Beijing’s Weirdest and Wackiest Food

Beijing is famous for its strange foods. From scorpion to penis hot pot, CW taste tests it all and dares you to expand your palate. Here are fifteen palate adventures… if you dare. By City Weekend Beijing

Rabbit Head

Fear Factor: 5/5

Taste Factor: 5/5

One of hundreds of delicious snacks to come out of Chengdu, rabbit head takes pride of place on the menu at Shuangliu Laoma Tutou, arguably Beijing’s best Sichuan restaurant. The heads (¥8 per head) arrive skinned, with eyes, teeth and brain intact. It is cooked in either a five-spice or mala sauce. To get the maximum amount of meat, diners separate the rabbit’s upper and lower jawbones, bite out the tongue, gnaw away the cheek meat, crack open the skull and suck out the brains, being sure to vacuum up any excess meat along the way. While those not fond of bones in their food should probably sit this one out, we found that the interesting textures of the tongue and brains complement the tasty tenderness of the flavorsome cheek meat to make a dish whose only fault is its size—each rabbit head is only as big as a tennis ball.

Find it: Shuangliu Laoma Tutou (48 Third East Ring South Road, 48号东三环南路, Tel: 6540-5858)

Silkworm Cocoon

Fear Factor: 3/5

Taste Factor: 1/5

Even when deep fried, the bulbous head of a silkworm cocoon threatens to hatch something nefarious and wiggly. We hunted down this Yunnan delicacy down at Chuan’r Bar, which specializes in skewering everything from bovine heart valves (¥3) to whole chicken heads (¥4). The silkworm chrysalis here (¥3) thankfully comes with a generous layer of cumin and chili, masking its true taste. Despite rumors of a “nutty” flavor, the spongy interior of our cocoons tasted like a shoe insole smells. More disgusting is the texture, which was very close to what a shoe insole feels like. Brave or inebriated diners can fortify themselves with the knowledge that silkworm cocoons are said to have powerful anti-aging properties. The faint of heart or sober can cheer from the sidelines with a tasty hot pot of skewers and a solid selection of veggie kebabs.

Find it: Chuan'r Bar (5–3 Dongzhimen Neidajie, 东城区东直门内大街5-3号, Tel: 6303-5678)

Fish Head

Fear Factor: 2/5

Taste Factor: 4/5

Sichuan restaurant Yu Xin serves some of the best steamed fish heads (¥58) in town. A classic Chinese dish, the steamed head of each yongyu carp is cut in half, then both halves are served cheek-side up on top of a bed of chili peppers and hot oil. The white eyes, believed to improve vision, are popular with diners and contain lots of healthy omega-3 fatty acids. Chinese diners will often fight over who gets to eat the eyes. The fish face, however, is the star of the show, as it contains the creamiest meat of the fish, the texture of which often resembles cream cheese. The small fish brain, a ball of transparent Jello-like substance connected to the eyes, has a very fishy odor and melts in the mouth. And yes, some believe it will make you smarter. Perhaps that's why in Chinese culture, the fish head should always be served so that it faces the most distinguished dinner guest.

Find it: Yu Xin (1/F, Jingtai Bldg, 24 Jianguomen Waidajie, 建国门外大街24号京泰大厦1层, Tel: 6515-6588)

Penis and Testes

Fear Factor: 5/5

Taste Factor: 1/5

According to Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), eating a specific animal organ will improve the health of that organ within you. If this is ever proven, Guolizhuang, aka Beijing's "penis restaurant," will become even more crowded with middle-aged men than it already is. Guolizhuang serves penis, and lots of it: dog penis, horse penis, donkey penis, ram penis, deer penis ... Snake penis is rumored to make men particularly virile as snakes have two penises, allowing copulation with two partners at once. We suggest the penis hotpot (¥988), which includes all the penises mentioned above. The hotpot broth is served with an entire turtle in it, which, according to TCM, produces longer lasting erections. The actual meat, lean and jerky like, has almost no flavor. Its presentation, however, makes it much more exciting to eat than Viagra. All seating is in private rooms, so call ahead for reservations.

Find it: Guoli Zhuang (Dongsishitiao B34-3, 东四十条乙34-3号, Tel: 6405-5698)

Weird Wines

Fear Factor: 3/5

Taste Factor: 4/5

Though China amuses tourists with snakes, animal penises and geckoes floating in bottles of everclear alcohol, only one of this nation's strange brews has a taste worthy of its oddness: Fermented mare's milk (¥45). A Mongolian alcohol made from fermenting and then distilling horse milk, the elixir tastes like a sweetened baijiu with a creamsicle aftertaste.
Though it may sound disgusting, most expats we've drunk it with have enjoyed the taste and even bought bottles of their own. We suggest picking some up at the Menggubao Chaoshi across from Little Sheep Hot Pot on Ghost Street. The Inner Mongolian foods store serves other Mongolian delights, including a range of spiced jerkies.
The fermented mare's milk is served in a yurt-shaped bottle, which also makes for a nice gift.

