This week, one of the projects I worked on was editing a eulogy. When I got the document, it struck me right away that it had been written almost entirely in the present tense.  “Person X is….”
Usually when the same issue consistently recurs in a text, I just use “Find and Replace”.  I Ctrl+H the heck out of it and move on.  But this was someone who had lost their life and in this instance my job was to cement their non-existence on a piece of paper. To change references to things they are and things they do, to things they did and things they used to do.  In the past.  In people’s memories.   Where stuff is bound to eventually fade. It felt very sterile.  And kind of disrespectful, somehow, to use a shortcut.  So I didn’t.  Find and replace. I don’t like the “replace” so much…

Something else I realized that my confrontation Chinese is terrible.  You know confrontation Chinese.  My hey-I’ll-let-a-lot-slide-but-that’s-just-rude Chinese.  I don’t bust it out a lot.  But sometimes I feel an important principle is at stake so I have to say something.  Other times my hormones are all over the place and shutting up is not an option.  This week, I think it was a little of both.

I’m standing at the bus stop and a lady walks past me with her umbrella.  The little tabs at the end of the spiky things get caught in my hair as she walks by.  I have dreadlocks so they kinda catch fast and she then just yanks her brolly hard (ouch!) and keeps on walking.   This would not had been my favorite occurrence of the day even if it hadn’t been raining in Shanghai for like the eleventieth day in a row but that was too much.  Just a cotton-picking minute! I wanted to say.  Dude, what the f***?! I wanted to growl.  Oi! Can I at least get my follicles back? I wanted to harrumph.  But I do not know how to say any of these things in Chinese. So I said to her: Dude, that’s just rude. Those were my exact words.  I didn’t want to swear – out loud – because – between you and me – the number of people who take photos of me when I am just going about my business, I didn’t want to take the chance that someone would catch it on video.  That’s right, my heightened sense of paranoia is what stopped me.  Not any chastening sense of decorum.

Umbrella Woman just looked at me and said: “我听不懂你的话” （I don’t understand what you are saying).  “话” means language and I thought: Save it, sister.  We’ve all played the “I have no idea what you are saying” card before.  Except that you totally understand my body “话”, don’t you?  How’s your French?  “Je suis pissed”.  That’s not what I said; I just thought it.

Perhaps it should go without saying, but I’ll say it anyway: Please don’t plunge your brolly into the roots of my hair.  I know I’m a little tall and for you it’s kind of like having to fly a tiny kite over the steeple of a really high cathedral but if you do get it stuck all up in there and have to pull it out, then  a little “My bad” or a raised arm of acknowledgment are in order.  That’s all I’m sayin’.

So I was riding the bus on the way home from work yesterday when on stepped a middle aged-gentleman, late 50s, early 60s.  He was dressed in black trousers, a red sports shirt (Tiger Woodsish) and had a red-and-white striped cardigan wrapped around his shoulders. I didn’t know that people actually dressed like that.  I mean you only ever see it on sitcoms to denote that someone is flamboyantly gay (think Jack from Will and Grace) or that they are wealthy and/or uptight. The guy also had a sports bag with two or three tennis rackets strapped onto his back.

So I was smiling to myself, thinking: Ooh, a toff riding the bus.  How…incongruous.

The bus was pretty full so the old guy was standing.  Next to him was a woman, of similar age.  One stop on, a seat became vacant and the dude practically shoulder-barged the woman out of the way, despite the fact that she was clearly scrambling to get to the empty space too.  He got there first, plonked himself down and slipped her a satisfied smirk.

I thought it was funny.  Classy on the surface; douche underneath.   How many of my exes does that describe?

AKA: Can I live my Shanghai life on RMB 32 (USD 4.70) a day?

We’ll see.  And here are more answers to questions you aren’t even thinking of asking.

What’s a “gudget”? A word that rhymes with “budget”.  Obviously.

Why RMB 32 (USD 4.70)? Two reasons:

• Because that will keep my monthly spend under RMB 1000 (USD 146).
• Because I tried RMB 25 (USD 3.60) a day once and I really, really struggled (jacked it in on Day 3).  I also did RMB 50 (USD 7.30) a day the year before last and it was far too easy.

I like to set myself these challenges because, since becoming a freelancer and having to deliver my very best for every single penny I earn, I am evangelically evangelical about VFM (value for money).  This is not to say that I always go cheap, but I do expect there to be a very direct correlation between the kerching! I spend and the satisfaction I derive from it. (Which is code for: When we are talking shoes, all bets are off.)

