And the winner of ‘The Best Texan Chilli’ is ….

I love cooking… so when the opportunity to take part in the ‘First Hangzhou Chilli Cook Off’ competition  presented itself I was not going to turn it down!!   Adverts for the event cluttered all the expat websites tempting budding chefs, not just Americans and foreigners who know what a chilli should taste like, but also local Chinese cooks.  Let’s try to integrate and promote a sense of community, the message rang.  Proceeds to go to charity! The leaflet did not exactly specify which one, but it sounded like a good cause nonetheless.  Plenty of orphanages and disadvantaged children to be cared for, we thought.

Being in the company of Indians, we left the Chilli to the Americans/Europeans and plumped for the ‘Non-Chilli Spicy Food’ class, concocting an Indian curry instead.  Our initial team of three shrunk to just two members on the day, we set off laden with ingredients, banners and bunting to jolly up our stall.

As the non-Indian member of my team, I focused mainly on chopping and stirring, leaving the adding of spices to the ‘One In The Know’ and kept fingers crossed.  We were working on Indian intuition, not a recipe book in sight…  And although P had tried out the curry before, she had not cooked it in the large quantities we were expected to produce…  Neither were we prepared for the cooking conditions:  a huge pot on a rather small burner giving off a paltry heat unable to cope with the vast amounts of onions to be sweated and browned…

So at the 10 am start of the event, our curry was still bubbling away and aromatizing, slowly gaining the optimum flavour to present to the judges and the public.  Our next door neighbours, definitely in the right spirit and dressing the part, were keen chilli fans, the pleasant odours of their wares wafting across…  We shared their beers, which was a lot cheaper than buying our drinks in the pub/restaurant run by an American who was clearly making a mint on the day…

Visitors came to our stall and sampled our curry, nodding their heads in approval at finally savouring a proper curry in Hangzhou, one that resembled Indian food, as eaten in India…  We were confident…

The afternoon lingered on with plenty of tasters.  And in the background, the obligatory ‘Eat the most hamburgers’, ‘Eat the most pies’ and ‘Eat the most cake’ (without vomiting) competitions carried on.  We could have been at any Chilli Cook Off in the US of A…  But the day eventually drew to a close when all the chillies had been consumed and everyone was eagerly anticipating the announcement of the winners…

I had looked around earlier and tried several of the chillies and curries entered by the other teams.  Apart from the professional amateurs from the Americas and Europeans regions, a sprinkling of local Chinese and Indian businesses also cooked chillies and curries.  And I was glad I was not the one to be judging the competition, although the Chicken Tikka Massala  cooked by the chef of a local Indian restaurant had all the hallmarks of too much sauce, too much food colouring and too little resemblance to anything Indian that I have eaten in India..  You know the kind of Chicken Tikka Massala that comes out of a jar…

But we should have taken more notice of the local businesses sponsoring the event and their lavish contributions to the raffle prizes…  Indeed when the winners were announced, not a single American entry was deemed the best.  You would have thought they should have been able to cook up ‘The Best Texan Chilli’.  The trophy went to the Chinese chefs of the restaurant that donated generous raffle prizes…  And the best non-Chilli dish trophy went to the Indian chef of a restaurant supporting the event…   And at the last minute, the organisers announced a surprise new category: the invention of a new chilli dish … which was given to a Chinese business selling chilli ice cream…  And the charity we supported???  A local ladies football team….

Thank goodness we made our own fun that day, but I wonder how many non-Chinese entrants will be rushing back for the Second Hangzhou Chilli Cook-Off….  Maybe sponsors of the event should be in a separate category????

And if you wonder about the spelling of ‘chili’; blame the Americans…

 

 

Beware the bargains….

I made it to Suzhou eventually…  only a week later than originally planned and maybe the trip was just a condensed version of what I had in mind.  But I made it and that is what counts!!

Suzhou is a picturesque little town, a tourist magnet just outside Shanghai and definitely on the list of attractions for visitors to the area, not unlike Hangzhou.  So it was inevitable that I would want to see what all the fuss was about.   The weekend trip, which is deemed long enough to cover essential Suzhou, had to be curtailed to just a Saturday as my Italian friend had a birthday party to attend that evening.  And as she still had to buy a birthday cake and get spruced up for the party,  we were left with about six hours to do it all.

