
There’s a little convenience market two doors up from the low dive.
Folks tend towards peckish after a few drinks.
So, while on a well-deserved smoke break, I pre-emptively purchased cheesy comestibles. Didn’t want to see the Spam experiment again, let alone that nightmarish scene with bologna for a coke-straw, and onion dip as a line. Which was, if I recall correctly (and darn that’s hard right now), a spur of the moment speculative demonstration of what an ex-coworker was probably doing at that very minute.
The exhibition put everyone else off the onion dip.
Onion dip looses a lot of its appeal once you see it flying from a nose.
Thank heavens it didn’t hit the remaining bologna, or some of us wouldn’t had had any dinner that evening.
Had I been entirely sane yesterday, I might not have bought any cheese, given what happened to the onion dip, and considering how similar in hue and texture dip and cheese can be.
It was an unconscionable risk.
Fortunately, matters did not get out of …………………… hand.
An hour later, elsewhere, I gesticulated energetically with a pungent dried fish at a bar tender. This in lieu of vocalizing my appreciation. Very keen appreciation.
Shortly afterwards I came home, where I gesticulated with the dried fish at my roommate.
Fortunately, matters did not get out of hand.
Yes, I have waved a large smelly thing at a woman.
It’s part of growing up.
I’m more mature now.
As I’m sure everyone will agree.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
TEAR GAS, PHOSPHORUS, PALESTINIAN DEATHS
Recently a woman died in Ramallah. Both the Palestinian Authority and her family have asserted that she expired as a direct result of teargas at the weekly rock-throwing festival in Bil'in.
This has been widely reported by the international press, eliciting outrage from several human rights organizations. And columnists.
Explaining how this could happen, when tear gas normally is by no means fatal, and no one else had been so grievously affected, Palestinian sources clarified that the Jews added phosphorus to the gas.
Further, the gas remained in an extremely concentrated form while traveling quite a distance, zeroing in on the young lady and no one else.
Several hours after she was released from the hospital where she went upon inhaling the fumes, the cleverly modified gas finally had the deadly effect intended.
The victim was buried immediately, no post-mortem deemed necessary.
.....................
By now it ought to be obvious that ANY demise within a ten mile radius of more than three Israelis is caused by Zionism.
That explains both honour killings and traffic accidents.
Those two would otherwise qualify, with cancer and kuru, as the leading natural causes of death in the West Bank.
Further, it has been CONCLUSIVELY proven, by reputable Saudi and Egyptian scientists, that ALL unpleasant phenomena are caused by Jews.
The Mossad, as you've probably heard, keeps an entire zoo of animals that have been trained to specifically harm non-Jews.
Vultures. Sharks. Jerusalem rats. Sinai snakes. Cartoonists.
Animal and plant life, the tides, eclipses, gravity, old age, flooding in Australia, skepticism, critical thinking, and perspective - all of these are controlled by the Jews!
Swine flu too. As well as the wild boar problem in the Galilee.
My aunt Bertha has arthritis because of them.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
This has been widely reported by the international press, eliciting outrage from several human rights organizations. And columnists.
Explaining how this could happen, when tear gas normally is by no means fatal, and no one else had been so grievously affected, Palestinian sources clarified that the Jews added phosphorus to the gas.
Further, the gas remained in an extremely concentrated form while traveling quite a distance, zeroing in on the young lady and no one else.
Several hours after she was released from the hospital where she went upon inhaling the fumes, the cleverly modified gas finally had the deadly effect intended.
The victim was buried immediately, no post-mortem deemed necessary.
.....................
By now it ought to be obvious that ANY demise within a ten mile radius of more than three Israelis is caused by Zionism.
That explains both honour killings and traffic accidents.
Those two would otherwise qualify, with cancer and kuru, as the leading natural causes of death in the West Bank.
Further, it has been CONCLUSIVELY proven, by reputable Saudi and Egyptian scientists, that ALL unpleasant phenomena are caused by Jews.
The Mossad, as you've probably heard, keeps an entire zoo of animals that have been trained to specifically harm non-Jews.
Vultures. Sharks. Jerusalem rats. Sinai snakes. Cartoonists.
Animal and plant life, the tides, eclipses, gravity, old age, flooding in Australia, skepticism, critical thinking, and perspective - all of these are controlled by the Jews!
Swine flu too. As well as the wild boar problem in the Galilee.
My aunt Bertha has arthritis because of them.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Wednesday, January 05, 2011
WONTON, WONTON SOUP, WONTON SOUP WITH NOODLES, WONTON NOODLE SOUP
On Monday I wrote about eating Wonton, and mentioned that my readers should expect a recipe on this blog sometime soon. Soon is now.
[RECAP: Wonton (雲吞 'wan tan') are Cantonese soul food. Cantonese are neurotic (in a very good way) about food. If you are in San Francisco, you probably want to go to Hon's Wun Tun House (洪記麵家) on Kearny Street between Commercial and Clay Streets, if you are in Hong Kong, definitely visit the heirs to Scrawny Mak: Mak's Noodle (麥奀雲吞麵世家), 77 Wellington Street - Ground Floor, Central District, HK. (中環, 威靈頓街, 77號, 地下); Mak Man Kee Noodle ( 麥文記麵家), 51 Parkes Street - Ground Floor, Jordan, in the Yau Tsim Mong District (油尖旺區), Kowloon. (九龍, 佐敦, 白加士街, 51號, 地下); Chung Kee Noodle (忠記麵家), 37 Wing Kut Street, Sheung Wan, HK (香港島, 上環, 永吉街, 37號). Hon's in C'town is quite decent, Mak's in Hong Kong is famous. Chung Kee Noodle is actually Scrawny Mak's oldest son's place.]
