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Chinatown – Chicago, IL

Sep10

Anytime I’m traveling, I like to check out the Chinatown if possible.  San Francisco has a huge Chinatown but I must have fluked out because the dim sum I tried was nothing special.  In fact, the dim sum I tried at SF and New York were nothing to write home about – they just made me miss the dim sum at home!  The dim sum I have tried in Chicago has been the best I’ve had in the mainland.  I actually dined at this same restaurant (Ming Hin) during my last trip and wanted to try a new restaurant so we headed to Chinese restaurant that specialized in main dishes/noodles.  Well we got seated right away but was ignored after that.  We watched as they seated more and more people and no one even came to see us with a menu.  I looked around and caught the eye of the girl behind the counter.  She caught my glance and proceeded to do nothing.  So…we left and went to Ming Hin.  Ming Hin is a huge Chinese restaurant and they’ve got everything down to a science!  The wait staff know Mandarin/Cantonese/English and their ordering system is so easy!  The menu is all pictures and you just put the number of orders you want with each picture.  We need this in Hawaii!  Also…the wait staff is incredibly friendly, something Hawaii is also lacking…hehe.

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This is kind of like deja vu.  I had a pork hash post not too long ago…it’s my favorite dim sum dish.  This version was pretty good.

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Slurping Turtle – Chicago, IL

Sep8

Being the Asian that I am, I made it a point to scope out as many Asian restaurants as I could.  As if I don’t get enough Asian food in Hawaii right?  The Slurping Turtle was located very close to our hotel so we decided to give them a try one night for dinner.  The restaurant was very busy but we were able to score a seat almost immediately!  As we were greeted by the waitress, we were informed that a future Top Chef contestant was the chef of this restaurant!  How exciting!  He even had a special tasting menu but since I was dining with others, I decided to order just noodles.  I guess this gives me an excuse to go back to the restaurant next time I return!  Let’s take a look at the food shall we?

130908-01Cute ah?  Sorry for the shiny spot on the menu…

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Shaw’s Crab House – Chicago, IL

Sep6

After my cousin’s white coat ceremony at her school, we decided to celebrate at a nice restaurant.  After searching through the many restaurants to choose from, we made a reservation at Shaw’s Crab House.  Busy busy place so I assume it’s great.  I think the food was good but the service was lacking.  The waiter seemed disinterested right after we declined drinks.  Sorry guys, we don’t all enjoy alcohol.  He all but disappeared for the rest of the meal which by the way lasted like half an hour (seriously!).  I can say that the food was delivered quickly and it wasn’t too bad to eat.  I do think you’re paying for the atmosphere, it’s really too bad the service was poor.  We did enjoy the food otherwise.

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King crab legs!! 

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Wow Bao – Chicago, IL

Sep4

Okay, so I’ve been to Chicago three times now.  The first time I went, I went with Kristian and we saw Wow Bao in downtown.  We both giggled like school kids at the name and the tagline.  Take a look at the cup, can you see it?  Yes, there it is.  Hot Asian Buns.  How can you not laugh at something so silly?  My second trip, I couldn’t help but go in and see what the big deal was.  Yes, they do specialize in hot buns.  This place is awesome, they make the food fast and as far as I can tell…pretty fresh.  They also make salads and dumplings.  So in my second trip, I totally got hooked on the spicy peanut noodles.  HOOKED.  I think I went there two or three times in the second trip.

This last trip I was a bit more disciplined.  Only once!  Spicy Peanut Noodle Salad.  It is SO good, I wish we had a Wow Bao here or that I could duplicate that recipe.  I was also able to try a seasonal ginger tea which was very refreshing.  Here are the pictures!

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Noodles, cilantro, cucumber and peanut dressing – there’s nowhere to go wrong with this!!

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Alive

Sep2

I am alive, indeed!  I’ve been back from Chicago for about a week now and it’s taken me about that long to get back to Hawaii time.  I spent last week waking up at 4 am almost everyday.  I had a very nice trip to Chicago.  It was incredibly hot the first two days but cooled down a bit for the rest of the trip.  The trip was definitely spent moving my cousin into her apartment for school.  It’s quite all right because we definitely got in some good eats and some sight seeing!  I wasn’t holding my camera too much this trip but did get some pictures through my phone that I will be sure to upload.

I’ve gotta admit, I’ve been in a bit of a slump for the past few weeks.  I don’t know what it has been and I don’t know how to get out of it. I also think the word slump is underselling what I’m feeling but what can I say?  It’s on me to get through this.  I hope everyone is doing well.  I leave you with my first meal of Chicago.  A Chicago dog from Portillos…along with cheese fries that I did not capture!

