Oh hello there, you caught me contemplating the universe and the sea.
Why yes I chose the most pretentious picture of me I could find, just so I can claim to be an artist when I go to some fancy bar and hopefully there's a discount for poor starving artists.
My name is Mou Zongxiao, a guy based in Singapore, and this is just a personal site for me to upload my better pictures and writings over the years.
Enjoy if you can.
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Oh, right. The website name.
What are Tongbas?
Imagine you are trekking through the Himalayan mountains and you finally settle in for the night.
By the gentle cracking fire, as the shadows grow long, as the plates are cleared and the stars come out, you lock eyes with your kind teahouse owner. The time for tea has passed. Give me some of your local stuff, you say to that rugged gentleman.
Up in the mountains, hard mountain stuff for hard mountain men.
He passes you a bamboo cylinder. It is filled with crushed fermented millet, and god, it smells like heartbreak. It goes down like gunshot. By the smile of the moon the roar of the silver river hunts your last waking thought like vapor into the night - this shit is so, so good.
What are Momos?
Momos are cute little things you find almost everywhere in the Asian mountains.
You can find thick oily ones darkly drenched in dusk, after an evening canoeing in Pokhara lake. You can find round juicy ones trembling in the cold shadow of ancient valleys, and beside a very dusty Kathmandu automobile shop, meaty ones drenched in a yogurty soup. That shit is so so good, so, so, good.
Now go get yourself some tongba and momos and enjoy the rest of this website, please and thank you.