Braaaaaiiiinnnsss. Yummy brains. Brains brains brains.
What follows is not my entire trip, kiddies. This is just a small selection of photos from my visit with the folks at ChinesePod. They were completely awesome. Just an amazing group of people. Commentary follows…
John Pasden gets a very important e-mail! John, by the way, is nine feet tall. We measured. He’s like Lurch.
Ah, the amazing Jenny Zhu. What a sweetie!
Why yes, ChinesePod is stockpiling hot women. Why do you ask?
And a saucy bit of hair-pulling, to boot! Later, there was Jell-O wrestling.
This is David, just arrived from Beijing. It was his first day on the job and he was a sincerely cool cat.
This is Eileen (ZOMFG *crush*). She speaks English better than I do. It’s crazy. She was the first to spot me standing there in the doorway and called out my name so loud they heard it back in Hong Kong.
Eileen’s behind the camera on this one, as the four of us went out that night for something called “hot pot.” It’s kind of a fondue thing, but you throw in meats and veggies and… oh, just look.
See?
And then we got a waitress to get us all in the shot.
Oh, and this is Colleen. She’s supercool. She’s my bud. She took this next shot…
…for which I am most thankful.
Colleen also snapped this little beauty while I was in the restroom. Quite the saucy surprise!
John Pasden says: Brains?
Brains!
BRAINS!!! Yes, those are in fact sheep’s brains we’re eating. The taste was pretty good, but the consistency was a little like runny scrambled eggs.
The next day, they took me into the studio and we did an interview for The Saturday Show. As luck would have it, that edition of the show is available now!!! Check it out!
Aric and Colleen mugging it up for the camera after we finished recording.
A little more mugging. And while we’re here, I have to say what an awesome guy Aric was. (And still is, I’d wager.) He’s something of a big shot in this town, but after we finished up, I had a few hours to kill before we all met up for dinner and drinks. Aric took me around town a bit, bought me some street food, and then took me back to his place. (Mind out of the gutters, people.) Then he took me over to Tai Kang Lu, which was this über-hip little bohemian district. Lots of fun. I’ll post pictures of that later.
Later that night, we were joined by Bao and Philip, fellow ChinesePod listeners!
Grabbing some face time with the lovely Ms. Zhu.
Aw, yeah, baby. Nobody gets this many gorgeous women around them in a single evening except James Bond. I felt like a rock star.
And last, but certainly not least, here’s me with Ken Carroll, co-founder of ChinesePod and an extraordinary gentleman to boot. I have rarely, if ever, in my life encountered a person so passionate and so kind in equal measures. Getting to meet him and talk to him and drink with him was one of the highlights of my trip.
I consider myself extremely blessed to have met them all!
Technorati Tags: chinesepod
Amazing set of photos Frank. Glad you had a great time.
Remember that time you came to Shanghai and we hung out? hey cool, heres 50 pictures!
Guess where I am, the Shanghai Library, yup, the hub of learning, my IQ is probably increasing just being in here.
So are you back home yet? Great post, I sent it to my mommy so she can see I am sourounded by kind and fun people!
Colleen
Frank, after hearing the Sat show interview and reading various comments on the site, I didn’t realize I was in the presence of such a luminary when I met you. Enjoyed the pictures. Good to see you in Shanghai!
I’m sure Ken must has some evil plan to collect all the beauty women from all around the world.
Frank, your pictures are awesome. I want to be a Cpod blogger too! I’m coming to China later this year, never thought of visiting Shangai, but now that I have seen you pictures and heard how well you were received, I really want to visit the CPod offices and meet all these people. Looks like I will have to change my plans…
Marc in Belgium
Ken in the last picture looks like a little (or heavily?) drunk…
So you and the Chinesepod team enjoyed the hotpot (huoguo) very much. Maybe you can cook one at home if you buy some ingredients in a Chinese food shop.
I remember when I first ordered a beef hotpot (niu2rou4 huo3guo1) in a restaurant in Taipei, I pronounced the tone wrong and the waiter at first didn’t understand me. I pointed the menu and was understood. That was when I decided to learn more about tones.
The Saturday Show was effective for you in some ways, at least. I just ordered Valley of Shadows, because the reviews on Amazon were so good (I’m assuming you didn’t write them…). Of course it took a little mangling because some people just don’t send stuff to little Aodaliya down under.
It sounds henhao. I can’t wait to kan it!
Xiexie
Sounds like a great time… I love hot pot. Can’t wait to have it in China next month. I’ve had it in Canada a lot but am essentially banned from the only Hot Pot restaurant in the area. If I go back they will seriously poison me. I’m disappointed because they had some amazing sauce, I think it was greenish brown. Can’t seem to buy it anywhere..
Bazza
Why do you think Ken’s plan to surround himself is evil? I think it is brilliant. But don’t worry as Aric and Will have mentioned and Frank has discovered being a Poddie makes you handsome, witty, edgy and instantly loved by equally beautiful, intelligent and kind women.
Look at Aric. Even in that plaid jacket he probably has women who find him interesting.
