coffee is for the mind and tea is for the body
Today is start of 端午節 Dragon Boat Festival. It's one of the Chinese holidays which i still don't really get what the point of it is. I mean, seriously, just go read the Wikipedia page and see if you can figure it out. It's all like "well it might commemorate this poet, or maybe that one, also it's almost summer, and something about insects and lizards, plus it kinda sounds like the number 5, anyway everyone just eats zongzi..." Nobody i met when i lived in China knew what it was all about and i don't think anyone here in Taiwan does either. People just shrug, take the two days off work and eat zongzi. (Zongzi are those pyramid tamal-looking things made of rice and various bits and bobs wrapped in a leaf.)
Our work bought everyone zongzi, but apparently i am the only person in the office who does not own a steamer in my apartment, so i ate them all at work over the past week. When i lived in China my apartments were big enough to have a large wok and then i had some bamboo steam baskets i'd occasionally put in there to heat up baozi (steam buns), but my apartment here is too small to fit a large pan, much less a basket. But turns out there are electric steam baskets which you basically pour some water in, put your goodies inside, then just flick the switch and let it go for 20 minutes till all the water evaporates and it clicks off. I could plug one of those in and put it on the floor at the foot of my bed, next to my electric kettle. Might be nice to have something in my house that can cook a bowl of rice. I always thought of rice cookers as large things they had in plastic stool restaurants in China where you'd open it up and there's a mountain of rice inside, and you just heap as much as you want in your bowl to go with the dishes you ordered, but these electric steam basket things seem a lot more practical for solo apartment dwelling.
But, you know, i never buy anything. I mean i'm still drinking from the one cup that i took with me in my backpack a few years ago, cutting with with the workman's knife i had on the road, cooking on the one small frying pan i bought when i moved in here and eating off either my stainless steel dish or my stainless steel bowl.
Anywho, so today is day one of Dragon Boat Festival, and i am having a lazy one. I have learned my lesson that trying to travel here on a long weekend is even worse than in China (China it's hard to find a ticket to go anywhere, here you can get there but there's no hotels available at the other end). So i am going to have a relaxing staycation and in a week or two i will take a couple weeks off and go on my Great Taiwanese Adventure.
Still doing an alright job not drinking much booze. I have taken to drinking sweet tea instead. Most ice tea in Taiwan is unsweetened, which imo totally defeats the point because you might as well just be drinking water if there's no calories in it. But if you dig through the bazillion unsweetened brands there are a handful of sweetened ones. My fave is 茉莉蜜茶 jasmine honey tea, which is the closest thing Taiwan has to the Chinese-style sweet green teas and pretty much the same as what they sell as 茉莉花茶 jasmine flower tea in China. Not very sweet, the jasmine gives it some floral notes but also there is a bitterness that i love. Another one they have here is 阿薩姆紅茶 Assam red tea, which tastes like typical English tea with no milk and plenty of sugar. Reminds me of my nan. 冬瓜茶 winter melon tea is also alright when i am in the mood - it's sweet but it has a thick mouthfeel. It's quite popular in Taiwan, sometimes you can even get it fresh made from roadside vendor, which for me is sort of a less awesome version of 甘蔗汁 sugar cane juice, but it'll do in a pinch. And last, but not least, there is a brand that does a sweetened 青草茶 "green grass tea", which is another Taiwanese thing made of some kind magical mountain herbs plus mint. It has a bit of a medical-ish, fresh flavor, similarish to 王老吉/加多寶 herbal tea from Guangdong. Well, also i suppose there is 燒仙草 grass jelly which sometimes comes in a can, but more usually it's like a pudding so i don't count it here.
Anyway, it occurred to me that when i drink tea i pretty much only drink it cold and sweet. I associate it with being on the road. It's a way to hydrate and get some extra calories when i am on a bike ride or a mountain hike. Occasionally i get a bubble tea (and then here in Taiwan you can get sweet green, sweet oolong, sweet red, sweet whatever you want), but the teas i'm talking about here are the ones in cans or plastic bottles you can pick up from any convenience store. Road drinks. Just like i used to pick up booze at the end of a hard day, now i pick up sweet tea.
Tea is for the body. It's for winding down when you've had enough and can't take any more. It's for relaxing and quenching your thirst. It's refreshing and soothing. So it is a good substitute for liquor.
But what's coffee then? Energy. Coffee for me never has sugar. It must always be black. Strong. Bitter. Acidic. It is a caffeine delivery vehicle and an appetite suppressant. Coffee is a wonderful drug which is conveniently legal and whose side effects are much easier to deal with than most every other stimulant out there. Coffee is the fucking best. I love coffee. Could not live without it, but the pleasure of a good cup is more than just the pleasure of feeding my addiction, it's also a flavor that legitimately bangs. Coffee is for the mind.
