street food!

I may have found my favorite thing about Shanghai. Street food. These guys on bicycles with attached carts (China will put anyone and everyone to shame when it comes to sweet shit to do on a bike) set up shop every night and wok up some amazing eats. So far I have only went to one guy (the guy that had a line at his cart last night) but it is phenomenal. The roomie went with me last night- she is much more skilled with the speaking of Chinese so that was a nice crutch to have. Tonight, after a work-out (see? I earned that shit!), I went by myself and was able to tell him that I wanted it spicy (laaaa-da) and no meat (bu row) and he half smiled at me. I was quite excited with the half smile- I haven't gotten a ton of smiles here and I could tell he remembered me from last night. When I asked for it spicy, he even was able to conjure the American word- "Spicy!" with that lovely half-smile. It made my day.

On top of the deliciousness of the food, it is cheap. Each of the bowls pictured above were 6 kaui each, which is just under one dollar U.S. The cheapness makes it taste better. Plus I get paid once a month here, so it's nice to be able to get a meal for that cheap when you are between checks and in your first few months in a place. We live on/near a very busy street (two blocks from a Metro stop interchange for 3 of the 11 subway lines) and all of this food happens to open up shop just seconds away from our place. Delicious, cheap and convenient equals story style perfection for me. 

Tomorrow is my 2nd Chinese class. I plan to find out how to say "less oil" as the Chinese do cook with an amount of oil that I don't necessarily care for. Either way, so excited about this lovely element of Shanghai that I have just discovered!