雲吞湯麵
WANTAN TONG-MIEN
Wonton are small noodle-skin dumplings, like ravioli or kreplach, filled with either pork or shrimp, often a mixture of both. They are usually served in broth - the ends of the noodly wrapper trail in the liquid like fish or clouds. All of China makes wonton, but only the Cantonese make wonderful wonton.
The difference is in the details: filling - broth - additions - attitude.
Wantan tong-mien: Wonton soup-noodles. Utterly Cantonese.
Dried flounder is more than just a flavour; it's a way of life.
Rather than making your own wrappers, it is best to buy them premade - the quality is virtually the same, and if you live near Chinatown (唐人街 'Tongyan Kai') you can simply buy them by the pound at Hon's. So I shall not discuss how to make the skins, other than to say that if you've made kreplach from scratch, you could use the same recipe for the wrapper.
[2016 ADDENDUM: For more on some of the ingredients, see this post: Dried shrimp cooking fat Chinese girls. Or this one: Cantonese ingredients.
Where to buy: Stockton Street, various shops.]
WONTON FILLING
Enough for fifty dumplings
One cup chopped shrimp.
One cup ground pork.
Quarter cup chopped water chestnuts (馬蹄 'maa tai').
One TBS minced parsley (洋香芹 'yeung heung kan') .
One TBS minced cilantro (芫茜 'yuen sai').
One stalk scallion (葱 'tsung'), minced.
Half TBS sherry or rice wine.
Half TBS oyster sauce (豪油 'ho yau').
One Tsp. soy sauce (醬油 'cheung yau', 豉油 'si yau').
One Tsp. sesame oil (麻油 'ma yau').
Half Tsp. cornstarch (玉米淀粉 'yiuk mai din fan').
Half Tsp. sugar (白糖 'pak tong').
[Regarding cup measurements for the shrimp and pork: these are more or less eight ounces or 226 grammes. Trust me on this, I weighed it out recently just to be sure.]
Mix everything, but do not overwork it, as doing so makes the meat tough. The shrimp fragments should be larger than the pork or water chestnut particles, everything else smaller - reason being that you want the 'crunch' of the shrimp, and the lesser ingredients need to be evenly distributed throughout.
Parsley is NOT traditional, but I like the taste, and it's good for the digestion.
Substitutions can be made, for instance the proportion of shrimp increased drastically and the quantity of pork decreased correspondingly.
Instead of water chestnut, chopped rehydrated cloud ear (雲耳 'wun yi') could be used, as they too have a wonderful textural effect.
Note: the amount of pork given above is the equivalent of two fresh Italian sausages. You could actually use four sausages squeezed from their casings for the filling entirely, if you're strapped for time. Radical, and perhaps it qualifies as 'fusion cuisine'.
But it certainly won't be kosher.
Put a dab of filling into each wonton skin, brush the exposed edges with egg wash, and first press two diagonal corners against each other, then bring up the other two corners up to form tails, pressing out the air in the pouch.
The result should look like a purse or hobo's pack.
Place each finished dumpling on a floured plate or tray. It is VERY important that the surface be floured. Otherwise you will rip the wontons when you try to pick them up.
You're making fifty wonton. Whatever you do not intend to use immediately, you can wrap in plastic and freeze.
SOUP FOR WONTON
Two pounds chicken on the bone.
One pound pork on the bone.
Half cup pieces dried flounder (左口魚 'jorhau yu', 大地魚 'daidei yu').
Two TBS dried shrimp (蝦米 'haa mai').
Four quarts (16 cups, approx 5 litres) water.
Quarter cup sherry or rice wine.
Three or four slices ginger.
Half Tsp. white peppercorns.
Roast or fry the dried flounder pieces nicely brown, but do not burn them.
Blanch the chicken and pork briefly in boiling water, drain and rinse well.
Place everything except the dried shrimp in a cauldron and simmer on low for three hours, skimming a few times in the first half hour.
Add the dried shrimp in the last half hour.
Strain very well.
Blanching the meat and bones first prevents overmuch scum, and yields a much cleaner broth.
The dried flounder is the essential Cantonese touch - it will NOT make the broth taste like stinky dried fish, but instead unify the flavours and add a nutty seafood saveur of its own.
Think of it as bouillon base.
Well then. You have your wonton, you've got the broth. What else will you need?
OTHER 'STUFF'
Egg-noodles. These have to be thin and fresh, for the best texture and taste. Fresh egg noodles need about a minute of blanching, whereas dried noodles take between three to five minutes, depending on thickness.
Dried noodles will also have a whiff of lye water.
Vegetables. It is very 'Chinatown' to add a few coarsely ripped baby bokchoi (小白菜 'siu paktsoi') to the bowl of soup, though it isn't traditional. For that matter, neither is adding noodles, and most non-Cantonese are appalled at that innovation, so go right ahead.
The sweet crisp freshness of the tiny greens are a marvelous chiddush.
