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This is a guest post from my Dutch friend Guus. This is his experiences of learning Mandarin. Guus runs a Mandarin school in Singapore and has been learning Mandarin himself for about 3 and a half years. I wanted to add a new perspective to the blog, to give new learners like myself an idea of the stages of transition that you are likely to go through learning Mandarin. Guus also runs a blog about learning Mandarin with tips.
Charlie
My journey of learning Mandarin
A Dutchman in Singapore, I have been learning Mandarin seriously since January 2006. In this post, I’d like to reflect on the various stages that I’ve gone through. Of course, the process by which one learns differs from person to person, but I think that each stage of proficiency and learning has recognizable characteristics.
My motivation
I enjoy learning languages, but I don’t think I would have started to learn Mandarin if it weren’t for my then girlfriend, now wife, who I met when on exchange to the National University of Singapore. It’s my philosophy that you have to have a purpose in mind before you start learning a language. If you don’t, whatever you learn will sink away from your memory in a few months’ time.
Pre ‘Serious learning’
In 2005, I was in the Netherlands, completing my degree and did want to try learning some Chinese. I used the ‘teach yourself’ method, which comes with a CD and textbook that covers many everyday situations and also found materials online. I managed to drill the number 1-10 and some everyday situations like introductions.
The practical focus was nice in the sense that it had a real purpose, but it didn’t yet touch those mysterious characters, which I had a great interest to grasp. I needed more depth (and peer pressure!) to make headway.
Mid-2005 I decided to move to Singapore in 2006 and look for a job there. I would have my degree, and since I had nothing to give up I thought it’d be a good time to move to Singapore and give life there a go.
Four months of full-time learning at NUS
Since I needed a legitimate reason for being in Singapore beyond the normal 1-month tourist allowance, and wanted to learn Mandarin anyway, I enrolled myself into the Mandarin program of NUS extension. I took classes from 9:00am-1:00pm daily and spent the afternoons job hunting.
The four months before I clinched my job turned out to be a great foundation for learning Mandarin. The teachers at NUS approached language learning intuitively, not scientifically, and really pushed us to make the language our own.
We spent hours repeating the 4 tones (always hard for Westerners) and me and my classmates were ‘put on the spot’ by having to make a coherent sentence with whatever limited vocabulary we had. It was intense learning, but learning like a baby does. Not according to rules, but by mindful repetition and reinforcement. As one of my four teachers told us, “I can teach you the rules, and you can understand the rules, but that does not mean you will be fluent. You need to show me that you can make a sentence, and show that you can make it fast enough.”
The breakthrough point was about 6 weeks into learning the language, when I overheard my girlfriend give her friends directions on the phone and got the gist of the conversation. For some of my classmates the 1-month mark was the break-off point, they felt they were putting so much energy into learning the language, but not seeing the pay-off.
While it was sometimes tough to keep up, I really enjoyed the fact that characters were an integral part of my course. After a month or so I could not imagine any more to learn Chinese without learning the characters. It is as if you don’t get the ‘soul’ of the Chinese language if you don’t pick up its written part. Of course, the progress in writing was slow, but in the context of course books, stripped from characters we hadn’t been introduced to, I could see what it might be like some day to be able to read and write freely using Chinese characters. The day I reach that stage is still ahead of me.
Part-time evening course
I found a job after learning Mandarin full-time for some 4 months and switched to a part-time class. I’ve kept taking 5 hours of Mandarin weekly in the evening hours for approximately 2 years. It was tough sometimes to concentrate, and we had again a teacher that really pushed us, in fun ways.
She would ask us to write a story and present it in front of the (approx. 15-person) class. After one student had told their story, she’d ask someone else to summarize what he’d heard. One day, she came with brochures for property developments and let us do a property viewing role play using new vocabulary about rental terms, fixtures and rooms in houses, etc.
The group was mixed with some Singaporean Chinese, some younger professionals and some older expatriates as well. We had lots of fun, which I think made all of us do that little bit extra, and most importantly, kept us coming for the classes. Let me repeat once again, it takes energy, not in a peak effort, but continuously for a long period of time, to make headway in learning Chinese.
