Recently I went to dinner with some lovely ladies from Twin Cities Transplants (which is a story for another time) Among all of the advise that poured in my direction as the newest import to this city was the information that in Minneapolis is the fulfillment of my husband's dream-- a large Asian and other international food and goods market in a former Sears store! The combination of two of his loves was too much to resist and today we made our way down to the intersection of Lake and Chicago Avenues and explored the recesses of the second largest building in the state (in terms of leasable square footage-- obviously the Metrodome is bigger) second only to the Mall of America.

One of the more familiar restaurants was the Holy Land Deli's second location. The original is just up the street from us, and we were delighted to see just how well the owners are doing. They are also expanding their location near us into a nearby abandoned restaurant. There are also numerous clothing/jewelry/curio stores in the building that we were able to poke through and a store selling saris and belly-dancing outfits that has been made into bikinis. Jim said that he would buy me one for my birthday, at which time the owner stated that life is too short to worry about what people think about what you are wearing.

We also made a discovery in United Noodles that brought Jim back to his childhood. He found the very brand of dried mangoes that his "Sweetheart" (his godmother) would bring back from her annual trip to the Philippines. we are planning on buying some for us and some for Jim's mom.