Cheese and Expats

One thing that's hard about traveling through Asia is the lack of cheese—not in Hong Kong since it was a British Territory up until 1997, but everywhere else.  It reminds me of a book I read called “Foreign Babes in Beijing.”  It was given to me during a book swap and I too cringed at the title, however, the book is actually pretty entertaining because it follows a young women’s life as an expat in China after China opened it’s borders to foreign trade.  In the book the girl talks about Chinese knockoffs and one of the examples she mentions is in regards to the book, Who Moved My Cheese, but rather it was called Who Moved My Soy; Chinese People Don't Eat Cheese.

On my last night in Taipei, Yu-Ju decided that we needed to go out since I probably won’t be hanging out at a bar by myself in Vietnam.  So she calls her sister and gets a recommendation to go to a bar called Brass Monkey  run by Aussie Expats who entertain themselves by playing drinking games doing the limbo.  Long story short, Yu-Ju and I drink Stella until about 4 in the morning talking about everything from how Brass Monkey is actually orange flavored Kool-Aid and malt liquor mixed together to how the Beastie Boys sang a song about it—all while eating Mozzarella Sticks so that we can get out cheese fix on.  For the first time, I thought, this is how Dave must have felt when he had to go to those underground meat markets in India to get his beef fix.

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