Happy "Moooo" Year

Gong Xi Fa Cai! Today is the first day of Chinese New Year, which farewelled the Year of the Rat and welcomed in the Year of the Ox. For Chinese people in New Zealand, especially in Auckland, Chinese New Year coincided with Auckland Anniversary Day, a public holiday for Aucklanders. So on New Years Eve, which is Sunday 25th January, Chinese people can stay up as late as they want and party the night away, or, more precisely, welcome in the new year.

The usual routine for me on Chinese New Year is to get together with family, and have a big feast on good Chinese cuisine. Red packets are also given out to the young ones, mostly containing an amount of money. I'm glad to say that I still benefit from receiving red packets from my grandma and a few of my uncles and aunties.

But not anymore! Since I moved to the UK, what can I do for Chinese New Year? No family to celebrate it with, no friends close by to hang out with - it seemed like a pretty quiet, even depressing, one for me. Especially coming from a person who is truly westernised. And worst of all, no red packets! This would probably be the first Chinese New Year where I have not received a single red packet!

I looked up the Internet to see what was going on in London on Chinese New Years Eve. Unfortunately there were no shows or performances happening on Sunday 25th, and quite rightly so. The proper tradition on New Years Eve is to feast with the family. And I had to be reminded about that too (thanks Conny). I guess it shows that I'm far too westernised to even know what exactly goes on during Chinese New Year.

So where does that leave me? There were no shows to watch, no family to feast with, no friends to hang out with, it seemed like it was going to be dull one.

It was anything but.

To put Chinese New Year aside, one of the things that I resolved to do each and every year was to learn how to cook properly. I'm not talking about boiling rice, eggs, or instant noodles. I'm talking about making proper meals for two or more people, and with a bit of style thrown in, a la Gordon Ramsay, Peter Gordon and the Naked Chef himself. Back in New Zealand, I was still living with my parents, so obviously they did most (okay, nearly all) of the cooking in the house. But now that I'm living on my own, I have had to resurrect those dormant cooking skills that I picked up in Form 1 primary school, and those useful bits of cooking information imparted by my folks. It was mostly just "watch and learn", and I'd usually just stand in the kitchen looking really dumb and confused.

In the first few weeks of living on my own here in the UK, I usually ate a microwave meal, or something simple, like instant noodles, boiled rice, a fried egg, etc. But even 10 year olds can do that. And it's not exactly healthy either. So if I was living on that stuff since the day I arrived in the country, what are the chances I could prepare a reasonable Chinese meal, fit for consumption on Chinese New Years Eve and look just as good, if not better, than the stuff I used to eat at home? The immediate answer would be no chance.

But it appears that I managed to prove myself wrong. Since I knew I was going to stay at home on Chinese New Year, I resolved to cook a Chinese feast. On the day before Chinese New Years Eve, I went to the local Morrisons supermarket to buy ingredients. It's amazing what you can find if you open your eyes in supermarkets a little more. I managed to find an entire section just for Chinese food. Soy sauce, hoisin sauce, oyster sauce, rice wine, black bean sauce, and a plethora of other cooking ingredients to add a taste of China to your meal. I also purchased rice, noodles, chicken, pork and vegetables. All up, it cost me around £60, but this round of shopping will last me for a long time, except for the meat, which obviously has to be consumed quickly. Plus I bought a few other items, not related to Chinese New Year.

So, using these acquired ingredients, I decided to cook a typical Chinese meal: boiled rice, stir-fry prawn noodles, stir-fry long beans with pork mince, and stir-fry satay chicken with snow peas. But what good is this big meal if you have no family or friends to help you eat it? Well Tina, my German housemate, was around. The day before, I explained to her about Chinese New Year, and that I was going to cook a big meal. She seemed indifferent. Rather than "this is great, I can't wait for your cooking", it seemed like "we'll see what happens, and if I'm in, I'm in... and if I'm not, then I'm not". When she got home just as I was starting to cook, I asked her "are you hungry?" She replied in a confused tone "I don't know". That's a good sign that my food is going to be eaten, at least it wasn't a flat-out "no"!

