In 1996, I was invited to dinner by the daughter of my program director at Nanjing University. The apartment consisted of one room with a bed taking up most of it. They conducted all their cooking on a gas burner on their building's tiny balcony, a shared "kitchen" where two people could barely stand, and yet they had cooked a feast for me. We ate seated on the wooden bed, their round table entirely covered in delicious dishes. I marveled at the variety, from bitter melon with egg (the unexpected bitterness had nearly made my hair stand on end) to tender steamed fish with ginger and scallions.

It was my first experience of home cooking by generous Chinese friends. It was also my first lesson on proper guest behavior in China. Now I often eat at Shanghainese friends' houses; 10 years have passed, the economy has boomed, apartments have expanded, but the culture of warm hospitality is the same.

In the U.S., frequent guests are welcome to help out--my mom was delighted when my high school classmates would set and clear the table--but in China I am usually forbidden from even standing up. I hand over my gifts of fruit, nuts or candy, and then my duty is to savor the food. The host sweats over the wok in the kitchen. Plate after plate of goodies arrive steaming to crowd the table --invariably a glass table top over a patterned cloth. Guests are urged repeatedly and mercilessly to "eat, eat!" and the more you stuff yourself, the more delighted your hosts will be.

Recently at a typical dinner at a friend's house we had hongshao pork with wood ear mushrooms, Shanghai-style borscht (luosongtang), sauteed celery, sauteed mushrooms, pork with water chestnuts, braised chicken wings and a mountain of the seasonal delicacy -- hairy crab. My friend's parents spent the first part of the meal making round-trips to the kitchen as they continued cooking, getting drinks, replacing dropped chopsticks, and generally taking exquisite care of the guests. "Eat while it's hot!" they exhorted, as we begged them to sit down and enjoy the glorious food together with us.

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