Find it: Caoyuan Xuri (158 Dongzhimennei Dajie, 东直门内大街158号, Tel: 8404-8518)

Spinal Chord

Fear Factor: 5/5

Taste Factor: 1/5

Ghost Street is crowded with hot pot restaurants specializing in a classic delicacy: sheep's spinal cord hot pot. One of the best is found on a small alley just east of Dongzhimennei Beixiaojie. The Huayang Jinxing Sheep Spinal Cord Hot Pot Restaurant is full of baijiu fumes and red-faced diners gorging on the dish, which is literally called "sheep scorpion" (羊蝎子) because the spinal cord looks like the poisonous insect. Anything cooked with a bone tends toward savory and hearty, and sheep spinal cord is no exception. The meat itself tasted somewhat like ribs fresh off the bone, but the texture and size of the spine itself was daunting. After you pick off the meat, bite into the spine's soft tissue and cartilage. Suck in the marrow for extra credit.

Find it: Huayang Jinxing Sheep Spinal Cord Hot Pot Restaurant (North side of Beidongxiang, east of Traktir), 东直门北小街路口北东巷内 (近北新桥派出所, Tel: 8406-0609)

Pig Brains

Fear Factor: 5/5

Taste Factor: 1/5

Kong Liang is one of Ghost Street’s most renowned hot pot restaurants, and regularly pulls in a large crowd of foreigners and Chinese, although its excellent reputation no doubt comes in spite of its pig brain dish rather than because of it. While ancient Chinese literature warns against eating brains (particularly for men), modern nutritionists claim they contains more calcium, phosphorous and iron than regular pork. Kong Liang serves a trio of raw pig brains (¥14), ready to be broiled in a mala hot pot (from ¥36) and dipped in satay sauce. Luckily, the mouth-numbing broth does a good job of covering the slightly rotten meaty taste of the brains, although it is powerless against the disagreeably squishy texture, which is likely to appeal only to fans of equally sludgy "tofu brains." There’s a saying in Chinese that says “eating brains helps the brain,” but we certainly didn’t feel any smarter after eating this.

Find it: Kongliang Chongqing Hotpot (218 Dongzhimen Neidajie, 东直门内大街218号, Tel: 8404-4906)

Scorpions and Beetles

Fear Factor: 5/5

Taste Factor: 2/5

Though crawling live scorpions and long-horned beetles will not catalyze a rush of digestive enzymes into your stomach, a good deep-frying will sedate your desire to run away. After that it’s all or nothing: close your eyes and bite in. You'll find that, thankfully, any nuance of taste has disappeared. Both scorpion and beetle tastes like a good old fashioned potato chips with a little extra grease. Perhaps your next Halloween costume can be superhero “Venom-man” with eating scorpions as a party trick? Culturally, scorpions and beetles have a long history of being ingredients in magical concoctions that treat everything from epilepsy, rheumatism, tetanus and cancer. But be wary: one vendor teased that the large scorpion variety is imported from the United States, while another reassured that they are indeed a local delicacy. Regardless, one is still left to question the medical righteousness of these bizarre skewered creatures.

Find it: Wangfujing Night Market (Just northwest of the south entrance of Wangfujing Pedestrian Street)

Pig’s Feet

Fear Factor: 2/5

Taste Factor: 3/5

A lively painting of a drooling, rabid-looking pig adorns the doorway of the “Duck Intestine Restaurant,” advertising its most popular dish: pig’s feet. Although the chef swears his trotters are cooked according to a home recipe from Yunnan, the flavors (honey roasted, hot and spicy and sour lemon sauce) bear a suspicious resemblance to pub-style chicken wings. Trotter pork is embraced by a thick blanket of fat and best eaten by biting confidently into the gelatinous flesh around the knuckles. In TCM, pig’s feet are said to beautify the skin and to help women with recovery after giving birth. We got our glow on by pairing our plate of trotters (¥36) with some braised cow feet (¥38) for virility.

