Maybe you mean 'Cork-Asian', like from Ireland?

Yesterday I had the most bizarre conversation with the girl who sits next to me at work.

It started off with a discussion about whether or not I liked Chinese food, as apparently I seem to eat it quite regularly (not that she ever sees me eat). Of course I said I do, and that I grew up eating it, because my dad cooks Chinese food. This was met with surprise, but that's okay.

This segued into an explanation about how my dad is from Guangdong province, and yes, my mother is also Chinese (ethnically, not by birth country). This took my coworker completely by surprise, as apparently she had always thought I was caucasian. This, in turn, threw me for a bit of a loop. Apparently, now that she looked at me, she realised that, yes, I do have black hair, and yellow skin (her words), and not-blue eyes. All the tell-tale signs of not being white.

Not recognising my surname as Chinese I can forgive, because I use a Cantonese spelling, not a Mandarin one, and I know I don't have any trace of Chinese accent or mannerisms, but...I am confused. There was that time that someone thought I was Scottish, but they were American, and I'm sure they didn't think I was Scots Scottish.

Now, I really don't have a problem with white people. I love white people. I'm just not one, and I don't think I look like one. I can't count all the times I've told people I don't speak the language, and been met with "but you look like a Chinese!"

I think I need to conduct a poll.

Bus blooper

It's not often that I get a seat on the bus, and it's rarer that I'm not running that slight bit late for work, so I was surprised to find the bus half-empty yesterday. Obviously I took a seat. There are only a couple of stops between my apartment and my office, but hey. Nobody else was getting off at my stop, and nobody was getting on. It took me far too long to realise that the conductor (there's always a conductor as well as a driver) was probably asking if anyone wanted to get off. We were driving past the stop as I stood up, and I'm fairly sure I got tut-tutted as I disembarked.

At least I didn't have to resort to random waving and shouting, or profuse apologising. Dodged a bullet there.

On the way to work today...

...it was raining pretty steadily.  I saw a little old lady wearing a grey beanie (or toque, for Canadians) with a see-through plastic shower cap over the top.  It was kind of wonderful.

Not so wonderful was the fact that I was already late for work when I ordered my coffee at the bakery, and they took absolutely forever to make it.  Some white girl kicked up a fuss, and they gave her what should have been MY coffee, and then I had to wait even longer.  People were faffing around behind the counter, not making espresso and not frothing my milk.  In the end, I brattily made them give me an extra shot of espresso, thinking all the while that it probably wouldn't do much to help my mood. 

Thank goodness for old ladies in makeshift rain gear.

Mmm, pudding

I just found out (through a funny exchange at the milk tea shop) that the word for 'pudding' in Chinese is bù dīng (布丁), which is excellent, as now I can order both pudding milk tea, and mango pudding.  Things are on the up and up.

Yang' sfry dumplings

I am at YANG' SFRY DUMPLINGS (exactly how it's punctuated on all their signs and on their chopstick wrappers).  This place is always always busy (the setup on the food stall street always has a huge queue), but isn't now as I guess am taking lunch at an unpopular time.  I just ordered some soup and dumplings, when I meant to order a different soup and dumplings.  The woman suggested a beef noodle soup which I hadn't even seen on the menu, which sounded nice.  So, why not eh?

On the way to work today, I saw an elderly couple travelling by bicycle.  Not unusual, especially in Asia, but the man was pushing the bike, and the woman was sitting on the back of it (not on the seat), leaning backwards, and using her cane to both stabilise and help push.  It was funny, and oddly cute. 

I just had a hilarious interchange with the waitress and the cashier.  I got my soup, no problem, and then they gave me my plate of four dumplings.  Cool.  Then apparently there was some mix up with a takeaway order, so they took my plate away.  Then they gave me another plate with 8 dumplings on it (two orders of 4).  I tried to tell them that I'd only ordered 4, and then they brought back someone else's receipt which had two orders on it.  I said it wasn't mine (was I being foolishly honest here?), and stumblingly tried to explain the situation.  Eventually the cashier got involved, and then they took away the 8, and brought back 4.  They are good enough that they were worth the wait.  The soup is good, too.

I'd almost forgotten how to eat these dumplings.  The least messy and least scaldy way I've worked out to eat them is by biting/squeezing a small hole in the outside, and sucking the juice out before eating the rest of the dumpling.  Otherwise, burning and messiness ensues.  I suppose I could've taken a photo so you could see, but suffice to say that they contain some hot juices inside.  Oh, here, they look like this.

Things I can't get at my local supermarket:

• brown sugar
• tinfoil (alumin(i)um foil)
• baking paper
• paper towels
• can opener
• sponges (for cleaning)
  
• fish sauce (although there's a possibility that I can't read the fish sauce bottle).

I have made trips especially for almost all of these items, only to stand around in what I think are the appropriate aisles and not be able to find what I want. 

We currently need (subjective) all of these things, except for the brown sugar, which I found at the other market on the same street.  Couldn't find any of the other things, though.

On the way to work today...

...I saw a man twirling two giant golden balls in his hand as he walked down the street.*

*I'm really busy at the moment but I'm going to try to add something here much more frequently, even if it's just a reminder to myself about how weirdly wonderful China is sometimes.