a few bits and pieces
This week has been bitterly cold in Taipei. I know that sounds kind of ridiculous to my North American friends under 4 feet of snow, or whatever, but i am supposed to be living on a Pacific island and goddamnit i should be able to wear flip-flops all year round.
No joke.
For several months - minus the trip to Laos - i have been wearing flip-flops as my only shoe, since one of the few areas not around my middle where the mystery red blotches have been recurring is on my heels, so keeping them out in the open air is one way to try minimize the irritation. I asked the office manager and she said it was alright, so i flip-flopped my way around the office looking like even more of a hobo than i already do in my shabby pants and ratty tank top. Which inspired one of my Indian colleagues to wear his flip-flops around the office too, and - not gonna lie - that did make me feel like i'm working at a proper Tech Company™️.
Of course, nobody in Taipei besides me has been stupid enough to wear flip-flops this week. It's been about 10 degrees overnight and barely hitting 13 during the day. It's windy. It's damp, overcast and drizzly. Cycling to work in flip-flops and a tank top is not the best plan. And then, inside the office, it's even colder than outside because of the torturous air conditioning. People have been wearing their heavy winter coats in the office, and yesterday one of our fashionable French colleagues came to work in what appeared to be a thick, mink hoodie.
I think it's warming up soon, and it's about goddamn time. When i get these stitches out of my belly, i hope i can go for a longer bike ride without risking frostbite.
I wanted to correct a possible misconception of some of those photos i shared from Laos a couple posts ago featuring me sitting at the table with an older Canadian lady and guiding her a-few-too-many-margaritas self through the night market in Luang Prabang. That lady was not my landlord slash roommate from Kamloops, but her sister K. K is also a wonderful person to know, and she's far less camera-shy than L. But i did get one picture of L, on the first day we met up, sitting by the Mekong, drinking out of coconut.
She sent a whole cavalcade of photos and short videos on WhatsApp of her and K's adventures in Chiang Mai, and i really should get on replying to that. But, you know, i'm back in work mode, which means responding to people's texts and emails can take months. Sigh.
Some of the Laos trip did rub off on me, though. Last weekend i bought some bok choy along with my usual stuff and i actually cut it up and cooked it first couple meals of the week, and it was glorious. I realize that even though my "kitchen" is just a sink and a hotplate and no counter space at all, i shouldn't let that stop me from eating fresh greens, which is one of the great pleasures of living in a part of the world where fresh greens come in all shapes, sizes and flavors. Maybe one day i'll even make it to one of the little wet markets (more like "wet alleys") near my house before work in the morning and get some greens with the mud still on them.
I did cook something else i liked the other day, and it features my last little piece of Laos cuisine, so here it is.
When i was walking to the airport on that last day, i stopped into a very quiet wet market on the non-tourist side of the river, and i bought one of the Lao snacks that i never had the chance to eat while i was there. It's dried river weed. They sell it in large sheets that look like nori, but the flavoring is different - much less salty. Apparently you are supposed to fry it before you eat it, which is why i didn't eat any while i was there. So i brought a big "pad" of river weed home with me and earlier this week i opened it up. Turns out it is pretty okay to eat raw, although it does have a bit of a chewy consistency that perhaps doesn't work well for western tastes. But if you fry it up just a smidge, it dehydrates it a bit, and you end up with wafer-thin blackish green crisps that have a really delightful flavor. It seems they dry it with garlic and chili and sesame seeds, so you don't need to add anything to it, but i used it as a condiment slash extra ingredient on my dumples.
The dish you see in the picture above is a dumpling extravaganza. Normally i buy the cheap, no-name brand vege dumplings that basically just have cabbage in them, but last week the store was out so i got the slightly more expensive dumplings that - now i've tried them - are actually way better. They have a whole bunch of stuff chopped up inside - shiitake mushroom, wood ear mushroom, cabbage, carrot, fake meat... Yum. I fry them on each side and then splash some water in to steam them a bit, let the water evaporate, then toss chili oil and fry them some more. Dumplings in a bowl, crisp up the river weed. Then the dumpling topping which this time was soy beans (edamame), soft tofu, kimchi and black bean chili sauce (half Lao Gan Ma, half local Taiwanese brand which is less umami and more salty). This is what i've been reduced to - cobbling together frozen ingredients, dried ingredients and fermented ingredients to try construct a semi-decent meal. If i just had a counter top wide enough for a chopping board i would use fresh garlic, ginger and chili - not to mention fresh mushrooms and greens - but it's baby steps. Either way i was very pleased with how this turned out, and river weed was the critical ingredient. I'll miss it when i run out.