So I got to work in the kitchen, while Tina waited in the lounge, probably worrying what I was going to toss out of the frying pan. After a while in the kitchen, I presented the feast on the coffee table. And she actually helped herself, and managed to sample each and every dish. And she gave a positive complement as well. Both of us haven't got sick yet, so that's a good sign too.

We discussed more about Chinese New Year. In particular, I explained that noodles appear in all Chinese New Year feasts as they represent longevity, and that I wished her a long life and a prosperous Year of the Ox with many happy returns. Grateful, she returned the complement as well.

So what have I learned? To coin a phrase from Back to the Future, if you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything. To go from cooking the basics to cooking a nice Chinese meal, even for two or more people, is a remarkable achievement for someone who hasn't much cooking experience. It was fun, it was quick, and it was very easy to do. Even I didn't know how easy it was before I tried.

I also learned a bit more about Chinese New Year. When I was in New Zealand, I took the occasion for granted. I saw it as a time to have a big feed with family and get a red packet from my relatives. But I didn't really know the meaning behind it all. Now that I don't have any family here to celebrate it with, I had to do it all on my own. I had to read a little bit about the occasion to see what it is all about, the symbolism behind it all, even the type of food that is normally served at a Chinese New Year feast. I'm glad I dished out the noodles. I wanted to do spring rolls as well, but that was going a bit too far.

And finally, I managed to take one step in resolving one of my goals that I've set time and time again, but never getting around to it - learning to cook proper meals. Hopefully with this end result, I can expand on this, perhaps even create a portfolio of dishes complete with photos.

Actually I've already started this. For those who would like to see this feast, here are the following photos.

The raw ingredients used to make the feast. Beans, snow peas, rice, noodles, king prawns, chicken and pork mince. Rice for the boiled rice (obviously), noodles and prawns for the stir-fry prawn noodles, chicken and snow peas for the satay chicken, and pork mince and beans for the stir-fry beans.

The finished result. Delicious! Gordon Ramsay, Peter Gordon and the Naked Chef would be proud. Watch out for a new celebrity chef near you.

To close, this Chinese New Year was different without the togetherness of family, but at least I managed to indulge myself in a reasonable Chinese meal, just like back in New Zealand. It was anything but dull. And I managed to share the meal with my housemate, Tina, who basically acted in place of my family. What more could I ask for? Perhaps a red packet?

Happy "Moooo" Year!

Thrills And Spills In The French Alps

Bon Jour! In July 2008, I was invited by my mate Jonny to go on a ski trip somewhere in the French Alps. Back then I only just arrived in the UK on a temporary basis, but I still said yes anyway. My only hope would be that I would get my visa before the ski trip because I had to return to New Zealand in order to receive it. Fortunately it did go to plan so once I got my visa in New Zealand, I flew back to the UK, legally entitled to work, and was ready to take a holiday in France.

For the holiday, I had to decide whether I would ski or snowboard. After lots of thinking, I decided on snowboarding because I've never done it before and have always wanted to imitate those pros who can execute 360 degree aerial manoeuvres. Having done skiing a few times (mostly at Auckland's Snow Planet, and once in Japan when I was 16), snowboarding was going to be an interesting learning experience.

For preparation, I had to buy some snowboarding gear. In the weeks leading up to the holiday, I purchased a snowboarding jacket, goggles and three pairs of thick socks from a sports shop in London. The pants, gloves and wrist-guards were kindly supplied by Jonny, and all I needed to complete the set was to hire a snowboard, boots and helmet from a ski shop in the resort. Jonny also lent me his DVD on snowboarding, but I only managed to watch the DVD the day before the holiday. The only thing I managed to learn in that short space of time was the Falling Leaf technique in snowboarding. A very useful technique indeed!

Come Saturday 27th December, I had to travel to London Gatwick Airport and wait for about 9 hours for the flight on Sunday. The early train from Reading to Gatwick would not have made it on time for the flight, so I was forced to travel the night before. It was not a comfortable wait as I slept on the airport seats on and off for around 4 hours.

