How Convenient!

There is something that goes on in China that I thought would be interesting to you. I finally took some pictures to go along with my explanation. We haven't seen this as much in our previous abodes because we were either on a college campus, or in a nicer apartment complex. Now we live in an average complex that people can go through a little more freely. The thing that I'm talking about is peddlers that come through the neighborhood promoting their little business-on-wheels. Some are buying recyclables, some are selling things, and some have a skill they're wanting to do for people.

The one who comes through the most often is the gas man. Many people here use small gas tanks to fire up their stovetops or gas water heaters. The gas man trades out empty gas tanks for full ones. He comes through a few times a day. Our gas man used to just use his voice to announce his arrival, but now he uses both his voice and a recording of the same announcement. I took a video of this man coming through and you can hear his voice yelling out.

The second most frequent one is the recycler person. In every city we've been in, these people are announced most always by a clanging or drumming type sound. They either use little tin pots to hit with a stick of some sorts, or they use a little cymbal that they clang against their handlebars. I think I've also seen some with a pot-sort of thing that had a lid glued on top and had stones(?) inside and they'd rattle them. These people buy (and I'm assume sell if need be) cardboard, plastics, and other recycleable items. We've sold some cardboard to them before, but the price is paltry.

This next one I think is selling "mantou." I think the mantou person comes around every day, but they usually don't come so near our building, so I'm not as familiar with what he/she looks like. Mantou is a Chinese steamed bun/roll, and it's quite bland. I assume most Chinese people don't eat mantou just by itself. It's usually a breakfast food. I believe the mantou person just yells out "mantou!" Here is a picture of the mantou man and also some mantou.

The last one I have a picture of is the blade sharpener. On the day that I took these pictures, I saw this man coming around, but I wasn't sure what he was selling. He was yelling something in a sing-songey voice, but it was hard to catch. I watched him as someone hailed down to him and asked him to wait for them. A woman came out a moment later with a pair of shears that she needed sharpening. The man sat down to work on the shears, and a few neighbors came around to gab with him for a bit. We have had some of our kitchen knives sharpened by the blade sharpener. Actually, last time we did that, Brant had brought out our big Chinese kitchen knife. These knives are VERY common here and used for preparing nearly every meal. Brant brought ours out - we had had it for over a year, and it was nice and shiny still. (actually now that I think of it, it's still nice and shiny) There was a small group around the sharpener man, and they exclaimed about our knife being so unused and new-looking - like it wasn't even barely broken in and we've had it for over a whole year already?!! I guess we don't use our Chinese knife quite the same way. I do like to use it sometimes though, honest! It's good for chopping things, and then you can put the veggies right on the side of the blade to transport them to the pot/bowl. Since Chinese people use only chopsticks to eat, they can't have foods at the table that would need any cutting with a fork or knife at the table, so they do a lot of chopping their foods before they cook them. When they buy meats with the bone attached, they chop the bone right up with the meats and fats, and then they just serve little meat pieces with little bone pieces right together. They put the whole thing in their mouths and then eat around the bone and spit it out right on the table! They eat everything but the bone, and sometimes they even suck out whatever flavor they can get out of the bone too! We have sometimes had difficulty with these types of meals because frankly, our mouths are not as nimble! Anyways, I'm way off topic now. Here's a picture of the sharpener man and the sort of knife I'm talking about.