Raw prawn!

Jellyfish

Chicken's feet

Rice noodles cooked with chicken's feet and garlic

Best meat dumplings ever. Steamed then fried.

Well, made it through to my last night in Sichuan, have been treated two two quite swish meals this week, including dishes made from chicken's feet and jellyfish! They do seem to like stuff that goes crunch over here. Also had a few shots of their local 52% vol spirit this eve so my packing may be a little erratic. Seem to have picked up a bit of a ( Read more... )

Another fun day out today. This morning we went along to the Shu shrine, which is dedicated to Liu Bei (who is also buried there) and Zhuge Liang. Lots of Chinese visit it for luck but for me it was a pretty geeky experience, my only knowledge of the three kingdoms era coming from Dynasty Warriors! All the familiar names had statues in place to ( Read more... )

You've not lived until you've been driven across the city of Chengdu. Lanes are optional and it's more like a moving herd of cars than traffic. We were veering about, on both sides of the road and between lanes, horn blaring almost constantly. I get the feeling that the horn is being used to let people know you're about to pass them in order to ( Read more... )

Dusk seems strange here, it's almost like there's a haze rather than it getting dark. Not sure if that's cos there actually is a haze. Still not adjusted to the timezone yet, which is beginning to get vexing. Waking up at 2am and lying there unable to sleep isn't the most fun. Tempting to get up and carry on at that point but I can't see that being ( Read more... )

I splashed out on dinner this eve, spent £2.80 for a sizzling platter of beef, egg and tomato soup and rice. Very nice it was too. Whilst eating it one of the chefs (I assume it was a chef, he had a chef's hat on) came out and cleaned one of the tables - whilst sporting a very long ashed cigarette. It was an iconic image and I wish I'd dared to ( Read more... )

Well, day two started with difficult-to-identify-but-not-bad-tasting breakfast in a freezing breakfast room (Going to have to get used to the idea of wearing a coat at all times, inside and out) before heading to the labs. They're in an 8 story building - most of the buildings here are several stories high, it's like being downtown in a significant ( Read more... )

Well I'm sat in the foreign experts building at Sichuan University. It's actually a suite but a bit scuzzy, so glad I have the laptop though! Strange place, a mix of really run down looking blocks of flags with the classic iron balconies covered in clothes right next to clearly very expensive new buildings ( Read more... )

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Hmm, high level seminar at the weekend that would be good to go to but it's 3.5 hours drive away. Many potential social engagements this weekend too, and getting up at 6, driving 3.5 hours, training 7 hours and then driving 3.5 hours again before going out and drinking sounds a bit more than my feeble body is capable of :s