zěnme shuō "MSG" ?

"zěnme shuō" means "how do you say ..." in Chinese. I asked our translator to arm me with this powerful phrase. Now I am like a two-year-old walking around and pointing at things and asking people how to say the word for it. its great fun.

Marek and Johanna posted some pics of the museum and the installation so far.

Things are really going well work-wise. I have still seen almost nothing of the city besides the hotel and museum, but that will soon change, as I am almost done. First few nights were so stressful ... was worried something catastrophic would happen like a hard drive crash and the project would epically fail. But I think we are over that hump. We have backups. Second night I was so stressed I thought I was having a heart attack in bed. And my left arm started getting tingly which I guess is a symptom. But I guess it was just because the mattress is so firm my arm fell asleep -- when I rolled onto my right side the same thing happened. Problem solving.

MSG makes my mouth hurt. I've seen a few restaurants that literally have a condiment on the table right next to the salt and pepper that says "味精 / MSG" (pronounced "wèijīng"). Needless to say I abstain. But I've given up on trying to avoid -- I think its in everything. On the flight here I sat next to a Chinese girl who was a foreign exchange student in St Louis. I asked her how to say "please no MSG" in Mandarin. She just laughed and said "that would be like me going to KFC and saying 'please, no chicken'."

So ... as the old saying goes, "When in Rome, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. But when in China, fried chicken tastes twice as good with wèijīng".

I'm going to dinner.