November
In our time in 天津 (tiānjīn) so far we’ve been able to try a pretty good amount food, focused mainly around the university, but still with some experience in further away places; most of which being 好吃 (hăochī - tasty, or delicious). We’ve eaten a lot in the canteen, from convenience stores, fast food places and a few restaurants.
The Canteens!
There are three canteens on campus: 一 (yī — meaning one)，二 (èr — meaning two) and Halal (which, as you can guess, serves Halal food). One of the canteens, the second canteen, is right next to our dorms and so naturally is the canteen most frequented by us. The canteen has three floors with something like 五十 (wǔshí — 50) different stalls. The main kinds of food served are, unsurprisingly, rice and noodle dishes, our favourites of such being the wondrous chicken katsu curry and wide noodles with egg and tomato; though aside from that there is quite a bit of lovely fried chicken – including a 很好吃鸡肉汉堡包地方 (hěn hǎochī jīòu hànbǎobāo dìfang — really tasty chicken burger place) –, lovely wanton soup, 饺子 (jiǎozi — dumplings) and more!
As mentioned there are three canteens in total on campus but we have only tried 2, the second canteen and the halal canteen, which we are going to talk about now. There’s not as much to say about the Halal canteen as it isn’t as huge as some of the others, but it is still impressive for only being one floor. It offers a huge variety of tasty and diverse foods from fried chicken to noodle dishes and rice so you don’t need to worry about finding halal food 在天津 (zài tiānjīn — in Tianjin).
Fast Food and Adj.
In China you’ll be able to find whatever food you want when you get here and, just as probably every scholar before us has said, the food is 非常好吃 (fēicháng hǎochī — which means extremely tasty), but one thing to keep in mind is that just as everyone else even if you don’t get homesick you will find yourself wanting some meals similar to back home at some point, but this is nothing to worry about as very close to the university there are fast food places such as McDonald’s and KFC in China as well as kfc they have Kpro which is meant to be a healthier version of KFC but it’s really not great, some of us had the misfortune of winding up there on accident so we’re speaking form experience, Avoid it! There are fast food places on and off of campus which are easy to get to and very cheap, on top of these if you happen to take a trip to the joy city mall, which we have gone to multiple times, there are burger joints, pizza places and more; the “Tube Station Pizza” is a spot in the mall known for its gorgeous and sensationally tantalising 32 inch circumference pizza which we had the honor of battling and come out successful. The point is even though the food here is great you will be able to get foods you could find back home when you want them as well. Inside the campus but also just a little walk outside the gates are multiple bakeries and coffee shops the one that the majority of us are lost find of us “post coffee” just outside South Gate and honestly it’s much better than most of the others we have tried so it comes highly recommended, unfortunately we haven’t actually been to the bakeries just outside or on the campus yet so we can’t say much about them but the delicacy’s that they have on offer look scrumptious so we will have to make a detour soon.
Chinese Restaurants
In our two and a bit months here we maybe should’ve been to more traditional Chinese restaurants, and we definitely have plans to — for instance, we’ve been planning to go to a Cantonese restaurant for a little bit —; but that said, we’ve still been to a few. The most common type has been hot pot as it’s very easy to get a lot of people in and be seated together. It’s a great chance to socialise and eat some good food, but we do think that hotpot in general is a little overrated. The food is not so filling, at least in our experience, and it can be a little costly (well, that is with reference to Chinese prices, so still extraordinarily cheap with respect to UK prices). We also think that there is a superior alternative that still has the same sort of experience: barbecue. The food is a similar price, but the meat cooks better on the grill and is usually marinated, which the hotpot meat doesn’t seem to be; additionally, their sides are divine (as our good friend 先生工 (xiānsheng Gōng — meaning Mr. Gong, otherwise known as Andrew, among other things) and his eggs will attest too) no the food in general is more substantial.
Corner Shop Food
Despite being surrounded by such cheap and delicious food, sometimes a quick sandwich, onigiri, sushi, ice cream, or miserable little pastry thing scratches an itch nothing else does. Thankfully, 在中国 (zài zhōngguó — meaning in China) such corner shops are more than abundant with such wonderful chains as Wumart, 711 and Familymart. They offer a really good range of cheap snacky food and drink (one even being able to get coffee and tea I believe) and sometimes, like at the 711 on campus, they have a little seating area outside to enjoy (if it’s not too windy); we’ve spent quite a few hours sitting outside the 711 talking about this and that.
That is all from us for this month, 再见 (zàijiàn — literally means again meet, which translates to goodbye)！