Time being of the essence, we whizzed to Suzhou on a high speed train, racing ahead of the grey skies bursting with rain.  Rather than making use of cheap public transport, we put a smile on a local taxi driver’s face paying probably just a little over the odds.  But it got us into the touristy heart of the town, ready for our exploration at break-neck speed.

Touts crowded the area, eagerly pointing to their display boards flaunting generous discounts for all the town’s features of interest: its famed  gardens, towering pagodas and temples; its quaint waterways lined with age-old houses;  its interesting museums and freshwater lakes.  We counted our blessings at being able to buy  access to our three destinations of choice for a fraction of the advertised price.  A bargain… or so we thought.

After parting with our money, we were herded to an assembly point, with a horde of other Chinese tourists waiting to get onto a bus..  A bus???  The garden and pagoda we had come to see were nearby and Pingjiang Road and Shantang Street just around the corner.  It would at least save our feet, we mused, and followed the flag obediently.

The tour took us around Suzhou town, that is to the newer parts full of shops and high rise blocks of flats, not the charming old buildings we were expecting to see.  We were treated to a boat ride (we paid for this one…), studying sights that had not made it onto our list of ‘must-sees’.  We quizzed the tour leader.  The gardens and pagoda we had the tickers for???  Next, she mumbled, we’ll be getting there next…

But another detour beckoned.  We passed Suzhou’s Silk Museum, which clearly warranted a visit and the entry was free.  To be fair, it was interesting to see the exquisite work produced by the humble silk worm  and to marvel at the elasticity of the seemingly fragile thread spun by such a delicate creature.  And we took the liberty to take an abundance of photographs before being told this was forbidden…  How were we supposed to know as there was no notice to alert us???  And obviously, the ‘Chinese Masters of Copying’ have understood the powers of guiding visitors through a well-stocked shop.  Silks of all hues, woven into pillows, underwear, nightgowns, classical and modern Chinese dresses and shirts screamed to be purchased.   We talked to our tour guide…. Yes, she confirmed, the gardens were next…

Only she forgot to mention that is was ‘next’ after stopping at a pearl factory, no entrance fee to be paid.   I believe the expression that most accurately reflects our sentiment at the time was: ‘We saw RED’.   With only a few hours left to enjoy Suzhou, pearls were not on our agenda as the time frame allowed in the ‘museum’ suggested a generous amount of time allotted for checking out the shop near the exit…  We were not born yesterday, so we left, clutching our tickets to the pagoda and gardens…

In the end we did not make it to the Humble Garden of The Administrator, nor the pagoda, but mustered up just enough energy and enthusiasm to join the throng of tourists in the old part of town: Shantang Street and Pingjiang Road.  We passed some of the pretty waterways and narrow cobbled roads, vibrant umbrellas dancing on the pavements along the canals and bringing colourful cheer to a dismal day.

On the upside, we may have missed out on most of the sights we had set our heart on, but that’s just a reason to come back another time… on a day when the sun laughs at us and no umbrellas obscure the delightful old town.  And then, we will just pay full price for the attractions we really want to visit, and leave the ticket touts shouting themselves hoarse…  There are such things as false economies and falling into the trap of peddlers is just one of them…

Avoiding the crowds on China’s National Holidays…

Finally after about 10 solid weeks of teaching – bar the one day off for Tomb Sweeping  Day – we had a long weekend!!  Hooray!! Not that any of us foreign teachers had an inkling about this impending event.  Unless you study the calendar of Chinese National Holidays rigorously and put reminders in your diary , you only discover these occasions by accident.  For instance, like the teacher who turned up to school only  to find the building under lock and key and no one present…  It happens, communication and advance notice are alien concepts here, a bit like in India…

I stumbled upon the advent of the extended  four-day break purely by coincidence.  Rumour had it that sports day season was upon us, the day or days when the services of the English foreign teachers are not required and we might just get the day off…  Enough for me to put out some feelers and gather information, so I found out about this long weekend a full week beforehand, well ahead of everyone else…  And surely, you would have thought this meant plenty of time to organise a trip to far flung places within China.  Beijing beckoned with its Great Wall, the Summer Palace and Tiananmen Square… and four days seemed about the right amount of time to just get a flavour without breaking the bank.  I surfed the net, invited friends along… only to find no seats available on trains and any flights not already snapped up well over my budget…  I had not even started on hotel rooms.

