Sunday 8 July 2007

Noodle and massage in 桂林


This not very exciting looking vermicelli is the famous 桂林米线. Since we are actually in Guilin, it's simply called 米粉. Seems like 米粉 is the staple diet of the place as we saw locals eating it for breakfast, lunch & dinner! There are slight variations of the way it is served by different places - you can sometimes get soup to be poured on the noodle, the condiments also vary by place. I don't know how they made the sauce but this simple looking dish is very delicious.

We were taken to this little 大排挡 (sounds funny to say little big "pai dang"!) by our lady taxi driver who brought us from the airport to the hotel. She managed to convince us that we should book the ferry tickets to go to 阳朔
for tomorrow on the night we arrived. She then offered to show us a local place for supper and even offered to pay for the noodles (mmm.. I wonder how much commission she made from the ferry tickets). Anyway, we didn't let her pay for the noodle - it's only RMB 2.50 per bowl and we were initially so skeptical that we only ordered 2 bowls among 4 of us...

Thinking about getting a massage after 米粉 and so happened there were quite several of them just next door. Initially we thought they didn't seem too dodgy, but after a dressed up woman walk past in 4-inch stilleto plus the guys noticing that the girls in the massage place opposite wearing hot pants under their white coats (what's the deal with these white coats by the way...? They do that too in HK. Are they supposed to somehow imply professionalism?). Another tell-tale sign was girls sitting outside some of the massage places on the same road. In the end, no massage that night.

From the photo on the right, you can probably make out the 按摩院 next to 龙记.


[Images courtesy of Chai Yew Wei]

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