After last night I was thinking that I had better post something. Because I don't too often just post stories. One, because I am not a creative story teller, and two, because funny stories don't happen to me too often. This will be short and sweet, hopefully with some smiles in between.
Last night, Friday, Yamid, Ryan and I decide to head downtown to the market which we go to usually every Friday or Saturday night. A ritual has developed since the recent opening of the new Xi'an Subway system. That ritual being this; when Yamid and I take the subway and we have to swipe our cards to get through the little gate, instead of just swiping it where we know every other person with a brain swipes it, we pull out our license or a business card and try to swipe it in really odd places. When the workers, who are there to help helpless people like us, come over to help us we start talking in a fake Russian language. Yamid actually speaks spanish, I speak in Russian. We swipe our cards in the end like smart people would, not until we have created a reputation of being the dumbest foreigners to pass through the subway. Please don't judge me, it is just a little comedic relief.
Once we got to the market, we headed to our friends booth to sit and chat a bit. So we all sit down in this little hallway of a store. We all are sitting on stools that are for toddlers, so we all look like giants, as out of place as we could get, but we love it! One of our friends' five year old son, who is the cutest little boy, was going around making sure everyone had a little stool. All I am thinking is I hope my son is that polite. I am pretty sure I tried something like this as a child, but compared to him I failed miserably. Hospitality is a very important thing in China, and the Chinese are very good at it. So after we have talked for awhile they offer us each a moon cake. Which are from the moon festival, that ended one month ago. During that time I didn't eat one moon cake, because I had heard that they have really strange things in them, and they do. I have a weaker stomach than a newborn baby, not really, but it is a good analogy. So we take the cakes with gracious smiles and thank you's, none of us intending to eat them. So we all set them strategically by our stools, hopefully out of site out of mind. One major gag scene was avoided, but I wasn't off the hook yet.
Ten minutes later our little friend brings out little tomato looking things. I really don't eat tomato's, I know I am pretty pathetic. All of our Chinese friends were saying, oh they are so good to eat, in Chinese of course. I have lived here enough to know when someone tells me it's delicious, it's not true. I have been tricked many a time. I wasn't going to be fooled this time, haha. Ryan and Yamid are true men, and they ate them with no complaint. In the meantime they were all still trying to get me to eat my mystery fruit/vegetable, with no avail. Finally I said to them using Chinese, I am not accustomed to eating them, that usually does the trick. They let me set it aside, close call. It wasn't over yet. The grandpa, the father of the whole family got up and grabbed the thing and gave it to me again, and said, try try try it is very good. This time I didn't have a choice. My good friend Ryan was telling me, don't eat it man, you can't handle it. While Yamid was saying, just eat it! I was torn, but I had to do it. I started to peel it, it started to bleed. I was scared. My stomach was already turning the wrong way. I thought I better just lick the juicy cream it had produced, before I take a bite. Oh man, I licked that stuff, instant gag reflex. No joke, I almost threw up. Ryan said told you, Yamid just laughed. In the end I got off the hook.
When we were leaving Yamid put his moon cake in his djembe case in a sly kind of way. The little boy saw him and called him out, saying to Yamid, hey don't you want to eat it? All the boy knew was the moon cakes were delicious. Yamid just patted him on the head with a big smile, trying to say with his smile, I will save it for later. Ryan whispers to me, "why didn't he just hide it away". I said to Ryan, "why didn't you hide yours", the cake was at his feet. Ryan said, "that's not mine, mine is in my pocket". So he picked the one up off the floor. Big mistake Ryan, the lady then gave Ryan that one too, when Ryan just wanted to point out it wasn't his, haha, it's yours now, sucker. I made it out unscathed from the exotic foods of China, but was blessed with some awesome time talking with my friends. Practicing my poor Chinese. Thanks for reading. Until next time!
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