Meats. Some people like to add some thinly sliced charsiu pork (叉燒) on top of the soup. This is not necessary at all, but no great heresy either. If you choose to do so, use the fattier kind.
I've added chunks of roast duck, which is also delicious.
Garnishes. Garlic chives are traditional in Hong Kong, but regular chives also can. Chopped scallion works too.
Personally I like to dump some cilantro on top.
Dipping sauce. I am a barbarian, I like hot and salty. What works for me is equal parts soy sauce, oyster sauce, chilipaste, and dark vinegar, with a little sugar and finely minced ginger mixed in. If it's too stiff, add some Louisiana hot sauce.
You do not really need a dip for the wontons, but it is always fun to play with your food.
ASSEMBLING WONTON NOODLE SOUP
It's supposed to be merely a snack and require only a small bowl, but after going through all the trouble of getting everything ready you aren't going to cook any other dishes.
So go ahead, use the big bowls.
Keep the broth on the back burner, below boiling temperature.
Heat up a large pot of water. When it boils, dump in the wonton. They're done when they all float. Scoop them out and apportion them in the bowls. Gently pour a sufficient quantity of hot broth over them. Put a porcelain soup spoon in each bowl, anchored by the wonton.
Blanch the noodles in the boiling water till toothsome. Immediately rinse them in cold water to stop them cooking any further. Place a skein on top of the wontons in the bowls, top off with a little more broth.
Add whatever else you feel necessary at this point, but it's fine already.
Garnish with chives, or scallion, and cilantro.
Now, go enjoy your wonton soup-noodles (雲吞湯麵 'wantan tong-mien') in front of the television, with one of your legs hurked up on the chair, wearing nothing but pajama pants and a wife-beater.
I would suggest watching a Chinese soap-opera, but you might not have that in your part of the world.
Maybe the discovery channel instead?
Kitten videos?
AFTER WORD
Right about now you are probably wondering 'why so specific an order to the soup assembly? Why not cook the noodles and wonton IN the broth?'
There are two very good reasons. The first one is that the wonton and the noodles have different cooking times. The second reason is that you do not want the starches that adhere to either the noodles or the wonton to muddy-up your fine broth.
Additionally, it just looks better if the wonton and the noodles form distinct areas in your bowl. That's why the dark green of scallions are, to my mind, a better garnish than the garlic chives commonly used - they're more dramatic, more visually appealing.
For the same reason, three thin slices of charsiu fanned out on top are also pleasing.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
[RECAP: Wonton (雲吞 'wan tan') are Cantonese soul food. Cantonese are neurotic (in a very good way) about food. If you are in San Francisco, you probably want to go to Hon's Wun Tun House (洪記麵家) on Kearny Street between Commercial and Clay Streets, if you are in Hong Kong, definitely visit the heirs to Scrawny Mak: Mak's Noodle (麥奀雲吞麵世家), 77 Wellington Street - Ground Floor, Central District, HK. (中環, 威靈頓街, 77號, 地下); Mak Man Kee Noodle ( 麥文記麵家), 51 Parkes Street - Ground Floor, Jordan, in the Yau Tsim Mong District (油尖旺區), Kowloon. (九龍, 佐敦, 白加士街, 51號, 地下); Chung Kee Noodle (忠記麵家), 37 Wing Kut Street, Sheung Wan, HK (香港島, 上環, 永吉街, 37號). Hon's in C'town is quite decent, Mak's in Hong Kong is famous. Chung Kee Noodle is actually Scrawny Mak's oldest son's place.]
雲吞湯麵
WANTAN TONG-MIEN
Wonton are small noodle-skin dumplings, like ravioli or kreplach, filled with either pork or shrimp, often a mixture of both. They are usually served in broth - the ends of the noodly wrapper trail in the liquid like fish or clouds. All of China makes wonton, but only the Cantonese make wonderful wonton.
The difference is in the details: filling - broth - additions - attitude.
Wantan tong-mien: Wonton soup-noodles. Utterly Cantonese.
Dried flounder is more than just a flavour; it's a way of life.
Rather than making your own wrappers, it is best to buy them premade - the quality is virtually the same, and if you live near Chinatown (唐人街 'Tongyan Kai') you can simply buy them by the pound at Hon's. So I shall not discuss how to make the skins, other than to say that if you've made kreplach from scratch, you could use the same recipe for the wrapper.
[2016 ADDENDUM: For more on some of the ingredients, see this post: Dried shrimp cooking fat Chinese girls. Or this one: Cantonese ingredients.
Where to buy: Stockton Street, various shops.]
WONTON FILLING
Enough for fifty dumplings
One cup chopped shrimp.
One cup ground pork.
Quarter cup chopped water chestnuts (馬蹄 'maa tai').
One TBS minced parsley (洋香芹 'yeung heung kan') .
One TBS minced cilantro (芫茜 'yuen sai').
One stalk scallion (葱 'tsung'), minced.
Half TBS sherry or rice wine.
Half TBS oyster sauce (豪油 'ho yau').
One Tsp. soy sauce (醬油 'cheung yau', 豉油 'si yau').
One Tsp. sesame oil (麻油 'ma yau').
Half Tsp. cornstarch (玉米淀粉 'yiuk mai din fan').
Half Tsp. sugar (白糖 'pak tong').
