I’m a fan of Asian food — Vietnamese, in particular. But this fondness developed after college. Before that, my experience of Asian food was limited to bland canned La Choy on Minute Rice.
My first taste of Vietnamese food was in New York during my first year out of college, when I was visiting a friend I’d met in Germany. We’d decided to take a load off for dinner and order take-out. He asked if I liked Vietnamese. I said, “Sure”, though I had absolutely no idea if I’d be eating dog, kidneys or otherwise. (Fortunately their staples are normal cuts of chicken, beef and pork.)
Let’s face it: in Kansas, there are few places to get authentic Asian food outside of Wichita, Lawrence and Kansas City. So you can see why I didn’t learn to use chop sticks until I was 28, when I moved to Chicago and my college chem lab partner introduced me to sushi. (Which I also really like.)
On our first night in Sydney, Mr. Farmer and I decided we should take Ma and Pa to Chinatown for an authentic Chinese food experience. It didn’t occur to me that they’d probably never eaten Chinese food except at the Chinese Kitchen take-out counter at Dillons, which hardly counts.
We didn’t have any particular restaurant on our radar, so once we crossed through the ornate red and gold dragon gate into Chinatown, we meandered by two places, then were nabbed in the middle of the street by the proprietor of a rather large establishment with seating on two floors plus tables out front on the sidewalk.
He took us upstairs to a large dining room, and he handed out the menus, which prompted a deer-in-the-headlights look from both of my parents. This was the “Western” version of the menu, devoid of chicken feet and other undesirables, but we could see that we were still going to have to make a recommendation in order for their faces to unfreeze. So it was lemon chicken for Mom and sweet and sour pork for Dad.
When the egg rolls arrived with chopsticks as the only eating utensils, Mr. Farmer gave a lesson in how to use them, which he’d learned from his Korean college roommate, who was also to blame for his keen appreciation of kimchi. Here’s how it went:
The main course arrived with a fork, to Mom’s great relief. Dad, on the other hand, proceeded to gobble down the whole plate with chopsticks. Mr. Farmer was shocked. Perhaps it was his overdeveloped skills with pliers and wrenches that made him a natural.
Chinatown is really close to Darling Harbor, so after we finished eating, we ambled on over. It reminds me of a much nicer Navy Pier (Chicago), with more attractions, better shopping and just a nicer overall ambience. From here we first experienced the spectacular Sydney skyline. We walked the promenade (with McDonald’s ice cream cone in hand), passing by the many fountains, ending up at the harbor itself. From there we called it a night.
gallopingnelly
