| rev:text
| - This dinner here had the potential to become the most awkward dinner of my life, and a possible disaster...if it were not for my limitless social politics skills.
Isabelle's family invited my family to dinner here, which is the only upscale restaurant within 'Splendid China Plaza'. I had only been here to buy tennis clothes, and bring Isabelle to get her nails done once before. This plaza is certainly anything but splendid.
First it was the circling game...where my family circled the plaza until Isabelle's family would arrive since they were the host..but then I saw Isabelle and her mother circle the plaza...so we had to circle some more while avoiding them. Then when we could circle no more..we found out that her Father was already inside the restaurant waiting for us. Nobody won the arrive later game.
We all sat down and the parents left the ordering to us 'children', Isabelle is a learned Chinese Woman...I left China when I was nine. I'm cultured...but not ordering off of a new menu cultured. If you know Chinese food, you know that they all have names bestowed from the heavens..with translations from hell. Working out what to eat was like trying to figured out which colour wire to cut in a bomb scene.
The décor was dull and there were no signature giant fish tanks, but at least our table wasn't wobbly. White cloth table linens, very simple. We were the only significant party here, so our conversations resonated throughout the floor. The waiters were professional and entertaining, good service overall. The food arrived, and like cattle, I was fed by the opposite family. Food came onto my plate as if I was five years old and wasn't capable of using chopsticks. I guess we'll always been children until we have children ourselves. There was a chair between me and Isabelle, and it became slightly awkward until that chair was filled by the totally unexpected arrival of Isabelle's new boyfriend from Shanghai. Like..fresh off the boat...and now it was extremely awkward.
I guess he was good looking, charming, but above all noticeably..taller. Let's just say it was a surprise to my family, and now the entire outcome of the evening rested upon my shoulders. My Chinese culture went into hyper-drive and I forced out intelligent conversation like a grade 7 vinegar and baking soda experiment. It became pleasant eventually, and we got along rather splendidly. At one point a dish arrived, and Mr. Shanghai said: we call these 'cold dishes' in Shanghai.
"Oh," I replied, "Because in Qingdao we call these....'cold dishes as well.' He got my point and retracted. Later I oneuped him with an ancient Chinese parable that had the whole table shoot back into their chairs. Nothing like unexpected knowledge. =]
I always end up playing host no matter what function I attend, people don't seem to understand that having drinks and food is not nearly enough to entertain guests. But I had the situation under control this time, and the dinner went successfully. Three hours, and not for a moment were we short on food. The place prepared dishes quickly and well, I might come back here for lunch.
I think we ordered a total of 23 dishes.
At the end of the night we were on the Shanghai High, a lovely time was had by all. The restaurant could benefit from a better location in my opinion. The family friendship lives. Of course all of this is mumbo-jumbo if you're not familiar with Chinese dinner etiquette. So in case of this..Hi Shanghai is a fairly well managed restaurant with decent food.
But for me...I was just glad it was over and I would be saying Bye Shanghai instead.
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