Alberta Canola Field
Camrose, AB Canada
July 2011
27 July 2011
22 July 2011
十四 Shí Sì and Chinglish
This July Mr Johnson and I celebrated our 14th wedding anniversary.
In China the number 14 (十四) pronounced shí sì, is considered one of the unluckiest of numbers. In a language that delights itself in the auspicious and perhaps particularly in the suspicious, 十四 is considered especially bad!
The Chinese counting is a building system. If you can memorize the numbers to 10, you can get to nearly any number after it. The teen numbers are 10 + the number. The twenties are two tens + the number.
The word for 'four' (四 or sì) in Chinese sounds nearly identical to the word 'death' in Chinese. 'Ten' ( pronounced shí) sound similar to the word for certain.
Can you imagine the consequence? Ten + Four (Shí sì) sounds like 'certain death'.
As a result, elevators across the country of China lack floors 4 and 14 {and usually any number ending in four, including two/ten/four (24), three/ten/four (34) etc.} For good measure, they often omit the unlucky Western 13 as well, leaving a confusing array of numbers in the lift, usually stumping more that one foreign visitor, who quickly comes to learn the story of "death" and "certain death"
We were in St Joe, sandy and sunburned, with three kids in tow, on our actual 'certain death' anniversary date .... But we took advantage of grandparents and babysitters and celebrated in style, although somewhat belatedly, this week. (Our big girls are off galavanting in Western Canada with their maternal grands, and Bei Bei spent Monday and Tuesday in Indiana with her cousins and paternal grands)
Mr Johnson and I took advantage of our child free moments, spending
Monday Night (sweatily) dining alfresco at a local pub we'd been keen to try. (It was good, although next time we'd both pass on the 'Irish Nachos'http://www.finnegansirish.com/).andTuesday we made our way into the city where stopped by the patio @ Chicago 312 (I am keen to try to figure out the recipe for the rhubarb and beefeater combination I sipped pre-show http://www.312chicago.com).We then made our way over to the Goodman, where the run of David Henry Hwang's Chingish has been extended. The show lived up to its reviews! We enjoyed it immensely, and found that we followed much of the Mandarin dialouge -- although subtitles were available for the mostly mono-lingual audience. Chicago performances close at the end of the month, but it is moving on to Broadway ... be sure to see it if you get a chance!
Bei Bei and the even Blonder Johnsons
Bei Bei and her cousins were off on Monday to Indiana with the grands
to tour Fair Oaks Farms
to tour Fair Oaks Farms
where they visited the dairy and birthing barn and
sampled ice cream and dairy fresh cheese
{Check it out @ http://fofarms.com/en/visit_us/explore_the_dairy}
Bei Bei had a great time!
{Love her personalized 'Beatrice Font'}
21 July 2011
Summer Visitors ...
Last month,
we had the friends from Bean Town
we had the friends from Bean Town
This month, we had my sister from Canada
Love that these both of these guys
{Bean Town Pengyous and the Canadian Mei Mei}
are now just three hours away by plane, instead of 12 or 15.
{Three hours if United Airlines cooperates.}
{{United Airlines NEVER cooperates.}}
19 July 2011
My Sis ...
The Bonita Barista @ The Bungalow
(My one-kidneyed sister circa: spring 2011)
A little over six months ago my sister Becca donated one of her healthy kidneys to a co-worker {and friend} who needed one. Their company featured this extraordinary gift in a video. Copy and paste the link below into your browser, and Becca and Pam will be featured about half-way through.
It gives me goosebumps.
Every.
Time.
Below is the note the producer's of the piece sent when they gave them a sneak peek at their montage this spring.
Updates @ The Bungalow
Summer improvement projects are continuing at The Bungalow. And while distributing 12 yards of mulch for the landscaping, and 17 tons of limestone for the drive were DIY projects, we are leaving this one to the experts.
Ignatius and his crew arrived yesterday to begin updating the trim and shakes. They removed all the exterior (storm) windows, and pressure washed the areas that will be painted. (Which made occupants of the house feel a bit as though they were living inside of a car wash!)