130902-01I’m not a fan of the hot peppers but everything else is winners.  

 

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Happy July!

Jul1

I had a pretty long weekend – good thing I scheduled my weekend posts early!  Yesterday, I had a morning training for work so it was a bit like losing a day in the weekend.  Today, we headed out to the beach and my gosh – it was insanely busy!  We generally like Magic Island because it’s emptier.  I had to go to Waikiki Beach today and it was very rocky and full of strong waves.  I hope today was busy because it’s the weekend before July 4th?

Anyhow!  I hope everyone had a great weekend.  This is a shot I took at the entrance of Meiji Shrine.  This little critter was hanging in mid-air wanting to say hello!  Sorry if any of you don’t like critters…:)

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Kiyomizu-dera – Kyoto, Japan

Jun30

I have a lot of pictures from my visit to this wonderful temple in Kyoto.  Today, I just wanna do a quick update with a few pictures.  I’ll try to upload the rest soon!  This post also marks the 30th straight day I have posted on this blog, a full month!  I’m quite proud of myself.  🙂  I hope to keep this up!  It’s been nice to have a little hobby.  It’s also helping me to use my camera more again!  Thanks for the visitors…or spam robots.  Someone is visiting this site anyhow.  Hehe..

I was so lucky to get a shot of this pair...

I was so lucky to get a shot of this pair…

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Japanese Tea Garden Treat

Jun29

When I visited a pretty garden in Tokyo, there was a cute little tea house in the middle of it.  This was definitely not your traditional tea house, we ordered our dessert from a vending machine outside and had a seat inside.  Then a little Japanese woman in a Kimono shuffled out with your order within minutes.  The tea house wasn’t crowded at all, I’ll assume it’s because it was more of a tourist thing.  That’s all right with me!  The dessert was gorgeous.  Please enjoy the pictures.

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Ewha Womans University – Seoul, Korea

Jun27

So I woke up this morning with a bad migraine and decided to stay home to nurse it.  By lunchtime, my headache was gone so I decided to go to a store to browse for a gift.  I brought along my little brother and we had a nice and leisurely walk through the store.  I was in such good spirits.  Then as I was browsing in an aisle, I see this elderly Japanese man coming my way.  He is very old and moving slowly and starts to walk around me.  As he was walking by me, I start to walk and continue walking.  Suddenly, I hear him yelling something and I see a woman right behind him so I thought he was yelling for her.  I see that she’s not answering him and look back at him and realize he’s yelling at me.  He’s yelling in a very angry tone…Lady!  Lady!  So when I look at him, he points to something at the ground and says very angrily, when you drop something, you need to pick it up.

I’m completely fine with it at first.  I really didn’t realize I knocked something over so I walked over and told him matter of factly that I didn’t realize I dropped it and picked it up and put it back and he is looking at me as if I had just murdered someone.  I wish I were overreacting!  The lady who was behind him and I met eyes as I was walking back and she was like telling me, what is his problem?  I can’t believe that.  She was genuinely offended and I just brushed it off and told her, nah he’s just a cranky old man (lol!) and just went on in my business.  You know, if she hadn’t been there to witness and comment – I wouldn’t have through twice about it.  But as the day as passed, I realize it did bother me.  I didn’t appreciate the tone he took with me and honestly it was really rude but I think it was his look that really got to me, I don’t know what his problem was.  Ah well, what can you do.

Let me try to post some pictures that bring me to a happier place.  In Korea, we decided to check out a college populated shopping street off the Ewha station.  I came with no knowledge of this school but when I hit the end of the shopping street – I was amazed by its beauty!  It made me wish I were back in school, that’s quite a feat!

Picturesque!

Picturesque!

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Blacksmith – Jongno-gu, Seoul

Jun26

Will this week turn into all posts from Korea?  Quite possibly!  We had a long day of touring the Changdeokgung Palace in Seoul – this is a famous palace that includes a tour of the secret garden. It was a beautiful day – one of the warmest we had while we were there.  I didn’t find that too helpful since I wore warm clothes and we did a LOT of walking to get to this palace.  Anyhow, we decided to go to Blacksmith for a late lunch after the Palace tour and I am quite happy we did!  This is a famous chain Italian restaurant whose spokespeople are Song Seung Hun, Kim Tae Hee and Park Yoochun!  It looks like Song Seung Hun is also the CEO of this restaurant so kudos to him!  Let’s get to the pictures!

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