Food is never a reason for me to travel anywhere so I didn’t worry too much when I realized I’d be going to China for 5 months; Chinese happens to rank near the bottom of my cuisine list. (I don’t care how many people say otherwise, “Golden Chopsticks” is the most overpriced, overrated, emperors-clothes Chinese restaurant in Redmond.) OK, so I can handle not having my favorite foods accessible. But, by the end of our lunch today, I had happily proclaimed to Michael and Marshall that the meal was “the best Chinese food I’ve ever had!”

It wasn’t because I had developed such an appetite after the morning’s exercise either. I arrived at the building this morning at 8:45 when a swarm of employees from various companies were also dashing in. The design of the building’s elevators is so bad (more on this in a future post) that I knew I’d be waiting for a while. Sure enough, the elevator hallway was clogged shoulder to shoulder with people. A few sturdy folks exited to the right to the stairs. “Why not?”, I thought. I work on the 15th floor and each floor contained four flights…

it:

By the time lunch time had arrived, I was eager to head out. I can’t remember the name of the restaurant, but it’s about 4 times the size of your average restaurant in the US. I guess there’s not really that much to tell other than what we had: small bowls of rice, a cooked spinach dish, some very spicy chicken bits, peanuts, a pork dish that had a fish flavor, and a soupy mix of bits of spicy pork and sprouts. All of it was tasty, but the pork dishes were especially delicious and I had Michael write the names down for me. Shucks, I left the sheet of paper at work so I don’t remember what they were called.

Short movie: Ordering at the restaurant

Check out this picture of the walk home. Pedestrians and bikes share the road almost equally with motor vehicles, but the vehicles naturally are king. Look in the distance of the photo, you can see someone standing in the intersection. It’s not as bad as you may think. Although it can be dangerous, it is no worse than those insane uncontrolled pedestrian crosswalks that we have in Seattle.