The Rules:

• This RMB 32 (USD 4.70)-a-day spend does not apply to weekly grocery shopping or any necessary recurring expenses e.g. rent / bills etc.  I am not doing a penance so I will still eat full meals and do what it takes to make sure our lights aren’t turned off.  I’m simply cutting back on the untrackable amounts I spend on things like cabs, lunch, post-work drinks etc. to see what’s possible if I take a more disciplined approach to me spending.
• The challenge doesn’t apply to my health.  I will not try to find a doctor to treat me for 20RMB if I have already blown 13RMB on the day I get sick.
• To make it a little harder I have to keep on living my Shanghai life, as I know it i.e. go out at least two or three times a week.
• If I come in under budget one day, I can carry the surplus over to the next day.  I cannot, however, go over-budget one day and the try to make up the difference on subsequent days.

Strategy Part I: Find a LOT of two for one deals, latch onto a friend and hold on for dear life.
Strategy Part II: Hope that said friend is not a reader of this blog.

The Point:

• I have just come back from a 4-week spend-a-thon vacation
• I’m paying 4 months of rent to activate my new lease on Friday so May is definitely be-smart-with-your-money month (I have one each year).

Start Date: Monday 10 May
End Date: When I get bored When I get paid When I spot a bottle of wine with my name on it June 9

So, here we are…Day 1.

The story so far…

• Breakfast – didn’t fancy oatmeal at home, just had free office coffee
• Bus(es) to work – 3RMB
• Lunch – 4 包子 (steamed buns) @ 1.2RMB.  That’s right, lunch for under 5RMB!
• Bus(es) from work – 3RMB
• Dinner – 8RMB (from vendors on the street – not off the street surface itself – in case that wasn’t clear)

Daily Spend: 19RMB

Surplus: 12RMB

Is this going to be be ridiculously easy?

To be continued…

Physical Fitness Gym*** in Shanghai is running a promotion where you get a 2-month membership for just 59RMB.  When I heard about it, I thought:

•    Either the gym is going to be horrendously filthy and crowded or
•    There are going to be about 100 hoops I have to jump through to get that deal.

Wrong on both counts.

The deal… How to get it

Like most things in China, there’s the way you are told things are and the way things actually are.

•    The advertised end date for this promotion is April 15.  But if you call in to the gym, you are told April 30.  So, sign up sooner rather than later because no one can really say when this gravy train will come to a shuddering halt.
•    Initially I was told I had to have special vouchers to register.  Then I heard that I had to have a QQ account/number (I still have no idea what QQ is).  Then I heard that I had to be able to tuck both feet behind my ears and hum the Marseillaise backwards while whittling out a banjo with my front teeth.  None of these is true.  What you definitely need is your passport and a little bit of your inner actress (for when they ask you why you don’t have all the other stuff).  Be prepared to burst into tears, or at least display a quivering lower lip if it looks like things are not going your way.

Here’s the deal:

• Two months unlimited use of the gym facilities except between 17:30 and 20:00 on weekdays.
• You have to bring your ID (passport) along with you each time you come to work out.

How I went about it:
I had called ahead and been told by one of the trainers that it was basically a free-for-all.  He said as long as I was a new member and brought along my passport, I could sign up.  But when I got there the girl at reception asked me for my QQ ID or voucher, which, of course, I didn’t have.

When I got to the gym, the two guys who were signing up ahead of me also had neither of these.   One was a local who said he’d bring his tomorrow and was allowed to sign up right away.  One was a laowai who got so frustrated with the language barrier that he jacked it in and left.  Not me.  Not for under 1RMB a day.  I stuck it out.

The easiest thing would be to just get your Chinese friend to sign you up for a QQ account if you can’t do it yourself.  Or, if you are feeling particularly rebellious, you can just make up an 8-digit number, which is what I hear a QQ account ID is.  I know someone who went down this route and it worked for her. But they could check the validity of the QQ number while you are standing there and that would be pretty embarrassing for you to be caught in a big fat lie.  Like some sort of big fat liar.  So avoid the deception.  Go instead for the emotional manipulation and be prepared to weep like a little girl if 59RMB over two months seems like too good a deal to pass up.

I admit to going to Physical with some trepidation.  The gym got a solid kicking from City Weekend’s reviewers.   But having said that, how seriously can you take someone who writes in all caps?  Not very, I say.