Learning in practice
I am lucky that my wife is Chinese, and while her English is faultless, her parents, uncles and aunts do not speak it that much. I got a great boost in my Mandarin, ironically, when we paid a visit to her family in the US in May of 2007. I was the only white guy between the uncles, aunts and cousins and while the younger generation is perfectly fine with English, several family members kept themselves to speaking Chinese.
Especially funny was the moment where I was in a shop with my newly found Chinese family and the shop attendant approached me as if I were a separate customer, apparently confused by the fact that a white guy was among these Chinese people. These “show-off moments” are great morale boosters that you simply need to keep going.
If you give up too early, you won’t get to the point where you realize you are actually making headway. So the earliest stages are really the hardest, because you are spending a lot of time and effort without being able to reap the fruits of your hard work. It’s like building the foundation of a skyscraper.
Since March 2008 I have stopped attending classes. I’m still using the language every day because of living in Singapore where Chinese is one of the spoken languages and having Chinese family.
A week ago, I was at the cashier of the local supermarket, where the lady thoughtlessly took my stuff, scanned it and bagged it. Without looking up, she mentioned the price in Chinese. When she looked up, she realized that I, being white, shouldn’t understand, but I had the right amount ready. I told her with a smile “be careful, I understand everything you say” and we had a good laugh.
But I do realise that while words may come out more confidently and fluently, my vocabulary is limited and I am still far from the level where I could pick up a Chinese newspaper and read it, let alone correspond in the language. My written Chinese level is actually slipping because I’m not taking time to deliberately exercise it. It may be terribly immature, but I need a certain level of peer pressure to set myself to doing that.
So I am planning to take up a new course again, this time a course focused on business Mandarin with the Singapore Chinese Chamber of Commerce. I have taken the Business Chinese test to assess my level and am now awaiting the result.
This proverb asks of you to think before you say things. Prompting the realisation that words have tremendous power. With a sentence you can change someones perception and in some cases lives have been changed with little more than a sentence. Yet other examples of how powerful words can be, are dimplomatic relationships between countries which can disintergrate with nothing but words.
一言既出驷马难追
yī yán jì chū sì mǎ nán zhuī
A word once spoken cannot be taken back even by a team of four horses
yī yán jì chū sì mǎ nán zhuī
A word once spoken cannot be taken back even by a team of four horses
This will usually be said in the place of 'What has been said cannot be unsaid'
or 'A promise must be kept.' especially important in never losing face.
Photo Source:
Flickr
乐队(band): HedgeHog
专辑(album): Blue Day Dreaming
国家(country): China (Beijing)
发行时间(release date): 2009
Hedgehog a Beijing 3 piece indie rock band. They also have the priviliage of being the first Chinese band that has stood out to me. Hedgehog, a power pop, indie rock outfit returned to Shanghai to launch "Blue Daydreaming," a 12-track gem in March 2009. They have a quirky electro synth vibe, a powerful backing with strong vocals that create catchy choruses. I wholeheartedly reccomend 'blue daydreaming' as a slightly twee catchy ditty to brighten up your afternoon.国家(country): China (Beijing)
发行时间(release date): 2009
Hedgehog's song (Track : Blue Daydreaming )
In their own words:
Percussionist and vocalist Atom(阿童木) is a tiny girl who just barely peeps over the top of her drum kit but who bangs out explosive rhythms like a monster possessed. Bassist Box(博宣), the person responsible for keeping the band in line, punches out the tight bass lines that hold the songs together while seeming lost in oblivion. Guitarist and vocalist ZO(子健) slashes out huge waves of chords that seemed to fit perfectly within the songs yet at the same time tear them apart - while jumping, twirling, staggering and even falling over several times during his performances without letting up for the slightest pause. Hedgehog is a classic power trio with three of the best performers in Beijing on their respective instruments, but it is their song-writing skills that make this band more than just a great performance band and one of the most important in China.
www.myspace.cn/hedgehog
Song Sourced : Via IndieHeartAttack
A 20 year old Chinese farmer, Jiuxian Town, Songxian County, Henan Province, China has created his own Helicopter. Wu Xizhao, ever since he was a child, dreamed of flying so he wouldn't need to climb mountains anymore. It would appear that he realised his dream using principles that he learned in middle-school physics and other knowledge found by surfing the Internet on a mobile phone to create this helicopter.