Another cool thing i discovered recently is buying pre-cooked Japanese curry - which is very much a comfort food in Taiwan - submersing the bag in boiling water to heat it, and then using that as a topping for my dumples. It's super easy and feels like a warm hug.
I think this is the first time i've mentioned "dumples" on LiveJournal, and i suppose i should document it for posterity.
I talk to myself a lot. Living alone, i talk to myself more than i talk to anybody else. And i've developed my own little language, with baby words and foreign terms and random turns of phrase that only make sense to my ears. Food is one of the things i have the most pet names for. Noodles are noods. Dumplings are dumples. Fruit is 水果 shuĭguŏ because it's more fun to say in Chinese. Porridge is oats or (recently) 'vena (short for Spanish "avena"). Green onion pancake is not 葱油餅 but just 餅 bĭng, which i mispronounce as rhyming with the Microsoft search engine because it sounds funnier that way. Coffee is either pronounced in the high tone Chinese way ("kāfēi") or colloquial German way with a short "e" so it sounds more like "cuffer". I realize sometimes when i accidentally say this stuff out loud to other people that i must sound like a moron, or at least someone whose grasp of language and pronunciation is very poor, but they just don't get how much i entertain myself with my personal lingo.
A particular embarassing one that i shall now reveal is sometimes i call my computer my poo poo (doubled-up second syllable "pu"). Which, i fucking hate the trend in Chinese language to double up on syllables to make it sound cuter, but somehow i started doing it for my own goddamn computer. My own poo poo. I'm typing on my poo poo right now. Ay la vida. Tiān na. (Yes, i also frequently use G-rated expressions of frustration from Spanish and Chinese in my spoken language, and yet never in text.)
Does this entry have a point? It does not. It has been cold. I have been eating. And i have been working. I hope everyone is fine.
No joke.
For several months - minus the trip to Laos - i have been wearing flip-flops as my only shoe, since one of the few areas not around my middle where the mystery red blotches have been recurring is on my heels, so keeping them out in the open air is one way to try minimize the irritation. I asked the office manager and she said it was alright, so i flip-flopped my way around the office looking like even more of a hobo than i already do in my shabby pants and ratty tank top. Which inspired one of my Indian colleagues to wear his flip-flops around the office too, and - not gonna lie - that did make me feel like i'm working at a proper Tech Company™️.
Of course, nobody in Taipei besides me has been stupid enough to wear flip-flops this week. It's been about 10 degrees overnight and barely hitting 13 during the day. It's windy. It's damp, overcast and drizzly. Cycling to work in flip-flops and a tank top is not the best plan. And then, inside the office, it's even colder than outside because of the torturous air conditioning. People have been wearing their heavy winter coats in the office, and yesterday one of our fashionable French colleagues came to work in what appeared to be a thick, mink hoodie.
I think it's warming up soon, and it's about goddamn time. When i get these stitches out of my belly, i hope i can go for a longer bike ride without risking frostbite.
I wanted to correct a possible misconception of some of those photos i shared from Laos a couple posts ago featuring me sitting at the table with an older Canadian lady and guiding her a-few-too-many-margaritas self through the night market in Luang Prabang. That lady was not my landlord slash roommate from Kamloops, but her sister K. K is also a wonderful person to know, and she's far less camera-shy than L. But i did get one picture of L, on the first day we met up, sitting by the Mekong, drinking out of coconut.
She sent a whole cavalcade of photos and short videos on WhatsApp of her and K's adventures in Chiang Mai, and i really should get on replying to that. But, you know, i'm back in work mode, which means responding to people's texts and emails can take months. Sigh.
