Saturday, November 5, 2011

...and you thought we only drink tea in Hong Kong

This week was a long week full of working hard...and working harder. Working hard is a lasting trend in Hong Kong. Everyone here works hard. Friday came, and it was finally time to let my hair down and kick my shoes off. Per my regular routine, however, I was up at 6 am on Saturday morning. Perhaps it was the glass....er 3...of wine I had last night, or maybe it was restlessness caused from doing something all the time here, but I woke up and the only thing I wanted to do was go for a run. So I slid downstairs to my building's gym and logged a few laps on the treadmill. I caught the first round of Saturday morning infomercials in Chinese and felt once again like a strange lady in a strange land. One amusing infomercial had a young Chinese man sipping some espresso and making a scrunched up, distasteful taste. After a few swirls of pink kittens(?) on the screen and some lightening bolts, the young up-and-comer and his gal pal bring out a tin of coffee. they are excited. but what they bring out is actually mix to make coffee jello. so the couple joyously makes morning jello shots of coffee (I won't even get into the actors facial expressions. but they were priceless), they roll the espresso shot-sized gelatinous morsel in some powdered sugar or coconut or something, pop it in each others mouths and loudly chew it to show how much they like it. For a second I didn't really know how to digest this idea. Coffee jello? Then i thought about how I shouldn't judge. this idea actually sounded kind of American-to process something like coffee to make it something completely different...but it's more Asian to love jellies and gel candies.

Anyway, this is probably a ridiculous post, but would you make coffee jello?

I digress, but the new popular shot for Hong Kong'ers to order at clubs is Coffee Patron. This is essentially coffee tequila. It is the beta version of Red Bull, and it is lauded for being more natural than Red Bull. Yes, I've had it, and it is quite good. Have you guys tried it? What do you think?