I have a UW Madison Student Living With Me in China for the Next Month as My (and Hu Ayi’s) Intern
I get loads of emails from potential interns who want to move out to China with me and lord knows I need some help out here but almost everyone I talk to is only able to come out during the Summer. Unfortunately for them the Summer is the one time of year where I do about anything possible to get out of China. Place becomes an absolute SWAMP. Shanghai Summers make New York Summer’s look temperate AF (although China at least has A/C in all their subway stations. Step your public transport game up USA). I promised myself I wouldn’t spend another 4th of July in China while writing this blog last summer and I plan to hold up my end of the bargain by moving into Barstool HQ by the end of June for a month or two.
Enter Donny (ya he goes by the same name as me but with a “y”). He also goes by the “The College Cook” as he’s a chef(haven’t tried his food yet) who started a business at his college where he’ll come to your dorm or house and cook for you.
He’s a Junior at UW Madison who decided that instead of doing a semester abroad he would just take a semester off of college to travel around Asia. I met him at the Winter Olympics when he heard I was there and offered me a ticket to a speed skating event.While the long track skating event was possibly the most boring sporting event I have ever attended, he wasn’t a bad kid and after getting hammered together afterwards I told him if he could make it to China this Spring he could be my intern for a month of two. Here is a clip of us shotgunning beers in the Olympic park. (The big M. Night Shyamalan twist is that those two nice Korean girls who walk up to us are actually security guards.)
After we both sobered up he followed up with me about the opportunity and I gotta say I was a bit reluctant at first.
Well he never found anyone he could cook meals for in exchange for lodging but since April 10th has been living out in Shanghai. I was actually in Thailand when he arrived so told him he could crash at my apartment at first
but since I’ve returned he has been AirBnbing a room in my friends apartment. Unfortunately, it’s my friend who moved into a place with a hybrid kitchen/bathroom which isn’t’ going to do wonders for his cooking career.
but I told him he could also use my kitchen whenever he wants. I haven’t laid out his intern ground rules yet in person so figured this blog would be a good place to do it.
- He’s only allowed to ask me three questions a day. Once again, he is here to help me, I’m not here to help him.
- He is not only my intern, he is also Hu Ayi’s (and any other Ayi’s I see fit) intern as well. By this transitive property he could essentially end up being my cleaning lady. Here is a live look at Hu Ayi’s brain when she learns she has a white college kid to boss around.
- He claims to be quite the chef.
Thus, he needs to learn how to cook a new Chinese dish each week. I know one Chinese chef out here who makes this incredible “Sichuan Pesto” sauce. Now Rick and Morty is a great show but the “McDonald’s Szechuan Sauce” it hyped up is extremely overrated. This sauce on the other hand, could very well be the best sauce I’ve had in my life. Makes any dish a million times better. His first mission is to infiltrate this guy’s kitchen and steal the recipe. For years China has been taking successful things in the US like Yeezys, Uber, and Tinder and making cheap knock offs of them (although China does still have some original ideas like Uncle Martian, which is a wonderful sports apparel company that I highly recommend).
Anyways, it’s about time USA starts fighting back and stealing ideas from China, starting with this sauce. If he succeeds in this mission I plan on a starting a “Stool Sauce” subdivision and making Barstool millions.
Besides kitchen espionage he will be helping me cut down hours of footage I have in the fault so I can start putting out more videos. He’s been travel blogging for a while so I’ll also have him write a few blogs about his first impressions of China . My videos come from a perspective of someone who has lived here for years and I try to focus on the most absurd aspects of it. He will have more insight on what everyday life is like out here for your “typical” college kid. If you can think of anything else you want to see “Donny Do” out here feel free to let me know. I’m all ears. Follow him on twitter @chefdonnyy