Stuart Beaton is back guest blogging about something near and dear to my heart, but I won’t spoil his surprise quite yet. His amazing podcasts (mostly author interviews) can be found at http://rastous.podomatic.com/. Here’s Stuart:
It’s the Tomb Sweeping Holiday week here in Tianjin, and so the Uni decided that it would be an excellent time to shut the power off for seven hours.
So, what’s a chap to do, when all the lights go dim?
He drags a colleague out for a spot of shopping.
Well, anything’s better than sitting alone in a cold, dark room… and so we set off onto the bustling streets of sunny downtown Tianjin. After a few hours of pounding the pavement between department stores and their supermarket sections, lunch was beginning to beckon. And my dogs were barking – any excuse to get off my feet was going to be welcome.
Having cross the road, we found the footpath blocked, and so took an unexpected turn down a little side street between Walmart and Gome.
Then a window display caught my eye.
A cross between a media installation and a toy collection, a fuzzy black and white TV repeating images from ancient Tom & Jerry cartoons, surrounded by Rubiks Cubes, Doraemons and Marios.
I was hooked – I needed to find out more about this place.
My colleague pointed to the number 80 on a sign, and said that she’d been to a Café 80 the day before, perhaps this was part of the chain? I thought it was a student art gallery, an exhibition space.
But we were both wrong.
Through the door, and behind the curtain, was a hotpot restaurant.
One modeled on Chinese classrooms of the 1980’s.
The furniture consisted of modified school desks, with a hole cut in the centre to accommodate the induction heater and pot, complete with matching chairs. A giant blackboard dominated the front of the room, while a video projector screened Doraemon cartoons against it.
One wall was decorated with posters that were in classrooms thirty years ago, and its opposite with pictures of film stars, cartoon characters and toys from the time.
We took our seats, and were presented with what, to all intents and purposes, looked like an exam paper, but was the menu – with multiple choice options!
Behind us a party of twenty somethings were singing an old school scarf, Young Pioneer scarves around their necks, laughing and snapping photos of each other with their cell phones.
Attention to nostalgic detail extended down to the enamelware cups and bowls, and the retro flasks in which the hotpot broth was poured from. They even sell retro 80’s toys to play with!
The food itself was fresh, preparation done carefully in the small kitchen (marked “School Canteen”), and very tasty.
As we went to leave, the owner and staff came and took some pictures with us for their Weibo site (http://weibo.com/no80syears), explaining that they didn’t get an awful lot of foreigners in… ever.
I’ve been left feeling a nostalgia for something I hadn’t experienced, a place I was never in, and a time that isn’t coming back in a hurry.
At least, though, I can go back there again.
Hi, Susan: got your blog site last year from your brother. Nevertheless, it is the first time I opened it this year 🙂 (I link it with my blog). So coincidently. the first one I read is about Tianjin where I spent 6 years for my college and grudate study. I will come back once a while. just say hi and intruduce myself. I live at Westchester of NY, used to sit not too far from your brother at office, left for another deaprtment last year. Luming
I LOVE quirky restaurants/things. That enamel thermos brought back great memories for me. Wish we had something in Miami, it’s so pathetic here for anything Asian. BTW, welcome to #LetsLunch.
Thanks so much, Eleanor! I love this post, too. My frequent guest blogger, Stuart Beaton, wrote it from his home in Tianjin. It’s so exciting to see a restaurant that pays tribute to the 80s!
Eleanor, having looked at your site, and the things you offer on it, I am surprised to hear that there is so little Asian food there…
Either you’re not having any impact on the locals, or your impact’s making everyone stop home and cook.
Sounds to me like you should be beating your wok to drum up restaurants in your locale.
Shame that Ohio’s so far from Tianjin – it’s a long way to haul just for a quick bite to eat.
I just hope this place survives long enough so that I can get back there. It’s in a lousy place for foot traffice (in a shadowy laneway between two giant buildings), but it’s less than fifty metres from the major shopping strip… so… we’ll see what happens.
I am planning to take my wife, who went to school in the 80’s here, to see if it lives up to her memories of the time.
This is so interesting! My husband, who grew up in Shanghai during the 80s, would love this place. He’s always telling me (with a twinkle/tear in his eye) about this period in China. Thank you Stuart (and Susan)!