Chicken Feet, Bubble Tea and Durian: Adventures in Chinatown

A couple of weekends ago, I accompanied my Mandarin teacher and several of her students from other classes to Chinatown in Boston. Having lived in and around Boston for 28 years, I had been to Chinatown every so often but never really spent too much time there.

We arrived at the China Pearl (one of the larger restaurants that has been in business since 1960) for Dim Sum at 11AM. Dim Sum literally means “a bit of the heart”. I had normally thought of Dim Sum as a selection of fried Chinese appetizers. We did not order one fried item although many were passed around. There were steamed dumplings filled with shrimp and bamboo called har gau, many types of baozi (steamed buns-one of the first words we learned in Mandarin was “baozi”) and jiaozi (steamed dumplings of many varieties) and chrysanthemum tea (júhuā chá) was served.  Then, the chicken feet (ji jiao) arrived.

Have fully intended to immerse myself in the Chinese experience all day (most of the shopkeepers speak very little/broken English to add to the authentic experience); I decided to try the chicken feet. They are also eaten in Peru, Mexico and South Africa, to name just a few. Surprisingly, they were quite flavorful but a bit gelatinous. The biggest surprise of the day was to see that the Chinese use jalapeno peppers (Mòxīgē làjiāo) and cilantro in their cooking. That was a very pleasant surprise as those are my two favorites!

The Chinese bakeries reminded me of bakeries found during one of my several trips to Japan, where you commonly see corn, cake and other oddities (for Americans) baked into the bread.

Then it was on to try bubble tea. I had no idea what this was but knew it was very popular in Taiwan. The bubbles are actually small balls of tapioca placed at the bottom of fruit or milk-based tea drink. You are given a large straw and with every sip of your cold tea, two-three of these “bubbles” end up in your mouth. Soft and chewy and not all that pleasant. I tried a pineapple green bubble tea but I saw a sign for durian bubble tea and almost, ALMOST tried it. Durian is a large, spiny, very foul-smelling fruit that is an acquired taste. I will try durian one day but that day was not the day.

Next it was on to a very large, all-Asian supermarket in Quincy (a small city south of Boston). This place is amazing. Rows and rows of Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Chinese, Taiwanese foods, clothes, house wares, school supplies, etc. Heavenly! There was also a large Asian bakery section selling a variety of desserts and steamed buns and a mini-Chinese takeout section selling authentic Chinese cuisine. Buddhas and Kuan Yins were beckoning to me everywhere! I ended up leaving with very cool bracelet with the prayers for the Buddha written in Cantonese on it and a Kuan Yin hanging protector for my car.

Back to Chinatown after that for an authentic Chinese dinner at Jade Garden. Yes, this was the eating tour of Chinatown! We were served platters of stuffed lobster, beef and vegetables and my personal, favorite, salt and pepper squid. Imagine a lightly breaded calamari (rings and tentacles) lightly sprinkled with salt and pepper with a layer of jalapeno peppers.I will go back just to have this dish again.

All the sights, sounds, smells felt like I was in Beijing for the day. While we didn’t do much conversing in Mandarin (although a lot of Cantonese was spoken by those around us), we did a lot of socializing, learning, talking about why we are studying Mandarin and laughing. I realized that language learning isn't just about learning the words, tones and sounds; it's about learning and absorbing the culture, the food and the customs.

A truly enjoyable experience!

Japan, China, Taiwan and the battle for the Senkaku islands

Earlier this week, I had read that 14 Chinese activists were arrested for placing a Chinese flag on the Senkaku islands. Not fully understanding what this debate was all about, I decided to do some research.

Known as Senkaku in Japanese, Diaoyu in Mandarin and Diaoyutai in Cantonese, there is an archipelago of eight islands being claimed by China, Japan and Taiwan. This archipelago is currently uninhabited and controlled by Japan and is located in the East China Sea (northeast of Taiwan and west of Okinawa). These islands are commonly thought to sit atop oil deposits, and are surrounded by rich fishing grounds. 

The Chinese claim that these islands were discovered during the Ming Dynasty; the Japanese claim that they discovered them in the late 1800s. Japan annexed the islands then in 1895 after winning the First Sino-Japanese War. China feels it was forced to sign the post-war treaty which handed the islands over to the Japanese.

In 1900, a brief attempt to make the island functionable by housing a bonito plant quickly failed; the islands remain vacant.

After World War II, the Senkaku islands were temporarily controlled by the United States. However, China does not recognize this Treaty of San Francisco.

In 1972, the Japanese regained control of the archipelago.

Earlier this year, Tokyo’s governor, Shintaro Ishihara raised three million with the help of private investors to purchase three of the islands. This has reignited the dispute.