The Good:

• It was pretty clean.  There were cleaners in the bathrooms and in the workout hall while I was there and I have definitely seen much, much worse.  The toilets were also ok.  The treadmill and the elliptical trainer both felt sticky on the grips (ew!), but, overall, I was pleasantly surprised
• The gym is huuuuuuuge.  There are dozens of every type of equipment.  I was just interested in cardio and stopped counting when  I passed 20 elliptical trainers.
• It was only a third full when I got there – around lunchtime.  So that is a sweet time to go.
• Everything inside is in Chinese and English.

The Bad

• The address that they advertise via Guanxi and local websites is, at best: misleading and at worst, downright wrong.  When you call to ask how to get there, the girl who answers the phone tells you to ask someone on the street. What?!
• It is very, very hard to find a) because they have done a lousy job of signposting it and b) there is loads of construction going on there at the moment.
• It is really warm in the workout area.  And we’re only in Spring.  They’ll have to amp up the aircon once the temperatures soar in summer
• I didn’t see any exercise balls or floor mats so the warm-down, ab-crunch-fakeout was a bit disappointing.
• Not only is getting to the gym kind of confusing, the gym layout itself could do with better signage.  For example there are two receptions (one where you get your key and one where you do the admin stuff) .  Both receptions have people on the phone and receptionists fiddling around with thick reams of paper.   If you don’t know you are in the wrong line, you will wait for what seems like ages before someone tells you where you should be.

How to get there.

Get out of Exit 2 of Huangpi Nan Lu Station and walk down HuaiHai Zhong Lu in the direction of all the construction.

The advertised address is:

1/F, South Tower, Hongkong Plaza, 283 Huaihai Zhong Lu (nr the cnr of Huangpi Nan Lu).

This is not right,  They are on the 3rd floor and the entrance is actually on Songshan Lu (i.e. turn left at the first set of traffic lights after the intersetion of Huai Hai and Huangpi).  When I went today there were loads of building trucks and workers unloading large chunks of cardboard.  They were also blocking the entrance that is just a large doorway (like a garage doorway) with a sign that says “To Cargo Loading Area”.  That is where you need to go in while construction is underway but you won’t see this sign until you are standing pretty much right under it.  So instead, look out for the stop for Bus 109.  Once you are at that stop (on Songshan Lu), you are right next to the entrance.  It is on you right if you are facing HuaiHai Lu.

***This information is based on my visit to the Hong Kong Plaza branch of Physical Fitness.  All references to directions etc. are accurate at the time of writing due to the construction that is currently underway.

Mad cow disease, E. coli, dysentery, dengue fever, typhoid, projectile vomiting, bilharzia, the Ebola virus, salmonella, pink eye, leprosy, cholera, Legionnaires Disease, athlete’s foot, lupus, acne,nervous dispepsia, glaucoma, snaggletooth, arthritis, …

Now I’m no doctor or anything so: How many of these can I get from ingesting raw cow?

Well done to Bulldog Pub who  saw fit to deliver me an uncooked beef burger tonight.   Not an underdone burger.  A raw burger.  How raw, you say?  Well, the mince was ice cold and blood red.

I don’t think I’ve ever been to Bulldog Pub. Unless it’s the place that used to do Music Matters a couple of summers ago on Wulumuqi Lu , in which case I did go once or twice.  But safe to say I am highly unlikely to ever set foot in there again.

After tonight, you couldn’t pay me enough to dress up in a Hazmat suit and walk past there**.   Because when a restaurant takes well over an hour to make your burger and then delivers it to you raw (after you have insisted that you want it well done*) then you know that you and that establishment are destined for the briefest of relationships.

Did I complain?

No.

Why not?

Because it was free.

When we placed the order, the food delivery service we called told us that the burgers  would take 45 minutes – 1hr to arrive.  We ordered around 8 and the food got there after 10.  In between, we chased up the order and were told that it had taken an hour to make and that because of the delay, we would get the meal comped.  It’s hard to complain when you haven’t spent a single penny.  You get what you pay for, right?  Except that I don’t remember shelling out for gastro-intestinal contamination.

I try never to write a review that is only negative because when I read a review that is a 100% downer I just assume that the writer has some sort of personal axe to grind. And I can honestly say that before tonight, I had no pro- or anti-Bulldog leanings.

What bugs me is not that the order was late, or even that they think up promotions and then don’t take the necessary steps to cope with the extra business (we were told the order was late because the kitchen was super busy*).  It’s the blatant negligence.  The I-don’t-care-how-sick-this-might-make-you-or-how-far-my-shoddy-efforts-are-from-what-you-must-surely-be-expecting aspect of it.  You will never convince me that the dude that put that burger patty onto the bun and into the delivery box and into the courier’s hands was thinking anything other than: I really don’t give a damn.   It’s hard to think of any other explanation that makes sense. And for that reason, I am struggling to find something for the plus column for this eatery.  Except, perhaps, that the burgers were big.  But considering I got a mangled clump of uncooked mince meat between the buns, it’s hard to even think of that as a good thing.