Find it: Duck Intestine Restaurant (Yachang Hutong, 252 Dongzhimen Neidajie, 鸭肠胡同, 东城区东直门内大街252号, Tel: 158-1083-2956)

Ma Doufu

Fear Factor: 3/5

Taste Factor: 5/5

The first time we ate the quintessential Beijing snack ma doufu, we weren’t sure what we were digging ourselves into. It looked like chunky hummus and tasted like rotten blue cheese—but we kind of like rotten cheese. When a faint-of-heart friend nauseously told us we had ingested mashed fermented soy beans stir-fried in mutton oil topped with dried chilis, we were neither shocked nor regretful. However, when we learned that ma doufu is the filtered residue left in the creation of douzhi, an incredibly gross lao Beijing dish if you ask us, we did have second thoughts. Like most fermented foods, ma doufu is healthy, strange and polemical. Get full on a warm plate at the cozy courtyard restaurant Liu Zhai Shifu for a mere ¥15 and decide for yourself. While you’re there, take your nose to its limits with China’s answer to wasabi: jiemodun (¥8), cabbage marinated in a whole-grain mustard so potent we cried just looking at it.

Find it: Liu Zhai Shifu (Meishuguan Dong Jie, 8 Jiang Jia Dayuan Hutong, 美术馆东街, 8蒋家大院胡同, Tel: 6400-5912)

Duck Blood

Fear Factor: 3/5

Taste Factor: 5/5

Hua's Restaurant (Huajia Yiyuan) is a favorite among expats for its sublime Beijing duck and gorgeous courtyard. But those willing to explore the menu more deeply will find a few exciting, odd Chinese delicacies among the restaurant's expat-friendly Chinese classics. We recommend the maoxuewang (¥48), literally "bubbling blood," which is served in a large bowl of mala broth and a range of animal organs, including cow stomach and pig intestine. The duck blood itself is very pleasant, with a soft tofu texture and salty flavor vaguely reminiscent of black pudding, its bloody Western cousin. The small, dark, congealed cuboids of duck blood are high in red blood cells, iron and various amino acids that the human body is unable to synthesize on its own. It's perfect for the adventurous and the anaemic. The spicy red soup may be a little overpowering, but a cool glass of plum juice swiftly put the fires out. In celebration of our "Weird Food" cover story, Hua's Restaurant is giving away a specially prepared weird meal for two, including "beef tripe and duck blood in spicy sauce," "marinated chicken claws with pickles," "sauteed whelk with green beans," "Hua's Chinese cabbage" and two glasses of plum herbal tea. Click on "Win Stuff" at www.cityweekend.com.cn and enter before November 10 for your chance to win.

Find it: Hua's Restaurant (235 Dongzhimennei Dajie, 东直门内235号, Tel: 5128-3315)

Lizard

Fear Factor: 3/5

Taste Factor: 2/5

Have no fear: eating lizard won’t leave you cold-blooded. Take away the heads, and the lizard on a stick served at Wangfujing Night Market could pass as a bourgeoisie fan that matches your in-vogue snake-skin patterned boots. The flying bat-like position provides easy access for munching on the deep-fried, fishy-chicken flavor with a slightly pungent undertone. The head is a little daunting to swallow, but any feelings of stress are balanced by its supposedly blood pressure-reducing properties. The lizard's ability to remain motionless for hours on end has led some to believe that it can even cure insomnia. Overall, the taste isn't bad, but it isn't great either. The dry, crunchy meat and brittle bones have little taste. Lizard on a stick looks pretty cool, and it might impress or disgust your date, but it isn't going to do anything for your taste buds.

Find it: Wangfujing Night Market (Just northwest of the south entrance of Wangfujing Pedestrian Street)

Bone Marrow

Fear Factor: 2/3

Taste Factor: 3/5

Although one expects bone to be a solid and strong structure, inside is the highly nutritious spongy and fatty bone marrow, which is rich in lipids, proteins, vitamins and minerals. Try it at Manchurian Special Flavor Jiaozi Restaurant, where freshly stewed bones are accompanied by a plastic glove and straw (¥15 per bone). You push your straw into the bone and suck in the snot-like gooeyness just as though the pig bone were a juice box. Light in taste with a fatty, bland flavor, bone marrow was important in the diet of earlier civilizations. Some even hypothesize that its nutritional components contributed to the evolution of man’s larger brain. If sucking bone juice doesn’t seem like your thing, the succulent and aromatic meat surrounding the bone will surely please any carnivore. And if you’re still hungry, the Manchurian restaurant also serves up jellyfish salad, "nausea sauce pork" and "Grandpa’s big face sato."

