The Rawpinions Weblog

I’m munching on Oishi Bread Pan, meat floss flavour.  See? Doesn’t take much to make me happy.

This reminds me of the first time I saw meat floss.  I was shopping at a minimarket right outside campus and they had this weird wool-looking thing in a small pack.  I couldn’t read a single Chinese character at the time but I saw a picture of a cow on the packet so I bought it.

It looked like wool because it was dried, shredded beef.  It was so interesting, because I had never seen such a thing back home (or anywhere else).

Here’s an image (Wikipedia)

Here in Shanghai, they actually add meat floss to sandwiches…and cakes! The first time I had it on a cake, I didn’t even realize it was meat floss (because it was sweet).  It’s actually not that bad.

What am I drinking right now? Chardonnay…gone bad:

I always thought ‘Chardonnay’ was a type of wine.  Apparently it’s a type of grape.  LOL (well I didn’t know that!).  The funny thing about this drink is that it would actually pass for cheap champagne.  Ideas come to mind…nobody has to know.

I am so frustrated (no surprise there).  I went downstairs to buy several packs of Oishi Bread Pan and THEY DIDN’T HAVE ANY LEFT.  Just ruined my evening quite frankly.  *Sobs*

I wanted to scream “ARE YOU KIDDING ME???” So I decided to buy chocolate ice cream instead…you scream, I scream, everybody scream for ice cream. =/

*Sobs*

I bought 3 packs last night and I finished everything this morning (or this afternoon rather).

I can’t describe it…the first time I tasted it I thought “wow”.  I then thought about it all day (I was literally obsessed) so that’s when I bought 3 packs.

It sort of tastes like garlic bread toast.  So imagine garlic bread toast mini bites.  That’s what it’s like (ok so I just described it).  I know people are always trying to avoid having garlic in their diet because it’s pungent (nobody wants garlic breath)…but come on, we all know it tastes good…as long as it’s not from someone’s mouth.

All this garlic ‘talk’ reminds me of the worst snog I’ve ever had in my entire life…

Yup, it’s true…they eat dogs here in China.

I’m in Shanghai so I don’t get to see the “real” China.  In fact, I don’t think many Chinese living here in Shanghai really understand the “real” China.

Everytime I ask one of my Chinese friends to confirm that Chinese people do eat dogs, they tell me that dogs here are regarded as delicacies and the “dog” they eat is just called “dog” but isn’t really the ‘dog’ we all are very familiar with (i.e. the ones we keep as pets).

*Note: not all Chinese are ok with eating dogs.

So yeah…my sister is currently at “Tonghua, Jilin” on a field trip.  She sent me an sms the other day telling me about how revolted she was when she saw a dead dog in a baby bathtub on the pavement outside a restaurant.  Apparently, the dog was just boiled (she could smell it…and she told me it “smelled like boiled beef”) and there was a woman who was plucking the fur off the dog.  The dog was white “sort of like what a chicken looks like after it’s been boiled”.  My sister also said the dog was a doberman pinscher (check out the picture I’ve attached).

I’ve never really seen anything like that here in Shanghai.  I might have come across dog restaurants but I’m extra careful when I go to Chinese restaurants in case they’re serving dogs.  Dogs are more expensive than chicken, duck, pork and beef so there’s nothing to worry half the time.  Although I would suggest staying away from street stalls…’coz you never know, haha…come to think of it, mongrels are rare here.

Ultimately, I think meat is meat.  If you’re a dog lover because dogs are awesome animals then it’s definitely immoral to eat dog meat.  But for those guys who don’t really care much about dogs, this shouldn’t be that big a deal.

I was telling a friend of mine that people in Seychelles actually eat fruit bats and shark.  She thought it was gross.  I didn’t tell her that I thought it was gross to eat fruit bats (or fruit bat soup)…esp. because bats are not only cute but they’re harmless.

But as for sharks…that’s a whole other thing.  Some (or most?) people think it’s crazy for us to eat shark…although I personally don’t know many Seychellois who’d think it’s not normal.  I love tuna (and WOW I really do)…but I’d honestly swap tuna salad or tuna-anything with ’satini reken’ (shark chutney) ANYDAY.

LOL, I just checked wikipedia and there’s an entry on satini reken (not written by me).

Interesting read:
Tom Cruise planning to eat placenta (he’s always up to something), isn’t he?

Yesterday, I had another one of those Kedi takeaways. I don’t usually buy those ones with too much lettuce but there’s a first time for everything so I bought one with more veggies than I usually take. I decided to take a pic of it for this blog, since it’s something I’ve spoken about once or twice before. So yeah, the picture above is an example of what microwaved takeaways look like here.

The picture below however, is the extra bonus item I found in my takeaway box yesterday: a small, white worm or caterpillar…or even grosser is if it was something like a maggot! I was so grossed out that I haven’t even eaten anything proper for almost 24 hours. Some people would be thinking, “man, that’s like something you shouldn’t tell anybody about!” hahahoohoo…but no, I actually think it’s hilarious.

