Chinatown

Friday, May 29, 2009

It's impossible to be married for almost nineteen years and not have the occasional, ah, altercation with your beloved spouse. Yesterday Marc and I had a doozy, and because I was entirely in the right (!) I would share the details with you, but that's not good spousing and I would very much like to be a good spouse.

Anyway, we made up. Because we always make up. Marc and I are totally co-dependant; we can't stay mad for long or we both forget how to breathe. So, today I decided to surprise him by going into the city for lunch...which brings me to what this post is actually about.
I love Chinatown in San Francisco! It is so entirely awesome. It's like a perfect little trip out of the country. Ever since I was a little girl growing up in the bay area I've been fascinated with the otherness of Chinatown. I read Fifth Chinese Daughter when I was maybe ten years old, then when we would drive through Chinatown I would stare out my car window and wonder if life inside those apartments was really so different from my own (of course I didn't realize that the book was written in the 1940's so it wasn't that different).

Later, in college, I read The Joy Luck Club and fell even more in love.
What is going on in there, I wonder as we walked from our parking garage to the restaurant and I peer into each shop and market. I love to see laundry hanging out of the windows because it means someone really does live there.

So to quick wrap up all my thoughts and put a bow around it... I am always seduced by novels with an Asian element, (any Amy Tan, The Samurai's Garden, Snowflower and the Secret Fan, Memoirs of a Geisha, Dreaming Water, The Legend of Fire horse Woman and so many more) PLUS I lurv good Chinese food like we had today at House of Nanking, and finally, as Marc and I try to plan for our 20th anniversary trip next year, should we go to China?

Oh, I have to add this, Marc ordered blooming tea for me. Isn't it beautiful?

It starts out in your cup as a tight pod, and then "blooms" into this. Mine actually had a little trouble completely blooming. I stealthily poked it with my chop stick when the server wasn't looking, but I had to settle for admiring my neighbors full blossom. I think it's because I eat too fast.

4 Responses to “Chinatown”

  1. I think you should DEF go to China, or at least to one of my all-time favorite cities, Hong Kong, for your 20th! You will lurve it to pieces. Like I lurve you.
    Mom

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wow. You have a really cool blog. And great taste in books. I've never even met anyone who's heard of Samurai's Garden, much less read it. Lurve that book!

    I'm so glad you found my blog, so we can be blog buddies, even though I reek at posting lately. Yikes.

    Also, your photos rock!

    See you tomorrow at church.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ooh, also, I want to try some blooming tea.

    Okay, shutting up now.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I just cried all the way through this post! Of course I LOVE CHINA!
    I just love you and all your beautiful thoughts about China in this post. ps I have read ALL those books and I love them too.
    4 years on Saturday since we adopted Clara! Time does fly.
    xoxo

    ReplyDelete

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