Olympics, International Buffet and learning a little

This evening we finally took a break from watching all the Olympic coverage,
and went out to dinner at our own International Buffet.
We had a coupon...boy are we seniors or what?
Anyway, we just so happened to start up a conversation with a gentleman who worked there. (Earlier I had complained that something was wrong with the pepper shaker the pepper smelled funny, and it made the salad and soup taste bad that I had sprinkled it on. This was so out of character for me; I never complain in restaurants, but I thought maybe a kid was fooling around and put something in it, it smelled like horse manure. He was kind enough to check it out, and took it away to taste (yuck) and I think brought a different one back.)
We discussed how quiet all the traffic and businesses were on our long three mile trek up there.
He happened to be Chinese living in the USA for the last 8 years hoping to become an American citizen by next year.
I asked him which province he was from, and believe it or not he was from Beijing!
That started the ball rolling and we asked him so many questions, and he spoke English fairly well, only with a slight accent. He was very genuine and seemed thrilled we were interested.
It took him just ten months to learn our difficult language.
We found out that Beijing is very much a city, not unlike New York.
No grass to grow anything, he laughed.
I was concerned for those who had to quit their factory jobs because of the Olympics and he said they all were working on the construction for the Olympics, and did very well.
He apparently has family still there, and that is why he knew so much currently going on.

Then on to Super Wal-Mart for a few of this and thats.

Good night to all.