The blades are 1.8m-radius propeller made from Elm tree wood, and a 150CC motorcycle engine provides the power. The frame is reinforced with steel pipes, and he claims that his single-seat copter can fly up to 2,600 feet. I am guesing that it 2600 feet length not height...
His father, Wu Xizhao, said his son had spent less than £1,000 on developing the helicopter.
"He loves machines. At one time or another, he has taken apart and put back together every gadget in the house," he said.
The trail flight of the villagers helicopter in Jiuxian Town, Henan Province, China was on August 1, 2009. It drew many villagers out to watch the contraptions trail flight. Sadly, the Chinese government won’t let Wu fly for safety reasons, which I guess is a sign of our times.
At 20 years old, this whole story does make you wonder what you are doing with your life? He has invented and built a functionable helicopter realising his dream.
What do you do?
This is a proverb which transcends all struggles, with the notion that if you want something enough, you will find a way to make what you want happen. If we have the determination to do something, we can always find the path or method to do it.
有志竟成
yǒu zhì jìng chéng
Where there's a will, there's a way
You might say "where there's a will there's a way" to someone who says that something
- can't be done
- shouldn't be done
- will be done immediately
Photo Source
Flickr
China View today reported that 44 Chinese Characters (many of which are in common use) are likely to be amended. This has caused widespread criticism from Chinese nationals who think the change is "瞎折腾" (blind torment: meaning similar to a ‘pain in the neck’) Whilst some complain that one billion people will have to learn Chinese characters anew.
However ministry officials and some experts said the revisions would only target 44 characters printed in the Song typeface on publications, in other words, the revised characters would only be used by computers and printing machines. These changes from the governments perspective is that it will unify the typeface and printing standards of Chinese characters, whilst not affecting the Chinese public too badly.
These 44 characters are to change from the Kai typeface to the Song typeface, most often in these cases a slight change of only one or two strokes are changed. "The characters printed in our textbooks adopt the Kai typeface, and we don't need any change. But students would be easily confused by the revised characters on other publications," said Wang Jiayu, a Chinese language teacher at a primary school in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.
Among the 44 characters in question are:
琴 (qín) violin,
征 (zhēng) musical instrument,
魅 (mèi) demon/magic,
籴 (dí) buy grain,
褰 (qiān) to lift clothes,
巽 (xùn) part of the trigram,
瑟 (sè) Se (type of harp),
琵琶 Pipa (lute),
亲 qīn parent、
杀 (shā) kill、
条 (tiáo) ribbon 'item'、
茶 (chá) tea 、
新 (xīn) new、
杂 (zá) miscellaneous、
寨 (zhài) camp / village,
恿 (怂恿) (sǒngyǒng) instigate,
瞥 (piē) glimpse,
蓐 (rù) mattress,
溽 (rù), muggy,
缛 (rù), elaborate,
褥 (rù) mattress (again),
耨 (nòu) hoe 'weeding tool',
薅 (hāo) to weed,
唇 (chún) lip,
蜃 (shèn) mythical sea creature, and
毂 (gǔ) hub.
Another 55 characters are considered allogeneic (异体), and to be recovered or unified in some way, among them 淼 (miao, flood), 喆 (zhe, same meaning as 哲), and 堃 (kun, same meaning as 坤, female).
