Australia

Soon, hordes of athletes and tourists will flock to China for the 2008 Summer Olympics. While they may or may not arrive hungry for victory, they are sure to arrive hungry, and as regards food, they may be in for a surprise.  For a satisfying culinary experience, foreigners should come with minds as open as their mouths, and try their best to eat like locals. A few must-haves include:

Beijing Roast Duck

In China, Beijing roast duck (pronounced bay-jing cow-yah) is famous; it’s even been elevated to the status of a “national food.”  Traditionally, the duck is oven-roasted, and served with thin rice-flour pancakes, scallions, cucumbers and hoisin sauce.  The dish is then eaten in the same style as Mexican fajitas.  The diner wraps a pancake around bits of meat and cucumber and dips the diminutive roll in sauce.  All parts of the bird are used—the head is served on a plate along with the body, and even the carcass is turned to soup that is served as a last course.  Chain restaurants like Quanjude serve Roast Duck at affordable prices, and even KFC in China has its own version of the dish, so there’s no excuse not to try it at least once.

Hole-in-the-Wall Dumplings

You’ll understand when you get there—in Beijing, sketch one-room restaurants (and the delicious dumplings that they sell) are ubiquitous. Here, “hole-in-the-wall” means lacking a door and buzzing with flies. Jiaozi (jow-zuh) have thinner and slipperier exterior wrappings than do Baozi (bow-zuh), which tend to have chewy rice-flour outer parts.  Both types of dumplings are usually steamed—not pan-fried like in the US—are served in brown circular baskets, and can come in a variety of flavors ranging from pork (jew-row) to vegetable (shoe-tie). The sauces that typically accompany dumplings in Bejing are vinegar and a hot (hot!) sauce that should be mixed together for the most zingy flavor.  Order hot salted peanuts (huah-sheng-me) with them and you’ll eat well for under US$1. 

Hot Pot

Technically, Hot Pot is a Mongolian Dish; eating Hot Pot in China is a bit like eating Mexican or Canadian food in the United States.  That’s no reason to avoid it, however; Hot Pot is delicious and (since you boil your own water in a pot in front of you) a pretty safe bet if you’re worried about food poisoning.  Hot Pot is a lot like fondue; you’re served a boiling pot of water and plates of thinly sliced meats, vegetables, and more, and it’s up to you to make a soup that cooks it all.  Hot pot can come plain or spicy—and be warned: spicy tends to pack heat and include tingling or numbing spices.

Scrambled Eggs with Stir-Fried Tomatoes

This is an unadventurous (and yet locally popular) dish that every foreigner should know how to order. The dish is pronounced see-hong-shuh-chow-gee-dan and is exactly what it sounds like. 

Vegetables

In China, ordering vegetables is tricky, because vegetables are the food that is most likely to give you food poisoning.  A good rule of thumb is that raw vegetables are never safe and cooked vegetables always are.  That said, if a vegetable dish looks or tastes funny, it’s probably safest not to eat it.  A few good dishes served at most restaurants are eggplant (chee-ay-zuh) and cabbage (buy-tie).

Closing Words (and Dishes)

In China, dishes are usually served in the following order: cold dishes, vegetable dishes, meat dishes, soup, and last but not least, white rice (to fill you up if you’re still hungry).  Foreigners who want their rice first should make sure to state this clearly.  Saying “First, rice” (Dee-ee-guh, me fan) will usually suffice.

Have you traveled across the barren Nullarbor or over the vast expanse of the Indian Ocean to see Western Australia's dolphins? Well, don't believe they're only to be found in touristy and pricey Monkey Mia, some 750km north of Perth. Just to the south of the state capital, 180km along the South West Highway, is Bunbury's non-profit Dolphin Discovery Centre. For $2, adults can view the Centre's interesting collection of sealife specimens and interactive exhibits on the biology of the region, while children do so for a mere $1 and families for $5. The Centre's real treasures, however, are the approximately 100 wild bottlenose dolphins which have made Koombana Bay their home. Included in admission is access to the beach where they come to visit daily. Trained dolphin experts are on hand to guide you in how to approach and touch these intelligent and spirited creatures.

The dolphins are not fed and come of their own free will, usually in the late morning. For those with a little less patience, eco-cruises ($27) and eight-person swim tours ($99) are also available, which take you out into the bay to meet the dolphins.

Koombana Drive, Bunbury. 1.5km from Bunbury city center.  1829 9791 3088. Open daily Oct.-Apr. 8am-5pm; May-Sept. 9am-3pm.

Linda Rowe wrote Paradise Found: A Cape York Adventure about her time as owner of Cooktowns Croc Shop and her love for the region.

Linda Rowe wrote Paradise Found: A Cape York Adventure about her time as owner of Cooktown's Croc Shop and her love for the region.

LG: So did you just camp out there for eight or nine years?

A: I lived in a tent for 5 years, but then I got upmarket with a caravan. And then for the shop, there was a little tarp on the roof. People would kind of come down, drive through the river, pull up at the shop. Some people would camp for the night, or else just drive to the top of the river bank and just carry on.

LG: How did you originally get up there—just with a 4WD?

A: Yeah, just driving around Australia, and thought, I'll go up there. One thing that everybody's fascinated by are the crocodiles. One time these bikers came through and asked where they could sleep the night because they were in swags. By midnight, I heard this guy screaming and raced up there to see what was going on. This huge 8m python just came down out of the tree and there's dinner. Luckily for him, it started swallowing from the elbow—he couldn't open his jaws wide enough for his head so he spat him out. All his mates are saying, "Look, you had a nightmare." His arm was instantly black and blue. People worry about crocodiles but they don't realize there are man-eating pythons up there as well.