Monday, August 15, 2011

Glad I do not live in Harbin

We were just watching one of Anthony Bourdain's fascinating and entertaining food travel shows. In this case, he was in Harbin in Manchuria, China in mid-winter at 25 below. He finds a rich local retired restaurant owner with an entire store of memorabilia from the old American West - and this is someone who had grown up with work gangs in the cultural revolution. The Chinese owner sings Mao-era marching songs with a funk overlay dressed in a cowboy hat. There are expat Russians knocking back vodka shots, and Americans building an entire new ski resort. Where else could you find something as obscure and bizarre and riveting on tv? The world is more weird and various and wonderful than we know.

Not putting Harbin on my list of tourist places to go, though.

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