Cute cute cute….mini panda pillow by mymimi, available at ShanaLogic. Each pillow is 7″ x 7″, perfect to decorate any little kiddie’s room. My other favorites include a cute little owl and the mini Geisha. Thinking of that, we have a birthday party coming up for an eight year old girl, this will make a perfect gift!
Zongzi – 粽子 – zòng zi
Zongzi is a traditional Chinese food made of glutinous rice stuffed with different fillings and wrapped in bamboo or reed leaves. They are cooked by steaming or boiling. Just like moon cake and most other Chinese food, there are different versions of Zongzi, and there are different versions of eating Zongzi. Fillings vary from mung beans, red bean paste, Chinese sausage, salted pork, salted duck egg, to chicken, and taro. I like to eat mine dipped in sugar, while other people may eat it plain. My husband likes it with soy sauce.
Zongzi is traditionally eaten during the Dragon Boat Festival. However, it is a favorite of lots of people, so you can see them in the Dim Sum carts too when you go to Chinatown.
I’ve recently brought one over to my Venezuelan friend’s for her to try. She loved it. It reminded her of the Hallaca, a traditional Venezuela dish that she loves growing up. That was pretty funny. I have two pictures here of Zongzi and Hallaca, can you tell or guess which one is which?
Tomorrow, June 16th, is one of the Chinese holiday called Dragon Boat Festival. The actual lunar date is May 5th. When I was little, this holiday consisted of 4 things for me: No school, Dragon Boat race (super boring watching it on TV, sorry, it wasn’t that exciting for a 10 year old girl), eat Zong-zi (sweet rice mixed with meat wrapped in Bamboo leaves), and taking a bath at noon. The day will then ends with a nice dinner, with everyone in the family gathered around.
A few things you should know about the Dragon Boat Festival. 1)This Dragon Boat festival is to memorializes the Chinese patriotic poet Chiu Yuan 
(340 BC-278 BC or 343-290 B.C.), who committed suicide by jumping into the river after tying himself with big rock on the 5th day of the 5th lunar month. He was loved by the people at that time, and many fishermen tried to rescue him but his body was never found. Then the people threw food into the river to feed the fish, so that the fish wouldn’t eat Chiu Yuan. The people then splashed the water with their paddles and beat the drums loudly to try to scare the fish away. Yes, you got it. That is exactly how the Zong-zi and the Dragon Boat come from.
Now the Dragon Boat race becomes an international sport. So whoever and whatever you are, raise your cups and give yourself some Dragon Boat spirit.
Ice Cream Bar – 雪糕 – xuě gāo
Chinese language is very interesting, as many of you already know. These two characters, if translated separately, means snow and cake respectly. In addition, Ice cream, is known as 冰淇淋, bīng qí lín, totally different from ice cream bar, or 雪糕.
Anyway, I found these adorable 雪糕 from H Mart, a local Korean grocery store. These 雪糕 have the shapes of a panda, almost too cute to eat! There are also many different flavors of 雪糕, including green tea, red bean, green bean, taro, in addition to the traditional vanilla and chocalate flavors.
My favorite flavor as a child is red bean, what’s yours?
Check this out! A Qing Dynasty table clock was sold for $3.8M at a Sotheby’s auction this week. This auction was held at the country estate of Patricia Kluge in Charlottesville.
The clock, one of the top showcase pieces sold Tuesday for a price more than triple the $1 million estimated top value after a heated telephone bidding session. A Chinese collector jumped in with an offer of $1.2 million for the nearly 200-year-old gilt-brass-and-enamel timepiece, then cast the winning bid of $3.78 million several minutes later.
This clock was dated back in the Qing Dynasty (1736-1795). It’s definitely a masterpiece, I wonder what it would look like in my dining room…… 
A good friend of mine got married a couple of weeks ago. It was a beautiful wedding on a beautiful sunny day, and I was very honored to be in the bridal party. She had a semi-traditional Chinese wedding, as her husband is not Chinese. One of my favorite Chinese wedding tradition is the Tea Ceremony. This is when the bride and the groom serve tea to the elders and show their respect, it is also a chance for the elders to give their good wishes to the newlyweds. I don’t want to risk not explaining it right. Here’s a good explanation of what I found on The Chinese Historical and Cultural Project.
On the wedding day, the bride serves tea (holding the teacup with both hands) to her parents at home before the groom arrives. She does this out of respect and to thank her parents for raising her. The tea at this time does not need to have the lotus seeds or dates, and the bride does not need the assistance of a “lucky woman.” She pours and serves the tea by herself without the groom.
Traditionally, after the wedding ceremony, the newlyweds serve tea (holding the teacups with both hands), inviting the groom’s elders to drink tea by addressing them by formal title, e.g. first uncle or third aunt.
The general rule is to have the woman on the left side and the man on the right side. The people being served will sit in chairs, while the bride and groom kneel. For example, when the newlyweds serve tea to the groom’s parents, the bride would kneel in front of her father-in-law, while the groom would kneels in front of his mother.
The newlyweds serve tea in order, starting with the groom’s parents then proceeding from the oldest family members to the youngest, e.g. the groom’s parents, then his paternal grandparents, then his maternal grandparents, then his oldest uncles and aunts, and all the way to his older brother.
In return, the newlyweds receive lucky red envelopes (“lai see,” which means “lucky”) stuffed with money or jewelry. The helpers, who are usually women blessed with a happy marriage or wealth and chosen by the fortune teller or bride’s mother, also get lucky red envelopes stuffed with money from those being served. These envelopes are placed on the platter which holds the teacups.
Weekend - 週末 – zhōu mò
I love weekends! Especially weekends during the summer season. The days are much longer and the weather is warm, it allows me to spend lots of outdoor time with the family. In our family, we also like to take little weekend trips to just get away. Recently, we went up to the Berkshires with some friends and took the kids bike riding. It was so much fun we hope to do it again soon.
Alright, I never thought that I would ever write anything about football or NFL, but I am weeping with joy about Ed Wang. He is the first Chinese American football player ever been drafted into the NFL. He is going to be playing for the Bills.
Ed Wang was born in the States, but both his parents were born and raised in China. Both are former Chinese Olympians, his dad was a high-jumper, and his mom was a hurdler. There you have it, Ed Wang is over 300 lbs, and 6′5″. No, this is not a joke and it is not a typo. Click here to listen to an interview with him.
I was very fortunate to get to talk (well, cyber chat)to one of our customers. She is a VERY dedicated mom, and my hats off for her. She works full time with a very demanding job, and she is dedicated in immersing her child with fun and educational materials, starting at a very young age.
She uses a couple of tools to teach her child Chinese, speaking and also recognizing the characters. One of the tools she uses and loves is the Baby Learns Chinese DVDs. She is teaching her child traditional Chinese characters, and she is always on the lookout for good materials. When she finds good materials available in Simplified Chinese, she would reach out to the publishers about their traditional character versions. She had painstakingly printed out the traditional characters on sticker paper and stick them onto the pages of some simplified Chinese books she found. Did I already told you that she is dedicated?
Her little girl in this video is only 15 month old. She is able to recognize Chinese characters!!! At 15 months old! Plus, she is sooo cute and adorable. Be prepare to say “Wow”!