With Beijing out of the running, maybe a visit to Shanghai or Suzhou might have been more manageable.  Both are only a stone’s throw away from where I live, especially when travelling on China’s fast and reliable bullet trains, their rocket-noses slicing through the Chinese countryside at exhilarating speeds of over 300 km per hour.  But courtesy of the sluggish Chinese internet and with too much ‘umming and ahing’ by my Indian friend about which days to go, which hostel to choose and which train to pick, things did not bode well…  Coupled with the fact that it would be considerably cheaper to travel any other weekend apart from this one, there was only one solution: stay put and explore what Hangzhou had to offer…  There was no point in trying to travel when the Chinese themselves were all out and about, and who could blame them as days off from school and work are a rarity indeed.

So on Saturday I accompanied Italian Anna to an art exhibition on the outskirts of town, hidden away in the corridors of a cinema complex.  At least we were there to give her artist friend Ahmad from Palestine some moral support.  Next we ventured to the West Lake, with the rest of Hangzhou’s residents and hordes of tourists.  If the area had seemed crowded when I first visited the lake way back in cold February, now the bridges and causeways swarmed with people soaking up the sun and women young and old indecently exposing too much leg and the odd glimpse of underwear…  We scrutinized the latest Chinese fashions in H&M under the pretext of Anna needing to buy more comfortable shoes to replace her glamorous high heels which were so not the right thing to wear for a long walk around the lake…  We spotted old Chinese men performing the art of water writing on the pavement, ‘reciting’ chunks from famous works by authors such as Shakespeare…  We watched animated elderly men with furrowed brows blending  seamlessly within a sculptured tableau.  In the evening we met up with random strangers in an ex-pat bar where I bumped into a fellow teacher coming all the way from Prestbury, Cheltenham..  It is indeed a small world!!

On Sunday, I finally made it to the top of Linping Hill, the green forested hill overlooking the town, and joined the rest of Linping in search of cool shade, a bit of line-dancing entertainment and a climb up the pagoda to enjoy the view of the town.  I had seen the pagoda often when cycling to Walmart; it rather sticks out above the tree line and from a distance seemed certainly worth a visit.  But if I was looking for a chunk of Linping history, I was in for a surprise.  The pagoda is clearly not ancient, not even old for that matter; entirely constructed using the finest modern metals, it glimmers in the sunshine, a testament to modern architecture imitating China’s rich past and culture.

The glorious weather faded away on Monday, leaving grey clouds and drizzly rain in its wake.  Only lunch at Grandma’s Kitchen cheered up the day… and the fact that we queued for more than two hours for a table was just a small inconvenience.  The food was gorgeous and well worth the wait.

This left me with Tuesday to fill, the last day of my long weekend…  I spent it diligently preparing lessons for Wednesday, and Thursday, and Friday…  How better to end a long, relaxing weekend than by sitting behind my laptop trying to think up hundreds of imaginative ways to entertain the little Chinese children…  Occasionally I need to remind myself that I am here to work, and this everlasting adventure holiday is a figment of my imagination…

 

Toni & Guy Experience China Style.

