Monday, June 23, 2008

Beijing (Mon)

First day of the main conference. I ducked out of the conference lunch to join Fred, Diana, and Sean for Szechuan food.

On the way to the restaurant... I don't think this is how it's explained in the installation manual.

Pretty posh restaurant. We ended up paying more for the four of us than we eventually paid for dinner for 14 people (still cheap overall).

Szechuan pao\ cai\ (pickled veggies).

Spicy diced chicken.

Lamb chop on my plate, eggplants in the distance.

Some kind of bun.

Caramelized fried bananas.

During a break in the afternoon. David Patterson (President of the ACM) has a posse. Chinese students mob him for autographs and photo-ops.

For dinner, we tried to find a restaurant that served donkey meat. We failed. We, however, ended up at a Chinese Muslim restaurant that was still very tasty, even sans donkey.

Various meats on sticks (mostly lamb).

Preserved eggs. (More people liked these than I anticipated... don't get me wrong, they weren't wildly popular but a non-zero number of non-Chinese folks ate some and didn't spit it out.)

Eggplant.

Some kind of soup with massive meat bones in it.

"Pine cone" fish.

Gizzards. (Chicken, I think.)

Lamb chops.

Small riblets.

Some kind of chopped meat that you put onto a tortilla-like object (similar to peking duck), wrap up, and eat.

Another interesting dish. It was a "da\ bing~" (big bread) but soaked in some kind of soup/broth with other assorted toppings.

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