Please tell me you’re able to spot the little intruder? Or did I have to draw another one of my patronizing diagrams?

To think, that’s not the first time I saw bugs in my food. How is it that Mark never seems to find weird things in his food, perhaps he’s being more open-minded and believes these things were meant to be there?

Ladies and gentlemen, it’s ice cream season here in Shanghai! Which is truly an awesome thing because the cheap ice cream you can find anywhere on the streets are just as good as the ones in the restaurants. I’m not a fan of Häagen-Dazs though. Am I the only one in this world who thinks their ice cream is way overpriced? Apparently, not anymore: the only people I ever see in those Häagen-Dazs chains are Chinese women (only the ones with a typical Singaporean teenage girl’s mindset, i.e. wannabe-sophisticated-let’s-eat-ice-cream-from-Europe
-because-we-wish-we-were-Europeans-so-we-do-what-Europeans-do
-and-hope-our-skin-turns-white-and-our-hair-turns-blonde).

The first time I had Häagen-Dazs was in 2001 on my way to Thailand on board Cathay Pacific. They served Häagen-Dazs and I was thrilled because I knew then that it was “branded” ice-cream. But I swear, I don’t even remember what I had, and don’t remember what it tasted like. My mum gave me hers so I had two servings - and I don’t remember what either one tasted like.

The most memorable ice-creams I had was a strawberry ice-cream I had in Singapore (basement of Takashimaya in Orchard Road). It was memorable because it was extra creamy x10; a whole different level of the word ‘creamy’. But the very best ice cream are the ones you can find on the streets of Shanghai, because:

1- They are cheap and taste like ice-cream
2 - They are cheap and taste like ice-cream
3 - They are cheap and taste like ice-cream

Ice-cream season is fab here in Shanghai, also because the Chinese are deep into ice-cream! It’s just so typical for them to eat ice-cream on a very warm/hot day so the streets turn into this one huge ice-cream party (without the ice-cream fights).

I just had a yoghurt ice cream (which ‘inspired’ me to write this post). I’m now having breakfast, which is a “takeaway” from Kedi (Shanghai’s most popular 7-Eleven equivalent). You can get a hefty meal for only 6-9 yuan, which isn’t even enough to get you a half portion of a takeaway meal back home (the last time I checked). *Sigh* I love Shanghai. But speaking of 7-Eleven stores, I don’t really know if there’s any here. On of my friends in Beijing mentioned that there were 7-Eleven stores in Beijing though…

Anyway, going back to the takeaway I’ve been chewing on: it’s a box of rice, vegetables, chutney and fried chicken. Sounds a bit familiar? Strangely, it’s just like the food back home. Which shows that we actually got quite a bit of the Chinese influence thing. Quite interesting really. I haven’t eaten shitang (canteen) food in year.

What am I drinking? Coca Cola Zero. Just finished watching their Coke Vs. Coke Zero videos. Coca Cola, you really have every reason to sue Coke Zero - because after Coke Zero, I don’t think I’ll ever go back to Coke (original flavour). You know what they say, “once you go black…”

I’m up (as always)! Woke up at around 5am. If it’s one thing that’ll get me up early morning, it’s a good breakfast. I am having curry mashed potatoes and Tuna in chilli (am.: chili). It’s a very hot meal, in almost every aspect of the word hot (but no, not sexy).

Mashed potatoes (without milk and salt) and tuna in olive oil is one of my favourite combination ever. It’s almost as good as fish and chips (it sort of is like fish and chips but prepared differently). Here in Shanghai, chips are usually categorized as “starters” and the only place I know where ordering chips/fries is a norm is at McDonalds.

So when I’m at a restaurant, I avoid ordering chips as my main course because the person I’m hanging out with might assume I’m on some sort of budget.

I almost forgot that chips is my all-time favourite food, I even like it more than pizza and spaghetti. I’m pretty sure Seychelles adopted the habit from the British, I think people there have this thing for fish and chips as well.

The only fish I eat here in Shanghai is imported Tuna, LOL. They have a thing for river fish here and it’s all full of fish bones.

I really miss the quality fish back home. After a lifetime of big ocean fish from the Indian Ocean , I don’t think anyone would be able to stomach the fish they have here…and I don’t even like to complain about food so I’m just being completely honest.

One thing you might not know about me: I drink a small bottle of Yakult after breakfast everyday (sometimes I drink another bottle after lunch, and sometimes I ‘over do it’ and drink 3 bottles a day). It’s a probiotic drink that helps digestion (among other things) and I used to drink all sorts of Yakult flavours when I was a child in Singapore.

Anyway, I only had a few hours of sleep and I have quite a bit of things to do today so I’ll leave you all to whatever it is you have to do. They’re making us go to class today (Sunday)! Saturday was a weekend so it wasn’t really a public holiday for me..and for a whole lot of other people. They made us believe we’re having a 3-day holiday when we only had one really. Darn clever clogs!

Have a good day!

I have this huge thing for these sweet tablets that’s most likely made for kids.  LOL.  That’s what I love about China: the adult women here are just like kids, so it’s actually a norm for 25 year-old women to buy candies.  I have a sweet-tooth, so tough!