Find it: Manchurian Special Flavor Jiaozi Restaurant (Dongzhimenwai Dajie, A-1 Xinzhongjie, 东直门外大街, 新中街A-1, Tel: 6415-2855)

Dog Hot Pot

Fear Factor:5/5

Taste Factor: 3/5

There is probably no Chinese dish that draws Westerners' ire more than dog meat. Dogs are supposed to be man's best friend rather than

man's best entrée, right? Two millennia ago in the

Middle Kingdom, however, dog was one of the three domesticated meats, which also included goat and pig. In the south, as well as in the northeast, it's still a popular delicacy. It was even served to Chinese astronauts during China's first space mission in 2003. Unable to go to space, we tried the dog hot pot (¥91) at Miao Village House, which carries an extensive menu of dog meats. The broth was a fragrant, sumptious mix of cloves, lemongrass and ginger—along with about four fistfuls of salt. Beneath the soup’s perfumed plumes of steam, unnervingly fatty slices of dog meat floated here and there. The meat had the consistency of overcooked, over-gravied baked steak. When mingled with the mashed potatoes, it tasted even more like Grandma's home cooking. Every thin slice of meat had a strip of drab, military green-colored skin stuck to it, which was a bit unnerving. The dog, the waitress told us, comes from a very small dog breed brought from Guizhou. Seeing that we were a little uncomfortable, she reassured us that this style of dog was a famous Guizhou dish and that many people come here to eat dog hot pot during the colder months. As it's winter and new legislation to ban dog meat in China is now on the table, now is the perfect time for breaking the Western taboo on dog meat—just don't be surprised if your friends swear to never speak to you again afterwards.

Find it: Miao Village House (4/F, 138 Wangfujing Dajie, 王府井大街138号4楼, Tel: 6523-8018)

Stinky Tofu

Fear Factor: 5/5

Taste Factor: 5/5

Everyone knows of the notorious stinky tofu that fills streets across China with a distinctly manure-like odor. Few, however, have actually tried it.

Fortunate are those who follow their noses. This famous delicacy originates in Shaoxing, where soybeans are left to ferment in a witches’ brew of brine for months before they are deep-fried to golden perfection and served with sweet and spicy sauce. On the outside, it reeks. On the inside, it’s all fragrant goodness. Brace yourself and head over to Houhai's (in)famous hole-in-the-wall Tianxia Diyi Chou ("Stinkiest in the World"), which has tormented and titillated for years. Once you bite into it, stinky tofu (¥5) is challenging and rewarding. Don’t turn your nose up at this one.

Find it: Tianxia Diyi Chou (77 Yan Dai Xie Jie, 77烟袋斜街)

By Michael Engstrom, Ola Kowalewski, Mia Li, Mikala Reasbeck, Blake Stone-Banks, Alex Taggart, Joanna Wong

Beijing’s Weirdest and Wackiest Food

En honor a mi hermano:JUAN PABLO VARGAS VELEZSept 1979 - Aug 2010

En honor a mi hermano:
JUAN PABLO VARGAS VELEZ
Sept 1979 - Aug 2010

5 minutes of fame for the Beijing HHH at msnbc!

5 minutes of fame for the Beijing HHH at msnbc!

Infographic: Tallest Mountain to Deepest Ocean Trench

One of the most interesting infographics that I have ever seen.

Infographic: Tallest Mountain to Deepest Ocean Trench

The Trouble With TeensBy Jiang Xueqin

The Diplomat Blog - May 20, 2010

There’s an old joke that goes like this: seven Chinese walk into a room, and ten political parties come out. Everyone says that Chinese are terrible managers, and an ordinary Chinese office will have more political drama than Romance of the Three Kingdoms and the Clinton household combined. Western managers know that Chinese have issues co-operating, and have spent tens of millions of dollars in corporate training to attempt to rectify this issue. But unlike the problem of process, co-operation is much harder to instil in Chinese because of a fundamental failing in China’s high schools.

Consider the life of an American high school student. He may play on a sports team, participate in student council, volunteer, date, and work part-time at McDonald’s. School can be a popularity contest, a jungle, a prison or just a nuisance, depending on your social designation. Teachers and parents, meanwhile, have resigned themselves to their minimal influence over these stubborn and rebellious teenagers, and will just seek to prevent pregnancies and drug abuse. The teenage years are an endless drama: fights with parents over curfew, acne, not making the football team or cheerleading squad, break-ups, depression, anorexia, Waiting for Godot anxiety, the prom.

Now consider the life of a Chinese teenager. He’ll study at his boarding school, and study when he’s locked at home on the weekends. His parents’ apartment and a classroom that looks like a prison cell are the boundaries of his experience and imagination. Chinese parents see their only child as a vessel for their aspirations and retirement plan; teachers see their students as test scores and possible financial rewards. The meaning and purpose of life are clear and simple: study hard, get a high score on the national examination, and become a mid-level bureaucrat.

