Who'da Thunk?

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Who'da Thunk? ... We'd travel halfway around the world to Shanghai, meet with a vendor that takes great pride in their chinese heritage and culture, and end up going to a Brazilian BBQ for dinner? Our driver, "Uncle" John (as they called him), Elsie, and Grace were kind enough to host our visit. After a very successful and well attended meeting, they offered to take us to the "copy" market (if for no other reason than the experience), and then out to dinner. We happily agreed.

This was no short ride in the car, and took quite a while to reach our dining destination. We parked in the first underground parking garage I had seen in Shanghai, rode the elevator to the 8th floor of a major shopping center that had very high-end goods, and sat down at a Brazilian BBQ restaurant (of sorts). I had greatly anticipated, with all this fanfare and effort, that we would be dining at an upscale, authentic Chinese restaurant only to be disappointed. There was a live band playing American cover songs (and providing comic relief) like Santana's "Oye Coma Va" and Frank Sinatra's "Fly Me To The Moon" and many, I won't use the term exotic, but "weird" dishes (like baked crab apples, wined pears [their terminology], and peppermint flavored radishes).

One of the funniest parts of this experience was our trying to determine what some of the BBQ'd items were. As expected at a Brazilian BBQ, they brought the skewers around to your tables and sliced off, or slid off the items for you to try. Various sausages, bacon wrapped chicken, cow tongue, stretched pork of some sort, hump of brahma bull (I'm guessing here because it was so tough), what we thought was possibly pancreas or stomach from some large beast, and many other "delightful" and interesting food items.

One that we tried I will call "Shanghai Surprise." These were smallish bits of some sort of meat item, which, upon first inspection, resembled what I guessed was chicken hearts. Well my friends, I was wrong. It was after several inspections, and discussion amongst ourselves (Mike and I) that we determined they were what we lovingly refer to in the American southwest as "Rocky Mountain Oysters." Except, having actually had these before (of the sheep variety), we decided these must have been pig "oysters."

Who'da thunk? ... In a country where there are no apparent traffic laws, with cars going every which direction, stopping in freeway traffic, and not yielding the right of way to anyone (not even pedestrians)... that there would be fewer accidents and seemingly no road rage. Oh mind you, they use their horns a LOT -- mostly to announce their arrival (at the intersection, in cutting off the driver that hasn't edged his front-end far enough to get the angle, and to tell that pesky pedestrian or bicyclist to "look out, I'm driving here").

Which brings up a whole other point... they can wait for cars to pass, be patient with people butting in line ahead of them, and always let you go through the doors first (I've tried to be the chivalrous one and allow the ladies to go first only to fail miserably and repeatedly), yet when it comes time to deboard an airplane (our first domestic flight), they will push and shove and crowd forward, and you have to fight your way into line to get off.

Who'da Thunk? ... You would ever read this... "Passengers are not allowed to carry with them contraband, illegal goods, smoke, spit, or litter inside the car" (I have a picture to prove it)... in a taxi cab?

Who'da Thunk? ... That I'd have to come all the way to Qingdao, China to meet Cindy Johnson's (my sister-in-law) brother, Greg Young, that works at Icon and lives less than a mile from my house? And then, to be disappointed because he and two others that were in Qingdao at the same time as us ended up going to Shanghai for the day. They missed out on the whole foot massage experience.

Who'da Thunk? ... That "ice water" could mean something warm or hot and totally devoid of ice?

Who'da Thunk? ... In a country that makes, and often times copies EVERYTHING, it would take two weeks to get name tags for servers at a restaurant. They probably make them in China, ship them to the US, engrave them, and ship them back to China. With the willingness of the common street vendor, you'd think this would be about a 10 minutejob.