Going to a different hairdresser always involves a little bit of a gamble.  Putting your hair – and with that your looks for the foreseeable future –  into the hands of an unknown quantity, however much recommended and bestowed with accolades, is not without risk.  How to translate your mind’s vision of the sleek appearance that must be shaped from your shock of unruly hair?  And will the hairstyle that is so befitting the woman in the picture you are brandishing in front of the stylist  really transform you into the next Marilyn Monroe????  Add to this the language barrier and you get some small idea of the monumental task facing me last week when a glimpse in the mirror through the gaps in my over-long fringe revealed the time had come…

Still haunted by the memory of my first unfortunate haircut experience in India, I was filled with dread.  There  I had ventured to the hairdresser’s without chaperone, and trusted that my hand gestures would be sufficient to explain I wanted a mere half inch of the length of my hair, but please don’t ruin the cut…   But what I envisaged as a minuscule fraction turned into an elephantine inch as she fashioned a haircut that my fellow Indian teachers ‘politely’ described as a ‘monkey haircut’.  Needless to say that my blog was devoid of any selfies or photographs of me in the weeks that followed, and the only evidence of my existence was through a headless picture in a sari…

Whilst on my travels, I could of course take the sensible route and let my hair grow at leisure, long and flowing; pin it up in a fashionable bun; let it dangle freely over my shoulders in a wild ‘devil-may-care’ style.  Haircut sorted, but covering up the signs of time??? Somehow the grey stubbornly refuses to blend gracefully with my darker strands…  Uncertain about which shades best compliment  the tint of my locks and hesitant about DIY hair colouring, I have always shied away from the boxes lurking on the supermarket shelves and put the fate of my hair into the hands of a hairdresser…  So where to turn here in China…??

No shortage of hairdressers in the vicinity, I had stolen looks through display windows at night when the salons are buzzing with action: men and women back from work cultivating the immaculate coiffured appearance of modern ‘Chinese man’, no strand of hair or dash of mascara out of place.  I also put out feelers with fellow teachers about where to find a reliable hairdresser, but their hairstyles – long and unkempt – and youthful complexions suggested that hair salons and stylists did not feature highly on their list of priorities.  ‘Make sure you take someone with you who speaks Chinese.  Someone who can translate for you…’  sage advice sounded.

In the end, I turned to Maggie who runs a little English language school in the area and as a business woman with a business nose seemed to be good source of mostly reliable information.   And indeed, she came up trumps.  She offered to take me to her hairdresser, an excellent stylist with excellent credentials who recently set up his own salon, so prices were still reasonable.  And I could even use her discount…. on top of that, she would be able to explain my wishes in plain Chinese…  It sounded as if I had landed on my feet and my hair would be in good hands… Plus I had arrived in China armed with pictures of my last cut and colour in the UK.  I am indeed becoming wiser…

I arrived at the salon on Tuesday, clutching a healthy dose of scepticism and my iPad with pictures, and kept my fingers crossed.  I needn’t have worried; boy was I in for a surprise!  After a brief discussion with the ‘chief stylist’,  studying the unsightly grey roots, glancing at colour swatches and my photographs, I was led to the place of transformation: comfy seats opposite a row of black, gleaming mirrors inset with television screens…  TELEVISION SCREENS???  ‘Did I care to watch an English movie whilst they mixed the colours and dyed my hair?’ ‘Or would I rather play a computer game or maybe listen to some soothing music?’  ‘Did I prefer coffee or tea?’  When I finally read the print on the hairdresser cape, it all fell into place: I was having the Toni & Guy experience, Chinese style!!  I did not have just the one person plastering on the colouring paste, but two men brushed and preened and prodded and coloured ensuring every strand was neatly daubed.  And my ears???  They were carefully protected with some little covers to stop them accidentally turning a shade darker and blending in too much with my new hair colour.  And when it was finally time to take off the paste and wash my hair??  No such discomfort as craning and bending my neck over a too high washbasin:  I was lying down, flat, resting my head easily just on the edge of the basin so water flowed gently and effortlessly over my head and hair with not a single drop being spilled on my clothes….   Even the haircut was a smooth affair.  With just a  few snips and tucks, a couple of different pairs of scissors and brushes and hey presto, I was greeted by the new me !!

Am I pleased with the result??  You bet I am.  No one has mentioned a ‘monkey haircut’ so far, and although my darker hair may make my skin look paler, the sunshine will soon rebalance that:  darker skin and fairer hair…. What is there to complain about?  Maybe the price of the haircut???  Luxuries do not come cheap, not even in China…