Hong Kong a People Packin' Place

We're dining in a very old and highly-thought of Chinese restuarant in Hong Kong. We have wound our way a half dozen blocks from the Prudential Hotel (5-star) through milling flocks of smiling, well-dressed, well-scrubbed people. None of the women own a skirt longer than a hands length and none of the men own a comb . They all have shiny black hair. A six-foot, four inch guy, like Rick, Pete or John, could hold his arm, straight out and 97.5 percent of them wouldn't even brush the top of their head as they walked under it.
It's eight p.m. Monday evening and we are exhausted, having just creaked off a plane that had held us captive for 15 hours of droning boredom.
"So, Michael, how do I say 'water' in Chinese?"
"Soy, it's spelled shuai (I may have missed or added a vowel there)"
"And how do I say'Please'?"
"Kin, it's spelled Qin."
"OK, then if I say to our waitress, 'Shuai, Qin', did I say 'water, please'?"
Michael laughed and looked away. "It's not quite that easy," he said.
Nothing is. And thus endeth my first and last Chinese lesson. But I get ahead of myself.
The flight from Chicago to Hong Kong consumes: five feature-length films, a Chinese lunch--a rice/chicken thing and a spice cake desert, later a bowl of Chinese noodles, dry--"Peel back half the lid and wait for the flight attendant to pour hot water into the bowl, cover and wait four minutes before eating", followed by a ham and cheese sandwich and a cookie, an entire book 'The Dead Sea Scrolls Deception'. about three stars out of five, a book that Kansas friend Don recommended, a few walks around our cattle car, a series of BR breaks, several bouts of fitful dozing, and a bellyful of boredom.
Oh, and one more: Uncrossing the Sunday Gazette's crossword . Dianne and I wage weekly war over who can finish with the least misses. She wins more often than I. (I missed three, Babe.)
Our friendly flight attendant, Miles, smiley, single, age 57, asked where we were from. When I said Cedar Rapids (who in their right mind says 'Vinton'?), he responded, "You know I just love your Kernels logo." Whaaaat?
Where do you live, Miles? Bankok. So where did you grow up? Idaho. Then how in the world do you know anything about the CR Kernels? I'm a baseball nut. Well, I guess.
Between shows. the crew flashed a map on the screen showing our altitude: 38000', ground speed: 589 mph (about a mile every 6 seconds), our ETA: 4:26 p.m. the next day, Tuesday--they missed: we arrived at 4:23--the outside temp.: Minus 58 degrees, and the distance to destination: Whatever.
The movies all bore subtitles. There are two langauges in Chinese, Mandarin the most prevalent, and Cantonese, both of whom can still talk to each other. with understanding. Maybe that's like we MidWesterners can (sometimes) understand a redneck from, say, Valdosta, Georgia.
Oh, the subtitles were all those unimagineable Chinese heiroglyphics. The spoken movie language was English.
When the flight path revealed that we were going over Juneau and Anchorage, we lifted our shades to watch the snowy/showy Alaskan mountains, ablaze and blinding with morning sun, fly by. Later we saw our flight path cover Tokyo, Hiroshima (can you imagine?), Taipei, Nagasaki and names I never heard of but that probably hold gazillions of Asians.
Hong Kong is under construction, not that the 7-8 million people (not sure the cab driver knew) don't already have more and higher buildings than anywhere on the planet.
But China is embracing capitalism like some Americans decry it. Maybe we can learn something from them.
In June of 1997, when the Brits lost their 100-year lease, China, in a display of friendship to their new subjects, gifted Hong Kong with a huge Civic and Convention center. I've been in several. This tops anything I have seen. Outside the entrance to the center is a 30-foot statue of a flower that I believe Michael said was the HK Flower. It was cast from tons and tons of 24-carat gold.
Today, Tuesday we are going slow trying to get our body clocks up to China's speed. Nap time now and then another of our Chinese Cuisine Quest dinners, slated for the best Chinese restaurants China has to offer.
Last night we had an Australian lobster and a Japanese fish, both lifted live from a tank in our dining room, then wok'd. No rice, but some Chinese Brussel sprouts. And two sets of chopsticks. The silver handled, black ones were for taking portions of the entres off the common serving family-style dish. The tan, bone ones were for eating. Desert was a soy-almond curd together with a walnet-soy curd in another bowl. They were to be mixed and eaten with a porcelain ladle, like soup. Sweet, tasty, different.
No chard on the wine menu, but a white that was suitable. There were likely more calories in the two glasses of wine than in the entire meal. Michael was tickled about how healthy the meal was. Yes, and perfectly delicious. There are many ways to travel much worse than going gourmet.
Tomorrow is Beijing, where the warning flags already fly: Bring your own chopsticks!
Tell you why tomorrow.