Time magazine recently published a report which concluded that Japan needs to “resolve the ownership dispute over a tiny group of islands or risk an honest-to-goodness shooting war with China”. A former prime minister of Japan also said that “Where China sees an unrepentant Japan clinging to a legacy of colonial expansion, Japan sees an arrogant and erratic China once again bullying its smaller neighbors”.

The idea of war between China and Japan in this day and age seems unthinkable but the bigger question is, if it happens, will America get involved?

The Navajo Code Talkers of World War II

Although it is a largely unknown story, August 14, 2012 is the day set aside to remember and give thanks to the Navajo Code Talkers of the second World War.

These young Navajo men changed the course of history by transmitting secret communications on the WWII battlefield, at a time when America’s best cryptographers were falling short. They came up with the most ingenious and successful code in military history.

At the beginning of WWII, Japanese intelligence was able to decipher every code that the US devised. With plenty of fluent English speakers among their ranks, the Japanese broke code at an alarming rate. They were also able to send false commands and sabotage messages. Due to this, increasingly difficult codes were produced which led to complaints that the codes were taking hours to encrypt. The military had to come up with a better way to communicate.

When a missionary’s son who grew up on a Navajo reservation named Phillip Johnson heard of the crisis, he remembered that the Navajo language had no alphabet and was impossible to decipher without early exposure. He led the first test group to try out this language for use as military code.

In 1942, 29 Navajo men of all ages were recruited for this mission. The code originated with 200 terms but grew to 600 by the end of the war. The Navajo men could communicate in 20 seconds what often had taken the coding machines 30 minutes. The code consisted of Najavo terms that were associated with the respective military terms they resembled. The Navajo word for turtle meant "tank," and a dive-bomber was a "chicken hawk."

In the first 48 hours alone in the battle for Iwo Jima, the Navajos coded over 800 transmissions with perfect accuracy.

Although their undecipherable code played a pivotal role in saving lives and helping to end WWII, the Navajo Code Talkers did not receive proper recognition when they returned home. Their secret was thought of as too precious to divulge. The code was declassified in 1968 but it still took many years to be officially recognized.

In 2001, almost 60 years after they created their remarkable code, the Navajo Code Talkers finally received their Congressional Medals of Honor.

Balinese, Bahasa and some other languages of Indonesia

Indonesia is made up of over 17,500 islands (6,000 of which are inhabited) which are home to over 300 ethnic groups. The Indonesian people are a mixture of Chinese, European, Indian, and Malay. 

There are at least 365 active languages spoken in Indonesia but the official language is Bahasa Indonesia. It is a relatively easy language to pronounce and understand and without verb conjugations or structures. Indonesian is a standardized dialect of the Malay language and became the official language during the start of the Indonesian independence in 1945. Malay and Indonesian remain very similar.

It may be the official language, but due to the size and island make-up of the country, most people speak regional dialects such as Minangkabau or Javanese. These languages are used informally at home and in the neighborhood but usually at work or at school, Indonesian is spoken. Interesting fact: Bahasa Indonesian actually has 12 ways of saying "No" and several other ways of saying "Yes" when the actual meaning is "No".

Most of the words in the Indonesian language originate from the Austronesian languages. Approximately 80% of the words come from Malay. There is also influence from Arabic, Chinese, Dutch, English, Portuguese, Sanskrit and Tamil.

Balinese (simply known as “Bali”) is spoken by approximately 3.3 million people on the Indonesian island of Bali (the lesser Sunda island chain in the southern part of the archipelago of Indonesia) and is the colloquial language of the island. It is a Malayo-Polynesian language also spoken in eastern Java, western Lombok and northern Nusa Penida. Most Balinese speakers can also speak Bahasa Indonesia.

Unlike the relatively straightforward Indonesian language, Balinese is made up of lots of unusual sounds that can be difficult for foreigners to pronounce. Balinese also does without the verb conjugations and tenses but it does contain a sort of lingual caste system where your choice of speech is based on with whom you are speaking.

Some examples of other regional dialects or languages spoken in the archipelago of Indonesia are as follows:

* Rejang (South Sumatra)

* Dairi Batak (North Sumatra)

* Toraja (South Sulawesi)

* Lampung (South Sumatra)

* Makassarese (South Sulawesi)

* Toba Batak (North Sumatra)

* Sasak (Lombok)

* Banjarese (South Kalimantan)

* Acehnese (North Sumatra)

* Buginese (South Sulawesi)

* Minangkabau (Central Sumatra)

* Mature (Madura and Java)

* Sundanese (Java)

* Javanese (Java)

For the brave, here are some basic greetings in the Indonesian language.

Indonesian

Apa kabar? -how are you?

Selamat pagi-Good morning

Selamat sore-Good afternoon

Selamat malam-Good evening