[Regarding cup measurements for the shrimp and pork: these are more or less eight ounces or 226 grammes. Trust me on this, I weighed it out recently just to be sure.]
Mix everything, but do not overwork it, as doing so makes the meat tough. The shrimp fragments should be larger than the pork or water chestnut particles, everything else smaller - reason being that you want the 'crunch' of the shrimp, and the lesser ingredients need to be evenly distributed throughout.
Parsley is NOT traditional, but I like the taste, and it's good for the digestion.
Substitutions can be made, for instance the proportion of shrimp increased drastically and the quantity of pork decreased correspondingly.
Instead of water chestnut, chopped rehydrated cloud ear (雲耳 'wun yi') could be used, as they too have a wonderful textural effect.
Note: the amount of pork given above is the equivalent of two fresh Italian sausages. You could actually use four sausages squeezed from their casings for the filling entirely, if you're strapped for time. Radical, and perhaps it qualifies as 'fusion cuisine'.
But it certainly won't be kosher.
Put a dab of filling into each wonton skin, brush the exposed edges with egg wash, and first press two diagonal corners against each other, then bring up the other two corners up to form tails, pressing out the air in the pouch.
The result should look like a purse or hobo's pack.
Place each finished dumpling on a floured plate or tray. It is VERY important that the surface be floured. Otherwise you will rip the wontons when you try to pick them up.
You're making fifty wonton. Whatever you do not intend to use immediately, you can wrap in plastic and freeze.
SOUP FOR WONTON
Two pounds chicken on the bone.
One pound pork on the bone.
Half cup pieces dried flounder (左口魚 'jorhau yu', 大地魚 'daidei yu').
Two TBS dried shrimp (蝦米 'haa mai').
Four quarts (16 cups, approx 5 litres) water.
Quarter cup sherry or rice wine.
Three or four slices ginger.
Half Tsp. white peppercorns.
Roast or fry the dried flounder pieces nicely brown, but do not burn them.
Blanch the chicken and pork briefly in boiling water, drain and rinse well.
Place everything except the dried shrimp in a cauldron and simmer on low for three hours, skimming a few times in the first half hour.
Add the dried shrimp in the last half hour.
Strain very well.
Blanching the meat and bones first prevents overmuch scum, and yields a much cleaner broth.
The dried flounder is the essential Cantonese touch - it will NOT make the broth taste like stinky dried fish, but instead unify the flavours and add a nutty seafood saveur of its own.
Think of it as bouillon base.
Well then. You have your wonton, you've got the broth. What else will you need?
OTHER 'STUFF'
Egg-noodles. These have to be thin and fresh, for the best texture and taste. Fresh egg noodles need about a minute of blanching, whereas dried noodles take between three to five minutes, depending on thickness.
Dried noodles will also have a whiff of lye water.
Vegetables. It is very 'Chinatown' to add a few coarsely ripped baby bokchoi (小白菜 'siu paktsoi') to the bowl of soup, though it isn't traditional. For that matter, neither is adding noodles, and most non-Cantonese are appalled at that innovation, so go right ahead.
The sweet crisp freshness of the tiny greens are a marvelous chiddush.
Meats. Some people like to add some thinly sliced charsiu pork (叉燒) on top of the soup. This is not necessary at all, but no great heresy either. If you choose to do so, use the fattier kind.
I've added chunks of roast duck, which is also delicious.
Garnishes. Garlic chives are traditional in Hong Kong, but regular chives also can. Chopped scallion works too.
Personally I like to dump some cilantro on top.
Dipping sauce. I am a barbarian, I like hot and salty. What works for me is equal parts soy sauce, oyster sauce, chilipaste, and dark vinegar, with a little sugar and finely minced ginger mixed in. If it's too stiff, add some Louisiana hot sauce.
You do not really need a dip for the wontons, but it is always fun to play with your food.
ASSEMBLING WONTON NOODLE SOUP
It's supposed to be merely a snack and require only a small bowl, but after going through all the trouble of getting everything ready you aren't going to cook any other dishes.
So go ahead, use the big bowls.
Keep the broth on the back burner, below boiling temperature.
Heat up a large pot of water. When it boils, dump in the wonton. They're done when they all float. Scoop them out and apportion them in the bowls. Gently pour a sufficient quantity of hot broth over them. Put a porcelain soup spoon in each bowl, anchored by the wonton.
Blanch the noodles in the boiling water till toothsome. Immediately rinse them in cold water to stop them cooking any further. Place a skein on top of the wontons in the bowls, top off with a little more broth.
Add whatever else you feel necessary at this point, but it's fine already.
Garnish with chives, or scallion, and cilantro.
Now, go enjoy your wonton soup-noodles (雲吞湯麵 'wantan tong-mien') in front of the television, with one of your legs hurked up on the chair, wearing nothing but pajama pants and a wife-beater.
I would suggest watching a Chinese soap-opera, but you might not have that in your part of the world.
Maybe the discovery channel instead?
Kitten videos?
AFTER WORD
Right about now you are probably wondering 'why so specific an order to the soup assembly? Why not cook the noodles and wonton IN the broth?'
There are two very good reasons. The first one is that the wonton and the noodles have different cooking times. The second reason is that you do not want the starches that adhere to either the noodles or the wonton to muddy-up your fine broth.
Additionally, it just looks better if the wonton and the noodles form distinct areas in your bowl. That's why the dark green of scallions are, to my mind, a better garnish than the garlic chives commonly used - they're more dramatic, more visually appealing.
