The Queen City of Charlotte, a town of 2.3 million should find no difficulties to entertainment me for a four-day weekend “getaway”, a getaway from the social desert of Western North Carolina. With six-year of networking experience inside a nuclear shelter, my contact list isn’t as long as the Schindler’s, however, I do manage to make friends with a fair amount of share-mind designers.
The first two nights, and day, were great, good friends, mild intoxication, and waiting to see the dawn with social chitchat. However, on day three, things started to get difficult; after a fun and educated lunch with a great friend of mine, my evening plan still remained vacant. Usually, during academic season, there was always dinner buddies to be find within 15 steps of walking distance in studio; very easily and unintentionally, dinner outing would transform into night procrastination.
These entire social dynamic seemed so distance this summer as everybody from my graduating class are moving on adventures of their own. And most of everybody was venture out of this city for the weekend.
Therefore, I figured it would be a good idea to contact someone who was working in this town, knowing that must be a better guarantee for them to stick around during the non-schooling season.
Thus I contacted my first year architecture professor Andrew, since we had not hang out form quite sometime and he told me not to leave this town without catching up with him. A brief text was sent and a reply never surface.
By dinnertime, I had decided to go solo for some flavor of the Queen City that I missed for this past month. Deciding a diner was a monumental mission by itself, Penguins, Hickory Tavern, Cans, Big Daddy, Lang Van, and Giacomo’s where only a short list. After an hour, a strategic plan had been made, the fish sandwich at the Hickory Tavern won the vote.
It didn’t take me long, after arriving at the restaurant, to realize why Andrew never replied my text. The Red Sox was playing that night; since he was from Boston, this was pretty much his life. And as a good friend, who never kept track nor understood baseball, I felt like I had insulated the man.
Strangely, the grill tilapia and cold beer gave me motivation to observe the live broadcast on the 42” LCD screen over the bar counter for hours. Even scarier was my attention toward the screen adjacent to the baseball live feed – NASCAR. For the first time in my live, I actually felt compelled by the racing-for-dummy association; a sports once I claim to be unrestricted-interstate-driving was actually fairly intense. At the end of the night, I had managed to understand the sports baseball and somewhat, only somewhat, appreciate NASCAR, because I knew the most prestigious racing sport would have a go in Hungary this Sunday.
Headed back to my recently broken-in arcHouse, I found my new sub-leasing housemate, Livi, also suffered the same summer-Saturday-night syndrome. I hardly knew him, since I had only been in the house for approximately six hours accumulated in the past two months. Going to the bar this time was a much easier decision to make than my dinner selection.
Settled at the same table and same seat as my previous night at Wine Vault, I not only learned Livi was all over the map, and also a person with an open-minded appetite.
Despite the mixed population in the US of A, finding diverse dining experience is still hugely limited. No doubt, street food is one my favorite type of dining experience; they are mostly simple, modestly dangerous but hugely rewarding.
Time after time, going back to Hong Kong, I would relentlessly go to Central Kowloon for the ultimate “Street Sweep”, hitting up favorite kiosk in my childhood while discovering the new trend in the fast changing culture city.
Talking to Livi surely bring back traveling memories from the frozen lake of northeastern China to the southern England port of Bristol. We might not share the same interest and carrier goal, and we most likely will never be BFF, but the common we share are the desire to taste the exotic cuisine at the most exclusive restaurant and the flavor makes familiar to the vast majority of the working class.
Sadly, this wasn’t an episode of Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservation, pork intestine covered in deep frying grease sold at street kiosk were only dreams reside outside of this country.
But I guess it will be okay for most of you, because I am sure you will not find stinky tofu as an attractive delicacy in the first place.
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