Parents may not like the American teenager’s rebelliousness, and teachers may not like his lack of focus, but psychologists will explain that for the teenager his most important task is to construct a self-narrative that will become the basis of his identity, and permit him to engage the world as an independent human being. He ceases to yearn for the approval of his parents and teachers, and instead seeks the approval of his peers. He takes unnecessary risks (betting he could eat 10 hamburgers at once) and places himself in constant danger (actually trying to eat 10 hamburgers at once). He has exhilarating triumphs (getting a date with a cheerleader) and abysmal tragedies (the cheerleader cancels). He faces impossible obstacles (his mother) and deadly challenges (calculus class). He will seek allies (he’ll read The Fountainhead) and seek the meaning of life (he’ll re-read The Fountainhead). His memory takes all this epic drama from his teenage years and writes his very own Aeneid (so please excuse him if his memory doesn’t have room to store the periodic table, and only gets a B+ in chemistry).

Yes, in the process of formulating his identity, the teenager may be a selfish jerk, but the same process equips him with ‘empathy’ and the growing self-awareness that he is a selfish jerk.

By placing himself in different roles in different situations (a student, an employee, a friend, a collaborator, a lover) the teenager is exploring and pushing the boundaries and limits of the world, and developing the social consciousness and skills necessary to navigate this world. He discovers he can’t make the world conform to his worldview (his employer is really going to fire him if he’s late again, and his girlfriend is really going to dump him if he doesn’t stop hitting on her best friend), and so compromises and slowly learns to adjust his worldview to conform with the world. Pain and consequences force him to reflect on his self-centred stubborn ways. As slowly but as surely as a glacier, he learns to accept the validity and legitimacy of other viewpoints: his thinking will often become nuanced and tolerant, more open and welcoming of diversity and difference. And he stops recommending The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged to all his friends.

This symbiotic development of identity and empathy are what educators call the ‘socialization’process: a teenager’s passionate and vehement search for identity will be calmed and rounded-out by the development of empathy, which will allow him to enter society as a citizen and to co-operate with others.

The crucial first step in this process is that teenagers be permitted to take risks and make mistakes, be stubborn and unreasonable, and just be the anti-social misfits that they naturally are. But Chinese families and schools don’t permit even make-up and dating, let alone risks and dangers, triumphs and tragedies, obstacles and challenges.

Boys and girls are not permitted to be near one meter of each other on school grounds, there’s a regulation haircut and school uniform, and there’s no mobile phone service and Internet access. All the students dress, look, act and think the same, and an administrator’s greatest pride is to see his 1000 students do calisthenics in synch on the soccer field. Walls and gates limit the movement of students, security cameras and the eyes of teachers track students, and if it were possible administrators would implant a signalling device on each student. If all this is still not enough to depress and stress out the Chinese teenager, then the head teacher and/or parent will now and then remind him that he’s worthless and useless.

The result of all this unreasonable and unnecessary repression is that Chinese students are remarkably polite and well-behaved. But at the end of their schooling they won’t be able to write their own Aeneid, (thoughmaybe the more literary among them can write The Tale of Peter Rabbit). They will matriculate at a top university, but they will lack sympathy and empathy, which will hinder them from developing and managing personal and professional relationships; they won’t understand trust and tolerance, only power and fear. They may rise to a top management position, but lacking in self-understanding and self-reflection they’ll curse and criticize their subordinates, making the workplace a cold stagnant repressive regime.

Having skipped the tumultuous teenage years, Chinese are forever doomed to live as teenagers all their lives. Whereas Americans may be stubborn, moody, quick to anger, insecure, impetuous, condescending, extreme, and paranoid in their teenage years, Chinese may suffer from these psychological issues all their lives. The psychologists who wrote Reviving Ophelia, Raising Cain, and Real Boys may not be happy with how American families and schools are distorting the emotional development of children, but if they came to China they’d faint inhorror and despair.

In education, permitting high school students the space and time to develop their individuality so that they may learn empathy and become happy and healthy citizens is the highest and more urgent priority. This is common sense among American educators, but in China, thinking along these lines—that students have the right to develop as human beings, and that this process is long, painful, traumatic, and ultimately necessary for everyone’s good—requires a visionary reformer.

In September 2008, I was fortunate enough to be hired by arguably China’s one and only visionary reformer in education, Principal Wang Zheng of Shenzhen Middle School. When I arrived at the school’s large sprawling campus I couldn’t possibly suspect that for the past six years the tree-lined quiet campus was actually the site of a long, traumatic, intensifying battle for the soul and destiny of China’s youth.