For the same reason, three thin slices of charsiu fanned out on top are also pleasing.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Tuesday, January 04, 2011
DRIED FLOUNDER OR HARÐFISKUR - FISH JERKY IN YOUR SOUP
While discussing wonton soup in a previous post, I mentioned an ingredient that is often used in the soup: dried flounder. It is not used in any great quantity, but for that real Cantonese taste it is absolutely essential.
This disgusted one of my readers.
Zheng Xie wrote: "Dried fish? Huh, typical. Probably stinky for words. I'll stick with steamed dumplings."
His name and attitude suggest that he is a northerner. And I may have been guilty of eliciting just such a loaded reaction by advertent snarkiness about his kind in that post.....
"Northern dumpling filling always includes chopped cabbage, garlic, and other stuff that to the southern mind has absolutely no business being there."
Mo yi-si ah, chan oi dik pakfong yan, but it's a valid opinion!
DRIED FLOUNDER
The taste contribution of dried flounder (左口魚 jorhau yu, 大地魚 daidei yu), roasted or fried before added, is not particularly 'fishy'. Rather, like many other dried seafood products, it contributes a unifying flavour and hint of sweet savouriness most complimentary to the other ingredients. The roasting or frying process mellows the dried fish and makes it easy to pulverize or crumble.
Per person per serving the quantity is in fact minute - probably less than half a teaspoon at best.
"Dried fish, huh, typical, probably stinky for words."
Dried flounder is also used in the form of little fried flakes in a number of simple vegetable dishes - such things as mustard greens (芥蘭 gai-lan), asparagus (蘆筍 lo-seun) or even little cabbages (小白菜 siu paktsoi) benefit from the inclusion of a small amount of dried flounder.
Just remove any scales and bones from the fish pieces if they're supposed to remain in the dish - if you are making stock, that isn't really necessary, as you will be straining it anyhow.
Fry the dried flounder crispy, but do not let it blacken. If you're making a supply of powder for future use, let the pieces dry on kitchen paper, then grind them fine. Otherwise, simply add them to the food during a moist stage, to let the flavours meld.
A few small pieces for the soup or added to one of the various 餸 should be perfect.
About one or two teaspoons (or more, if you really have a gevaldikke taam) for the entire dish.
AFTER WORD
About that unusual term in the title of this post: Harðfiskur is an Icelandic term for various kinds of dried fish. Seeing as Zheng Xie voiced a very northern bias, it seemed appropriate to throw in a word from a very Northern language.
Should make him feel right at home.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
This disgusted one of my readers.
Zheng Xie wrote: "Dried fish? Huh, typical. Probably stinky for words. I'll stick with steamed dumplings."
His name and attitude suggest that he is a northerner. And I may have been guilty of eliciting just such a loaded reaction by advertent snarkiness about his kind in that post.....
"Northern dumpling filling always includes chopped cabbage, garlic, and other stuff that to the southern mind has absolutely no business being there."
Mo yi-si ah, chan oi dik pakfong yan, but it's a valid opinion!
DRIED FLOUNDER
The taste contribution of dried flounder (左口魚 jorhau yu, 大地魚 daidei yu), roasted or fried before added, is not particularly 'fishy'. Rather, like many other dried seafood products, it contributes a unifying flavour and hint of sweet savouriness most complimentary to the other ingredients. The roasting or frying process mellows the dried fish and makes it easy to pulverize or crumble.
Per person per serving the quantity is in fact minute - probably less than half a teaspoon at best.
"Dried fish, huh, typical, probably stinky for words."
Dried flounder is also used in the form of little fried flakes in a number of simple vegetable dishes - such things as mustard greens (芥蘭 gai-lan), asparagus (蘆筍 lo-seun) or even little cabbages (小白菜 siu paktsoi) benefit from the inclusion of a small amount of dried flounder.
Just remove any scales and bones from the fish pieces if they're supposed to remain in the dish - if you are making stock, that isn't really necessary, as you will be straining it anyhow.
Fry the dried flounder crispy, but do not let it blacken. If you're making a supply of powder for future use, let the pieces dry on kitchen paper, then grind them fine. Otherwise, simply add them to the food during a moist stage, to let the flavours meld.
A few small pieces for the soup or added to one of the various 餸 should be perfect.
About one or two teaspoons (or more, if you really have a gevaldikke taam) for the entire dish.
AFTER WORD
About that unusual term in the title of this post: Harðfiskur is an Icelandic term for various kinds of dried fish. Seeing as Zheng Xie voiced a very northern bias, it seemed appropriate to throw in a word from a very Northern language.
Should make him feel right at home.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Monday, January 03, 2011
WONTON, WANTAN, WUNTUN: HON'S WUN TUN HOUSE AND SCRAWNY MAK
Really, it doesn’t matter what you call those things. As long as you're saying 雲吞, which is the Cantonese way of writing and pronouncing the word.
Northerners say 餛飩 and mean something that really isn't the same.
To Northerners, 'hwuntwun' (餛飩) are always a poorer cousin of 'shwei-jiao' (水餃), without the warm familial connotations or cold-weather comfort. For many Cantonese, soei-gaau (水餃) are simply a larger and coarser version of wantan (雲吞) with a distinct pong to the stuffing.
