Before arriving in the Philippines, we were delayed overnight in Shanghai, having missed that day’s single connecting flight to Manila. Honestly, coming off the hell trip described earlier, I was glad of the chance for a rest and shower before boarding another jet. But the delay offered another benefit: the chance to see China, however briefly. Because we’d missed our flight, customs officials gave us a 24-hour visa stamp, and six of us braved an expedition into the communist dictatorship.
In truth, there was nothing to see in the space of three hours that can’t be found in any metropolis. Eileene and I spent our time breakfasting in one of Zagat’s highly rated choices, which proved to be a hotel buffet. The food was delicious, but no more exotic than the tiny glimpse we got of the rest of Shanghai. What the buffet did provide was variety: station after station with traditional breakfasts from around the world. One station devoted to Chinese dumplings, another to the British British heart attack special, another to Japanese fish and seaweed, another to “Mongolian†custom noodle bowls, another to French pastries, and so on.
This presented me with something of a dilemma. Should I take this rare opportunity to breakfast in foreign style, feasting on dumplings and noodles and sticky buns, the closest I’d get to experiencing China? Or was I so desperate for a little sanity after—nay, amid—a nightmare trip that I should retreat to familiar foods like the baguette and quite excellent salami?
In the end, I split the difference, though not as a conscious strategy. I opted for Chinese food first, an act of will over immediate desire. I quickly decided I’d rather have baguette and salami, though not before filling up a bit. I soon wished I’d asked for a hot chocolate when it was offered as we were seated, for neither hostess nor waiters approached our table again, but I made due with many glasses of fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice. It was good. Even at the time, I commented to Eileene that this might be the high point of the trip. Looking back, it may indeed have been the high point, though not indisputably so: both of us together without the noise and distraction of a larger family, relatively fresh attitudes toward (not very) foreign experience before homesickness set in, no sign yet of exotic diseases, the temporary high of bed and shower after several days without and all the stressful pre-travel work complete, enjoying some very fine food. I refuse to feel guilty about traveling to the opposite side of the globe only to stuff myself with French bread and salami. If I really want dumplings for breakfast, I can get them just as good in New York’s Chinatown.
I do feel guilty, however, about a suppressed urge. I was sorely tempted that morning to breakfast on corn flakes. Very safe, very familiar, very, very comforting to a guy strung out by four straight days of helpless anxiety. The only thing preventing me from eating corn flakes that morning was the price tag of $35 for that breakfast–$45 if you take the bullet train ticket into account. I’ll be damned if I’m going to spend $45 for a bowl of corn flakes.
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