Phew! School sorted

Daddy and I took half a day off to take Changunnie to school assessment at an English Kindergarten. It is one of the four kindergarten for a network of English Schools. Whilst there's no guarantee of placement at one of the network's primary school, you do get priority if you attended the network's kindergarten and first language isn't Chinese.

Knowing Changunnie is Ms Opposite Froggie (Chung Gae Goo Ri in Korean, the story goes: little froggie that always says the opposite to what mummy froggie said. When mummy froggie was really sick, mummy froggie told little froggie to bury her in the river, thinking little froggie would do the exact opposite and bury mummy froggie in the mountain, the preferred burial ground. When mummy froggie died, little froggie thought he would do what mummy froggie told him to do for once and buried mummy froggie in the river.... So, when little froggie found out, he became really sad and cried whenever it rained), we didn't say anything about the assessment. We told her that it's a playdates with old friends and new friends at a big playground.

It all went well when she got to the school and she was hanging out with everyone and when she met kids from her pre-school, she ran up to hold their hands. Just when we were very happy with our little scheme, it backfired. Couple of her friends were done with the assessment at an earlier time slot and Changunnie decided that since it was a playdate, she should hang out with everyone instead of going into the classroom. Daddy was at the presentation and I tried everything I could to get Changunnie into the classroom but to no avail. To make it worse, a little boy arrived for a session after Changunnie's. The two got along so well that he too decided to hang out by the sand box! The other mother was more prepared and managed to ask a teacher to come out to check them out for the assessment (I think they have been to other assessments).

When we left, I was very convinced that we had to send couple more applications for other schools. Then the letter arrived on Saturday that Changunnie got in. Phew! One less thing to worry about

Comfort Food - big lotus seed paste bun

I don't have an old Teddy bear without an eye or a square of what was a blanket. Whenever I go through a tough time, I think of those old style lotus seed paste bun.

Before my mum passed away, she would take me to a dim sum restaurant in the neighbourhood. It wasn't a fancy place but it was my day out to see the world outside of our home and I knew if I behaved, I would get my lotus seed paste bun. The bun that I remember was about the size of two fists together. So big that the restaurant steamed 12 of them in a big bamboo basket and the old lady put the bun on a saucer to serve. The bread was soft. The lotus seed paste was like soft butter and wasn't overly sweet but I could taste the lotus seed in my mouth even after chowing down the bun. Steam came out and blurred my vision when I cracked open the bun to find the duck egg yolk inside. The bun was warm and so was the way I felt. I felt like the most fortunate person in the world, with a warm bun in my hand, sitting next to my mother.

It all stopped when my mum passed away. My father stopped cooking all the special dishes and we didn't go for dim sum that much. Each time we went, I wanted my bun.

I know that if I'm upset about something, I can get a bun and I could feel the comfort of having my mother by my side.

Buns these days don't taste the same as the ones I remember. I'm going to go to different places to try out the buns and I'll record each tasting in search of my perfect bun and to relive the moment I had with my mother

A new year resolution

I know I'm slow to talk about new year resolution in the second week but hey! It's better be late than sorry.

It all started with a wonderful galette des rois that my french colleague shared with us. He told us about the history and brought two galette to demonstrate the difference in different region. That got me into my Chinese mode and I want to cook according to the twenty four dates in the Chinese Lunar calendar (二十四氣節). There's already certain things that you eat according to traditions but that also means the use of some medicinal herbs that isn't that easy to find/handle. So, my to do list this year

- study the lunar calendar and get a better understanding of how it works and what it means

- study the 本草綱目 to learn about the characteristic of food/herbs and the effect on human

- come up with a menu for each day and try to cook at least some of the dishes

Bring your passport the next time you go to Yuen Long

We took Changunnie and Bear to join some friends for food crawl and photo shoot in Yuen Long. We were pretty well prepared for Bear's first outing since he completed his vaccination. Got a big piece of bone the night before (It's a Jamon Iberico!), cleaned the cage, packed the bowl, lunch, water...etc. In fact, we almost forgot to pack Changunnie's bag. It was quite easy to get to Yuen Long and the eating began. Changunnie wasn't impressed by the look of egg noodle toasted with shrimp roe but one bite of it (and I think it was also the taste of lard), there was no turning back. Every chopstickful of noodle went to her mouth instead of mine.

Next, we got Chinese pastry from a local bakery. It was different from the more famous Yuen Long bakery (which made its footprint all over Hong Kong). The winter melon and sugar filling was soft, fragrant, moist without being overly gluey. The answer is 30% lard. No wonder Yuen Long was the key farming settlement and supported all of Hong Kong for a long time. No one in the city would dare to use lard anymore. Changunnie of course had couple bites of my cake. (I will find the shortest way to go back for some takeout!)

It wasn't easy to drag a puppy and a toddler around town but we made it to the small shop for some beef brisket. The variety was impressive but the food a little too salty. I couldn't taste if the radish had the sweetness only found in the Winter. The good thing was we were able to feed Bear as there's a table outside of the shop by a small resting area under a tree.

