Beware the baijui
I'm always thirsty, as I'm used to guzzling my gallon jug of water every day at work and, here, people might go a month on a gallon of water. It's unwise to drink out of the tap, so bottled is the only way to drink, and the costs add up quickly.
To remedy this, I went to the little faculty grocery store tonight. It was filled with young college girls, looking very innocent. I saw some jumbo bottles -- probably half-gallon jugs -- of clear, water-like liquid. Bingo! I picked three bottles off the shelf and headed to the next aisle.
The girls went bananas, in their very proper way. One girl looked in astonishment at my bottles, pointed, and said something in Chinese that made everyone else laugh. Soon, all eyes were trained on me and my bottles of water. Huh?
Finally, out of this confusion, the one boy in the store pointed at the bottles and blurted out, "By-joe!" And, immediately, it clicked: the bottles in my hand contained not water but baijiu (BY-joe), a clear, heavily alcoholic, throat-searing Chinese "spirit" that, according to one of Frank's professors, "smells like piss, tastes like poop." I've had sips of it before, and his description fits perfectly. For some reason, it's cherished by Chinese men, who have contests to see who can endure the most baijiu. That's a contest I won't enter. I put back the baijiu, was directed to the water jugs, and made off with four 1.5 liter jugs. Shew!
