Sunday, September 9, 2007

Chinese Irish

Growing up, my teachers called me "Maureen" because they couldn't pronounce my Chinese name. I didn't think it was strange until Jr. High when someone told me that Maureen was an Irish name.

Last week, I returned from a business trip to Dublin where I ventured out to city center and experienced my unofficial heritage for the first time.
The Temple Bar area was just as I imagined it with Guinness signs everywhere and cobblestone roads. On Grafton Street, the shops were mostly the same as you would find in any big city with the exception of Butlers Chocolates.

The ironic part of the entire trip was when my coworker suggested that we have Mongolian BBQ for dinner in Dublin. I suppose that is better than the traditional meal of potatoes and beef stew of some sort. At over 25 Euros for a decent meal, I would still prefer the cheap eats in the Bay Area where less than 5 Euros would buy you a full Chinese dinner and then some for leftovers.

  • As for my name, I've long since dropped the nickname Maureen, but people still call me "Mo".
  • 3 comments:

    Master Jedi said...

    i think i've found that asian food outside of anywhere except from bay area or somewhere that i'm familiar with tends to be disappointing. When i had japanese and chinese food in France it was very disappointing. I think i'm either just used to the way things are made at home or i'm spoiled w/"good" asian food.

    I think i would have enjoyed "traditional" irish food...beef stew and potatoes must be pretty good there since it's something every irish person should have as part of their diet.

    For that price too...seems kind of expensive!

    Vadhri said...

    hi mo

    nice blogs. keep going. just happened to notice this.

    regards
    Srinivas

    Mo's Musings said...

    Thanks for the comments Ted and Srinivas. You're just the pep talk I needed for my next entry.

    Ted - You can always count on good Asian food at home. :-)