Today the crew of four returned, on quite possibly the hottest day of the year, to paint and stain the areas they pressure washed, scraped, and caulked yesterday.
We, as many of you know, have an avid bird watcher/nature lover among our ranks. And, even though EHJ isn't here this week (she and MGJ flew to Canada on Sunday with their auntie, for a few days of fun ahead of the rest of us), Mr Johnson knew how important the patient momma mourning dove is to our bird girl. He asked the painting crew to mind the momma bird, and they were careful to do so. They removed the nest from it's perch under the soffit, placed in on the table by the pond, and then returned it to its original spot when they were done. (There was one white egg in the nest.) And do you know what? That momma came back!
The Promised Book Reports
It's been a summer of memoirs for the Tai Tai ...
with tales set on three different continents ...
with tales set on three different continents ...
My Korean Deli was a book I previewed first on Kindle. This spring I read the first chapter for free (a nice feature Kindle allows), and then I sourced it from our local library's inter-library loan program. (It didn't come as a big surprise to me that our Midwestern town wouldn't have a copy of this niche memoir. This is however the same, Midwestern town where our dry-cleaners is run by an enterprising Korean American couple who have confided that while they think public education in the US is close to abysmal, they think American universities are second to none. They also have been helpful in helping us track town Asian groceries, a Korean-style spa, and Japanese restaurant run by Koreans, that will make Korean food to order if you know to say, "Cindy from your church sent me." They've also invited us to their Sunday church service, but warned it would be in Korean, but that kids Sunday School is conducted Enlgish!)
The Saturday Big Tent ....
This book wouldn't be for everyone, but the author does a great job of describing the ins and outs of running a bodega in New York City. I loved the cultural angle of the WASP son-in-law's perception of a Korean American family. It wasn't a riveting read, it took me my full two weeks to read it, and I read other stuff in between, but solid writing and an honest telling of the challenges of their 'experiment in risking it all' made me glad I read it. (I'll have to see if Cindy has read it too.)
Okay, so maybe I didn't only read memoirs. This slim novel is the most recent in a series of endearing books that have been long-time favorites. This it the 12th book in Alexander McCall Smith's No. 1 Ladies Decective Agency books, which are set in present-day Botswana. The stories are simple, the sentiments endearing. If you are looking for good, light reading that will leave you with a feeling of good will toward humanity and with knowledge of another culture, consider picking up any of the books in this series.
I love how McCall Smith closes each of his books in this series. With a simple repeated phrase.
Africa
Africa Africa
Africa Africa Africa
Africa Africa
Africa
Twenty Chickens for a Saddle kept me in Africa. Kept me even in Botswana in fact! This is an absolutely remarkable memoir of Robyn Smith growing up in Botswana in the 1980s and 90s. Parented by a couple who lived off the grid and on the fringe, her childhood memories provide a remarkable account of homeschooling (bordering nearly on un-schooling), homeopathic medicine, bush planes and lots of encounters with wild animals (snakes, hippos, unruly ponies). I really can't say enough about this book. It offers a sad portrayal of AIDS slowly and quietly ravaging another African nation. It tells the story of unity and strength of a nation that was largely unaffected by the racism and racial divides that so plagued it's neighbor South Africa ... It describes a landscape that varies greatly in different parts of the country ... I'm passing it on to MGJ to read next.
My Foremost Good Fortune will now gain a worthy place in our China bookshelf along side the likes of Peter Hessler and Pearl S Buck. Conley tells the story of her moving to Beijing with her husband and sons, and later discovering she has breast cancer. I can so relate to her Beijing experiences. She does a great job describing life as an expat, the challenges and privileges and the chaos of living in a thriving city during the ramp up to the Olympics. I will probably refer more to this book later, but would recommend it to anyone who has ever lived abroad or is planning to.
