Chapter 397 - “See? It takes two to tango." (1)
Tong Jiaming’s face was covered in chickenpox. Luckily, he had very good self-restrain and he was able to fight off the urge to scratch no matter how itchy it was.
It takes two weeks to recover fully from chickenpox and he stayed home this entire time.
Tong Jiaxin, after staying home for a few days and remained healthy, returned to school quickly.
The culinary competition was moved up in time before Tong Jiaming had recovered.
Words had it that a Chinese American would be returning to visit and it was said that this person had a very special status. He was a Chinese translator working at the United Nation.
After Chinese’s spot had been re-instated in 1971, all Chinese documents need to be reviewed and approved by said individual. To put it simply, he had a very special and highly regarded status.
The orders from above had already came and that this person was to be treated with the highest respect.
As the time was short, the culinary competition was moved forward.
Tong Xuelu, too, was surprised when she learned that. Luckily she had been practicing recently and she was not entirely unprepared.
On the day of the competition, Tong Xuelu brought Guo Weiping with her to Red Star Restaurant.
It was chosen as the venue as it was the ranked the highest among all restaurants and that it was big enough to hold a lot of people.
That was an advantage for Red Star Restaurant. It gave them a sense of arrogance for being on their own home turf.
As far as Tong Xuelu was concerned, Red Star Restaurant was her biggest competitor today.
Arriving at Red Star Restaurant, some of the other competitors had already arrived. Tong Xuelu was among the middle of the pack.
Even so, her arrival had attracted a lot of attention. First of all, she was the only competitor from a Tier 2 restaurant. Secondly, she was the only female chef + manager.
That and she was young and pretty. It would be difficult for her to remain low key.
“Manager Tong, you have arrived. We were just talking about you!”
Tong Xuelu’s lips curved and she smiled politely. “Is that so? What exactly about me were you saying?”
A man said, “Everybody were guessing what kind of dishes would Manager Tong compete with this time. Not malatang and beef meatballs, I hope. HAHAHAHAHA……”
Everybody else laughed with him after he had said that.
Tong Xuelu remained nonchalant.
He was trying to psych her out. He wanted her to be frazzled during the competition.
Unfortunately, she might be young, but her mental capability was better than most there.
That being said, the man, noticing that she did not get angry or blush, felt a bit awkward.
Some others were impressed at how she was taking this in stride. No wonder she was able to hold down the position of a manager at a restaurant at her age.
As time passed, the judges had arrived.
Three of the judges were from the Commerce Department and Minister Lin was one of them.
There were three others that came from Municipal Foreign Affairs Office and another old man besides them.
The old man looked to be 70-80 years in age. His face was pale and he had no facial hair. All of his hair and brows were white but he looked to be in good health. He also seemed very kind sitting there smiling.
During the introduction, the old man was only introduced as Mr. Gao with no mentioning of his status or background.
Everybody looked at this Mr. Gao, trying to figure out his background.
If nobody else there knew about it, Tong Xuelu would have even less clue. She merely glanced over at him before she refocused on her competition.
The competition was divided into three parts and the order was determined by drawing.
Tong Xuelu got #10 in group 3, the last of the groups.
The gong rang and the competition commenced.
The four restaurants in the first group began their competitive competition.
Tong Xuelu watched in a relaxing mood.
Some of the chefs were frazzled and clumsy and made mistakes here and there. Others were unphased.
Tong Xuelu was enjoying the show but Guo Weiping, next to her, was so nervous that his palms were sweaty.