I'll have what he's having.

We have been advised to limit our consumption of raw fruits and vegetables in China, due to the fact that many farms use human waste as a fertilizer. Yum. But today we forgot ourselves, and ordered a salad at a restaurant. Well, it looked like a salad. It turned out to be a pile of shredded jalapenos and onions, a combination that apparently destroys anything else that might be festering in your stomach, as I have noticed no side effects of the evil raw foods yet. 

The thing to understand about the food ordering process is that all menus are written in Mandarin, so the only way for the non-speakers to order is by pointing at things on other people’s tables. My friend Caitlin has demonstrated the best technique of ordering so far, when she walked around from table to table with the waiter at her side, pointing to plates and alternately flapping her arms like a chicken or mooing like a cow to indicate which meat she preferred in the dish. At one point the restaurant owner was actually flapping along with her, much to the amusement of the other restaurant patrons. I plan to defer to Caitlin for all future ordering endeavors, as the best I can seem to do is accidently ask for three of everything at all the places we go. When its beer, not so bad, but three plates of sliced beef is a little hard to finish.