How do you say China, in China?

It started with sashimi, miso soup (miso means water in Japanese) and a Kirin beer, a typical enough lunch if one does not have to go back to the office. And then I met Kong Ni the owner of Osaka's Japanese Steakhouse inCedar Rapids. We have shaken hands probably a thousand times now, a year and a half later. It always seems like the right thing to do, before, during and after anything. I lunch there two to three times a week and, one day last year, he confided his plans to build a new restuarant.

Kong masquerades under the name Michael. He was born in Canton, lived in Hong Kong as a young teen, immigrated to Canada, then New Jersey, then Nashville and finally to open his thriving and highly successful restaurant in CR.

His English teacher told him he couldn't go around under the name Kong in America. When he asked her what name he could go around under, she said, You look like a Michael. And that was it. Most of us are stuck with our parents' birthing kneejerk.

Must be fun to choose one's name. I would have chosen Dan for mine. My daughters have changed theirs from Cyndee to Cyd and Catherine to Cat. That and their hair color. It's a new age thing, I know. I'm comfortable with the name granddaughter Rachel gave me years ago: Schmidt-Dawg.

A year ago Michael confided he wanted to open another restuarant, an Asian-French restuarant. Somehow that strikes me as a conflict in terms. He showed me gorgeous pictures of elegant Chinese restaurants. We talked and soon it developed that I would build the shell and he would fill it with a Chinese restuarant. The French aspect soon melted when he couldn't persuade his uncle--who had a Chinese French restuarant in NYC--to come live in CR. Culture shock supreme, of course.

So the restuarant will be of the PF Chang persuasion, supremely upscale, modern, catering to a younger crowd. Interestingly, Michael's mother was Japanese and his father Chinese. And now he will own a Japanese restuarant and a Chinese restaurant. So we will bring back a picture of each of his (now deceased) parents and he will build a little shrine on a prominent wall dedicating each restaurant to his parent with that nationality. That's a ka-chung moment.

Michael said he had to go to NYC to order kitchen equipment. He went seven times and it's ordered. A few nickels short of a million dollars worth of it. Actually, his restuarnat will make PF Changs look like a China Buffet.

Last summer, I was nosing around on a Mayo Clinic computer (they have them, for use in reception areas) and ran onto a form of Chinese astrology called Purple Star. Michael said it was a lucky color and would make a lucky name. So, the Purple Star Bistro it is. None in the USA, one in London, but the TM will hold water. The A in star is a star symbol with a Nike-like swoosh coming down to it.

Then, Michael said he had to go to China to buy Terra Cotta warrior memorabilia to decorate his restuarant, plus glassware and, well, Chinaware, and chopsticks and whatever. Then, he said I must go, too. Then, I said yes.

So I went to Barnes & Noble and bought a CD, Chinese for Dummies, an investment only a dummy would make. I understand the name now. I could get more understanding from the noise of a chair sqeaking on a wooden floor than from the gutteral grunts on this CD. I took it back. B&N said I had opened it and they couldn't take it back. They need to talk to Wal-Mart to learn you can always take something back. Besides, how do you know it isn't right unless you open it? I gave it to the clerk and voted with my feet. Amazon.com will work fine for future books. For one thing, they take it back.

Then Banker Dolph said he had a bunch of Yuan, the Chinese version of the more familiar Japanese Yen. I could buy them without a fee, $637 and change worth. If I figure correctly a Yuan is about thirteen and a half cents, making ten of them worth 1.35 and a hundred...well, you get the idea.

Then again, the rule is: Never trust a decimal point to a dyslexic. A hundred of them are worth either $13.50 or $135. This knowledge gap will make shopping in China an interesting experience.

But, then, there's Michael who will not let me go astray.

As further prep, I read The China Road, a fascinating journey of a Brit PBS reporter stationed in China for 12 years, who was leaving and as his swan trip decided to hitchhike across China on Hiway 312, a road that bissects China from East to West. A speaker, there was no language problem. And his reports are intriguing as he chronicles the rapid changes coming into a country embracing capitalism under the Red Star.

My final prep is to read The Fortune Cookie Chronicles, by Jennifer 8. Lee. Her book began when the Powerball lottery results were reported one day and 110 people had the identical same 5 out of 6 numbers, meaning they each won $100,000. Astounded lottery officals checked and found that the people all got the numbers from a Chinese fortune cookie. And the book goes on from there with a wonderful expose' of Chinese culinary delights, with it's lack of sugar and minimal oil.

For example, there are more Chinese restuarants in America than there are KFCs, Burger Kings and MacDonalds combined. One chapter is the Chosen Food of the Chosen people, how Jews love Chinese almost over all other repasts. Chop Suey means 'odds and ends' or 'bits and pieces.' The Chinese don't know of it and fortune cookies were invented in America by a Japanese cook.