There is always conservatives and moaning regarding any change, especially with regard to unification where some people feel they are loosing identity through the changes. However this small amount of changes are unlikley to cause any real loss of identity and arent anywhere near as big as the simplification in 1965 to the Printed General-use Chinese Character Table. (the proposed changes are just 0.57% of all the characters in the ‘Printed General-use Chinese Character Table')
The changes being made to the Song typeface are a technological based upgrade as Song is a typeface thats origins are from when block printing flourished in China. Because the wood grain on printing blocks ran horizontally, it was fairly easy to carve horizontal lines with the grain. However, carving vertical or slanted patterns was difficult because those patterns intersect with the grain and break easily. This resulted in a typeface that has thin horizontal strokes and thick vertical strokes. To prevent wear and tear, the ending of horizontal strokes are also thickened. Song typeface is characterized by design with thick vertical strokes contrasted with thin horizontal strokes; triangular ornaments at the end of single horizontal strokes; and overall geometrical regularity. This typeface is similar to Western serif fonts such as Times New Roman in both appearance and function.
This is different to the Kai (Kaiti) typeface which is more even with the strokes looking more like the caligraphy that we are used to with both horizontal and vertical strokes being fairly consistant.
字型寫法比較 (Font Comparison)
Despite this criticism and controversy that surrounds this move by the governemnt to unify the print into an understandable and universally understood set of characters there seems to be a lot of confusion around it. Personally I think it is much ado about nothing, there seems to be very minor changes proposed and won't really affect people in the way that they think it might.
To me it seems that the 44 characters that are due to be 'changed' aren't really being changed so much as look slightly different in the different font. It is like us having a font where the a has a curl, and a font where the a doesnt have a curl. The differences seem to be in the majority where dots turn into strokes. For example on the bottom of 茶 (chá) the different fonts mean the symbol looking slightly different, but certainly not unrecognisable.
Maybe living in the West has adapted me to seeing lettering in different ways with the several standard fonts. Or it could be that my personal learning of Chinese has not yet given me the ability to write characters properly, nor learnt enough to see characters that are very similiar already.
What do you think about the propsed 44 character changes?
This proverb talks about the habits and peoples perception and influence.
我行我素
wǒ xíng wǒ sù
To persist in one's old ways no matter what others say
wǒ xíng wǒ sù
To persist in one's old ways no matter what others say
Photo Source:
Flickr
This past week has been a tough week for me personally, I have had arguements and spent more time than anticipated doing everything other than learning Mandarin. I didn't even participate in #MandarinMonday on twitter, half as much as I had intended.
I am hoping that tomorrow I will write some more content after having spent more time getting back into the learning process. The time is an issue, because I live in a shared house, and when learning have to concentrate and lock myself away for an hour at a time.
Finding time for Mandarin is something that is becoming an issue with the amount of projects and other things that I am commited to. The arguements have stemmed from this point usually with me spending time craving Mandarin fixes, or actually writing a post for the blog or researching a recipe, when I should actually be doing work. The time that goes into this blog, news research and writing is growing as the topics I learn about and want to write about grow. And time so it seems is an ever decreasing commodity.
Anyone got any tips how to squeeze an extra half hour out of every day?
Tomorrow then, I will try and write some more posts and learn something new to share.
Charlie
Discovering Mandarin
Perhaps Confucius' most famous teaching was the Golden Rule stated in the negative form, often called the silver rule:
子貢問曰、有一言、而可以終身行之者乎。子曰、其恕乎、己所 不欲、勿施於人。
zǐ gòng wèn yuē, yǒu yī yán, ér kěyǐ zhōngshēn xíng zhī zhě hū. zǐyuē,
qí shù hū, jǐ suǒ bù yù, wù shī wū rén.
qí shù hū, jǐ suǒ bù yù, wù shī wū rén.
Adept Kung asked: "Is there any one word that could guide a person throughout life?"
The Master replied: "How about 'shu' [reciprocity]: never impose on others what you would not choose for yourself?"
I found a great collection of World religions that share this belief.
Firecracker Beef w/Rice Noodle Salad
Serves 4
This recipe includes double cooking Beef skirt steak. It is to be served on a tangy cold noodle salad. A great mix of flavours ranging between the cold and the hot, and the sweet and the sour, and the spicy and the salty. The cut of Beef is vital in keeping the Beef juicy and succulent when cooking twice.
