Welcome to America

My first mission companion (Qing Ping) from Taiwan is in America visiting for a few days. My task: introduce her to American stuff and convince her to return to Taiwan and report that Americans don’t sit around watching tv and movies all day, while eating only hamburgers, french fries, and ice cream.

First on the list: American steak! Taiwan has this franchise called “Noble’s Steakhouse”, which we’d eat at after saving up money during the mission. Their cheapest steak is less than $4, which also includes the price of an unlimited salad bar, ice cream, and fruit juice/soda. Needless to say, those Taiwanese steakhouses serve, ahem, premium cuts of meat.

Nonetheless, we decided to take Qing Ping to eat REAL American cow—we called Outback and were informed that the wait was 35 minutes for a party of 5. Imagine our surprise about 30 minutes later when we got there and the wait was in fact an hour. [We confirmed with a couple that looked starved that they had already been waiting for 70 minutes. Interesting]. We then called Ruby River and they told us that the wait was only ten [10] minutes. Not believing the hostess initially, I annoyed her by asking her to confirm twice that the wait was in fact ten minutes. We got in the car and drove directly to Ruby River, which took about ten minutes—the hostess at Ruby River then cheerily informed us that the wait time was 50 minutes. [I smell a conspiracy]. Future plan: call and ask what the wait time is while I’m walking into the restaurant, then scream “LIAR” when the hostess grossly underestimates the wait time to get me in the door.

In any case, after I discussed my prior phone call with the hostess and indicated that we had just driven to Ruby River from Outback Steakhouse, we were seated within 25 minutes. We then proceeded to order and consume massive amounts of beef. Unfortunately, the pictures attached fail to include a photo op that we missed—Wendy was sitting in front of Qing Ping and watched as Qing Ping took her first bite of steak. Despite the fact that Chinese people are usually stoic and expressionless, my roommates analogize her expression to one that a baby gives after getting their first taste of ice cream—confused bliss. Like I said. America serves real steak. Heather, Wendy’s BFF from childhood and our honorary roommate for the night, piped in and explained by saying: “This is why we live in a place with so much land where cows can roam freely. So we can eat them.”

Since then, we’ve taken Qing Ping to eat Costa Vida Mexican salads, play miniature golf, play random video games, and eat dippin’ dots. The fun has only begun.

Also worthy of report—Chantal destroyed us in miniature golf. I then played Qing Ping in air hockey. I briefly considered putting aside my overly-competitive spirit and letting her win when she, in desperation, grabbed a neighboring table’s air hockey puck and was fruitlessly trying to guard her goal with both hands and both pucks. Result: I beat her 7 to 3. I still have some growing to do.