… eat what the Romans eat. But what if Rome is a mixture of peoples from all over the world? Whose Rome is it and what is typical for these Romans. For now, my Rome is spicy, full of flavors of all sorts and colourful.
Guardian Buddha (so nothing bad happens when washing hands)? I love it. :)
I’m presently stationed at Box Hill aka Peking feat. Hong Kong feat. Kuala Lumpur. Just the mere walk to work is a burst of colours, sounds and especially smells (no, I would not call them scents). The route to work goes through a few shopping centres, which are packed with everything from chemists (aka pharmacies), ice cream parlour to butchers. And you can only guess, which smells delight me the most… The first shopping area I enter in the mall is butchers and poultry vendors (they seem to want to sell pork and chicken in different shops). Folded pig skin, all the pieces of meat separated into own piles and set nicely to appeal to customers. I must admit, I haven’t seen this meticulous sorting of different body parts before. It looks like they took the anatomy book of a chicken and decided to separate it muscle by muscle and intestine by intestine. They’ve done a great job at it too. But I must say this: I would prefer to smell fresh brewed coffee in the morning or a sizzling pancake or nice cinnamon porridge – not carcass. Because that is how it smells. It’s a wall of raw meat smell that greets me in the mornings.
The path to work continues by the veggie and fruit section. Not so many smells there, but all the more colour! Green of the spring onions and cucumbers and all the lovely leafy greens. Red of the capsicum, chillies and apples. Bright yellow bananas and yellow-green pawpaws. Orange citrus fruits of all sizes, a punch of carrots. The purplish skin of an eggplant. The only problem is that I’m not necessarily passing by on my back, or more likely, the vendors have packed their stuff before I get there. But behold, I will challenge myself to do a proper shopping session of vegetables before my time in Box Hill is up (that is – next week).
There are also a lot of shops where you can buy ready cooked food, ranging from regular sandwiches to sushi and something called rice burgers… I think might get that for lunch today just out of curiosity. And then is the sound part. It’s a cruel, cruel joke on innocent people on their way to work.
It’s opera. It’s goddam opera. Loud. And clear. And it fills the whole square in front of the shopping centre. And I have to listen to it for at least a minute before I’m in the safety of the other shopping mall and its thick walls. I guess I don’t like to like all kind of music and it’s pretty clear now that opera is not my thing. Especially in the mornings.
Actually, the perfect morning sound is again related to coffee. The purring sound of a filter coffee machine. Well, to be honest, it’s more of a gurgle or a snort. :D Because that’s one things I truly and honestly miss (I know, I have been here only for three and a half weeks…). Proper filtered coffee. Instant is what it is, instant. Wouldn’t even bother to add the word ‘coffee’ to it. And these fancy coffee houses that Melbourne is known for – they serve a squint of strong brown liquid in the bottom of your cup or glass, it’s not the same as a MUGFUL of heavenly dark-roasted coffee with FRESH soy milk (still haven’t found one here that would please my ‘sophisticated’ taste buds). Having an espresso is nice, but I just doesn’t fit with mornings.
I don’t know what Mrs Hong’s, the neighbour’s, preference to morning drinks is, but I sure would love to taste her cooking. Jess told me about it and I have been able to experience the lingering scent of soy and fish sauce in the hallway. Jess hasn’t got any recipes out of her, but it’s not that Mrs Hong hasn’t tried to explain. She just doesn’t speak much English, and her vocabulary mostly consists of words like ‘morning’ and ‘beauuutiful’. She seems like one interesting lady. I’m a little upset that I have only once spotted her. She was doing her morning taiji in the backyard and waved morning greetings.
My challenge is to feast on Chinese food to the max, because I think this is as good and authentic as it gets. My flat rice noodle dish from Wednesday was tasty, but not as spicy as I had hoped. I did ask extra hot, but just like Jess warned, they see a white face, not so spicy. Well, will have to try and get spicy food the next time.
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In my previous post (in Finnish) I was thinking of having an urban jungle weekend, but no. I'm heading for the snowy mountains. TO SKI!!! :D :D :D Like proper cross-country skiing! And I will be skiing in the same place as the ski marathon is heald, so I get to see the setting before hand, yay me!
More info on where I'm heading and what I'm up to: http://www.hoppet.com.au/ and http://www.fallscreek.com.au/
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