Well,harukimurakami
As a fan of Dai food, I don't think it is the hygiene of the restaurant you went caused diarrhea, but is the special ingredients of Dai food. As I know a kind of extremely spicy chilli(Chinese call it 小米辣xiaomila) will be mostly added into dishes, which is also the glamour of Dai food exists. But unfortunately most people's stomachs can hardly bear 小米辣 and that's probably the reason you got diarrhea.

Me and Patchi and friends have actually started a blog dedicated to this very subject. It's brand new so there aren't that many posts as of yet, but anyhow, it's found here in it's full glory: kunmingsshabbiest.blog.se/

personally I love "freedom hotpot" all you can eat and drink, super low price, just don't go if you have to work for the next day or two.

Barbara

If the food sucks it sucks. Has nothing to do with anything else in the big picture of life. And when the food sucks and you pay more in American dollars than you would back in the US than you know you are simply being scammed and there is no reason anybody should have to jump for joy over that. I would happy if I could find decent Chinese food here actually.

This is not just the opinion of a "Negative Nancy" (what a gay term) lao wai, but it is also the opinion of many Chinese people who come to Kunming as well. The food sucks. The service is so bad as to be legendary across all of China and it is expensive. Meaning a rip off. Exploitation.

I went to a now closed Italian Restaurant on Wenlin Jie once and on the menu it had casserole. It said vegetable casserole for 28 RMB. I know what a casserole is. And it is not a little tiny bowl of soup. Total scam. They just look on the Internet for western terms and put it on a menu and screw the customer over and they don't care if the customer ever comes back.

Another example (I am many): Chili cheese fries. A place on Wenhua Xiang (also now closed and good riddance) had chili cheese fries for about the same price as the casserole on their menu. You think I am unreasonable. A grump. I do not expect it to be something from Denny's or Shoney's. But you knwo what I got? Fries fries and a bowl of ketchup. I complained and the waitress is all mute and confused and told my wife and I that that is how the cook makes it.

So maybe some people here are saying "oh buck up! come on! If you don't like it leave, find some other hell hole with worse food and worse service and more intestinal distress and liquid poop and no medicine to treat it with!" Every complaint I made here is not just an opinion, it is backed up by one expensive and tasteless experience after another. I may use hyperbole but I have not embellished anything.

By the way, this blog is great:

kunmingsshabbiest.blog.se/

I believe the gist here is that customers should articulate their complaints over the pricing and quality of products offered in Kunming. But in the big scheme of things, it may be healthy to take a look at what is going on at the macro level. Yunnan is a third tier province. People like yourselves are driving its development through a want of higher standards. However, it should be noted that these pressures will also affect factors such as pricing and mentality. The novelty of Kunming as a quaint town (with its flaws that are continually being chastised) will change with more opinions voiced, and we are already seeing that the majority are voicing their opinions — truly for the individuals betterment or not is the interesting outcome to watch for. Quality may increase but at what cost? Service may improve but for what customer segment? It really is interesting to chart Kunming's development.

LouieK

The day I can get an apple pie at McDonalds in KM, and not just green pea pie or taro root (barf) I will return here and announce I am a changed man. I don't think think I am sitting the bar too high.

If you had the purchasing power to affect the market, I would be grateful as well. I also like the traditional apple pie. But I can make do with the pineapple, however. Give it a go. :)

@BillDan
I would kill for a taro pie in any mainland USA MickeyD (Hawaii got them 4sale). Apple pie is so 1900's. That being said, I would buy apple pies here, since I can't get them. Crave what you can't have.

I've got a JiaHua fruit pizza with your name on it BillDan.

I'm not sure what kind of "fine dining" experiences customers are used to back home, but I've been perfectly content with most of the western food in Kunming, with the exception of Momma Teresa's on Wenlin Jie. For a restaurant that supposedly specializes in pizza, they have done a really horrible job. Awful, tasteless thick-crusted pizza (ughh!!) rather than the crispy thin-crust which most people seem to prefer these days at prices higher than the French Cafe and the Prague Cafe and A Slice of Heaven, all of which dish out quite decent pizza at a better price!

As for the service in restaurants, yeah it's not that great...but right now I'd rather not receive too much unwanted attention from people who are employed merely to take my order, serve my food and take my money. As long as they manage to do all these things right, it's fine (and there's nothing worse than someone interrupting me when I'm in a restaurant talking with the friend(s) I am with and enjoying my food). Also, it's perfectly fine to click your fingers or shout out "waitress" in Chinese to grab the attention of a waitress and they will always happily come to serve you, try doing that in the west, haha...

Fruit Pizza! My God. It is the end of civilization as we know it.