He asked if he could have just ONE chocolate just before bedtime and when I reluctantly agreed he did what he always does when I say yes without an argument, “Can I have two?”  We have buckets of candy left over which takes us by surprise.  We’re used to 150 – 200 kids coming ’round but not this Eve – so few witches, goblins and Buzz Lightyears graced our porch in this apparently child-friendy neighbourhood. Not sure what went wrong there.  At one point Kman was given three double-handfuls of candy from a house of young twenty-somethings on Albany Avenue.  They pleaded with us to tell the other children that they were there.  “We have so much candy and no one to give it to!” they cried.  Had we run into any other children we would’ve told them, but we didn’t see any others after that.  Where were all the children??

We know they live in the neighbourhood because we see scads of them every morning, walking to school, multi-child families with parents who don’t work at conventional jobs (we know this because they are not rushing out of their houses the way we do and they LINGER in the school yards talking to other parents-without-conventional-jobs).  They are writers and artists, musicians and community workers, educators and actors, and they ride their bikes with one child perched in front and the other child hinged at the back.  If on foot they walk their infants in Stokke strollers, latte in hand and dressed in ‘this old thing?’ casual-chic fashion.  So, where were they on Hallowe’en?  And what are we going to do with all of this leftover candy?  Hmmm?

The other day we took a walk through Kensington Market and then headed into Chinatown for some noodle soup.  We knew it wasn’t going to be the same but Chinatown is not without its charms (they have dragonfruit!) and many of the restaurants are frequented by the Chinese, which is always a good thing.  We should have just gone into Kom Jug Yuen with its roasted ducks hanging in the front window (which is one of the reasons we’re ‘guilty’ vegetarians) but I prefer the takeaway there rather than eating in (the egg-foo-yung is to die for).  Yes, I know, the dour-faced servers are all business and the grotty-ness of the restaurant with total lack of ambience reminds us of the hidden Hong Kong kitchens, but with the little one in tow we decided on the calmer and prettier E-Pan next door.  I’d eaten there a few years ago just after it opened and although I don’t recall what I ate I remember that the meal with my work colleagues was pleasant and that everyone was delighted with the food.  Olivia Chow was also sitting a couple of tables over, having lunch with her mother.  Also good.

Today the restaurant is empty and the service slow.  We ordered a lo mein noodle and vegetable dish, fried tofu squares and spring rolls. We wanted to keep it simple and simple it was.  Simply awful.  The noodles were covered in that mystery glaze that always seems to accompany food that appears and tastes like it’s been reheated.  I don’t know that it was, but it didn’t pass the chopstick test with me:  the veggies were impossible to pick up, so slippery they were.  And flavourless.  The spring rolls weren’t hot enough which just added to my suspicion that they’d been just taken out from underneath heat lamps.  Everything tasted greasy except for the tofu.  It was awesome – firm but tender on the outside, nicely spiced with herbs and braised so that the inside was cooked to creamy perfection.  Too bad it was too spicy for darling daughter because she started to cry during the noodles and I can’t say I blamed her.  It was the first time she’s refused noodles.  We felt guilty for removing her from the land of excellent noodles.  I’m sure this will come out in her future therapy sessions but for now we must persevere and keep looking.  It wouldn’t have been hard –  we should’ve just gone next door.

We want to thank the Delightful Ms. S once again for endeavouring to post our entries while we were being censored in Beijing.  It seems a little funny now but as our week wore on a few things became increasingly difficult.  First the blog became inaccessible, then our emails became spotty.  We heard on the news that three people were arrested in China for “spreading false rumours on the internet.” It was not difficult to get slightly paranoid, especially on the day before we came home when our access cards for our hotel room suddenly stopped working.  We returned to the lobby and were instantly met with a very helpful concierge (who seemed to anticipate our arrival).  He directed us to the woman behind the counter who murmured that she thought we had checked out, which is why the cards didn’t work. Checked out?  As in, “I’m sorry, sir, they’ve already checked out”, never to be seen or heard from again?  Or, “Who?  I’m sorry sir, but we’ve had no guests by that name. You must be mistaken.”

We went back up to our room.  The beds were made and luggage where we left it.  They even left us an extra bottle of water.