Northern dumpling filling always includes chopped cabbage, garlic, and other stuff that to the southern mind has absolutely no business being there.
Wonton (wantan) are quintessentially Cantonese - refined yet brash, small but feisty.
All good stuff.
[Besides the fact that the dough skins and construction of the dumplings are different, that the sizes are dissimilar , and the fillings vary enormously, it's also a question of attitude: Wonton are to the Cantonese what shwei-jiao (水餃 'soei-gau') are to the Northerners - something that appeals on a deeper level, and darnitall why can't that other bunch ('northerners', usually meaning most other Chinese) just learn to do it right?
Shwei-jiao properly are large dumplings with a filling of minced meat and chives or cabbage poached in boiling water for about twenty minutes - which is far too long by the standards of the impatient Cantonese, who don't know really what those things are and consequently often use the term to refer to a big ugly type of wonton. Ordering wonton outside of the Cantonese world leads to disappointment, in the same way that expecting real shwei-jiao in a Cantonese restaurant will get you what precisely you did NOT want. ]
By northern standards the Cantonese commit several horrid crimes with wonton.
Cantonese serve them with noodles ("nope, that just ain't right!").
In a stock flavoured with a smelly dried fish ("everybody KNOWS it should be superior broth!").
Frequently with some small cabbage (小白菜 'siu pak tsoi') added ("the nerve, the effrontery!").
And maybe even slices of red roast pork (叉燒 'charsiu') on top for extra fun ("scream, wail, faint!!!").
[Superior broth (高湯 'ko tong') is made from chicken and pork bones simmered on low heat for a couple of hours, skimmed and strained. The result is a clear intense flavour with a touch of sweetness. The soup used for wonton is anything but "superior", being more of a clean briny bouillon than anything else. If you went into a wonton restaurant looking for something similar to Vietnamese pho, you will be quite as horrified as the average Northerner (北方人 'pakfong yan') often is upon discovering charred fish and shrimp roe.]
Which makes it all the more remarkable that I had really excellent wonton the other day at a place where most of the staff spoke Mandarin among themselves, and didn't even look Cantonese!
HON'S WUN-TUN HOUSE (CA.) LTD.
洪記麵家 ("Hung Gei Mien Ga")
648 Kearny Street
San Francisco, CA 94108
415-433-3966
Hon's is located just north of Commercial Street (襟美慎街 'kam-mei-san kai' - "la calle de los commerciantes") on the east side of Kearny (乾尼街 'kin-nei kai') , before Clay (企李街 'kei-lei kai').
Darn good wonton. Seriously. Yes, the place looks like a hole-in-the-wall, and the tourists will probably be scared to go in, and despite the restaurant name being a major clue won't know what to order if they do. Plus it has that slightly grungy look that many places in Chinatown have - people work here, business is transacted, you got what you wanted, so don't bellyache about the décor.
Décor costs extra.
However.....
Sweet fresh shrimp filling, nine lovely cloud dumplings in a bouillon flavoured with I think the merest touch of dried flounder (左口魚 'jorhauyu', "leftside mouth fish").
It was so satisfying I just had to have another portion.
Hon's Wun-Tun House has been around a heck of a long time, they know what they're doing.
Next time I'll order the wantan tong mien (雲吞湯麵) - wonton and soup noodles.
Of course, for 'real Hong Kong wonton', you probably have to go to Hong Kong. Even though Hon's are the best thing around, some people will always insist that there's a difference.
HONG KONG WONTON: SCRAWNY MAK
Fragrant Harbour's most well-known wonton were from a food stand in Central named 麥奀記 ('mak ngan gei'), started back in the sixties by 麥鏡鴻 (Mak King-hong), whose nickname was 'Scrawny Mak' (麥奀 Mak Ngan).
Presently the family business is called 麥奀雲吞麵世家 ('mak ngan wantan mien sai ga'), and located indoors since the founder gave up his food stall license upon retiring in 1983.
[麥奀雲吞麵世家: 77 Wellington Street - Ground Floor, Central District, HK. (中環, 威靈頓街, 77號, 地下) as well as 麥文記麵家 (Mak Man Kee Noodle): 51 Parkes Street - Ground Floor, Jordan (in the Yau Tsim Mong District 油尖旺區), Kowloon. (九龍, 佐敦, 白加士街, 51號, 地下).]
Mr. Mak's oldest son runs a restaurant named Chung Kee Noodle (忠記麵家 'chung gei mien ga'), and there's even an outpost of the family enterprise in Macau (or so I have heard).
[忠記麵家 (Chung Kee Noodle): 37 Wing Kut Street, Sheung Wan, HK (香港島, 上環, 永吉街, 37號).]
Mak's uses shrimp as filling, served in a broth made of grilled or toasted dried flounder (左口魚 'jorhauyu', "leftside mouth fish"), shrimp roe (蝦子 'haa ji'), and pork stock. If you order the wantan tong mien (雲吞湯麵) the noodles are added last, so that they don't get overcooked and soggy.
Mak's uses only fresh thin noodles, which should be eaten al dente.
Minced garlic chives are used to garnish.
[The character translated as 'scrawny' (奀 'ngan') also means stingy, by the way. Not germane in this context.]
POSTSCRIPTUM
In the United States and Canada dried noodles are often encountered, which have a recognizable smell that is inappropriate in wonton soup. But dried noodles can take a bit more culinary abuse than the fresh product, and are more widely available outside of San Francisco C'town.
