China

 

Shancheng Hotpot King

This is a sichuan hot pot restaurant which was heaps of fun. We went soup which was medium spicy and medium sichuan pepper, which I found pretty hot. At hot pot restaurants you order what you like and cook it yourself. Just some of the things we ordered - pig liver, dumplings, fish balls, sliced lamb, sliced beef, enoki mushrooms, sweet potato noodles, chinese veggies, tripe... I went with my family which are cantos and can eat chilli, but our tolerance is low compared to Sichuan people and we were coughing a bit. It makes you feel alive!

This is not a bad place for a big group, but you'll hear people coughing all around you because of the chilli!

Shop 8a, 363 Sussex Street
Haymarket NSW 2000

House

This eatery does north-east Thai food, which is quite similar to Lao food. I was very keen to try this place and I was very happy with it. They made a variation on some of the dishes, but not too much. I just loved the sitting outdoors on a large table, and despite a queue at some time, they never did hurry us. This allowed me to talk about travelling to Laos, as my friends are going there, while eating Lao food.

* The pork rib soup was very delicious - highly recommended
* The eggplant dip was good too, the blanched side vegetables made the dish which I miss so much. I prefer the char-grilled eggplants of Laos though, and am not sure whether they steam it in Thailand.
* I loved the deep fried snapper, a variation of the salted, grilled river fish you can get on the side of the street in Laos.
* Papaya salad was great - my friends said it was the hottest thing they'd ever eaten, and it was hot, but it didn't make me cry =)
* The fried pork and beef was pretty good
* The chicken curry in a steamed parcel was interesting - it was quite good and I'd never had something exactly like it.

I think this is a meal I will remember. This together with sticky rice came to $20 per person. I'll definitely be back as there are heaps of things I want to try. Actually, I want to try everything on the menu! It did remind me of Laos and north-east Thailand.

202 Elizabeth St
Surry Hills, 2010

Mino

Mino is a Japanese restaurant with a kaiseki menu for $59. This means we had an aperitif, sushi, 5 small entrees, a main and a dessert plate. Very pretty surroundings. The service was average, and the food took a while to come, whether you came at 6:30pm or 7:30pm you finished your meal at the same time.

The small entrees were the highlight, as they were beautifully presented and delicious too. The sushi was perfect. It's not often I get to taste so many things in the one meal! There is a choice of two menus, and within that there's more choice. I had the goshu menu and had:

Aperitif and Amuse
Seasonal shot cocktail and small side dish (alcohol free available)

Appetizer
Steamed prawns and seaweed with plum dressing

Sashimi and sushi
Chef's selection of today' sashimi (3kinds), sushi (2pc) and a fresh oyster

Assorted entree (five small portions on one plate)
*Grilled kingfish and Shimeji mushroom with ginger and soy sauce-mayonnaise in foil
*Seared scallop salad with onion vinaigrette
*Asparagus and duck tempura with miso and blue cheese sauce
*Buckwheat soba noodle soup with duck mince ball
*Wagyu beef tataki (seared) salad with ginger sauce


Main (please select one of the following dishes)
1.Grilled chicken with teriyaki sauce
2.Grilled salmon with walnut teriyaki sauce
3.Crumbed kurobuta pork loin
4.Steamed barramundi with spicy soy sauce
5.Sukiyaki hotpot (wagyu beef)
6.Mixed hotpot light soy or spicy miso flavour soup
7.Assorted tempura
8.Eel kabayaki served on rice
9.Seared king fish, gently simmered in soy stock
10.Chicken nanban
11.Slow cooked wagyu beef and beef strips on rice

Main Specials
12.Wagu steak with miso or ponzu sauce
13.Grilled ocean perch with sweet miso sauce
14.Assorted sushi
15.Grilled duck breast with Japanese style tomato sauce
16.Grilled lamp rump with red wine miso sauce
17.Japanese style beef curry with crumbed kurobuta pork or chicken
18.Eel hot pot Yanagawa style

*Rice and miso soup if required with main course.
Dessert
Seasonal dessert, fruit, chocolate with soy bean powder and your choice of ice cream or sorbet


521 Military Rd
Mosman NSW 2088
www.minomino.com.au

Couchsurfing.org

Couchsurfing started as a way to travel cheaply, by staying somewhere for free. It has grown into a way to meet people when travelling for cultural exchange. There are a few ways to participate in Couchsurfing, and the good thing about is that you can participate in an exact way that it suits you. I think it is well managed. It has a well- thought out strategy, and has guidelines on important issues such as security, and performance measures in place. I'd like to document my experiences so far. I joined up to meet some new people. I had been overseas in Laos for a year. When in Laos and when travelling in general, I was able to meet some people with interesting stories. I joined so I could continue to challenge my perspectives, meet new people, and go to place in Sydney I'd liked to visit. Some people I have met:

* A Swiss girl who quit her stable job to study English in Australia
* An American guy who was working as an engineer contracted to the US Army in Abu Dhabi who was travelling as much as he could while he was away.
* A French-Canadian who worked for one of main agencies that tests the quality of airline food made around the world.
* A Singaporean guy who was a water engineer who was working in Australia for a few months in a large multi-national in Sydney's west
* A guy from Melbourne on a short trip to Sydney who coordinates quality for universities.
* A Singaporean girl who was here with her boyfriend who was looking for a job, who cooked dinner for me twice and helped me cook for a dinner party.
* A Lao-French guy who had a good job in France's music industry who quit his job to travel the world whom I took to Royal National Park.
* An Indian guy who ran a catering/ event business including organising huge Indian weddings

Pretty much all the people I have met have been professionals - not what I expected at all! I definitely gained some perspective from meeting all these people, and managed to choose places in Sydney to take them that I usually wouldn't go to. If I had more time, I'd join in more of their events. There are pages for different cities, and I'm a member of the Sydney group and can join in things people are organising.

Bye Grandma

My grandma died the morning of 10 July 2010 in Hong Kong. She was 93. My parents went to her funeral one week ago. This is sometimes after the death because it takes a while for book a cremation which is government-run in Hong Kong. My dad said her funeral was very traditional Chinese. It followed Buddhist traditions as grandma had wished, with Buddhist monks being part of the ceremony. He had to buy white clothes and white shoes for the occasion. The funeral to 6 hours from afternoon to night. Then the cremation took two hours the next day. The close family attended. Bureaucratic issues with visas and a delayed death certificate meant some other relatives from China couldn't attend.

Some things that I'll remember about Grandma - that she came to live with us for one year in 1988. I don't remember much, but that she was around. I think my Canto as a 6-year-old was ok enough to speak to her, and I remember teaching her a few English words and the only one I remember is 'cucumber'. Then when I visited Hong Kong for the first time in 1993, and then for years after that until 2000, she was really active and could walk around for hours with us, despite being around 80 years old. When I visited her 2006 she was in a nursing home. The last time I visited her in 2008 she couldn't remember who I was. But she did understand my Cantonese, not even adjusting for my slightly dodgy non-native speaker less-than-perfect Canto, which means I must have been doing ok. As a person who couldn't remember much, she was a very smiley and easy going old lady, luckily not scared as some people get. She had the tidiest bed of anyone, with all her clothes folded up neatly. And she loved sweets and cakes.

Bye grandma!