Mapo Restaurant

Today our Chinese teacher invited us to an Asian restaurant called Mapo. Actually it's kind of part of our grade because we have to accept three of her invitations to do Chinese things outside of class. The last one I did was attend a meeting about travelling to China in December so I could answer any questions the students interested might have about China. However, today was much more relaxing, we just had to order in Mandarin. I didn't have an actual Chinese meal though; I had fried rice. Fried rice in China is not at all like the fried rice here. In China it's white rice with peas and eggs and maybe a few vegetables. Here it's somehow brown because, I'm guessing, they put some type of sauce in it. I knew it was going to be more than I could eat in one sitting and I'm broke so I ordered something I knew I'd like and could take home with me.
In China the portions are usually huge because it's "family style." Basically, the dishes are meant for everyone and everyone eats everything so only one person pays. In China, people actually fight to pay the bill. You can then imagine how crazy it was to try to have separate bills by the end of the meal since none of what we ordered was actually by us. The Chinese sit at circular tables and there's a platform on the table that spins. So you put the dishes on the center platform and spin it so everyone can get to the food easier.
I'm really glad I went because I get to spend outside time with people studying what I'm studying. All of my friends here are psychology and education majors. Except for a physics major, biology major, and then a chemistry major. Oh, and an English major. I'm really the odd one out in the group so it's always nice to spend time with people also learning Chinese.