Sometimes wheat noodles show up, which is an improvement in taste (over the dried egg noodles), but NOT in texture.
Wheat noodles are just wrong.
Instead of garlic chives, most often you will find scallion used instead.
You should expect to see a recipe for wonton on this blog sometime in the near-future.
Savage Kitten used to make the wonton in our household, now it's my turn.
Because we are no longer a couple and so do not eat together very often - though we still live together as roommates and friends - our eating patterns have changed enormously, and I have re-explored many of the foods that deeply resonate for me.
Also, since the Yat Pan Heung (一品香) on the corner of Jackson and Kearny closed several years ago, there has not been a place with decent shwei-jiao in the old neighborhood. So there will probably be a recipe for boiled dumplings here at some point too.
Northerners may find it heretical.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Northerners say 餛飩 and mean something that really isn't the same.
To Northerners, 'hwuntwun' (餛飩) are always a poorer cousin of 'shwei-jiao' (水餃), without the warm familial connotations or cold-weather comfort. For many Cantonese, soei-gaau (水餃) are simply a larger and coarser version of wantan (雲吞) with a distinct pong to the stuffing.
Northern dumpling filling always includes chopped cabbage, garlic, and other stuff that to the southern mind has absolutely no business being there.
Wonton (wantan) are quintessentially Cantonese - refined yet brash, small but feisty.
All good stuff.
[Besides the fact that the dough skins and construction of the dumplings are different, that the sizes are dissimilar , and the fillings vary enormously, it's also a question of attitude: Wonton are to the Cantonese what shwei-jiao (水餃 'soei-gau') are to the Northerners - something that appeals on a deeper level, and darnitall why can't that other bunch ('northerners', usually meaning most other Chinese) just learn to do it right?
Shwei-jiao properly are large dumplings with a filling of minced meat and chives or cabbage poached in boiling water for about twenty minutes - which is far too long by the standards of the impatient Cantonese, who don't know really what those things are and consequently often use the term to refer to a big ugly type of wonton. Ordering wonton outside of the Cantonese world leads to disappointment, in the same way that expecting real shwei-jiao in a Cantonese restaurant will get you what precisely you did NOT want. ]
By northern standards the Cantonese commit several horrid crimes with wonton.
Cantonese serve them with noodles ("nope, that just ain't right!").
In a stock flavoured with a smelly dried fish ("everybody KNOWS it should be superior broth!").
Frequently with some small cabbage (小白菜 'siu pak tsoi') added ("the nerve, the effrontery!").
And maybe even slices of red roast pork (叉燒 'charsiu') on top for extra fun ("scream, wail, faint!!!").
[Superior broth (高湯 'ko tong') is made from chicken and pork bones simmered on low heat for a couple of hours, skimmed and strained. The result is a clear intense flavour with a touch of sweetness. The soup used for wonton is anything but "superior", being more of a clean briny bouillon than anything else. If you went into a wonton restaurant looking for something similar to Vietnamese pho, you will be quite as horrified as the average Northerner (北方人 'pakfong yan') often is upon discovering charred fish and shrimp roe.]
Which makes it all the more remarkable that I had really excellent wonton the other day at a place where most of the staff spoke Mandarin among themselves, and didn't even look Cantonese!
HON'S WUN-TUN HOUSE (CA.) LTD.
洪記麵家 ("Hung Gei Mien Ga")
648 Kearny Street
San Francisco, CA 94108
415-433-3966
Hon's is located just north of Commercial Street (襟美慎街 'kam-mei-san kai' - "la calle de los commerciantes") on the east side of Kearny (乾尼街 'kin-nei kai') , before Clay (企李街 'kei-lei kai').
Darn good wonton. Seriously. Yes, the place looks like a hole-in-the-wall, and the tourists will probably be scared to go in, and despite the restaurant name being a major clue won't know what to order if they do. Plus it has that slightly grungy look that many places in Chinatown have - people work here, business is transacted, you got what you wanted, so don't bellyache about the décor.
Décor costs extra.
However.....
Sweet fresh shrimp filling, nine lovely cloud dumplings in a bouillon flavoured with I think the merest touch of dried flounder (左口魚 'jorhauyu', "leftside mouth fish").
It was so satisfying I just had to have another portion.
Hon's Wun-Tun House has been around a heck of a long time, they know what they're doing.
Next time I'll order the wantan tong mien (雲吞湯麵) - wonton and soup noodles.
Of course, for 'real Hong Kong wonton', you probably have to go to Hong Kong. Even though Hon's are the best thing around, some people will always insist that there's a difference.
HONG KONG WONTON: SCRAWNY MAK
Fragrant Harbour's most well-known wonton were from a food stand in Central named 麥奀記 ('mak ngan gei'), started back in the sixties by 麥鏡鴻 (Mak King-hong), whose nickname was 'Scrawny Mak' (麥奀 Mak Ngan).
Presently the family business is called 麥奀雲吞麵世家 ('mak ngan wantan mien sai ga'), and located indoors since the founder gave up his food stall license upon retiring in 1983.
