Chinese New Year is upon us!

All the locals are gearing up for the most important time of the year--Lunar New Year!  They will be saying goodbye to the Year of the Tiger and hello to the 

Year of the Rabbit.

I've been practicing my 'Gong Xi Fa Cai!'  It literally means 'Wishing you good fortune in the new year.'  But people say it just like they would 'Happy New Year'.  My teacher said that people would really appreciate it if I said it to them, and that seems to be very true!  they are so nice here!  

Along with the saying, people usually give out a red envelope with money in it. The amount of money has to end with an even digit (lucky numbers) and odd numbers are associated with funerals. The red color is very prominent here as it symbolizes good luck and is supposed to ward off evil spirits.  I bought two of these envelopes for my teacher's daughters and put American dollars in them.  I wonder if they'll use them some day... :-)

In the next week or so, we are going to a lantern festival!  I'm so excited!  You write your wish for the new year of a piece of paper and put it in a red lantern.  Then people release the lanterns and they float away with your wish.

This is a picture of  a lantern festival:

 

I'll be sure to upload pictures of all the Chinese New Year festivities.  Stay tuned...

Nutty Carrot Fries?

Yes, please! I found a recipe for Nutty Carrot Fries and just had to make them myself! I loved it so much that I just had to share them with you!

I used smooth peanut butter (about 1.5 tbsp) with some EVOO (1tbsp) in a bowl and threw the carrots in the bowl to coat them.  Then I lined the baking sheet, sprinkled them with a bit of salt and into the 200degree Celsius oven they went.  I flipped them after 20 minutes and then baked them another 10minutes--they came out perfect.  SO YUMMY!!  You can also use parsnips.  I will definitely have to try those some day!

Here's a picture of Nutty Carrot and Parsnip Fries:

Taichung

I fell in love with Taichung as soon as I saw it!  I thought it was such a cool city and I'd love to visit again!  I spent my days walking around the city.  I am a firm believer that I experience the city better by walking than by riding a bike or scooter.  Here are a few pictures of my two days in Taichung:

The first day I needed to find a post office, but I found this temple first!

 Small canal

National Museum of Natural Science

Entry to the walkway up to the museum

Botanical Gardens

It's Year 100: Year of the Rabbit. There are rabbit displays and artwork everywhere.

 

I saw these ducks on the corner of the Art Museum!  They are made of wood, but they fooled me at first!  When I saw them I was already thinking about how I would get around them.  :)

Why are they giving this puppy beer?

This tree was so unique I just had to get a picture!

'Damn Sweet' Tea!

 Sun Cakes are famous in Taichung.  I had to get one with my afternoon tea.  It's a flaky pastry with a gooey middle. I just got the original flavor, but I picked up the brown sugar one for Aaron.  Yummy!

 

KTV

I uploaded some pictures today and realized I haven't shared my KTV pictures with you! I decided to make a collage for you:



This was my first KTV (karaoke) experience in Asia. We were celebrating a few birthdays (mine included!). We sang, danced, ate, and sang some more! I had no idea that people go to KTV in the middle of the day and stay until dinner. One of the ladies knew someone who worked at this KTV location and we had a VIP room and got free food! You can't beat that! :-)

At first I was a bit hesitant to sing, but everyone else was doing it, so I did too. I sang all the English songs they chose for me. Side note: Drinking would have improved both my singing. I might need to go back and try it again one evening.

Something to note about KTV in Taiwan--The songs tend to be sad and sappy Chinese songs. I really don't get that. I was leaning more toward singing Girls Just Wanna Have Fun, but sad love songs were most popular with the group.

Taichung

Thank you everyone for all the wonderful Birthday wishes, cards, and gifts!  I really appreciate your thoughtfulness!

I'm sorry I've been MIA this past week!  I don't really have a good excuse, except that I'm staying busy by exploring the city.  I met a girl from Nashville (of all places!) and we've been to a few new places in Tainan. It's cool that I'm now the person to show someone around town. AND helping with a bit of Chinese!! ;-)  After 2.5 months here, I'm happy that there is still so much to see and do.  Plus I still have the rest of the country to experience...yay! 