Next I’d like to discuss Principal Wang Zheng’s reforms and efforts to turn his students into citizens, and the opposition to his education project.

The Trouble With Teens
By Jiang Xueqin

How to Suck at FacebookBy The Oatmeal

Como ser un fastidioso en Facebook
por theoatmeal.com

EL DE LOS JUEGUITOS
Las invitaciones y actualizaciones nunca terminan.
Hola, quieres unirte a myiFarmville?? Acabo de mejorar mis cerdos a puercos caballeros de nivel 13!

EL COORDINADOR DE EVENTOS
Ellos invitan a todo el mundo a todo.
Deberías venir a la fiesta de cumple de mi gato!!

EL IMPULSOR DESESPERADO
Su idea de mercadeo en FB es mandarle Spam a todos sus amigos con el famoso:
"Deberías ser fan de [lo-que-sea].
Te gustaría ser fan de mi nueva página chads-porkchop.com?

EL HORRIBLE ETIQUETADOR
Etiquetan TODO, sin importarles si quieres que tu familia o tus colegas lo vean.
Matt etiquetó una foto tuya: "te tome esta foto anoche cuando vomitaste nachos y alcohol en los ojos de esa prostituta"

EL ACOSADOR
Estos te siguen en todo Facebook y comentan en todo lo que hagas.
Jajaja, excelente! eres el mejor! TQM!!

EL QUE NO SE PIERDE UN TEST
Y pensabas que ya tomo el mundo estaba cansado de los test!
Christy tomo el test: Que clase de carne rancia eres?
Soy un cadáver de búfalo pudriéndose.

EL AGRESOR PASIVO
Ellos responden agresivamente sin mencionar a nadie por el nombre.
No No, no solo me lo has dicho a mi! Yo soy mi propio espíritu individual y valiente!

EL PERFIL DE BEBE

Usan la foto de su bebe en su propio perfil. Supuestamente es muy tierno pero para los demás es molesto y hasta preocupante.

Bill Pickleburg: Estoy con resaca, necesito un Burrito...

LOS SIN PUDOR
Ellos cambian su estatus por todo, incluso cuando es algo que a ti nunca jamas te gustaría saber.

Hey miren todos! Acabe de cagar y la mierda tiene forma de puma!

How to Suck at Facebook
By The Oatmeal

Scouts en colombia: Siempre Listos

Me tomó un buen tiempito poder escribir algo en mi blog. Definitivamente la censura en China, el bloqueo de páginas web y cosas así ya me tiene aburrido del todo. Pero bueno eso es otra historia. Aunque hace mucho tiempo no escribo nada personal, esta vez quiero hacerlo contándoles una pequeña historia sobre el escultismo. Esa historia que para muchos de nosotros estuvo llena de aventuras, amistad, canciones, fogatas, campamentos y muchas más cosas, todas bonitas según mi experiencia.

En nuestra visita a Colombia, Isil y yo, visitamos Santa Fe de Antioquia en compañía de mi familia. Mientras nos deleitábamos con las pomposas entradas y zaguanes de esas casas señoriales del pueblo, Isil vio una escuela del pueblo, muy tradicional, muy bonita. Yo me atreví a preguntar a los jóvenes que estaban ahí si era posible entrar a conocerla por dentro y eventualmente nos dieron acceso. Lo que yo no me esperaba era que la escuela estaba inundada por varios grupos de scouts del ciudad de Medellín que voluntariamente se fueron hasta Santa Fe de Antioquia a ayudar logísticamente en las actividades de la Semana Santa. Como llegamos de improviso los cogimos en su tiempo de descanso, pero gracias al llamado del Jefe, quien siempre estuvo atento de nosotros resolviéndonos todas nuestras inquietudes, toda la muchachada hizo honor a esa frase inmortal que identifica a los Scouts: SIEMPRE LISTOS! En menos de 3 minutos estaban formados los diferentes grupos!! Hicieron lo suyo presentando cualquier novedad en medo de pequeñas risas e improvisados cantos del escultismo. Personalmente me dio una nostalgia increíble y me hizo pensar que aunque fue hace tanto tiempo que tuve la suerte de estar en los scouts, uno nunca iba dejar de serlo. Así me sentí yo en ese momento.

Isil jamás tuvo la experiencia de ser parte de esta organización, que pese a estar en todo el mundo, quizás en Turquía no fue o es tan popular como lo es en América. Sin embargo, en esta oportunidad, el jefe de todos los grupos, tuvo la gentileza de hacer sentir a Isil como un scout aunque fuese por unos minutos. Después de unas palabras muy bonitas y tras otorgar a Isil una membrecía simbólica en el grupo de jefes, logro que cada uno de los grupos le hiciera parte de novedades a Isil, siguiendo las tradiciones del escultismo. Fue realmente algo emocionante, que paso de ser una simple visita de escuela a una experiencia inolvidable.

