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Underneath an enormous tent, my friend, Pete, and I found ourselves at a table of shouting, boisterous dining companions. The cacophony of the open-air kitchens was joined by our outbursts of raucous laughter and clinking glasses to create a jubilant concert of the sounds of this most important act of Chinese hospitality and communion the sharing of a meal. We had arrived just weeks earlier to travel the country and to begin our assignments as English teachers. After touring through Beijing, Xi'an and Shanghai, we had finally settled into our new home, a canal town called Shaoxing, near the eastern coast of the country. On this particular evening several native teachers had whisked us off to an outdoor food court of sorts to celebrate the upcoming marriage of one of our hosts. We quickly learned that for a people who still have vivid memories of famine, food occupies a very central space in their world.

At the center of the circular table the platters were quickly spun about on the carousel, stopping only for a moment to accommodate the eager chopsticks of a hungry diner as he plucked up his desired morsel before the plate was spun away yet again. I was at a distinct disadvantage as my chopstick skills were still developing and it always seemed that the tastiest bits were also the most slippery. Rice wine and beer flowed from a seemingly never-ending line of bottles as the men goaded each other on to drink up, happy to be done with another day of work. As we nibbled away at the spicy chicken feet, boiled peanuts and pickled vegetables, glass after glass was raised and emptied to the shout of "ganbei!" or bottoms up.

The main courses arrived, and most needed more translations than the jokes and stories flying about. Pulling the lid off one glass bowl, several shrimp jumped out from their brown sauce and scurried around the scrap-laden table. My shock elicited obvious delight from my dining companions. They snapped at the animals with their chopsticks and quickly bit the exoskeleton in half and slurped out the flesh. After some prodding, I soon found myself doing the same. Giant red shrimp, fried pumpkin slices, spicy fish soup, fragrant tofu and countless other dishes soon joined the live shrimp. Conversation slowed to a halt as everyone focused all their concentration on the panoply of dishes spinning around the table. The inedible bits were expelled unceremoniously, creating a graveyard of shells, seeds and bones stretching from one end of the table to the

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