Chinese rocket launch

(Photo  weather dot.com)

Came home from my Chinese Network meeting just in time 

to watch the launching of the Chinese Rocket on live China 

channel 9.

Chinese rocket launch marks giant leap towards space station

By Kathrin Hille in Beijing

China launched its longest-ever space mission on Tuesday, marking another milestone on its path towards developing its own space station.

Shenzhou-X lifted off at 5.38pm from the space centre near the northwestern town of Jiuquan with three astronauts on board. They will stay in space for 15 days, the China Manned Space Engineering Office said.

Like my grand dad, I am proud to be a Chinese.

Keeping tradition and cultural alive 端午节

Keeping tradition and cultural alive. Big Sister Rose demonstrates making the Zhung Zi to two non Chinese friends.
aka as Bak Zhang in the Hokkien Fujian dialect.

Duanwu Festival
Traditional Chinese	端午節
Simplified Chinese	端午节

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duanwu_Festival

The best-known traditional story holds that the festival commemorates the death of poet Qu Yuan (c. 340–278 BCE) of the ancient state of Chu during the Warring States Period of the Zhou Dynasty.^[6] A descendant of the Chu royal house, Qu served in high offices. However, when the king decided to ally with the increasingly powerful state of Qin, Qu was banished for opposing the alliance; he was accused of treason.^[6] During his exile, Qu Yuan wrote a great deal of poetry, for which he is now remembered. Twenty-eight years later, Qin captured Ying, the capital of Chu. In despair, Qu Yuan committed suicide by drowning himself in the Miluo River on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month.

It is said that the local people, who admired him, dropped sticky hi triangles wrapped in bamboo leaves into the river to feed the fish. The rice was wrapped so that fish would not eat Qu Yuan's body and eat the rice instead.^[6] This is said to be the origin of zongzi. The local people were also said to have paddled out on boats, either to scare the fish away or to retrieve his body. This is said to be the origin of dragon boat racing.

Chinese Language Network (中文俱乐部)

I attended my first Chinese Language network meeting this evening. 

(中文俱乐部) 

It wasn't what I expected.I had gone with the intention of improving my limited Spoken Mandarin and almost zilch  written Chinese. As a Child, I failed in Chinese, and the thought of learning it again is quite horrifying. Yet, I know I am a Chinese and it is right to learn the language of my roots.

I had fun tonight meeting with non Chinese friends speaking  Mandarin better than me, with Chinese like me who came for the first time. 

https://www.facebook.com/CLN.nz

欢迎大家！Simple, fun, effective - Chinese Language 

Network has the edge in helping you to learn Chinese - join 

us at our Chinese Conversation Group (CCG) on Tuesdays or 

our CLN Toastmasters Club on Thursdays!

I love you China

Many of the Chinese Immigrants were not considered citizens of the county

 they had gone to live all their lives. They would have loved this song.

Andrew Tan, a very good friend of father posted this first. It is a privilege to be a facebook friend of my dad.

殷秀梅-我爱你中国（祖国万岁60周年国庆晚会）

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=opNks9aWi_w

Father's teak elephant

We Chan kids are a funny lot, we laugh, we cry as we recall the times when we were kids. Memories exude such fondness for each other.

When I was 20 months old, Father went to England on a P & O liner. At each stop, he bought souvenirs. We all remember his black elephant.

Elizabeth asked her daughter Jeng to email us if any of her siblings remembered it. I even jokingly accused her that so it was her who stole the Elephant. Some remembered it was made of teak and the tusk of ivory, another that it had a broken stump.

Actually this wasn't the original elephant. Elizabeth's daughter in law Rosemary bought it in Cambodia, because her husband Wayne must have spoken about it.

I have 2 elephants, because I remembered that elephant. One, we bought it in a duty free shop in Bangkok. The water engineer took it to his office in Singapore. He didn't bring it back.

The other is an ornamented Sri Lanka elephant. This I treasure because my friend's husband died prematurely and left her and her 3 kids in a foreign land.

Alphabe-Thursday letter C for collecting, carton

This is the Civic Theatre, not the cinema my Grandpa went to watch his movies. I was awed by this beautiful building when I first saw it in 1978.

It is a heritage building so I can't bring you in there as I am not allowed to take photos inside the building. Inside you will be carried into the nights of the Arabian, including the occasional comet. In the foyer, you see ornate statutes of elephants and richly decorated in motifs and styles from romantic images of the East.

The first time I entered this building was to watch Star Wars. I didn't like Star Wars, but I was mesmerised by the theatre. I am stilled awed by it, thirty years later when I watched "My Fair Lady". It seems so incredible that so much attention was placed in detail.


The Colgate Carton race is a competition for schools where they can win prizes online simply by collecting Colgate Cartons.  The more Colgate Cartons schools collect the more prizes they can win.   All primary and intermediate schools in New Zealand are eligible to participate.

When this competition advertisement comes on, it brings me to when I was in High school, another toothpaste had a collection of it's carton. It wasn't for charity or competition. It had an arrangement with a certain cinema. For a collection of x number of cartons, you can change it with the cheapest cinema ticket.

Grandpa got all his children to buy that brand of toothpaste, so he could go to the movies. Dad complained that people would criticise he was such a cheapskate and would not buy his dad a ticket. 

Grandpa  said, if people say anything, I will tell them that I wanted the cheap seat because I couldn't see properly with a more expensive ticket sitting at the back.

http://jennymatlock.blogspot.co.nz/

search/label/Alphabe-Thursday

The golden wattle, Acacia pycnantha

Photo: berniesgarden.blogspot.com


You will love this story, and it is true.

My Dad was a senior civil servant, often the senior servants of Agricultural dept would give him plants to grow. Once he had 6 of these saplings. They told him was Christmas tree. 

He nurtured them, but they didn't look anything like the pine trees we associate with, to be Christmas trees. They didn't have pine needles and were not conical in shape.

Mum likes to get rid of things,  Mum says they are not Christmas trees, don't waste the land, get rid of them.

Dad likes to keep things, he says since he has already planted them, let them stay.

Each time we see the saplings grow taller and taller, we said what the heck. They definitely were not Christmas trees.

Mum and Dad went to live in Australia. Sadly mum died.

I went with my sister Helen  and we walked in the bush.

The wattles were in in full bloom.There were a zillion yellow baubles.

Excitedly I exclaimed,"That's the Christmas tree Dad grew."

I told Helen, now I understand why it is called a Christmas tree. It is the Wattle tree, the Australian National flower.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wattleseed

Wattleseeds are the edible seeds from any of the 120 species of Australian Acacia that were traditionally used as food by Australian Aborigines and they were eaten either green (and cooked) or dried (and milled to a flour) to make a type of bush bread.
Acacia seed flour has recently gained popularity in Australia due to its high nutritional content, hardiness, availability, and low toxicity. Due to its low glycemic index, it is also often incorporated into diabetic foods. Vic Cherikoff (a significant pioneer in the Australian native food industry) developed Wattleseed as a flavouring in 1984 from selected species and this is now the major commercial product used because of its chocolate, coffee, hazelnut flavor profile. It is often added to ice cream, granola, chocolates and bread and widely used by chefs to enhance sauces and in whipped cream and other dairy desserts. Baron's Brewery in Sydney makes Wattle Seed Ale, a spiced ale that is lightly flavored with Wattle seed. Dogfish Head Brewery in Milton, DE also makes a beer called Urkontinent made with Wattle seed, among other interesting spices.

http://asoutherndaydreamer.blogspot.com