Prep time: 30 mins
Cooking Time: 15 mins
You Will Need:
600g Beef Skirt
For Marinade:
1 tsp of soy sauce
2 tbsp of rice vinegar
2 tbsp of chilli garlic sauce (you'll find that in an Asian Store)
1/2 tsp of 5-spice
1/2 tsp of ginger puree or grated ginger
4 cloves of roughly chopped garlic
some black pepper to taste
1 tbsp of sesame oil
For Cold Noodle Salad:
400g Rice noodles
2 Carrots shredded
4tbsp Rice Wine Vinegar
2tbsp Fish Sauce
1tbsp Vegetable Oil
Chopped Cashew Nuts
Chopped Coriander Leaves
2 Spring Onions
1. Cut Beef skirt into four pieces. Marinade Beef adding all ingredients and mix well. Place marinade and Beef in a bag in fridge for 1 hour.
2. Cook rice noodles in boiling water for 3 minutes, rinse with cold water. Drain well to prevent a wet salad.
3. Add 2 tsp of fish sauce, which is a fermented condiment, kind of like soy sauce. We're going to add 1 tbsp of vegetable oil, we're going to add 2 tbsp of rice vinegar, shredded carrot. Mix it up and refrigerate until needed.
4. Take the Beef, and save the marinade. Sear Beef in a flat dry pan for 2-3 minutes on each side until caramelised. Save beef drippings with marinade for later.
5. Leave Beef to cool to room temperature. Now slice the Beef against the grain, the center will still be pink and juicy.
6. We're going to add 2 more tbsp of rice vinegar, chopped cashews, chopped coriander leaves, chopped spring onions and toss together. The salad is ready as a base for this delicious firecracker beef.
7. Preheat the pan well, sear the beef slices for just a minute or two. Caramelize the outside of the beef and the inside is still going to be really juicy and delicious.
8. Add the hot slices back to the drippings and marinade briefly.
9. Serve and top the cold tangy noodle salad with the hot, spicy firecracker beef, maybe a little sprinkle of chopped cashews
As I Serve it:
Enjoy your Firecracker Beef and Cold Rice-Noodle Salad
Often used as a metaphor for coping with death, this proverb also can be used to reassure in many instances. Nothing Lasts forever, good, bad or ugly.
天下無不散之筵席
tiānxià wú bù sǎn zhī yán xí
No feast could last (Under the sun) forever
tiānxià wú bù sǎn zhī yán xí
No feast could last (Under the sun) forever
More commonly in English: All good things must come to an end.
Chinese style Hoi Sin Pork
Serves 4
Serves 4
This meal is pretty similiar to the Hoisin Chicken I cooked a couple of weeks ago, But I made too much sauce. I wanted to use it up, so here is the very tasty Hoisin Pork recipe.
Prep time: 25mins
Cooking Time: 15mins
You Will Need:
750g pork (preferably boneless cut)
1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil
1 tbsp soy sauce
6 tbsp hoi sin sauce
Salt and pepper
4 medium garlic cloves, smashed
12 ounces green beans, cut into 1-inch lengths
1 Bell Pepper
Thinly sliced spring onions
Toasted sesame seeds, for garnish, optional
Medium Egg Noodles
To Cook:
1. Cut up pork into bite-sized chunks. Marinade the Pork in ½ tbsp Hoisin sauce, 1tbsp soy sauce with salt and pepper. Leave in fridge for 20mins.
2. Prepare garlic, green beans, pepper and spring onions, cutting them however you like them. Boil the kettle ready for the noodles to cook in.
3. Heat the oil in the pan, until oil is hot. Fry Pork for about 5mins, then leave to the side, and leave the wok on the heat. Now quickly drop noodles into boiling water.
