The Coconut Head: GuiYang

October 12, 2008

GuiYang - My Home Town

Guiyang, my hometown, is a medium-size city in the mountainous southwest of China. She offers one of the most genuinely pretty, unpretentious sceneries I have seen, filled with the most kind-hearted and down-to-earth people I have known, and the most delicious and unique local food I have had.

Guiyang is a rather small city compared to Beijing and New York, but much more approachable and friendly. Some streets would welcome you with the tasty street food on both sides and tempt you with the smell from many yards away. Here is the mean-looking dude who is making the BBQ lamb on the street.

Although the urban part of the city has big grocery stores, such as Walmart, people still go to the farmer’s market on the street in the suburban part of the city. Besides the vegetables freshly cut from the field 3 or 4 hours ago and the meat just butchered in the morning, the street also offers one of the unique street eats in Guiyang - BBQ spicy tofu (on the right). It is numbingly spicy and good!

After snacking on breakfast in the street, my father and I decided to go visit my old high school area. My father is a excellent photographer, and I am a great model. But, we are not good at working with each other. Father wants to teach the daughter how to pose; and the daughter wants to teach the father how to position the subject. Here you go…

Here is end result, when we finally reached consensus.

A couple of more.

We were a little tired after walking so much. Mom, Dad and I retired to a local coffee house. While the Chinese skill at making cocktails in China still needs improvement, they have definitely mastered the technique of making coffee — especially, fancy coffee.

For dinner, my uncles took us to a local “spicy chicken house.” It is not the regular spicy chicken available in those Americanized Chinese restaurants in the San Francisco Bay Area. It’s THE spicy chicken house. First of all, you can pick the chicken to eat first. Second, you can pretend to make your own BBQ chicken if you wish. Third, the spicy chicken is sooooooo good that you won’t be able to stop eating until all your lips, fingers, nose and head are all numb.