Spoil away

Couldn't sleep, so I finally finished Deathly Hallows. So, you will no longer be banned from my FL FOR EVAR for spoilers.

Buns!

So, if you're an inveterate armchair traveler (and tiki definitely is--believe us, it's much easier to kick back with a glass of Shiraz and watch Tony Bourdain nosh at a food stand in Nairobi than it is to sample some satai from a street vendor in Beijing and end up with 5 days of explosive diahrrea--as Transformer Andy remarked, "Bourdain travels with a doctor!"), you've perhaps seen some mention of Shanghai dumplings. Typically, the well groomed host will wheel up to the vendor window, snatch a snack, and then declare the superiority of this region's greasy snack food.

So, are you ready for some truth?

( you can't handle the truth! )

Hey, look who just showed up

Someone took the scenic route back, but here's The Stitchie from Shanghai--the big ass plushies we bought a couple hours before we were supposed to fly out, inside the cool $8 luggage Mr. Tiki haggled for us to take them along.

Well, if YOU guys aren't gonna take it seriously...

Just extracted this item from the bottom of our luggage. A flea market find from Beijing, for which we spent lest than $10 (post-haggling) and which we expect to break within the week (the gal was unable to get another similar watch to work, so gave us her sample). We're comfortable with the former Soviet Union poking fun at their Commie past, but, as is sometimes difficult to remember when you're walking around its shopping malls, China is still very much a communist country, and Chairman Mao was never repudiated in the way, say, Stalin has been marginalized.

This wristwatch is pretty easy to find in China, and depicts the erstwhile leader of the Communist party happily waving his arm (which, yes, moves) at the Masses. It's not exactly disrespectful, but not exactly a very reverent item either. It's actually not any less silly than a Mickey Mao watch that would have the Great Leader pointing his arms at the time. Just makes one wonder, c'mon Commies, are you taking this seriously at all any more?

A tale of two post offices

Just playing our marvy bootleg copy of Lilo & Stitch pa russki. (Stitch is "Experment shest-dva-shest.") We mailed it to ourselves from Beijing. Once we found the post office (the first post office we were pointed to was actually a bank, and the second was literally a bombed out shell of a building), doing EMS from China turned out to be simple and quick. The forms were even in English! Wow. And, the packages are arriving literally days later.

Now, London, on the other hand...

( London post is falling down )