These milk tablets are packed like over-sized panadols so that’s quite funny.  I’m sick of buying them individually (the packs) so the next time I go to Carrefour I’ll try to find them in their wholesale pack like this one.  I honestly couldn’t care what others thought about my appetite, especially because:

1 - It’s my money
2 - It’s my body
3 - It’s my life

I really wish I could make these things myself.  But just like cooking, I tend to lose my appetite if I were to prepare the food stuff myself.

All my life, I’ve probably drank less that 150 glasses/bottles of water. As far as I can remember, it has always been Coke, tea and coffee and juice. Water has this “heavy” feel to it, and it doesn’t go down smoothly. After drinking, it makes my stomach feel heavy so if I had been eating It’d make me want to vomit.

I can’t believe some people would go as far as drinking 8 tall glasses a day. I’m totally for drinking plenty of fluids, but my system just can’t handle being too diluted - it just doesn’t feel right to drink that much. I don’t know how others do it!

I’ve been drinking a 550 ml bottle (or half a bottle) of water everyday now for about 2 weeks and it’s still a challenge. I’m drinking water because I can’t stand green tea anymore, I can’t stand the taste. The ones that come with sugar tastes too sweet so I can’t stand those ones either. I do drink a cup of normal tea (red tea with milk and sugar) once in a while, but I keep it to about 2-3 cups a week.

Current Mood: Confused

After talking to my twin sister on the phone yesterday I’ve come to the conclusion that the palpitations could be due to or connected with hypertension. She scolded me about my diet and after trying to figure out if there could have possibly been a change in my diet over the past week it hit me: I bought 2 packs of eggs this past week, and I’m almost done with the second.

Ever since I was a kid I was warned not to eat more than one egg a day…but I never really knew why. Turns out, eggs have a very high cholesterol content and I’ve definitely been over-doing it.

The stress of knowing what I’ve done to myself is actually causing even more stress in my life. The best way to remedy the situation at this point is to eat health and to do aerobic exercises. I’m also going to cut down on food in general, and have a diet of oats, boiled vegetables, grape juice and…green tea (yuck).

I haven’t really mentioned this yet on this blog: I’ve been back on tea for about a month now. I’m going to have to cut back on that altogether.

I joked to my sister that it’s not my fault that I can “whip up a mean egg breakfast”, but jokes aside this is a very serious situation (if my self-diagnosis is correct). Hypertension and hypercholesterolaemia are serious and life-threatening conditions, and together they are literally a killer-combination.

It’s morning and I’ve skipped breakfast. I had some carbs last night and did a bit of speed-walking and a bit of jogging this morning.

I feel horribly guilty about what I’m putting my cardiovascular system and entire body through. I feel like my mind (and appetite) has betrayed the rest of me.

Current Mood: Cool

I’ve decided to come clean and tell you guys that I am obsessed with reality TV. As a result, I’ve let my real-life friends down and worst; I’ve gained 2Kgs. I am currently 44.8 Kgs, I try to keep to 43Kgs.

2 weekends ago, I was 3 hours late in meeting some friends at Attica and they all wanted to know why. One person pulled me to a corner and asked me if I had just indulged in some raunchy lovemaking before I decided to join them (It was almost 2am). Another one thought I came in with {male friend who owns the posh car} after we did it on expensive satin sheets.

For crying out loud people…I was watching American Idol and Celebrity Apprentice, while stuffing my fat cheeks (but slim figure…ahem) with junk food! Believe it or not, I’m not ashamed to say that watching reality TV with pizza and Coke is a whole lot more fun than getting drunk and having some stranger(s)’ sweaty hands all over my clothes or worse, having your single friends watch you use and abuse men on the dance floor.

Oh yeah, I’m drinking Coke again…and coffee (I’m currently out of tea sachets).

The other day, I was talking to my twin sister on the phone and we were discussing the difference between socializing here in China and socializing in Seychelles. I told her that I missed hanging out back home, and she was very surprised. She expected it to be a whole lot more fun here in Shanghai than Seychelles.

I guess to me, it comes down to who I’m hanging out with. Surprisingly, it’s not language but sense of humour that causes a barrier between me and the rest of my friends here. They don’t seem to get me at all, and I’m constantly misunderstood. I try to stay away from everyone so they’d stop talking about me but they somehow find a way of making me a topic of conversation (even if it’s just a mention). Funny, I’ve managed to create a personality out of myself, even by steering clear of people in general. If I can actually draw attention by avoiding attention, I have every reason to be as snobbish and arrogant as I appear to be.

Now I know why almost everyone wants to have a cat; they’re snobbish, arrogant yet manage to somehow draw attention. They’re annoying to the point of frustration but it pisses you off when you don’t have their attention and you’re being completely ignored. That’s pretty much what I am: in a society of animals, I’m a cat.

If you’re reading all this and thinking “gimme a break Sabz, you’re not all that”…why are you still reading on? Ok, ok, I’m annoying. Moving on:

Round 1 winner: Reality TV Plus Weight Gain.