Life and Times in the Southern Capital
Archive for April, 2010
Afternoon at Metro
Apr 27th
Spent the afternoon at Metro, and seems they are adding some new stock lately. It’s a real pain to get to, and their prices aren’t always the best, but they do have by far the largest stock of imported food stuffs in Nanjing. Also, if you go during the week, the place is especially dead, it’s almost worth the trip just to shop in wide aisled peace and quiet!
Feta, Sour Cream, etc. The selection seems to grow every time I go in.
People overseas get a laugh when I tell them I usually buy my Bleu Cheese from Ikea, but looks like I may have to either give that up or blatantly lie as the prices seem better at Metro.
Decent selection of wines under ~70RMB, but have had some real horrible stuff. Have been meaning to start keeping a record of what I’ve tried….
Ton of wine and large liquor selection behind that.
First time I’ve noticed, but they now have TimTams. For those uninitiated, these are disgustingly(or deliciously) sweet chocolate covered wafer type cookies that are originally from Australia. Seriously one of the most intensely sweet things I’ve ever eaten.
More info:
Metro （麦德龙）
近郊雨花台区卡子门大街98号
Things I like #002: Distingue Smokey Cheese Slices
Apr 25th
This stuff is a pretty good choice if you need processed cheese slices (or are forced to make due in this cheeseless wasteland). Available in most grocery stores with 3 varieties, the dark blue one is regular flavor, light blue is the low fat and the orange one pictured has a real nice smoked flavor. The other two are pretty typical, but it’s the smoked that I get, makes great grilled cheese sandwiches!
Tortilla Time
Apr 14th
Take that Old El Paso. No more of your overpriced imported tortillas. Metro now has these Shanghai made tortillas frozen in the bakery for ~15 RMB per dozen. These won’t keep as long once unfrozen as those Old El Paso bio-engineered mutant tortillas, but believe me, that is a good thing!
GFW Google Schizophrenia
Apr 2nd
So appears I spoke too soon (along with just about everyone else). Google appears to be back to the same state it was in a few days ago in China. Namely rerouting through Hong Kong, but still delivering search results.
Turns out it was just a “glitch” and not censorship. Well, not intentional censorship of Google anyways. The search results were returning URLs which contained “gs_rfai”, which gets blocked as the Great Firewall interprets them as having something to do with “Radio Free Asia”, which is in fact blocked. So Google fixed the “glitch” and we’re back to normal, or what passes for normal in this cyber soap opera\pissing contest………
more info:
Things I like #001: Darlie Tea Toothpaste
Apr 1st
Black Man Dragon Well Green Tea Toothpaste
Despite any moral issues with the “Black Man” brand, this toothpaste is awesome, not scientifically or results wise, those I can’t attest to, but the taste is great. What first sounds like it may be odd or disgusting actually works out really well. Once I tried this stuff, I couldn’t switch back to typical mint flavored stuff. Just hoping I don’t get tea stains on my teeth from my toothpaste….
More info on Darlie aka Darkie aka 黑人牙膏 (Blank Man Toothpaste)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darlie
EPL side Birmingham City to include Nanjing on its Asian Tour
Apr 1st
In news from South China Morning Post:
Birmingham City, the English Premier League side owned by businessman Carson Yeung Ka-sing, have confirmed that they will be playing in Hong Kong this summer.
The Blues will face the Hong Kong team on July 16 as part of their Asian tour, which includes matches in Nanjing, Beijing and a fourth city yet to be decided.
Birmingham are currently ninth in the league table and still have a chance to qualify for the Europa League next season if they can finish at least sixth. They still have six matches to play.
….
Meanwhile, a squad of three local players will be selected to join City on their Asian tour before following the team back in England for a three-week training stint in their soccer academy.
The game will almost surely take place at Olympic stadium, though it is unclear at this point who their opponent will be, as it won’t likely be Hong Kong as the article states 3 Hong Kong players will join Birmingham City for the Asia tour following their Hong Kong match. But should be a good time and a rare chance to see some international sport in Nanjing (That is until the Youth Olympics come to town!). I’ll be keeping an eye out for more info on this as the match date approaches.