I'd love to tell people that no one speaks English here, and most people don't, but I'm guessing at least 1 in 3 speak as much English as I speak Chinese (so far not much.) Today, after school when I was getting hungry, I resolved to go out and try something new. Not new food, but new words and new situations. So I figured I'd be ordering something I didn't know, and frustrating the poor people taking the order. I set my sites on dumplings, dumplings was my goal for tonight. I decided on them because (a) I'd never ordered them, (b) I had learned at least two Chinese characters for a type of dumpling, (c) I like them, and (d) there isn't blood in dumplings, which is an issue here for us. I also chose dumplings because I'd had trouble saying dumplings before, or getting someone to understand what I was saying. The dumplings I was going to order are called shui3jiao3, the numbers are the tones, and it sounds kind of like: shway jeeow. So, without making the story any more complicated, I walked out the door and down the stairs with my heart beating fast in anticipation. Starting from my alley I walked in a 6 block circle, trying to choose a suitable vendor to give my money and my broken Chinese to. My first victim told me "no" they did not have dumplings, the vendor 3 vendors down had "shui jiao." I was excited that they understood what I wanted, even though they responded in English and Chinese. So, 3 vendors down, I only knew which vendor they were pointing to because I had been there before with someone else who was picking up dumplings. So I stood in front of the vendors menu-sign trying to see if i could recognize any of the characters for dumpling, (actually if you want the true flavor of the story and the surroundings, I was standing about dead center in the street, about 10 feet from the menu-sign.) But a woman comes around from behind the sign, and asks me, in broken English, what I want (to order) (they don't usually come out) I don't think she understood the disappointment on my face. I ended up ordering 20 "spicy flavor" dumplings. That's about 10 too many for me, and I really don't like that kind, so I really had to force feed myself that last 10. But the story is not as sad as it sounds, because, as I remembered on my way out, passing the first vendor, I had successfully communicated "Do you have dumplings?" to the first vendor. So the mission was a success! Thanks for tuning in. Mission 2: Order less and better tasting dumplings. (edit 278) Permalink