After that, we went over to a Chinese restaurant for some Chinese steamed cake. It was nice and soft and I wouldn't ask if there was any lark in it. We then set off to look for cholesterol sandwich (Gold Coin Chicken... http://chi-he-wan-le.blogspot.com/2009/12/going-for-gold.html ) but didn't find it and so we settled for ice-cream from Arce Dairy from the Philippines. Despite the funny sounding name, the ice-cream was very rich and the Ube Supreme and Maize were fantastic. At that point, we were driving to the wetland for the photo shooting session and so everyone except the driver and co-driver happily dug in. At a red light, I tried to pass the tin to the front for the co-driver and a little hand pulled my arm back with a not too little voice saying "My ice-cream!"

A bumpy ride through the fish ponds and we got to the border. Without knowing better, we drove along despite people gave us the "these people gotta be brain dead" look along the way. It turned out that we drove into the restricted area (close to the Chinese border and if it's not the restricted area, what is? Duh!) without a permit which, not being a local, would not be possible for us anyway. A police patrol car came by and asked us why we drove to the area. It was a bit tense at first as it could have been a traffic AND criminal offense. When the policeman found out we drove in from the pond side, we earned respect and he just urged us to leave asap.

It was a fun day and I want to go out more with Changunnie and Bear. Next time though, I need to make sure Bear is better trained as he almost shot into a Chinese cured meat shop when he smelled the cured duck!

Back to school

I remember the day I received my diploma. I was happy that I could move on to the next stage, just like when you were nine, you eagerly waited for your tenth birthday so that your age became double digit. I was in my new home in Boston by mid afternoon on the day of the commencement and I thought that marked the end of school life and the beginning of my life as a working adult. My working life didn't really have anything to do with school in the first 10 years or so. When everyone was talking about going back to school to get an MBA, I was like "They gotta be crazy!"

Just when I was totally convinced that I didn't have to deal with schools anymore. I got thrown back into the whole school scene again and I was shocked.

Changunnie will be turning three in about a month. In Hong Kong, it means she can go to K1 in September this year. Schools don't go knock on your door to offer you a place. In fact, parents are supposed to run around like headless chicken, read up all the "About Our School" and "Our Philosophy" on each school's website and write long winded essays to talk about how great their children are. We have done round 1 for those schools that accept kids below age 4 to start K1 and we will need to do it again for schools that only accept kids who turned 4 when the start K1 in couple months. I thought the tough part was done. I was so wrong about it.

The first school (let's just call it the Pretzel School) held a parents information day yesterday morning. It's a school that takes in about 60 kids each year and about 75% go there with a corporate debenture. We got to the school hall about 10 minutes late but there were over 300 parents already. The presentation had already started but I managed to get the key message "Your children will be assessed based on how good their English is. We need to work with children who can understand us. Parents are strongly recommended to speak to your children in English in the next few weeks leading up to the assessment day. You should read story with them." So, it'll be bootcamp for Changunnie in the next few weeks. If there's a language problem at home, it's not her English but rather her reluctance to use any non-English language. What do they want from kids who are barely 3? Are they supposed to play scrabbles and know how to score higher points by using double word and triple word? Or they should be so evolved that they need to know how to block someone from using double word in the last round??

Parents were very enthusiastic during the Q&A session and everyone got a question except us. The only thing I wanted to ask was whether there's enough sports facility for the kids as the school will operate on other premises in the new few years due to renovation of the campus. And I wasn't exactly thrilled at the 7:30am - 12:30 pm schedule. It means Changunnie has to wake up at 5:30 every day for school.

There will be an assessment in March and we will also be there to meet the teachers. I just have a strong feeling that it will be a Curb Your Enthusiasm episode....

An eye for an eye

Remember I talked about the break-in attempts in the neighbourhood? The weirdest thing happened to us on New Year's Day.

We may not have the entire family at home on that day but we definitely have at least one person around at any point of time and it was full house at night as we cooked at home. We were very surprised to find out the heavy plastic canopy we use to protect our chili pepper plant went missing on Jan 2.

It is crucial to protect the little white flowers on a chili pepper plant in order to harvest chili pepper. In our case, we were especially careful with the Jalapeno as the first two trials failed and we went from scratch (seeds were stored in the fridge, many early mornings to check if there is any seedlings in the flower bed...etc). When the flowers appeared, we were ecstatic. Not only it was the first success, it meant we would have a reliable supply of Jalapeno. It's not easy to buy fresh good ones in Hong Kong!

In order to protect the precious flowers from rain, strong wind and bugs, we spent hours looking for big strong plastic sheets that we can use to make a canopy.

Then, on Jan 2, the biggest sheet above the chili pepper plants went missing. The Knots of the strings to the lamp post were undone. There were evidence that whoever borrowed the plasic sheets tried to take the sheets for the other flower racks but found it too difficult and gave up half way through. We went to the refuse collection station. Interviewed everyone at home and at the management office and finally found the cleaning lady who gave us the most clue. She saw the sheet in front of our garage and looked dirty. So, she threw it away with the other rubbish.