So this isn’t my Don’t ever order from Bulldog blog entry.  One narrow escape from food poisoning (fingers crossed!) does not a summer make, after all.  But in a Shanghai that has Blue Frog and Munchies and Gourmet Café and Kabb and about 1000 other places who do the same thing faster and better, why chance it?

*Worth pointing out that at no point did I actually talk to anyone at Bulldog – we dealt only with the food delivery company.

** Just kidding, you could totally pay me enough.  Go on, name an obscenely high number. Just for fun.

a.k.a Things I love about the office

Office Running

I have thought about it.  I have thought about it a lot.  I really have.  And I cannot, try as I might, come up with a single reason why it is ever necessary to break into a run inside an office.  Where is this girl rushing to?  What devastating catastrophe will befall her if she gets there three measly seconds later? Does she have to pick up a ringing phone?  Even then… she’d be better off just walking faster in this tiny confined space, wouldn’t she? Or maybe she needs to sell that last little bit of killer stock before trading closes?  That’d make total sense – if we worked on a trading floor. Or is she trying to escape the putrid stench of burning ink cartridges as the entire building is engulfed by ravenous flames?  Ok.  Then we’ll all run.  But as a rule, office running is “Grrrr”.  As is office overtaking. You know, when there is that tiny, 3m-long, narrow walkway between you and the door and someone just has to overtake to get there nanoseconds ahead of you.  What’s the point of that? Just stop with all running / skipping / jogging.  Anything that requires a sports bra, basically,  is unneccessary.

Office Belching

Oddly enough, I am one of that tiny minority that doesn’t mind tea eggs (eggs that are boiled for days on end in some grimy brown goo masquerading as “tea”). If you think about the preparation process, it is beyond gross.  But I don’t think about it and I’ve had a tea egg or two in my day.  I usually close my eyes and clench every muscle in my body as my incisors pierce the egg “white” – and you know what?  Four years in and a tea egg hasn’t done for me.  Yet.  Tea eggs are alright.  But you know what is not alright?  The T.E.B. (tea-egg belch).  Performed anywhere, it is pretty nasty, but if you are the person sitting directly opposite me, the tea-egg belch – right into my face – is your way of saying “Screw you, Iris.  Right in the heart.  Bee-yotch.” Seriously, that is what you are saying.  Every time.

Office Toileting

The things I’ve seen, y’all.  The.  Things.  I. Have.  Seen.

Office Ringtoning

Thank you for ruining Empire State of Mind for me.  No, really, thanks.  It’s been on my list of things to do every single day of the week since the song came out.  See?  Right here – here it is – Number 4: Find someone who can achieve the impossible by making me hate Jay-Z. Congratulations.  Mission so very accomplished. You forcing us to endure the first 4 bars of the chorus, played in that high-pitched wheedling whine, on a loop, a bajillion times a day, has done it for me.  I no longer love the Z.  And that, coupled with your office running to answer your phone after Alicia wails New York!!! New York!!! New York!!! for the 120th time is fabulous.  Whatever you do, don’t take your phone with you when you leave your desk, or switch it to silent/vibrate when you come into the office.  No.  Don’t do it.  You are special.  Everybody loves you.  Nobody else on this planet has caught on to this ring tone thing, you trendsetter, you. Don’t ever change.  Ever.

And…breathe.

I’ve never been a fan of flying but about a year ago, on a trip back from the consumerist nirvana that is Hong Kong, our flight experienced some pretty bad turbulence. At the time, one of the stewardesses screamed and ran the length of the aisle to her seat. I haven’t been able to get on a plane since.

I tried flying to Hong Kong on Wednesday but heavy fog meant the flight was delayed by 4hrs. As the plan was to get in and get out in the same day, 4hrs proved too long a delay. I rebooked the flight for Friday and convinced myself that Wednesday’s abortive attempt to overcome my flying dread was a sure sign that my number was up.

So, having written a brief note bequeathing each of my Apple gadgets to the siblings I deemed most deserving, my shoes to the only charity I know which combines fashion-consciousness with humanitarianism (just because someone is starving and without shelter, doesn’t mean they’ve given up on looking good), handed my sister passwords to my online aliases and a list of websites she absolutely had to delete from my browsing history should the worst come to the worst, I set off again at 5am on Friday morning to face my fate. More fog. And a 5hr delay this time.