Did you know that the nationwide Powerball headquarters are located in Des Moines, housed in an innocuous building? I didn't, either.

We wanted to fly first class. Oh yeah. Julie, my T.A. reported that 1st class on UAL fcrom Chicago to Hong Kong is $28,000. The cattle car accomodations are $1,231. For that kind of difference, we'll tough out the 15-hour ride. Take an Ambien my barber advises.

So I guess I'm ready. Our good Vinton friends, Keith and Kathie Ervin, will be in Beijing the Wednesday of next week. We were headed to Xi'an (Terra Cotta Warriors) first but Michael switched our plans so we will be in Beijing and will see them and even stay in their hotel.

When I asked Michael what clothes to take, he said, Hardly anything. Buy it over there. it's cheaper. Hey, why not?

As I find Internet Cafes in the various cities, I'll Blog a daily diary. And if I truly have Photobucket.com in hand--not really sure there--I'll drop in pictures from different cities.

I have no idea how to say anything in Chinese. But, then, I've got Michael. Such a deal.

And I will miss most my MQB, Mama Queen Bee, Dianne, and wish she felt up to the journey.

Dawg

Celine & Co. at age 4. Days, that is.

http://picasaweb.google.com/das5063/CelineCo

Nurse Rachel tends to Queen Bee and Dawg

http://picasaweb.google.com/das5063/RachelVisitsPVB

The San Mateo Ferris's Wheel in to PVB

http://picasaweb.google.com/das5063/CaliforniaKidsCydDavidVisitTheBeachHouseFebruary08

Evolution: The 800-pound Gorilla

In what has portent for every Board of Education in the United States, the Florida State Board of Education recently tossed a banana to scientists who affirm that Darwin’s theory makes sense. Florida teachers are now required to teach the theory, and call it just that, as well they should.
Evolution has hung around 150 years and been extolled or excoriated by scientists of all stripe. Those who proclaim its validity, conveniently overlook magnificent flaws in the theory. But they should be heard. And their arguments weighed.
On the flip side, many of those who go ballistic over the concept, do so–not because they are onto the scientific waffling of the theory–but because it conflicts with their religious beliefs. That discussion has no place in any science classroom.
Kids need to know a theory as grand as evolution. They need to know how Darwin cranked it up and the evidence he saw that seemed to convince him to speculate that we evolved from that first cell of life, in some primordial soup. Followed by his speculation that living species changed over time.
They also need to know that the theory of evolution poses some scientific gaps that currently seem unbridgeable, for teaching the theory without teaching its shortcomings is proselytizing, not teaching.
The gnawing questions about the theory are legion: How did that first cell of life pop up from five inorganic elements? Life requires information. The smallest cell of life contains as much information as the New York City Public Library (52 million volumes). This, in a cell so small we cannot see it. No known science can show how information can create itself, which that first little bugger had to do.
How does a lizard (cold-blooded, lays eggs) become a rat (warm-blooded, gives birth)? In essence, if a rat evolved from a lizard there’s a hold-the-phone moment in the whole process: How does a half rat/half lizard reproduce?
Where is proof of a single evolved species? Every so-called ‘evolved’ species is only speculated to have evolved. Scientists have every right to speculate at will; but they have an obligation to call guesswork what it truly is. Some find it difficult to believe that whales ‘evolved’ from polar bears. And germs that lose their ability to respond to penicillin, for example, are not a new species—merely a defective species that will return to form later.
Just where is the fossil trail? The ‘Cambrian Explosion’ is an era when suddenly fossil layers are found in the subsoil. But there’s a problem: Those fossil critters are fully developed, not little fellers on their way somewhere. Where are the beginners?
And, yes, it always comes to this: Where is the missing link? Darwin himself shook his head over those horrendous chasms, as he called them, gaps that have not been bridged in the 150 years since. Maybe someday those gaps will be filled with solid science; but certainly not today.
None of the supposed missing links–Nebraska Man, Java Man, Peking Man, et al.--actually steps up to the evolutionary plate and hits a homer. Even poor little Lucy’s knee was found 2 miles away and 200 feet deeper in the ground. Seems like quite a stretch there. For all we know, Lucy may well have been Lucifer.
Science is all about questioning and Florida science teachers, as well as their colleagues nationwide, should teach the substance of the theory of evolution. Teaching about the theory is no more anti-religious than is teaching the many ways in which human beings reach out to various altars of higher powers.
Learning does not corrupt. It’s people who do.

Photos of the Carolina Kids

http://picasaweb.google.com/das5063/TheBeachHouse