4. Add garlic, beans and pepper now until the garlic turns brown.
5. Add back the pork, rest of the hoi sin sauce and the spring onions. Stir fry for a minute and take out the noodles. Add soy sauce to the noodles before serving immediately.
As I Served Hoisin Pork w/Noodles
This is another chapter of Lao Zi's Dao De Jing (Formerly Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching). This is chapter 9, and talks about how overdoing things causes the reverse action of what was initally intended. Lao Zi talks about how it is better to withdraw or retire when satisfied with the results. Carrying on, or pushing for more than what was originally desired; that is both arrogant and will cause your cup to spill.
持而盈之，不如其已。
揣而梲之，不可長保。
金玉滿堂，莫之能守。
富貴而驕，自遺其咎。
功成、名遂、身退，天之道。
chí ér yíng zhī, bùrú qí yǐ.
chuāi ér zhuó zhī, bùkě cháng bǎo.
jīnyù mǎntáng, mò zhī néng shǒu.
fùguì ér jiāo, zì yí qí jiù.
gōng chéng, míng suì, shēn tuì, tiān zhī dào.
Fill a cup to overflowing, And it will spill.
Hone a sword to the very sharpest, And it won't stay sharp for long.
Fill your halls with gemstones, And you won't be able to guard them.
Be proud with wealth and status, And you will cause your own fall.
Withdraw when your work is done. This is the way of heaven.
揣而梲之，不可長保。
金玉滿堂，莫之能守。
富貴而驕，自遺其咎。
功成、名遂、身退，天之道。
chí ér yíng zhī, bùrú qí yǐ.
chuāi ér zhuó zhī, bùkě cháng bǎo.
jīnyù mǎntáng, mò zhī néng shǒu.
fùguì ér jiāo, zì yí qí jiù.
gōng chéng, míng suì, shēn tuì, tiān zhī dào.
Fill a cup to overflowing, And it will spill.
Hone a sword to the very sharpest, And it won't stay sharp for long.
Fill your halls with gemstones, And you won't be able to guard them.
Be proud with wealth and status, And you will cause your own fall.
Withdraw when your work is done. This is the way of heaven.
This is just one translation, and there are many. Dao De Jing has been translated into many languages, and even Chinese scholars still argue over the true translations due to the lack of Classical Chinese punctuation marks, seperations of commas and full stops can drastically alter the meanings of passages.
Text Source:
Chinese Characters
Wang Bianlian (Xu Zhu) is an aging street performer known as the King of Masks for his mastery of Sichuan Mask Changing Art. His wife left him with and infant son over 30 years ago. The son died from illness at age 10. This left Wang a melancholy loner desperate for a male heir so he could pass on his rare and dying art.
A famous master performer of the Sichuan Opera, Master Liang offers to bring Wang into his act, thus giving him fame and possible fortune, but Wang opts for staying the simple street performer. Then, one night after a performance he is sold a young boy by a slave trader posing as the boy's parent. "Grandpa" finds new joy in life as he plans to teach "Doggie"(Zhou Renying) (an affectionate term often used for young children in China) his art. All is well until Doggie is found out to really be a girl.
Set in 1930s China, this 1996 film ranges through the heart-breaking and joyful. Showing how hard life was for the characters you truly see the depths and heights of human existence in this film. The actors are all perfect, such that you feel like you have really entered a different world.
Bian Lian: King of Masks is very predictable and has great mirroring of pivotal moments within the film. I reccomend this heart warming tale for all. I watched it for the first time on Youtube. I enjoyed it so much, that I will be buying it.
Video Trailer: IMDB
This is a proverb that Daoists take seriously and the French call Laissez-faire, which in English literally means "Let it be". Leave things to their own devices, get on with life and let everything be as it will be, without stressing.
顺其自然
shùnqízìrán
Let things take their own course
(Without external influence)
无为 (wúwéi) means very similiar and literally 'Inaction' and is used most often within Daoism.
Photo Source:
Flickr
A 41 year old Chinese man says he likes to relax by eating live snakes and washing them down with beer. Wen Xide of Wangzhuang village, Zhumadian, says he has been eating live snakes for 10 years.