So, 600RMB in wasted taxi fare later, I decided to train it to Hong Kong instead.

Shanghai – Hong Kong – Shanghai Train Schedule

This is the most annoyingly confusing thing I have found online in while. Like they intentionally wrote the website content to make everything unclear. You can find out about fares here but the advertised discounts are not available if your journey originates in Shanghai – no matter what the website tells you. The schedule varies but right now, trains leave Shanghai on even dates (not even days, Mr. Data Compiler). So don’t break your brain trying to figure out what an “even day” is, or if they count the first day of the week as Sunday or Monday. To get to Hong Kong you leave Shanghai at 18:24 on the 2nd, 4th, 6th, etc. of the month. Trains come back from Hong Kong on odd dates. Setting off from Hung Hom Station in Kowloon at about 15:30pm. The schedule is subject to seasonal changes, though, so departure and return dates alternate.

Buying Train Tickets

This is kinda inconvenient. Train tickets to Hong Kong can only be bought from Shanghai Railway Station. And then only from counters 11 or 12. Counter 11 is tagged as an “English Speaking Counter”. The editor in me always wants to whip out a big black marker and scribble “English Service Available” over these words but the proliferation of military types milling around with batons puts me off. Like most major stations, Shanghai Railway station smells like a petty crime wave waiting to happen. That may seem like a rather specific smell but if you’ve been there, you know exactly what I’m talking about. If you’re paranoid enough, you can almost hear the pickpocketers’ buzz of excitement as they thrill at the throngs of opportunity around them. Tickets are 725RMB for a space in the 4-person sleeper cabin and just over 1000RMB for what they call the en suite “deluxe sleeper”. I’ve ridden in one of these; let’s just call them “2-person sleepers” so nobody gets their raised hopes cruelly dashed.

Be sure to specify that you want the lower bunk, if that kind of thing matters to you (it’s slightly pricier – but only by a couple of kuai).

Check-In

This is exactly like at the airport except that a) you can leave it pretty late b) the waiting room is always full and really, really dirty. I mean really dirty. If, like me, you are on an African passport, expect them to ask you to take off your glasses, let down your hair, shimmy to the left, shimmy to the right and explain the very essence of your being and how it correlates with each aspect of your stay in China. This is either a very misguided seduction ritual or it’s profiling . Yum!

The Train

The T99 train, the overnighter to Hong Kong, is always clean (when you get on, anyway). The cabins are comfy, the bedding is crisp and white, there’s an electrical socket for you to recharge stuff, hangers for your clothes and in-train TV.

Dining Car

The first time we rode the train to Hong Kong, when we got to the dining car, one of the train staff was seated at a table picking the dirt out of her nails with tweezers, onto the tablecloth. The moral of that story? Stock up on sterilizing agents before you make this trip and bring your own food and utensils. Obviously.

Toilets

Well, it’s a public toilet. So…hold your breath and think of England.

Overnight trains to Beijing and Hong Kong are the most comfortable way to get to either city, if you are not in a rush. The route is scenic, the trains always punctual, you cut back on hotel charges, it’s mostly cheaper than air travel and, if you have a phobia like I do, you get to eliminate several nights of anguished terror in the build up to your departure.

I am a fan.

I’ve always found the presumptuousness of this particular cluster of words puzzling.  As though it is the most natural thing in the world to assume a new identity every time I cross a border.  I’m not Sydney Bristow.

I don’t mind being asked if I have a Chinese name.  But people assuming that my living in this SE Asian behemoth means I’m ready to give up my identity makes me … itchy.

I mean we all faux-drink the China Kool Aid, right?  But do we all swallow?

I don’t want a Chinese name.  And I don’t need one.  Not to process my official documentation or to sign up for stuff or to clumsily introduce myself at the myriad of networking events I am now attending to show off my delicious new shoes to expand my professional network.  And in the same way I don’t have a Uzbek name, or a Portuguese name, or a Venutian name, I do not have a Chinese name.   That’s just not how Mama and Papa Iris rolled.

How hard is “Iris” to pronounce anyway?  You don’t get to obfuscate my identity or try to diminish my sense of self-worth for your own convenience, China.  No Sirree-Bob.  I’ve got shamelessly photoshopped magazine covers and ludicrously improbable cosmetics adverts to do that.

