A Little Window Into Self Delusion

Sichuan fish in Sichuan Province - in a Sichuan sauce. All those little balls you can see are Sichuan peppers.

Regular readers will be aware that Emergency Contact and I just had a little jaunt with some mates through parts of China.

In previous blobs on the subject, I will have given the impression that this was a highly cultural tour, mixed with unusual activities that provided a thorough immersion in that amazing place. That we made a well rounded and proper connection to the Middle Kingdom and its multifarious peoples. While that is largely true, I want to refine that impression a little.

We ate our way round China.

Man, the food we consumed! Holy cow, did we pull on the nosebag. I mean, two 15 course meals a day (and they usually followed a pretty healthily sized breakfast). Not to mention snacks and of course, the local beer Tsing Tao (And it’s a good brew).

Every meal was an event, an adventure, and I was never disappointed. If they do decide to act on it, the Chinese approach to world domination should be to over-feed us until we can’t move, quietly walk in and take over our businesses as we sit there belching and fizzing away, and efficiently turn a profit as our overloaded hearts give out.

I could rave on and on about the various brilliant plates, but suffice to say; Sichuan fish in Sichuan province - full body experience. And that body was getting larger and larger, day by day, under the food onslaught.

So, how does this get us to self delusion? Well, upon return to Oz and a normal diet, I immediately felt that I was losing the extra weight, which pleased me until I realised how I was getting that impression.

You see, it’s a mirror thing. I’ve gone from decent hotels with disturbing, full-length mirrors on a lot of surfaces, back to our little flat in Sydney. There’s only a tiny mirror in the bathroom and you can only get about 30 centimetres away from it before you fall in the toilet.

I’ve only seen myself from the neck up since getting back home. Anything could be going on below my collar.