U.S.B. (United States of Boba)

San Jose, Calif. - It's been almost a week since I left Shanghai, and one of the toughest parts about moving back has been knowing I can no longer cross the street for a quality $0.50 boba fix.

I've had boba twice since returning to the States, both of which were predictably anticlimactic. The first was at Quickly in Berkeley's Asian Ghetto - what we Cal students and alumni (omg I'm an alum! How depressing.) say when referring to the cluster of cheap, mostly Asian restaurants in Southside, less than a 5-minute walk from the UC Berkeley main gate. As most NorCal-ers know, Quickly is a cheap knockoff for real boba, mostly because it's so inexpensive ($0.59 for milk tea w/o boba, $1.19 w/ boba), we tend to excuse its mediocrity as a trade-off for price.

To be honest, I never really had a problem with Quickly, probably because I like my milk tea on the sweet side. Also, I like money, and I spend a lot less of it when I get boba from Quickly instead of some other boba place, which would charge around $2.50 for the same thing. You're probably thinking, "Okay, so you save $1.31, you bargain-hunting boba-boozer, who cares?" BUT consider this:

1. Well, first check out that alliteration. "Bargain-hunting boba-boozer," I feel, is one of my finer literary creations on this site, which should tell you a thing or two about the quality of writing here.
2. If you factor in just HOW MUCH boba I drink, $1.31 definitely adds up. If I spent $1.19 every time I drank boba (and there have been times I've shamefully spent more than $3...check past entries), I'd likely be able to afford all kinds of things, including some underhanded scheme to buy my way into being named CEO of some boba company.

Anyways, I'll be on the East Coast this week, so stay tuned to see what, if any, boba tricks New England's got up 'er sleeve.