Didn't you know?
It was on Thursday. February 7th: Chinese New Year! The year of the rat. Like me. (I mean, 1984 is also rat. What always made me sad - dragon or tiger sounds so much cooler)
Well, I wouldn't have noticed this second "Sylvester" without my Chinses roommates, who had invited friends and had a big party. Actually they told me in advance, but I forgot about that (see, the date is not really the easiest to remember), and so I came home from recital - work that day at 10pm, totally tired and just in the mood to go to bed, when I entered our appartment and found exactly THIS:
my first thought: shock!!
my 2nd: well, how interesting... I feel already less tired.
And then I tried to mix and mingle with all teh Chinese people, being as Chinese as possible, laughing at the same jokes on TV even without understanding them, and stupidly repeating every word I could catch from any conversation. (That was always followed by a burst of laughter from everybody around me)
Actually there were just 2 things everybody was doing at this party: 1) watching Chinese TV (via Internet), 2) making those typical New Year - dumplings (what, you didn't know, they were typical?) -but not eating them!
Apparently the pleasure was just the making:
It was on Thursday. February 7th: Chinese New Year! The year of the rat. Like me. (I mean, 1984 is also rat. What always made me sad - dragon or tiger sounds so much cooler)
Well, I wouldn't have noticed this second "Sylvester" without my Chinses roommates, who had invited friends and had a big party. Actually they told me in advance, but I forgot about that (see, the date is not really the easiest to remember), and so I came home from recital - work that day at 10pm, totally tired and just in the mood to go to bed, when I entered our appartment and found exactly THIS:
my first thought: shock!!
my 2nd: well, how interesting... I feel already less tired.
And then I tried to mix and mingle with all teh Chinese people, being as Chinese as possible, laughing at the same jokes on TV even without understanding them, and stupidly repeating every word I could catch from any conversation. (That was always followed by a burst of laughter from everybody around me)
Actually there were just 2 things everybody was doing at this party: 1) watching Chinese TV (via Internet), 2) making those typical New Year - dumplings (what, you didn't know, they were typical?) -but not eating them!
Apparently the pleasure was just the making:
forming the dough to a "ring" and dividing it into many small balls
flattening them with a rolling pin and putting the stuffing on it. "like a little UFO" - as a Chinese fellow tried to make it clear to me
Ai (middle) and friends at work
The last (and most difficult) step: closing the UFOs and actually making them look like dumlings. Actually, after all that hard work, I couldn't resist to ask Ai, if I could just cook and try some of them, and so we did. (all the rest dissappeared into the freezer and was never seen again) But: they are sooo strikingly similar to Kärntner Kasnudeln or Polish Pierogi! Maybe that has been the original dish of Pangäa once, when there was just one continent on earth!?
flattening them with a rolling pin and putting the stuffing on it. "like a little UFO" - as a Chinese fellow tried to make it clear to me
Ai (middle) and friends at work
The last (and most difficult) step: closing the UFOs and actually making them look like dumlings. Actually, after all that hard work, I couldn't resist to ask Ai, if I could just cook and try some of them, and so we did. (all the rest dissappeared into the freezer and was never seen again) But: they are sooo strikingly similar to Kärntner Kasnudeln or Polish Pierogi! Maybe that has been the original dish of Pangäa once, when there was just one continent on earth!?
The Chinese TV. Hm.... interesting. There was a wild mix of a (according to them) special New Year program - with artists, barbie-doll-like filmstars who "aspirated" pop songs, crazy old women and not-so-handsome men in sort of cabarets, and sonstiger kitsch hoch 3.
The party people while watching all that. Happy Rat Year!
1 Kommentar:
my son's also gonna be a rat! :)
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