[麥奀雲吞麵世家: 77 Wellington Street - Ground Floor, Central District, HK. (中環, 威靈頓街, 77號, 地下) as well as 麥文記麵家 (Mak Man Kee Noodle): 51 Parkes Street - Ground Floor, Jordan (in the Yau Tsim Mong District 油尖旺區), Kowloon. (九龍, 佐敦, 白加士街, 51號, 地下).]
Mr. Mak's oldest son runs a restaurant named Chung Kee Noodle (忠記麵家 'chung gei mien ga'), and there's even an outpost of the family enterprise in Macau (or so I have heard).
[忠記麵家 (Chung Kee Noodle): 37 Wing Kut Street, Sheung Wan, HK (香港島, 上環, 永吉街, 37號).]
Mak's uses shrimp as filling, served in a broth made of grilled or toasted dried flounder (左口魚 'jorhauyu', "leftside mouth fish"), shrimp roe (蝦子 'haa ji'), and pork stock. If you order the wantan tong mien (雲吞湯麵) the noodles are added last, so that they don't get overcooked and soggy.
Mak's uses only fresh thin noodles, which should be eaten al dente.
Minced garlic chives are used to garnish.
[The character translated as 'scrawny' (奀 'ngan') also means stingy, by the way. Not germane in this context.]
POSTSCRIPTUM
In the United States and Canada dried noodles are often encountered, which have a recognizable smell that is inappropriate in wonton soup. But dried noodles can take a bit more culinary abuse than the fresh product, and are more widely available outside of San Francisco C'town.
Sometimes wheat noodles show up, which is an improvement in taste (over the dried egg noodles), but NOT in texture.
Wheat noodles are just wrong.
Instead of garlic chives, most often you will find scallion used instead.
You should expect to see a recipe for wonton on this blog sometime in the near-future.
Savage Kitten used to make the wonton in our household, now it's my turn.
Because we are no longer a couple and so do not eat together very often - though we still live together as roommates and friends - our eating patterns have changed enormously, and I have re-explored many of the foods that deeply resonate for me.
Also, since the Yat Pan Heung (一品香) on the corner of Jackson and Kearny closed several years ago, there has not been a place with decent shwei-jiao in the old neighborhood. So there will probably be a recipe for boiled dumplings here at some point too.
Northerners may find it heretical.
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LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
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LOONIES WARN OF END OF DAYS
Apparently the much-trumpeted "second coming" will be on May 21st. 2011.
Approximately five months of unbearable torment are scheduled immediately after.
Pencil it in on your calenders.
This per Family Radio Worldwide, a Christian ministry whose supreme ayatollah has reckoned the date based on the Bible.
Oh boy, I can't wait.
The idea of all the most insufferable people being yanked up is too glorious to contemplate.
This world would be so much better with all of them gone.
Such a pity that it will not happen.
"Beyond the shadow of a doubt, May 21 will be the date of the Rapture and the day of judgment"
------Said by some senile old harhar somewhere in California.
Given that the aforementioned S.O.H. had previously calculated that the second coming would be in 1994, you may reasonably doubt the S.O.H.'s ability to predict the blasted event.
Apparently the S.O.H. was an adherent of the Dutch branch of Calvinism, before splitting off and forming his own belief-structure, which is based on radio waves and creative mathematics. These are perhaps unusual fundaments for a new creed, but eccentric separatism is well within the tradition of the Netherlandish churches.
Many Dutch Calvinists will aver that the tendency to form dissenting sects is a sign of vibrant health, and that one cannot split rotten wood........
Respectfully, I beg to differ.
With so many 'different' groups, the Dutch Calvinist tradition clearly suffers from theological schizophrenia.
There are some real nuts in the woodwork.
Note, by the way, that though the "rapture" will occur in May, the "End of Days" is scheduled for October.
Possibly right on my birthday. I'll be turning 52 then.
All I can say is that no matter what, there had better be cake.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
Approximately five months of unbearable torment are scheduled immediately after.
Pencil it in on your calenders.
This per Family Radio Worldwide, a Christian ministry whose supreme ayatollah has reckoned the date based on the Bible.
Oh boy, I can't wait.
The idea of all the most insufferable people being yanked up is too glorious to contemplate.
This world would be so much better with all of them gone.
Such a pity that it will not happen.
"Beyond the shadow of a doubt, May 21 will be the date of the Rapture and the day of judgment"
------Said by some senile old harhar somewhere in California.
Given that the aforementioned S.O.H. had previously calculated that the second coming would be in 1994, you may reasonably doubt the S.O.H.'s ability to predict the blasted event.
Apparently the S.O.H. was an adherent of the Dutch branch of Calvinism, before splitting off and forming his own belief-structure, which is based on radio waves and creative mathematics. These are perhaps unusual fundaments for a new creed, but eccentric separatism is well within the tradition of the Netherlandish churches.
Many Dutch Calvinists will aver that the tendency to form dissenting sects is a sign of vibrant health, and that one cannot split rotten wood........
Respectfully, I beg to differ.
With so many 'different' groups, the Dutch Calvinist tradition clearly suffers from theological schizophrenia.
There are some real nuts in the woodwork.
Note, by the way, that though the "rapture" will occur in May, the "End of Days" is scheduled for October.
Possibly right on my birthday. I'll be turning 52 then.
All I can say is that no matter what, there had better be cake.
==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================
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GRITS AND TOFU
Like most Americans, I have a list of people who should be peacefully retired from public service and thereafter kept away from their desks,...