Mike in Jubei
Mike in Jubei
Even I laughed out loud at that one, Mike - it’s the newest masterpiece from my tailor.
Frank - had a blast with you here (yes, please post pics of tai kang lu so people can see how cool I am to live in such a place), the “hospitality” was simply us enjoying being around a great guy.
Safe travels (back here).
Aric
Guelph Mike: Wow, besides the cool contracting/sewage gig, you are also banned from a hot pot place? My curiousity grows. The only thing I can think that would ban one from hotpot would be a)throwing food or b) drunken disorderliness, and both sound hilarious.
If you are in China I sincerely hope you will stop by and see us. I know a rockin’ hot pot joint that didn’t seem to mind out disorderliness, and we can all find out if they mind throwing food:)
Wow! Look at all these comments! Holy shaznak!
The Mighty Bazza - Thank you, man. It really was the experience of a lifetime.
Colleen - Aww, too many pics, you think? But they were all so GOOD! And I cut people out entirely!
Philip - Hello again! Hey, no worries. It was great getting to meet you! Keep in touch, huh?
Marc - I can’t recommend it highly enough. I won’t pretend that they roll out the red carpet for everyone like this, but they seem really great about making the time to meet with folks when they drop by the office.
pharmine - Hehe. Well, he is Irish…
Will - Hey, that’s awesome, thanks! I’m so glad to hear that! Please let me know what you think when you’re done! (Unless you hate it, in which case that will be the perfect time for quiet reflection.)
Guelph Mike - I’m a little afraid to ask what you did to get banned!
Mike in Jubei - If only it could make me handsome…
Aric - Tai Kang Lu pics are forthcoming. They’d made great postcards!
Colleen - Maybe it was the lingering scent of his work following him into the restaurant?
Aric
Since this week’s Saturday Show was partly about what to say to someone with Bad Breathe, hasn’t any of the CPod Ladies who all have style and grace suggested you lose the Plaid Jacket. Smoke, swear, get in bar fights, be intolerant of laxatives but THE JACKET.
What would happen if you wore IT in Texas ?
And YOU make fun of dear sweet Jenny’s Mole Button !
Doesn’t it at least clash with The Teal Terror?
Mike in Jubei
Mike - it’s going to be massive in Japan; just you wait…you’ll see, YOU’LL ALL SEE!
OK,
I don’t know if anyone else feels this way, but that pic of the brains–well that should just be censored. Ew! Everytime I open up this page my stomach actually turns…!
(Some things you never get used to!) John’s right…hotpot gone wrong, very wrong…
Great blog, which I intend to follow…..
Thanks for posting the pictures - so good to be able to associate faces with the voices that slowly became part of my day here, as I struggle to learn this beautiful and challenging language all by myself
Both Jenny and Ken look just like I imagined - and I am sure they are a pleasure to be around
The hotpot restaurant had abominable service and the rudest employees I have ever encountered. One time it was so awful (i.e. no food) that I didn’t leave a tip, actually I wanted to ask for money back. Never go back to a restaurant you just snubbed (within the past week). After going back and having a pretty nice hot pot for a change, the owner notices us and starts yelling at us from across the restaurant. After a few minutes of arguing, my wife and I left. The last image I have of the place is of him backing into the kitchen doorway yelling at us as we walked out of the restaurant.
Disclaimer: I am a liberal tipper (under normal circumstances).
Haha, great story Guelph Mike! Its funny how tipping was originally meant to be for ‘above and beyond service’ and now its completely rude if you don’t (well, not in China, ha!).
When I went home for Christmas I had a really hard time tipping taxi drivers, but I felt to scared of the repercussions if I didn’t (ie. some kind of ‘bad customer list’)(I’m from Victoria Canada, so it’s a small enough town that this could happen, haha).
*note to self: don’t pick fights with john*
I bet Frank now has that picture of him and Jenny framed on his bedside table.
Btw thanks for the hotpot invite Colleen.. I just bought the ingredients to make it for myself tomorrow night..
About 6 weeks after my traumatic hotpot incident we were in Toronto at another Hotpot place. At first they said 10 minutes for a table.. after 45 minutes we were finally seated, and there was only one couple ahead of us (really slow turnover). We were looking over the items to select and the waitor who had seated us came back and said that people with reservations had just arrived and that they needed our table. I just stared at him without speaking.. after about 20 seconds he walked away and never came back. We stayed and ate, but it wasn’t very good. We each had our own hotpot, instead of sharing, which I don’t like as much. And the sauce wasn’t very good.
Anyways, enough about my hotpot stories…
Just saw Curse of the Golden Flower last night… pretty good. No hotpot scenes though.
Frank,
Lovely meeting you. Hope you had a great time in Beijing.
Aric keeps saying you smell like a rainbow, but he must have got that impression before your hotpot dinner. I always stink after a satisfying hotpot treat. It’s so bad that I am willing to give up one of the greatest culinary delights known to mankind.
All poddies,
Do come and visit us and hug hug and hug us like all the rest has done!
Jenny, I should be over in October hopefully. It will be first time in Asia.