And Dragon Boat Festival is for drinking coffee in the morning and tea in the afternoon and staying in your bed all day long. Mind and body in harmony.
Did that sound suitably oriental and mysterious?
Just wait till i get out of my Jesus wiki hole and start reading about historical Confucius, lordy.
Our work bought everyone zongzi, but apparently i am the only person in the office who does not own a steamer in my apartment, so i ate them all at work over the past week. When i lived in China my apartments were big enough to have a large wok and then i had some bamboo steam baskets i'd occasionally put in there to heat up baozi (steam buns), but my apartment here is too small to fit a large pan, much less a basket. But turns out there are electric steam baskets which you basically pour some water in, put your goodies inside, then just flick the switch and let it go for 20 minutes till all the water evaporates and it clicks off. I could plug one of those in and put it on the floor at the foot of my bed, next to my electric kettle. Might be nice to have something in my house that can cook a bowl of rice. I always thought of rice cookers as large things they had in plastic stool restaurants in China where you'd open it up and there's a mountain of rice inside, and you just heap as much as you want in your bowl to go with the dishes you ordered, but these electric steam basket things seem a lot more practical for solo apartment dwelling.
But, you know, i never buy anything. I mean i'm still drinking from the one cup that i took with me in my backpack a few years ago, cutting with with the workman's knife i had on the road, cooking on the one small frying pan i bought when i moved in here and eating off either my stainless steel dish or my stainless steel bowl.
Anywho, so today is day one of Dragon Boat Festival, and i am having a lazy one. I have learned my lesson that trying to travel here on a long weekend is even worse than in China (China it's hard to find a ticket to go anywhere, here you can get there but there's no hotels available at the other end). So i am going to have a relaxing staycation and in a week or two i will take a couple weeks off and go on my Great Taiwanese Adventure.
Still doing an alright job not drinking much booze. I have taken to drinking sweet tea instead. Most ice tea in Taiwan is unsweetened, which imo totally defeats the point because you might as well just be drinking water if there's no calories in it. But if you dig through the bazillion unsweetened brands there are a handful of sweetened ones. My fave is 茉莉蜜茶 jasmine honey tea, which is the closest thing Taiwan has to the Chinese-style sweet green teas and pretty much the same as what they sell as 茉莉花茶 jasmine flower tea in China. Not very sweet, the jasmine gives it some floral notes but also there is a bitterness that i love. Another one they have here is 阿薩姆紅茶 Assam red tea, which tastes like typical English tea with no milk and plenty of sugar. Reminds me of my nan. 冬瓜茶 winter melon tea is also alright when i am in the mood - it's sweet but it has a thick mouthfeel. It's quite popular in Taiwan, sometimes you can even get it fresh made from roadside vendor, which for me is sort of a less awesome version of 甘蔗汁 sugar cane juice, but it'll do in a pinch. And last, but not least, there is a brand that does a sweetened 青草茶 "green grass tea", which is another Taiwanese thing made of some kind magical mountain herbs plus mint. It has a bit of a medical-ish, fresh flavor, similarish to 王老吉/加多寶 herbal tea from Guangdong. Well, also i suppose there is 燒仙草 grass jelly which sometimes comes in a can, but more usually it's like a pudding so i don't count it here.
Anyway, it occurred to me that when i drink tea i pretty much only drink it cold and sweet. I associate it with being on the road. It's a way to hydrate and get some extra calories when i am on a bike ride or a mountain hike. Occasionally i get a bubble tea (and then here in Taiwan you can get sweet green, sweet oolong, sweet red, sweet whatever you want), but the teas i'm talking about here are the ones in cans or plastic bottles you can pick up from any convenience store. Road drinks. Just like i used to pick up booze at the end of a hard day, now i pick up sweet tea.
Tea is for the body. It's for winding down when you've had enough and can't take any more. It's for relaxing and quenching your thirst. It's refreshing and soothing. So it is a good substitute for liquor.
But what's coffee then? Energy. Coffee for me never has sugar. It must always be black. Strong. Bitter. Acidic. It is a caffeine delivery vehicle and an appetite suppressant. Coffee is a wonderful drug which is conveniently legal and whose side effects are much easier to deal with than most every other stimulant out there. Coffee is the fucking best. I love coffee. Could not live without it, but the pleasure of a good cup is more than just the pleasure of feeding my addiction, it's also a flavor that legitimately bangs. Coffee is for the mind.
And Dragon Boat Festival is for drinking coffee in the morning and tea in the afternoon and staying in your bed all day long. Mind and body in harmony.
Did that sound suitably oriental and mysterious?
Just wait till i get out of my Jesus wiki hole and start reading about historical Confucius, lordy.