99 Ranch Market- no it's not a strip club!

Kai tries to eat with one chopstick and gives up- uses his hand instead.

June 20, 2007 , Wednesday
I had enough of Kai harassing me and screaming his head off, so I decided to take him to the Pacific East Mall in El Cerito, CA. I had this huge craving for noodles (oh golly, I'm becoming like my mother!) and since Kai just loves noodles also, I figured we'd have lunch at one of the authentic Asian restaurants there.

Everytime I enter that mall, I feel I have been transported to Hong Kong...so many lights, so many signs that I could not read, so many things Asian- and of course the Asians there that make it all feel possible that I am in a different country. Suddenly I felt totally out of my element- an odd thing for me to say considering I am part Asian, and I was born in Japan. But being unable to read the signs made me understand how illiterate people feel...lost. And I became anxious, hoping that they understood English as I ordered a bowl of Thai vermicelli, fried egg rolls, and tapioca with coconut drink.

By American standards, a non-Asian person would have felt insulted because the Asians do not tend to their customers as most are used to. When I was shown my seat, the waiter beckoned me with a nod and a deflected glance as he left the menus on the table. No hello or how are you's. Another waitress came by and served my drinks and condiments without even making eye contact, nor did a peep from her mouth come. I think she flinched a little when I said thank you.

Then Kai starts his screaming session again. Who needs sirens, when I have Kai? I was pretty embarrassed because he had gotten a hold of his food bag and found an energy Luna bar (meant for women, and they give you titties-teehee) only to explode when I took it away.

He would not stop until I had him in my lap and gave him some chopsticks to poke his eyes out. (I am such an awesome mom!) So the food fight began...noodles flew almost everywhere except in his mouth, he smeared vegetables on the table, and then he put me in an awkwardly seated position that I had food splatters on my outfit. I just needed a rain jacket and I would have been perfectly fine.

I almost gave up and would have asked for containers to take home, but I wanted Kai to get used to eating in public just as well.

A Vietnamese waitress came by and told Kai to be a good boy. Kai stopped and smiled. Wish I had some of that magic! And somehow she got around to telling me that she has kids but does not know what happened to them. I was like, Huh? She said her mother took them away when they were little, and she never saw them again. This was in Vietnam. And here she is now. I wanted to talk more but felt this could go on forever, and Kai's sirens would start soon again. So I wished her a good day and exited.

We stopped at the candy store and I was ecstatic to find these Japanese sugar candies for myself and Pocky-sticks for Kai (straight pretzels dipped in dark chocolate- you noticed how I said it was for Kai? uh-huh). And he began to scream again and suddenly stopped which caused me to swing around to check on him. Kai was holding a plastic lid to his mouth, and when I asked how he got a hold of it, one of the girls said she gave it to him...is that how the expression "put a lid on it" originated?


We walked into the supermarket and I was pleased to see lychee fruit for sampling, which I hadn't tasted a fresh one since Hong Kong. There were also spiny-durian fruit, which brought back memories of train signs in Singapore prohibiting durians on board (they smell like rotten eggs, but if you can get past the smell, they taste like custard), and I smiled when I saw the tamarind fruit. I remember eating them as a child, a novelty dessert shared with my mother. Tamarind looks like huge brown stringbeans, with a casing to be cracked open like an egg shell, and their insides brown, stringy and gooey. It is chewy, like thick molasses but tastes semi-sweet and semi-sour (oooh my tastebuds are acting up!). But don't eat the black seed inside. In other forms, they come in bright-colored transparent plastic, are mostly pitted and rolled in sugar or salt. If you eat enough of it, you can get the runs...that's how zookeepers help out elephants...seriously!

I also saw several packages of fresh noodles and bean curd/tofu that took up a whole store aisle. I could not understand the writing on the package but said what the heck- I can guess when I prepare it. (By the way my pickings were great, tonite's dinner was delicious!)

And of course, I had to take pictures of their fresh seafood market. I had never seen that many fish, still alive in one aquarium, or conch shells, crabs, shrimp, clams, oysters, and crawfish ALIVE! I think there were more sea creatures here than in Marine World.

The caution sign: "Live Crabs Do Bite", Duh!

Anyone for salmon fish head soup?

Blue crabs and crawfish. Alive. I though crawfish would have turned red after being cooked!

Live oyster and conch shell.

I will have to take my in-laws here. The last time I attempted to take them to a small Filipino mart in Hercules, they refused after I warned them of how it may smell. I could make my mother-in-law prepare an Asian dish after having shopped for the ingredients, and as for dad...he'll try anything...he's a bottomless pit and has a stomach made of steel. Hmmm...let's see how he does with tamarind?