I’ve mentioned some of the quirks of crossing the road in a couple of the cities I’ve been to so far. Well, Beijing has a pretty big one: cars will straight-up run you over if you’re not paying attention.
McDonald’s in China is an absolute treasure trove of menu oddities. It’s amazing. There were a few countries where I struggled to find even one or two things that I wanted to order; meanwhile, there was so much stuff I wanted to try in China that I actually wound up having two separate meals at McDonald’s.
You’ve probably heard that the pollution in Beijing is so bad, just breathing the air is the health equivalent of smoking a bunch of cigarettes. This is true.
I mentioned in a previous post that I wasn’t sure if I’d get a chance to sample Peking duck — given that it involves a whole duck, it’s not exactly a solo-friendly endeavor (though in retrospect, I’m pretty sure I could have polished it off myself if I came hungry and didn’t order anything else).
Once we got back into the city, a few people from the group I went to the Great Wall with decided to go to Siji Minfu for duck. So: problem solved.
I almost didn’t even bother going to see the Great Wall of China. I figured it’s cold, it’s expensive, I’d have to wake up early, and wouldn’t it be easier to just… not go? I mean, it’s a wall. What’s the big whoop?
The whoop, as it turns out, is pretty big. The Great Wall might have been one of the most awe-inspiring things I’ve ever seen.
I just had a wing that was stuffed with rice, and I need to say that whoever invented this is a goddamned genius. Wings are good. Rice is good. Why not stuff one into the other?
Why not indeed.
Eating Peking duck in Beijing is a no-brainer. You’ve gotta do it.
However, since it typically involves a whole duck being served over multiple courses, it’s a difficult dish to enjoy solo.
I recently found myself in a food hall of sorts in Beijing, hungry for something a little bit more substantial than the various snacks that most of the vendors were offering up. There was a full fledged restaurant in the back, but the menu was fully Chinese, with no pictures to point at.
There’s an app you can get on your phone called Google Translate, where you can point your camera at something and it’ll translate it on the fly. When I first heard about this, I thought, well, travel has been revolutionized. Then I tried it. It sorta-kinda works, depending on what you point it at, but for some reason when you try it on menus the results tend to be gibberish.
Still, I was desperate enough to give it a shot, and amongst the nonsense was a line that said something about “old noodles.” So I pointed at that and ordered it.
Well, that’s a wrap on Amsterdam (and on Europe!). As usual, here’s a few random photos to close things out.
Thanks to its colonialist history, Surinamese cuisine is quite common in Amsterdam (the history of colonialism is pretty horrifying, but at the very least some good food came out of it. So… glass half full?).