The cleaning lady said the sheet must have been blown away from the roof top. Ok, the sheet is the thick clear plastic type. Given the size ( 25 ft across and 10 ft wide), it would be at least 20 lbs. Unless you flip it, it's not something that "floats". Plus with the knots undone??

Someone must have borrowed it for reason unknown and decided to chuck it in front of our house after his/her deed was done. I was angry because it was a clear intrusion and if that person really needed to use the sheet, it' very easy to ring the door bell.

I looked at my Jalapeno and decided if I ever find out who did it, I'll make sure that person will have some thing being pulled away from his/her body just like how the white flowers got tormented by the wind a rain!

Food and More Food

When I say everyone in our family loves food, I mean we care about what we eat and we are always willing to learn more about our food. Min, an accomplished amateur cook, was with us for the Christmas/New Year week and we had lots of cooking sessions and interesting discussions.

As a Christmas present, Min bought me a copy of The Omnivore's Dilemma (by Michael Pollan). The author wrote about corn in our diet, whether products with the organic label really follow real organic farming theory and the meal that uses only local produce (hunted, gathered or grown by the author himself). I have not finished reading but would be very interested to read about the Organic farming part.

We experimented with various ways to cook our food. We came up with two versions of macaroni and cheese. And we had two roast days! Cookies baked, vanilla french toast served... I can still taste the steak with blue cheese melt in my mouth.

We spent a long time to analyse the diet for Bear, the family dog. What he can eat and what he should eat. Where to get the bone for him to chew on. I gotta make sure there's NO onion or grapes in Bear's dish.

And of course we went out to restaurants to try out food that are not easy to re-create at home.

Everyone at home got REALLY upset when one of the protective rain gear we made for the chili pepper plants was "borrowed" by someone else (and later left on the driveway and the cleaning lady put it in the trash collection station). We didn't care about the cost and time to remake the rain gear. We worried about the rain killing the budding chili plants! One of them is a Jalapeno and took us two trials to have fruit!

If there is one thing that makes everyone at home happy and united, it is food. We don't need to go to expensive restaurants at all. We just want to know where our food is form, how it is prepared, when is the best time to eat and how to improve the taste and texture.

I feel sad when I see people paying a premium to stuff their face with sub-par food. Just remember one thing, the amount of food we can take is subject to our metabolic rate. Some people may have a bigger appetite than the others but there is a limit. Why be stupid in using such precious quota???

My kid vs your kid

We didn't go anywhere this Christmas and New Year. Partly because both Daddy and I stayed back whilst the rest of the team took time off, partly because we have relatives visiting Hong Kong.

Min (Daddy's younger sister) stopped by Hong Kong for a week on her way to Seoul for her research (the difference between a banker's business trip and that of a professor? Bankers travel for "important" meetings which are dominated by unsubstantial conversations that no one would remember after a week whilst Professors talk to real people about their specific field and publish paper afterwards). Hyunjo, Daddy's cousin's youngest Daughter (11 year old) also came here to spend time with us (read Changunnie!) It was nice to see them both. It's been a long time since Min's last visit and it was Hyunjo's first time to Hong Kong (as an accompanied minor which was pretty impressive). Lots of plans were made but we ended up staying home a lot because of the awful weather. Well, no 12 inches snow but it was rainy and cold and killed any incentive to leave the front gate.

Anyway, we ended up spending lots of time at home and that really got me thinking about how to deal with children, especially someone else's children.

Those of you who have children would understand it. So long as the child is yours, you will not see any flaw in him/her. You can be holding a wrinkly monkey-like child and still call him/her the most beautiful angel because he/she is your child. Parents are pretty blind when it comes to anything about their own flesh and blood. I am sure there are times when I talk about nothing but how wonderful my Changunnie is in front of other people. To make it worse, parents can get competitive and be critical at other children (thus, I won't be surprise if I am labelled as a Smug Parent!)

Hyunjo was a joyous girl when I first met her as a toddler. She was outgoing and loved dancing and singing. This time, she was still playful when she was with Changunnie but was very quiet when she was with us. With two children around, there were times when it could be a little rough and instinctively, I tried to protect Changunnie. There were also couple times when I got critical about her eating habit (preference of chocolate over other healthier snack), TV marathon (Is Ben 10 really such a must watch show?) and desire to go to DisneyLand (ok, I am quite against all things Disney...)

Children are very sensitive little human beings. They can smell fear and bias from miles away. I kept reminding myself not to appear to be Changunnie-biased in front of Hyunjo but I am not sure if I was that successful. Hyunjo is still a young girl and has the potentially to grow into a wonderful person. Did I kill her desire to reach out?

It is not an easy thing to do but I gotta learn to help other children as well as my own to grow into a happy and healthy person. A little encouragement here and there, a supportive word when there is a job well done mean a lot to children. And it is also important for Changunnie. She has to realize she is not the centre of the world. Otherwise, she will suffer from princess syndrome as a grown up.