Animal Vegetable Miracle: A Year of Food Life is not a new book. Kingsolver (yes the same Kingsolver who wrote The Poisinwood Bible) tells of the adventures of her family's one year experiment as locavores. The book is a group effort, with her daughter constructing menus and recipes based on what is available at different times of the year, and her husband writing companion pieces on the state of various industries, practices and codes in the Untied States.
The Kingsolver-Hopps moved back to their family property in Virginia, from Arizona, raised livestock and vegetables, harvested fruit and bought only locally produced goods for a full calendar year. Their book helps challenge thinking about food. (And when you consider both the volume of food consumed and the intense processing it undergoes in this country, it seems Americans aren't really doing enough thinking about their food.) We have so distorted our view of food and eating in the United States that doing what Kingsolvers did (which was ultimately done for the purpose of creating a book on the topic) seems as strange as packing up and moving to the other side of the globe. (Maybe that's why I loved it!)
Mr Johnson told me to stop fretting about what was in our freezer, as I read selections aloud, and contemplated twenty chickens of my own :-) If you read this book, you will never think of bananas or grocery-bought chicken in the same way. (Consider yourself warned)! You may reconsider buying strawberries in January, or may begin to consider the carbon footprint on a number of items in your deli.
But, to be fair, Kingsolver's book is not about being an alarmist. It's about thoughtfully considering the resources around you, the season for produce, and what fruits, and especially vegetables should really taste like. We have created food that is perfectly shaped, able to be shipped, and can last for weeks in your fridge. But we have given up taste, and the sweetness of limiting exposure to fruits and vegetables to their normal growing season. Nor, is her book about becoming elitist. To eat well, you don't have to pay alot. She drives this point home, many times throughout her treatise.
Now, go water your heirloom tomatoes!!
12 July 2011
Losing Face {again}
Last night Mr Johnson read an article on a number of projects The People's Republic of China is trying to push through/accomplish/finish before the 90th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party in what is now the PRC.
Of course, the British journal was highlighting the misses. The projects that had been rushed to meet a date, are not actually fully completed, or have failed completely. There was great risk in some of the projects. In others people have died.
In an attempt to gain face, the Chinese will probably end up losing some. (The ironic, Daoist ying and yang at play.)
The section that stood out to us was the project in our former home city of five years, Qingdao. QD recently "completed" the longest bridge in the world. Except, when they opened it earlier this summer, it might not have been fully lit, nor had all the safety measures in place.
(The bridge is over 26 miles long. Who would have thought safety measures where optional?)
Here's the paragraph on Qingdao:
In the northern city of Qingdao, engineers have resumed work on the world's longest sea bridge to fit it with the safety barriers and lighting that were not quite done when it was opened to the public, with some fanfare, ahead of the anniversary.
Here's a link to the entire article in The Telegraph:
----------------------------
This morning a long-term expat in QD posted on Facebook another unrelated article also sure to be face-losing for China. It dealt with water contamination. The bottled water that must be used for drinking and cooking has been found in Beijing to be tainted. (Tap water in China is almost never potable).
The Taipei Times reported:
Random market inspections found bacteria colonies in the water, the Beijing Administration for Industry and Commerce said on its Web site, citing a joint study with the capital’s product quality bureau.
“In order to prevent these substandard products from entering the distribution chain, the product quality bureau has taken measures to halt sales,” the administration said in a statement on Wednesday.
Tests on one brand of bottled water — Yiqun — found that bacteria levels were 9,000 times above safety standards, while those in Tianxing Special Water were 560 times higher, a report in the state-run Beijing Times said.
The tests were carried out on large barrels of water and did not include the smaller bottles of water normally bought in supermarkets, the report said.
Drinking the tainted water could lead to bouts of diarrhea, dizziness and vomiting, it added.
Part of the problems stemmed from quality controls at factories, including the failure to clean and sterilize water pipes, and replace and disinfect filters, the paper said.
Full article at the following link:
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2011/07/08/2003507723
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2011/07/08/2003507723
Links from this blog on former food safety scandals, losing face and life in China:
A Sad Story
The Tai Tai's Musings on 'Face'
Perspective
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)