Some of the Laos trip did rub off on me, though. Last weekend i bought some bok choy along with my usual stuff and i actually cut it up and cooked it first couple meals of the week, and it was glorious. I realize that even though my "kitchen" is just a sink and a hotplate and no counter space at all, i shouldn't let that stop me from eating fresh greens, which is one of the great pleasures of living in a part of the world where fresh greens come in all shapes, sizes and flavors. Maybe one day i'll even make it to one of the little wet markets (more like "wet alleys") near my house before work in the morning and get some greens with the mud still on them.
I did cook something else i liked the other day, and it features my last little piece of Laos cuisine, so here it is.
When i was walking to the airport on that last day, i stopped into a very quiet wet market on the non-tourist side of the river, and i bought one of the Lao snacks that i never had the chance to eat while i was there. It's dried river weed. They sell it in large sheets that look like nori, but the flavoring is different - much less salty. Apparently you are supposed to fry it before you eat it, which is why i didn't eat any while i was there. So i brought a big "pad" of river weed home with me and earlier this week i opened it up. Turns out it is pretty okay to eat raw, although it does have a bit of a chewy consistency that perhaps doesn't work well for western tastes. But if you fry it up just a smidge, it dehydrates it a bit, and you end up with wafer-thin blackish green crisps that have a really delightful flavor. It seems they dry it with garlic and chili and sesame seeds, so you don't need to add anything to it, but i used it as a condiment slash extra ingredient on my dumples.
The dish you see in the picture above is a dumpling extravaganza. Normally i buy the cheap, no-name brand vege dumplings that basically just have cabbage in them, but last week the store was out so i got the slightly more expensive dumplings that - now i've tried them - are actually way better. They have a whole bunch of stuff chopped up inside - shiitake mushroom, wood ear mushroom, cabbage, carrot, fake meat... Yum. I fry them on each side and then splash some water in to steam them a bit, let the water evaporate, then toss chili oil and fry them some more. Dumplings in a bowl, crisp up the river weed. Then the dumpling topping which this time was soy beans (edamame), soft tofu, kimchi and black bean chili sauce (half Lao Gan Ma, half local Taiwanese brand which is less umami and more salty). This is what i've been reduced to - cobbling together frozen ingredients, dried ingredients and fermented ingredients to try construct a semi-decent meal. If i just had a counter top wide enough for a chopping board i would use fresh garlic, ginger and chili - not to mention fresh mushrooms and greens - but it's baby steps. Either way i was very pleased with how this turned out, and river weed was the critical ingredient. I'll miss it when i run out.
Another cool thing i discovered recently is buying pre-cooked Japanese curry - which is very much a comfort food in Taiwan - submersing the bag in boiling water to heat it, and then using that as a topping for my dumples. It's super easy and feels like a warm hug.
I think this is the first time i've mentioned "dumples" on LiveJournal, and i suppose i should document it for posterity.
I talk to myself a lot. Living alone, i talk to myself more than i talk to anybody else. And i've developed my own little language, with baby words and foreign terms and random turns of phrase that only make sense to my ears. Food is one of the things i have the most pet names for. Noodles are noods. Dumplings are dumples. Fruit is 水果 shuĭguŏ because it's more fun to say in Chinese. Porridge is oats or (recently) 'vena (short for Spanish "avena"). Green onion pancake is not 葱油餅 but just 餅 bĭng, which i mispronounce as rhyming with the Microsoft search engine because it sounds funnier that way. Coffee is either pronounced in the high tone Chinese way ("kāfēi") or colloquial German way with a short "e" so it sounds more like "cuffer". I realize sometimes when i accidentally say this stuff out loud to other people that i must sound like a moron, or at least someone whose grasp of language and pronunciation is very poor, but they just don't get how much i entertain myself with my personal lingo.
A particular embarassing one that i shall now reveal is sometimes i call my computer my poo poo (doubled-up second syllable "pu"). Which, i fucking hate the trend in Chinese language to double up on syllables to make it sound cuter, but somehow i started doing it for my own goddamn computer. My own poo poo. I'm typing on my poo poo right now. Ay la vida. Tiān na. (Yes, i also frequently use G-rated expressions of frustration from Spanish and Chinese in my spoken language, and yet never in text.)
Does this entry have a point? It does not. It has been cold. I have been eating. And i have been working. I hope everyone is fine.