MISTER DONUT

when i discovered several weeks ago that there is a mister donut in shanghai, i knew i had to go sometime. since we had been planning for weeks a trip to shanghai that occurred yesterday and the day before, that was the perfect opportunity. we took the subway there and arrived around 9 AM and i ended up spending a full 6 hours there...haha. (my friends had other things to do, so i just stayed and hung out.)

why is this a momentous occasion, you might ask? i haven't been to a mister donut in 11 years, and i thought they only existed in japan, and it is THE BEST donut place EVER. do not even speak to me about krispy kreme or any other such nonsense. they are nothing.
look at these donut choices.
just look at them...
there are SO many choices, and they all look amazing. these are not mass produced donuts. they are all painstakingly made. and they are not expensive either--somewhere between 60 cents and 1 USD per donut. the donut on the middle right is a panda lion donut, no less. i only mention that because it's an extra bonus. i didn't actually taste that one.

these are the ones i tasted, minus the panda lion.
my mouth is watering again.... oh my... you need an up close look.
seven of nine would approve (perfection).

also they have donuts called happy sticks.
another bonus, also which i did not taste.

since i stayed for six hours, you might ask, why? i already partially explained that part, and that is not part of this story. you might also ask, did you really just sit there eating donuts for six hours? no, of course not. for those connoisseurs like me who love mister donut so much, they provide nourishment sets (displayed by charis).

so you can continue to stay at donut, eat something actually nourishing, and then go on with eating donuts, and then buy some for take out when you leave (all of which i did).

here is my nourishment set.
it looks pretty good, the soup is excellent (the other choice was corn soup, which i had when we first got there....aaaamazing), but the meal itself isn't all that great. which is cleverly appropriate, because this is mister donut, after all. the meal gives you nourishment, but the real reason to come to mister donut is of course, the donuts. so the nourishment sets are needed for nourishment but then only remind you how excellent and praiseworthy the donuts are (worthy of occupying thoughts, most assuredly).

another wonderful thing about mister donut is that it is no smoking. this is surely a noteworthy place, both in china and japan, but more so in china. every restaurant for the most part is smoky, you just expect it and don't even comment on it. mister donut was blissfully smoke free, with signs everywhere announcing the fact that smoking is not allowed, even little signs permanently attached to every table. except when a group of men comes in and starts smoking. i thought, really? someone will tell them to stop soon. but i forgot momentarily that i was in china. no one that worked there said anything at all or even seemed to look at them or notice them. not surprising actually. rules are mostly suggestions. even in the metro, there are security scanners that you are supposed to put your bags through before entering, but i must have walked past about half a dozen times on our many metro rides without being stopped or even quite realizing that i really was supposed to take my bag off and put it through the machine. the security people stood off to the side and didn't move a muscle or say one word as we just walked past with our backpacks. eventually one security person said "excuse me" once in a low voice that i happened to hear and we realized that maybe they really did mean it and started scanning our bags after that. i think i am going to be desensitized in some way to expectations that society has when i return to the US... anyway, so at mister donut, these people are still smoking, and i hear them calling for someone who works there to come over. i thought, aha, now they will not be able to avoid "noticing" that people are smoking and will have to tell them to stop. well, clearly the lady working there realized they were smoking, when the men asked for an ash tray. she told them that they don't have those here, proceeded to pick up one of their finished cigarettes off the floor, said a few more things, and left them there. since i didn't understand all the chinese, i don't know if she actually told them that smoking is not allowed or asked them to stop, but they stopped after that, either for one of the above reasons, or for lack of an ash tray. but that didn't stop another man from coming in later and smoking unhindered for quite a while. i live in china. and there is mister donut. yessss

in case you are thinking i'm crazy, of course krispy kreme or whatever or however it's spelled is just as good or probably better, you are wrong (just accept it). and if you are not wrong, if you taste mister donut and you really think krispy kreme is better and you would rather eat it everyday of your life than mister donut, then i pity you, because your life will be monotonous. my friends who were with me heard me talking up mister donut for weeks, literally weeks, and when they had it, they were not disappointed. when you visit me and i take you to shanghai, i will gladly take you there to experience the amazingness for yourself.