Lee Guang Hua
He teaches me all the best-kept secrets of his 18-years of food-making, things that the majority of chefs out there don't know.
He'll try to sneak in whatever English he knows when talking to me... I'll get random "Sank you bery much!" and "No problem"s here and there.
Whenever I ask how to make something (even if the restaurant doesn't make it), he'll take time out to show me. If he doesn't have the recipe on him, he'll go home and make a copy for me. If the kitchen doesn't have something in stock that we need, he'll go out and find/buy it so we can make it.
He pours me a lot of cups of the best pu-er tea. (costs $300USD/600 g)
He knew my teeth were sore from chewing too much, so he made a giant batch of Cantonese congee for me (and went out to buy some thousand-year eggs for it).
He asks me every 20 minutes whether I'm tired, and even if I'm not, he'll tell me to go take a break so that I don't overexert myself.
He laughs a lot and his face turns bright red when he finds my comments amusing (mostly because I have no other way of explaining things except with really simple language...aka "Titanic" is "the very big boat")
He feeds me a TON because he doesn't ever want me to be hungry. He'll buy some Taiwanese small eats for me or scoop some of the food that we make and warm it up for me to eat.
Not being able to communicate effectively is actually really hilarious b/c we'll both just make this face and then start laughing...and move on to the next topic.
He imparts life wisdom on me and tells it like it is. He shares his stories of failures and success and tells me how I can avoid those same mistakes or achieve similar success in the future.
He took me on a field trip on his autobike to a nearby dimsum place in the middle of our workday to get some pork ribs because I said that I really like eating them... And then he asked the head chef to order 10 kilos of pork ribs and taught me how to make it the very next day. Hahaha.
His standards are super high, but he has a lot of patience with me whenever I mess up. When I do improve, he compliments me and tells me that I have a natural knack for food.
When I finish his thought for him, his face lights up and he exclaims "ah! so clever!" to me.
He can really read me and gently challenges me (and humbles me) where I need it most.
He treats me like family and makes me feel welcomed and appreciated.
He treats his wife and kids really well, and he also shows no favoritism at work. Everyone's like family to him.
I commented that one of the pastry cutters was really cute, and he said "here, take it. You can have it." And then he proceeded to give me more pastry tools. Hahaha
His skill with his hand is superb. The things that he wraps are all consistent in size and really really pretty.
He gave me two discs of pu-er tea as gifts -- one to keep in my future store (which I cannot drink until at least 10 years from now), and one that's already aged so I can drink it right now.
He has the sense and integrity not to take me out late at night to eat all the good stuff in Taichung after work because it wouldn't look right. And I totally totally respect that.
My last week of work, he made sure to teach me everything he promised to teach me -- including one of the best pork buns I've ever had, egg tarts, mochi, and ha-gao. After he finished teaching me, he was really really happy that he had lived up to his word.
He *hardly hardly* ever takes people as his "students", but I was an exception. People are lineedd UP to study under him...
He called me the morning after I got home to make sure that I got back to American safely.
He was probably one of the closest friends I made in Taiwan and definitely a huge, semi life-changing gift from God for me for my time in Taiwan. I'm going to miss him, but I'm glad that he gave me the permission to call him whenever to ask him about food, life, ...anything! Yay.
wow, it was SUCH a blessing to read this
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