A todos los grupos, a cada uno de los miembros, a los jefes y en particular a este jefe que nos dio la oportunidad de compartir un poco con ellos, les mandamos un gran abrazo y nuestro más sincero agradecimiento.

Andrés & Isil

Colombia tiene 13.348 scouts registrados en la Asociación Scouts de Colombia. La asociación de Scouts en Colombia fue fundada en 1917 y reconocida por la comunidad mundial Scout la Organización Mundial del Movimiento Scout en 1933. El movimiento es co-educacional, aceptando muchachos y a muchachas. El escultismo primero aparecido en Colombia en 1913, introducido por Miguel Jiménez, que vivía en Inglaterra en ese entonces. Él volvió a Colombia y trajo el escultismo con él. Las actividades al aire libre y el servicio de comunidad son partes importantes del programa scout en Colombia. Los scouts participan en festivales y días de fiesta nacionales. Ayudan en acontecimientos de los deportes, la relevación del desastre y situaciones de los primeros auxilios. Hay también un énfasis fuerte en la conservación y la ecología.

Los invito a que visiten los enlaces a continuación más información sobre los Scouts en Colombia y en el mundo:

El Escultismo:

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escultismo

El Escultismo en Colombia:

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escultismo_en_Colombia

Asociación de scouts de Colombia

http://www.scoutsdecolombia.org/

P.S: Quedo a espera de un email del jefe para darles información detallada sobre los grupos y sus nombres. Más adelante voy a subir un video muy interesante que hicimos ese día.

Scouts en colombia: Siempre Listos

A Quirky New Approach to Running: Beijing Hash House Harriers

At the "Red Dress Run" for charity, male and female members "honor" a woman in San Diego who wore a red dress to a HHH event years ago, not realizing it was a running club. Here, members are pictured in the charity run in front of the Forbidden City in Beijing. [Photo: CRIENGLISH.com]

The expansion of the Internet has made it so much easier in modern society to find people who share the same interests, spanning from the eccentric to the mundane. Whether it's knitting or skydiving-or perhaps running and drinking beer-the Web can unite people who are like you.

CRI Reporter Andrea Hunt has more:

The Beijing Hash House Harriers club embraces a world where, rain or shine, runners who also appreciate drinking beer can explore China's capital and create their own ideal social event with like-minded people.

It may sound a bit quirky since during the week, these people are Chinese and expat consultants, teachers, writers, bankers, students and the like. But on the weekend or during the full moon, these people can finally enjoy burning off calories then quickly replacing them with beer guzzling in the company of friends.

Andres Vargas is marketing and communication specialist from Colombia who has enjoyed the experience since he first ran in 2004, when he was living in Turkey.

In Beijing, he is now the GM of the "Full Moon Hash," which meets every month at night, and unlike other runs, which are marked beforehand, this one is "live," or improvised along the way.

Vargas explains why he loves being part of a running group like this.

"It's a perfect way of meeting people, it's incredible, and I can say that my best friends here in Beijing are "hashers," it's like a kind of family. It has been like that wherever I go; for example, some time ago I went to Thailand I didn't know anybody. I went to the Hash there I contacted some people, friends that I didn't know before. It works as a networking group you can find people where you can do business, it's not only about the fun or the running or the beer. "

Bystanders in Beijing may be surprised to see a group of runners pausing for a moment to chug a beer before searching for the next trail marker made of flour or scribbled chalk lines. The runners follow the "hare," or the person who planned the event and marked the trail. The runs range anywhere from 5 to 18 km.

The Beijing HHH groups are part of the "Hash House Harriers," a worldwide, self-proclaimed "drinking club with a running problem." Their Web site informs those of us confused by the name that a "hash house" refers to a cheap place to eat and a "harrier" is a runner on a cross country team.

In their words, "hashing is a form of non-competitive cross-country running with the main objective of working up a decent thirst." In addition, they want to improve the fitness of their members and give them a chance to run off weekend hangovers.

The idea started in 1938 with a group of expat running enthusiasts sprinting to a club in Kuala Lumpur called the "Hash House." Seventy years later, this quirky tradition has spread globally to major cities in more than 160 countries worldwide.

George Cuzzocrea works for a private banking services company in Beijing and describes himself as a "keep fit fanatic" who has been running since he was a kid.

He had never heard of the Hash House Harriers until coming to China, when his boss took him to the 500th run in Shanghai, a three-day event with hundreds of people eating, drinking and running.

