Breakfasts at the factory cafeteria in China were a simple and delicious affair with very little variation. Noodle soup took center stage with fried rice, steamed buns, and an occasional side dish forming the rest of the cast. I'm not sure what the side dish was. Brian was not sure what the side dish was. In fact, nobody seemed sure what the side dish was. Believe me; we asked.
Brian was much more adventurous with the food than I had really expected him to be. He was quite willing to try just about anything so long as it wasn't seafood. So when we arrived one morning to a new side dish, Brian said he'd be willing to try it as soon as we knew what it was. I guessed vegetables, but one can never be sure. A Chinese coworker came in, and after allowing an appropriate time for her to get her breakfast, I asked politely what the dish in question was. In English, of course.
The coworker puzzled for a moment, bringing her finger to her chin. Hesitation over food in China is never promising. I was about to tell her to never mind when she said, "Snake?"
"Snake?" I said. "Oh. Thank you." I turned back to my meal, and told Brian that we didn't know what it was. He hadn't quite heard her say "snake" and I wasn't about to tell him she'd said, "snake." I didn't believe it was snake. My functioning theory was that she meant the word "snack," but this was conjecture at best. The funny thing about the Chinese is that they don't believe in disguising what you're being served. If it looks like noodles, it's noodles. If it looks like chopped-up chunks of eel, it's chopped-up chunks of eel. If it looks like Sebastian escaped the mad French cook and is hiding on your lettuce platter, then it might be Sebastian's cousin, but the scenario hasn't varied much.
The real point is, if it looks like shredded pickled vegetables, it certainly isn't snake. And if it had been snake, it would have looked like snake. We just needed to wait for a second opinion. Unless maybe they were all baby snakes? I searched surreptitiously for any sign of eyeballs while we all quietly ate our noodles.
Another coworker arrived and the first lady lost absolutely no time posing our query to him in Chinese. I could hear her explaining that she hadn't been sure about what it was called. "Oh," he replied at length. "It is a condiment."
I thanked him, but neither of us touched the dish yet. His response merely labeled the role the dish played at the table, not the question of its basic construction. I'd expect a large snake to be a main dish, but a handful of baby snakes to merely be a "condiment." We all ate our noodles and waited a further opinion.
One of Brian's engineer coworkers was the next to enter, and she was promptly bombarded by the two present Chinese people to identify for us the dish on the table. Her English enjoyed a slightly broader vocabulary, and they seemed to be able to tell our question had not quite been answered. The third coworker quickly offered us two more synonyms for condiment, "side dish," and "appetizer." I felt a little more comfortable with her and so pressed the issue and said, "Yes, but what's it made of. Vegetables?"
"Mmm. I do not know. Maybe." She returned to the other two in Chinese conversation asking them if either of them knew the composition of the dish. They both shrugged. She turned back to me and repeated "appetizer" following it up with an assurance that it was delicious and not too spicy. This seemed to be the most satisfactory response we would receive, and so I leaned over to her and said, "She said it was snake."
The engineer burst into laughter, and translated hurriedly for the other two who also burst into laughter. The first woman looked embarrassed and emphasized that her English was not good, and she knew she hadn't gotten the right word. The joke was passed on to everyone who came in to breakfast, but we still didn't try the dish. After all, we still don't know what's in it.