What seemed like forever, we finally departed from London Gatwick en route to Turin, or Torino, whichever you prefer. Once we landed, we took a 2 hour bus ride to the Serre Chevalier ski resort in the French Alps, not far from Grenoble. The views of the snow-covered alps was breathtaking, and I was getting excited of the fact that I would be finally hitting those slopes on a snowboard.

We got to our destination, a small chalet in a village called Villeneuve, which is part of Serre Chevalier. Ten other people shared the chalet with us, and over time we became as one skiing family. I did feel a little overwhelmed that everyone else were enthusiastic skiers and snowboarders. The very serious ones in our group liked to talk about their skiing experiences in other countries and ski resorts; I had absolutely no experience whatsoever. But the others were very encouraging towards me as a complete beginner. The chalet host was very hospitable in making our stay a worthwhile one. He provided breakfast, dinner and drinks on all nights except one.

Finally it was time to hit the slopes. To get an introduction, I signed up for three morning lessons. Over the course of those lessons, we covered the basics, like stance, balance, edge control and turning. The first two mornings seemed very frustrating. I just couldn't get it together, but on the third morning it all fell into place magically. Pretty soon I started moving from the nursery slopes, onto the green runs, and then, with the coaxing of Jonny and co, moved to blues, reds and blacks. For the first five days of snowboarding, I mostly kept myself on the green runs, practicing the basics, keeping control and trying not to fall over.

However, I saved my best for last on the last day of snowboarding. This time I joined Jonny and co, who decided which runs to go on. I was a bit apprehensive about attempting blue, red and black runs, but once I got a taste for it the entire snowboarding experience felt really comfortable. I did fall over and wipeout on the difficult runs, but I still managed to negotiate them slowly without any major problems. I also learned how to read the piste map in order to negotiate your way through the different runs on the mountain; before I only stayed on a couple of green runs but never managed to explore the mountains. While exploring the mountains I had no idea how many runs were available to us. It was as if we were on some kind of adventure, navigating up and down the mountains and negotiating our way through the various runs. Indeed, it was literally one gigantic playground of snow.

The last day certainly summed up a successful holiday - I learnt how to snowboard, I managed to explore the mountains of the French Alps, I managed to do the difficult runs and overall I had an experience I will never forget. If I had the opportunity to go on another skiing holiday in another country/resort, I wouldn't hesitate for one second. I am thinking about taking up snowboarding more seriously as a hobby and even buy my own snowboard. And I am definitely keen to go to other countries for skiing holidays, e.g. Austria, Italy, Finland, to name a few.

During the holiday Jonny and I managed to dine at a French restaurant, where we cooked meat on a hot stone. We also had New Years Eve celebrations in a small bar, and there were many revellers and drunken antics to go with it. Probably one of my best New Years celebrations so far!

On the last day, we packed up, left that chalet and went back to Torino airport. Unfortunately our flight was delayed by 3 hours, so it was yet more waiting at the airport, which is definitely an uncomfortable experience. We finally left Torino and landed safely back at London Gatwick. By the time I got back to Reading, it was already 9:00pm. I basically crashed in my bed, and had to go to work the very next day.

It's now a week since I got back, and I have recovered sufficiently from my snowboarding holiday. The aches, pains and bruises have all but gone from me. I didn't realise that snowboarding took so much out of me; on some mornings during the holiday I had trouble getting out of bed. At least I didn't break any bones, that was definitely a victory!

Finally, here is a photo of me on top of Serre Chevalier, 2491m above sea level.


Au Revour!

Where Is Home?

Happy New Year. I have just passed the mark for the longest time period I have spent in a foreign country. The longest time I have spent away from New Zealand was 52 days which was set during my last stint in the UK, and today I have just passed that mark.

I said earlier that I would celebrate this occasion with a visit to the local pub, instead I opted to have a quiet drink at home with the housemate. And no, there was no beer or wine!

I suppose that this milestone could soon be irrelevant, since I'm no longer living in New Zealand. The UK is starting to be less of a foreign country to me..... I'm trying to make it my home.