Since then, Cuzzocrea has attended Hash House Harrier runs all over the world, but he notes that each one is different.

"The Cyprus one I would say is more of a family type hash with small children, it's more family orientated. The Hash in Borneo, I think that's really for serious runners because most of it, it's running in jungle. If I look at Shanghai compared to Beijing, I think Shanghai is more competitive; the Beijing Hash is all about the social run. At the end of the day, it's all about running; it's all about having a few drinks, food and just generally enjoying yourself."

Yvonne Wei is originally from Taiwan and has worked in Beijing for five years doing finance. Though there are other running clubs, she says this one was a better fit for her.

"Most of the running clubs that I know are more competitive, they are training together to improve their time, maybe for a marathon and sometimes they even have maybe a sports company sponsoring them. This one, I think it's more sociable than training for a run, although we do have serious runners in our club as well."

Sometimes the "hares" plan holiday runs or camping trips, or a weekend trip to Beidaihe Island, where members can run on the beach.

Moreover, the group does a variety of charity events to raise money for a number of causes, Mr. Vargas explains.

"It's not only about having fun, it's also about having some social responsibility. We try to do it as much as can, the 'Red Dress Run' is one of them, sometimes at Christmas we collect some money or presents for children."

The "Red Dress Run" is one of the charity events done internationally every year. Apparently, it started in San Francisco, when a woman wore a red dress and high heels, not realizing it was a running event.

To honor this embarrassing error, both men and women participate in a local once-a-year charity event in which everyone does the run wearing a red dress.

In addition to the charity events and social benefits, George explains his favorite part of having the HHH club in Beijing.

"Obviously, we're running in the capital of China. One of the good things about the Hash especially when you're running in town is that you get to see the places that you probably wouldn't get to see. I've been hashing now in Beijing for 7 years and I've seen the transformation of the city, for me the best part of the Hash is seeing Beijing."

The Beijing hashers' advise newcomers to show up and get ready to not only meet new people and explore a new side of Beijing, but also approach running in a whole new light.

For CRI, I'm Andrea Hunt.

Beijing Hash House Harriers run in the hills of Beijing. [Photo: CRIENGLISH.com]

A Quirky New Approach to Running: Beijing Hash House Harriers

Sausage stylus for the iPhone now on sale in the US

By Vladislav Savov (Engadget)
Mar 8th 2010 7:22PM

So you thought awesome gear never made the transition from Korea to the USA, huh? Not so in the case of the infamous sausage stylus we spotted a month ago. That cold weather peripheral -allowing its ingenious users to operate a capacitive touchscreen with gloves on - has made the big leap over to the Americas and can be yours for the low (seriously low) price of $0.99. Naturally, it's a sausage, so it will be compatible with not just iPhones but anything receptive to capacitive touch, although you should be cognizant of the "not for consumption" label - compatibility with human stomachs is unlikely.

Sausage stylus for the iPhone now on sale in the US

Patria o Muerte

Por Hector Rincón

Feb. 24 2010

Cada detalle nuevo que se sabe del martirio de Orlando Zapata Tamayo es peor que el anterior. El preso político cubano estaba en estado de coma y, sin embargo, lo tenían esposado. Y vigilado por dos guardas armados. Pesaba 39 kilos cuando murió tras 85 días de ayuno. Y hasta cuando fue conciente lanzaba gritos de abajo a Fidel Castro y vivas a los derechos humanos. Zapata Tamayo se convertirá con el tiempo en un nuevo símbolo de la resistencia contra un régimen que nos engañó a millones. Que nos vendió una idea romántica del poder popular y de la urgente democracia del desarrollo para todos. Un régimen que lleva ya cincuenta años y que no ha conseguido ninguna victoria distinta a la de exhibirse como abanderado de una dignidad que no vale un carajo.

Ha cambiado para muchos, para millones, la idea que teníamos de Cuba. Abrazamos en el comienzo de la revolución barbuda la proclama de la Patria o la Muerte. Tras tantos años de decepción ahora abrazamos la proclama de Zapata Tamayo que es la misma pero para fines distintos. Patria o muerte, gritan hoy los disidentes cubanos uno de los cuales acaba de fallecer en una huelga de hambre.

Puntillazo:
Bastante incómoda la posición del presidente del Brasil. Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, tan prestigioso, tan ecuánime, tan representativo, llega a Cuba en el momento de la muerte de Zapata Tamayo. No se sabe qué cara pondrá, qué frase dirá, que reflexión suscitará en sus citas con los hermanos Castro. Lula se juega mucho en esta visita a Cuba.

Patria o Muerte