My Sister, My Daughter

Well, if the title didn't give it away, then I will just have to tell you. This weekend Eric and I ventured to Chinatown for our most recent adventure! And what an adventure it was. For anybody who has ever traveled to a big city, or who lives in a big city, I think you may have found that all big cities have a Chinatown. Chicago is no exception.

Living in the South Loop, Eric and I are pretty close to Chinatown. The unfortunate part is that a stretch of the seedy part of town is what separates us. So, we decided to take the Watertaxi. The Watertaxi really could be a blog post of its own, but for the sake of time, I will just tell you simply here. What it is is a taxi service that runs through downtown Chicago, but obviously only when the river is not frozen. It has four stops, and is set up essentially so that commuters can have a quicker way into downtown from their Metra depots. Thanks the the Chicago Office of Tourism, we had a coupon for a buy one get one free fare. If you're interested, you can find the coupon here. Let me assure you; if you are planning to go to Chinatown you want to use public transportation. You can take the Watertaxi or the Red Line, or a bus (I don't know which one) or a cab even. Just don't walk! I tell you this from experience; yes, we chose to walk!

Chinatown is like a village unto itself in this huge city. Houses like this one



are not uncommon. This is a single family home decorated with Chinese inspired plants, images, and window coverings. We are pretty sure that this house is the reason why every development in the area looks exactly the same. And yes, I said developments. The area is undergoing major building, and has beautiful condos being built everywhere. If it wasn't for the aforementioned seedy parts of town, Eric and I would seriously want to consider living here. Oh, and also for the fact that we couldn't find a store that didn't sell only Chinese food.

There are a ton of things to do in Chinatown. There is a war memorial for Chinese vets, and even a piece of the Great Wall of China. Also, for those with a curious spirit, it is a little amazing to see everything in a single place (outside of China I suppose) labeled in Chinese. (Ed. note :: It may be a faux pas to call all writing "Chinese" since perhaps there are dialects. However, I am unaware. Please, if you know better, feel free to leave me a notes in my comments!) Even the Walgreens has Chinese writing and dragons on it.

Ok, so you've gotten to Chinatown (hopefully on the Watertaxi, or public transportation), and you've seen the writing and the wall. What next? Well, really the only thing to "do" in Chinatown is to visit the tourist/shopping center.

This is a picture of the "plaza" area in the shopping center. It is pretty much a two story outdoor mall, which contains an outdoor market (flee market perhaps?) specializing in baby tiny turtles, knick-knacks made in 1994, and knock off bags (some good, some not some good, all worth taking a look at). Approximately 85% of the area, though, is made up of restaurants, and because it seemed absurd to go to Chinatown and not eat Chinese, we partook.

We ate at a noodle restaurant of some sort, which was actually really good. We were drawn in by the display in the window, which showcased all of their dishes made out of plastic. Eric was especially excited by the red fish, which was an entire fish stuffed with all types of vegetables. It was $19, and we did not eat it. Instead we split an order of crab rangoons and shrimp and scallop fried rice, both of which were absolutely fabulous. For drinking & dessert, we had a mango blended drink (essentially blended mango, ice, and vanilla frozen yogurt). These drinks are all the rage in Chinatown. The restaurant we ate at had a window to the outside where they were selling these like a street vendor would. I had to have one since they seemed to be a specialty of the area. If you are, like I was, wondering what the black things are in the bottom, let me tell you; they are tapioca balls. I remember, vaguely, an experience with tapioca pudding as a child. I am not sure what about this memory made me think this was a good idea. However, the drink itself was a great idea! The tapioca balls were less. They tasted a little bit like slimy boogers. The drink is served with an abnormally large straw and every once in a while when you take a sip, one of them pops up the straw. Not something I would do every day, but something I really enjoyed doing in Chinatown! After our Chinese shopping, our walking, and our lunch Eric and I decided to head home. We did, in fact, take the Watertaxi home (considering especially how unhappy I was that we skipped the Watertaxi and maybe risked our lives, or at least our wallets, by walking there). The Watertaxi is a cool experience, and a great way to see a lot of the city in a short amount of time. Moral of the post, if you're coming to Chicago, and going to be here for more than two days, Chinatown is worth the trip. Here are our pointers ::

• As previously stated, take public transportation. Chinatown is a relatively small area surrounded by not the best part of town.
• Come hungry! There are a ton of options for places to eat, and if you're hungry enough you could hop place to place. Appetizers at one place, lunch/dinner at another, dessert somewhere else. Oh, and don't forget your tapioca drink!
• Bring cash. I know, I know, we live in a credit card/debit card society. But Chinatown has a great street market, the kind of place you can negotiate to the price you want to pay, and the vendors will take only cash.

Final tip of the blog. If a trip to Chicago Chinatown is not in your near plans, experience a bit of it wherever you are. Through a little of research, I was able to discover that a bunch of places sell tapioca drinks and refer to them as "Bubble Tea." For my Lansing area readers, these are (or were) fairly common in East Lansing, in a few places on Grand Rive just off of campus.