Today was so nice! Weather was just perfect!
Since neither Xyon nor Chad have ever tried dim sum, we had been planning to do dim sum for sometime. This weekend turn out to be a great day to do dim sum. I took them to O’Asian, one of the better dim sum places around here, but even that’s not really saying much. If you really want good dim sum, you go to LA or Vancouver, but we had to make do with what we had. Surprisingly their favorite dish was 合桃蝦 (shrimp and walnut), which technically isn’t really a dim sum.
After dim sum, Xyon had to go help Janine pack, while Chad and I went browsing through downtown. Chad had to meet a friend in the city later and his choice was to go home and come back later or hang around till then. I had nothing better to do, so we just hung out around the city. It was such a nice day, so we just walked everywhere.
We first headed to Pike Place Market. At first I thought this was my first time here when everything was opened given that I used to wake up at 4pm on the weekends, but then I recalled I probably took my mom and sister here at a reasonable hour. While going through Pike Place Market, there was this long line in front of this donut shop called Daily Dozen. I asked a random girl if the donuts were really good, and her reply was “They’re awesome!”
I snapped this picture. Now I want my own donut making machine! I already have a deep fryer. I just need something to make dough turn into O’s.
After chilling at Pike Place Market for awhile, we headed over to International District as I wanted to find a red envelope and a wedding card and Chad wanted melonpan. Oh yeah that reminds me, during dim sum, we had wanted 菠蘿包 (pineapple bun), since I told Chad it’s basically the Chinese equivalent of melonpan, but they had already sold out at noon. Technically pineapple bun’s don’t have any pineapple in it. It’s just that the top crust resembles a pineapple. According to Wikipedia:
Melonpan and pineapple bun from Hong Kong are very similar. By comparison the Japanese style is lighter in weight and taste, slightly dryer and has a firmer outer layer (including top cookie crust) which resists to flaking unlike its Hong Kong counterpart which should be treated with care as the top cookie crust tends to flake easily. The Hong Kong version is also more moist and is generally soft on the outside and inside and has a stronger butter flavour.
Unfortunately there’s no Japanese bakery in International District, so no melonpan. I have been told they sell awesome melonpan somewhere in Lynnwood, but they sell out around noon everyday.
We browsed through Uwajimaya and Kinokuniya, but I wasn’t able to find anything that I particularly liked. They also didn’t have any wedding red envelopes. I had found some wedding red envelopes in the Bellevue Uwajimaya, but they didn’t look that nice and came in packs of 10. Why would I ever need 10 wedding red envelopes. Save for the future? This bigger Uwajimaya didn’t even have wedding red envelopes, just regular lucky ones.
We walked a bit more around International District trying to find a store that might sell wedding cards or red envelopes, but that ended up being fruitless. I personally wouldn’t know what type of store would sell wedding cards and red envelopes. My best guess was a gift shop. We stopped by Gossip to get boba milk tea and sat at the park across the street while we enjoyed the sun and let our legs rest for a bit. It was quite funny trying to explain to Chad what boba meant in Chinese, since it doesn’t mean tapioca. I’m not going to explain it here, but you can read more about it at Urban Dictionary (2nd entry).
Afterwards we took a bus to Westlake shopping center and just hung around Nordstrom and Pacific Place and checked out mostly clothing stores. We ended up in a real Papyrus store (not one of the fake ones where you see a section inside a supermarket) and Chad helped me pick out a really nice wedding card, which I approved. Now I just need to figure out what to write inside of it. Haha. Chad took a big hit in his wallet when we went through Express for Men. Our trip ended in Barnes & Noble, where we hung around there until Chad had to leave.
Earlier, I had planned on getting roast duck for dinner. I was already downtown and it’s been awhile since I had roast duck. However, Tekman and texted me earlier asking if I was coming to his Cinco de Mayo party and I had totally forgotten about it. I replied asking when it was going to end as I was still downtown with Chad at that time. His reply was probably very late as usual. So now that Chad was gone, I called Tekman asking if they wanted roast duck (I still had that roast duck craving). He said he would very much like roast duck. Perfect! I didn’t have to finish all the roast duck by myself + now I get all the extra goodies Angel and Tekman were making.
While I was at Ocean City waiting for them to chop up my duck, I asked the waitress where I could find red envelopes and they pointed me to a book store a block up the street. I guess I should’ve asked for instructions earlier on instead of walking around International District looking for a gift store. Turns out this bookstore sells red envelopes individually and it was only $0.60. Hating carrying change around, I told the shop owner to keep the change (唔使找 – interesting… to make change in Cantonese uses 找 which means to find). However the shop owner insisted I take the $0.40. Oh well.
I headed over to Tekman’s afterwards and enjoyed really awesome tacos and enchiladas. Angel also made these awesome sugar cookies (with lime and zest?). The company there is awesome as usual and the conversations are always intellectual, intriguing, and fun. I played a bit of Rock Band and later switched to Dominion. I got pwned in Dominion every time. Haha. I ended the night by having some of Angel’s awesome margarita cake.
I wonder how many times I used the word awesome?