Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Chinatown, Sept. 2006


This dragon peers down from the roof of Chinatown’s tourist information center on Canal Street. He’s right around the corner from one of my favorite neighborhood restaurants, XO Cafe on Walker Street, where I sometimes get takeout bubble tea.

Bubble tea, in case you’ve never had it, is sweet milky iced tea (I usually get the taro variety) with pearls of chewy tapioca at the bottom. It’s served with a wide straw, so that you can suck up the tapioca with the tea and give it a good chew. I know, I know: How disgusting. Well, lemme tell you, just try it. It’s awesome.

I’ve developed a tendency to buy occasional gummy food. The cafeteria at work sometimes sells bags of Japanese Kasugai gummy candies, and I pick those up too - but mostly for the strained English phrases used on the packaging.

From the apple gummy bag: “Every drop of fresh apple juice, carefully pressed from the reddest apples, shining in colors of the cheeks of a snow-country child, is yours to enjoy in each soft and juicy Kasugai Apple Gummy.”

From the grape: “Enjoy the softness of gentle breeze that sweeps through the vineyard spread vast on the hill in each soft and juicy Kasugai Grape Gummy.”

Now, doesn’t that make you want to crack open your wallet?

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