We are actually in Taichung right now.  Aaron had to come here for business, so I tagged along to see what Taichung has to offer.  I REALLY like it so far!  It's so different from Tainan, which was pretty surprising to me. Tainan was the old capital and is really known for its history, traditional food, and culture, whereas Taichung is a city with high rises, modern shops, ethnic food, large museums, and a night life.  :-)  Taichung is the 3rd largest city in Taiwan.

When I finish taking pictures tomorrow, I'll be sure to post them!

Mahjong

My homework from today's Chinese lesson is to study the Mahjong tiles. Chinese New Year is approaching and many families play this game together. I have only played the computer version, but it is quite different than the real deal. The best way to play is with 4 players. I'm sure Aaron will have all these pieces memorized in a few minutes so I need to start studying. I'll start with the numbers...
I hope I have them in the correct order! ;-)






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Weekend adventures

Aaron and I make it a point to visit a few attractions each weekend so we can take it all in during the 6 months we are here in Tainan. Here are a few pictures from this weekend's exploration.

We visited the Flower Garden Night Market. (花園夜市) It's the 'younger and more fashionable' night market in Tainan. It's also the largest and most popular one. It was difficult to move around because there were so many people!

Grilled Squid. The fried ones look yummy.

Here I am eating some Calamari on a stick- Yum! I asked for 'yoa yi dian' (a little bit) of spices and it was almost too spicy!

Food for the beloved Hot Pot meal.

Aaron's breakfast at BOA- Breakfast of America.

We took a break from the temples to play around in the park.

This is in every 7/11. I don't think it looks very appetizing and it definitely doesn't smell good either!

Aaron being silly.

My teacher told me that in addition to burning paper money for their ancestors, people also burn paper houses, cars, computers, etc. We walked by a shop where people were building and then selling these items.

Aren't you glad I didn't give you the same weekend recap as I'm giving my teacher Chinese tomorrow morning?


I'm not sure what's on next weekend's agenda, but I'll take as many pictures as possible!

Buddha-head fruit

We were gifted a basket full of Taiwanese fruits.  The most interesting was this Buddha-head fruit!  They say that these custard apples resembles the Head of Buddha.  What do you think?

You can test the ripeness of the fruit by giving it a bit of a squeeze.  When it's ripe, it will have a little give.  The first few days we had it it was so hard!  Then today, I went to pick it up and it was so soft!  I didn't even need a knife to cut it open!

Here is the inside of the fruit:

There are black seeds in the middle (you don't eat those!).  It's a very sweet and juicy fruit.  My teacher said that it's so sugary that if you eat too many of them you'll get fat!

While I'm posting pictures, here's a picture of my snack today:

CocoPop topped with a little bit of Nutella and slices of banana--YUMMY!

One more picture of the party

Corning Gorilla Glass video

New Year's Celebrations

Happy New Year!!


This is a picture of our neighborhood's power outage. The street lights, Starbucks, and bookstore across the street lost power for over an hour. Our elevator wasn't working and we realized we didn't have any candles and it got dark quick! One hour felt like forever!

This is a picture of "Bio Papper Spray"! haha! It was in a taxi I took yesterday and I just had to take a picture of the misspelling and the crazy looking bad guy on the packaging. :-)

New Year's Day Celebrations

We invited Aaron's colleagues over to celebrate the New Year with us. We grilled burgers and BBQ chicken and had yummy appetizers and pasta salad.  Unfortunately the grill's propane tank was so much smaller than in the US, and we actually ran out of gas in the middle of grilling the burgers!!  What a disaster!  We had to finish the burgers in the kitchen.  They all tasted yummy, so that's all that mattered. We had a really nice time with everyone and their families. Here are some pictures from our party:

This is Anita, her daughter Addison, and Bettie's son Kaiser.

This is Bettie, our real estate agent, and her friend Yuki, an English teacher.

This is Aaron's coworker Eric, Eric's son Benny, and his wife.

 This is Aaron's coworker Alvin.

 This is Aaron's coworker Bryan and his wife Amy.  They are expecting a baby boy in March!

This is Aaron's coworker Anita, her husband Champion, and daughter Addison.

Aaron really enjoyed his cheeseburger!

Benny ate Doritos with chopsticks!!!  LOL

I just had to include to more pictures of Addison and Kaiser--too cute!

I hope everyone had a wonderful 2010 (I know we did!) and here's to an even better 2011! 

It's going to be the year of the Rabbit in February so we'll have another celebration then.  YAY!