I get the whole checking one’s idealism at immigration when one arrives on these shores.  Totally on board with that.
I understand learning the lingo to show a little respect and achieve a level of independence.  Riding that train.
I even appreciate the importance of not whining about every single aspect of this country that is not identical to my own.  Woot woooooot!

But there’s a line.  There has to be.  And I draw it at adopting an Asian alter ego to go with the laowai flow.  Can’t do it.  Won’t do it.

Word.

Once in a while I’ll go for drinks or a meal in Xintiandi or along the Bund and looking at the menu makes me wonder which deity’s DNA they are marinating the food in, so ridiculously astronomical are the prices.

So if you are anywhere along the Maoming Nan Lu area and want a little bit of “Italian”, you can do worse than Pasta Inn where I had lunch today.

What I liked:

1. The food. I ordered seafood soup (RMB29) to start with, they didn’t sconch me on the seafood and it was really very tasty.   So tasty that I’d wolfed mine all down before it dawned on me to take a picture. My friend had mushroom soup (RMB29) and she was equally pleased with hers.   Her penne (RMB29)  was luscious and creamy and the chicken wings (RMB29) I had (served with sweet and sour dip) were crisp and succulent.
2. The location. It’s very close to Huai Hai Zhong Lu and Nanchang Lu so a convenient walk away if you work or are out shopping in that area.
3. The menu. It has all the things I like on it – wine, women and desserts. Of course I only added “women” to make that a list of three things.  Otherwise it wouldn’t be a “list”, would it?  What is the word for something that is too short to qualify as a list?
4. The prices. We ordered two soups, my friend had penne and I had the chicken wings and we spent RMB116 (we didn’t get drinks)
5. The service.  It wasn’t spectacular, but it wasn’t hideous.   I call this a win.

What I disliked:

1. The chef. He did that nasal throat-clearing thing really loudly and for an excrutiatingly long period of time – while still front-of-house! – before spitting into what I can only assume was some kind of slosh bucket behind the bar.  That was so many kinds of gross, but there you go.
2. The real deal? I am not sure how Italian any of it was – other than the type of food served – everything else seemed to be Chinese.   Maybe they should park a Ferrari inconspicuously outside the entrance.  Just to amp up the authenticity a little.
3. Thing Number 1.  Seriously, it was beyond disgusting.  Don’t do that in front of the customers, dude!
4. They wouldn’t let me take a menu away with me.  It was just a piece of brown cardboard so I didn’t think it’d be that big a deal.  A lesser girl than me might’ve just stolen a menu and not bothered to be all classy and ask for it first.  A lesser girl than me might also have to remember to carry a bigger handbag next time in case such an opportunity presents itself again.
5. Thing Number 1.  Again.  I am struggling to get the visual (and the audio) out of my head.

Pasta Inn
132 Maoming Nan Lu (nr Nanchang Lu)
Tel: 5465 9816



I’ve wanted to go to hoF for ages.  Months.  It’s right opposite the All Days I go to to top up my transport card sometimes, so I wistfully press my nose against the window of this delicious little eatery and make tiny anguished mewling sounds pretty much every week.  They’ll be closed when I do it though, so it’s not creepy or weird or anything.

Yesterday, December 31, on Day 8 of my eight-day, carbo-loading spree,  I had to hoF it up.  And boy did I ever.

Of course I left it pretty last minute to make a booking.  The girl on the phone spoke fab English, and told me they were fully booked but if anything opened up she’d call me.

I expected that to be the end of that but then about an hour later Brian called and told me they could seat us at the required time (9:30pm) but that they’d need the table at 11pm.  “Brian” turned out to be Brian Tan, the owner.  Very friendly, and chatty and very open to the pickiness that overtakes the Jumbe clan when we are getting our dessert on.

My Dad: I don’t drink but I’d like something that tastes like alcohol.  And I want it to be a cocktail.  But I don’t want it to be cold.  I don’t want it to be hot either.  Definitely no hot cocktails.  And not too sweet.
My Mom: I’ll just have the………
Me: I’d like something New Yearsy.  Something not on the menu.

The prices are adorable too … wine for under 60RMB, most of the desserts for 30- 50RMB, the service quick and friendly and the place still low-key enough to not be crowded on NYE.

Hard to be certain, but I’m pretty sure the sensation I had when I took my first bite of the Marble Cheesecake must be what it feels like to hold your child in your arms that very first time.

If only complex carbohydrates weren’t the devil…

hoF

30 Sinan Lu,
Huaihai Zhong Lu
Near Huaihai Zhong Lu
思南路30号
近淮海中路