He started by eating one to win a bet with friends for a packet of cigarettes.
"From then on I became addicted to eating live snakes," he said.
Wen demonstrats his habit in the street, chewing down two live snakes bit by bit over a bottle of beer.
"It's a bit smelly, but they're very delicious," Wen said.
Wen says his son is now following his lead and has eaten eight live snakes this year.
But Wang Tianming, a doctor specialising in digestion at a local hospital, said Wen could suffer nerve problems and risked infection from parasites.
This proverb talks of how one can be modest and create low expectations whilst delivering highly on promises. Yet again Confucius (孔夫子) is very wise, and says things that are picked up time and time again. As a marketer myself, the idea that you can overdeliver on promises and expectations is a powerful notion.
君子欲訥於言而敏於行
jūnzi yù nè wū yán ér mǐn wū xìng
A superior man is modest in his speech, but exceeds in his actions.
jūnzi yù nè wū yán ér mǐn wū xìng
A superior man is modest in his speech, but exceeds in his actions.
- Confucius
Fried Wontons
Makes 50 Wontons
In Mandarin, Wontons are called; 馄饨 húntún "irregularly shaped dumpling" and also popularly called 云吞 yúntūn "swallowing clouds" in both Mandarin and Cantonese. However the English word actually derives from the Cantonese word 雲吞 wàntān.
Wontons are wonderfully wrapped in a silky wheat based sheet. When fried they make tasty snacks, they can be used as an appetiser, part of a meal, or as a tasty snack.
These were the wontons I had left over from the wonton soup I made last week.
Prep time: ½ hour (first time preparing wontons took longer than expected)
Cooking Time: 5 mins
You Will Need:
1 Pack of 50 Wonton Wrappers
Wonton Filling:
600g Minced Pork
2 Spring Onions
3 cloves Garlic
8g Ginger
¾ Cup of water
Seasonings for filling
1.5 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar
1 tbsp cornstarch
1 tsp pepper
1 tbsp sesame seed oil
How To Cook:
1. Whilst the soup is simmering away chop spring onions into sections, cut up garlic and ginger small. Add the minced pork, and all the seasoning and fillings into a food processor, blend until really well mixed.
2. Now wrap the wontons:• Place a wonton wrapper on a dry clean cutting board
• Place 1 teaspoon of filling in the center of the wrapper
• Take another piece of wonton wrapper and lay it over the filling
• Press the top wrapper gently but firmly over the filling, working out any air between filling and wonton wrapper
• Use a little water to seal the edges
3. Leave wontons aside under a damp towel, and leave in the fridge to prevent the wonton wrappers drying out.
4. Once all the wrappers are filled and completed. Warm up a wok or pan with oil until hot. Add wontons a couple at a time until golden brown.
This proverb comes directly from Mark's China Blog in yesterday's post. It is about uphill struggles and challenges in one's life. Everyday I find new things which re-affirm in my mind that learning Mandarin is truly one of these struggles. But worth every second of it.
逆流而上
nìliú ér shàng
Swimming Upstream
nìliú ér shàng
Swimming Upstream
Ultimatley this picture has absolutley nothing to do with the quote, although I did feel that Pandas themselves have an 逆流而上 of their own.
Photo Source:
Flickr
Xi’an in Shaanxi
(西安; Xī'ān) (陕西; Shǎnxī)
Xi’an is now the capital of the Shaanxi province, located in the southern part of the Guanzhong Plain. With the Qinling Mountains to the south and the Weihe River to the north, it is in a favourable geographical location surrounded by water and hills. Its monsoon climate is semi-moist and there is clear distinction between the four seasons.
Xi’an was historically known as Cháng'ān (长安). Though the name of the city itself has changed many times during the dynasties. Xi'an is the eastern terminus of the Silk Road which connected Europe, Africa and Arabia to China and Asia throughout history. It is historically one of the oldest Chinese cities and boasts one of only two intact city fortifications in the country.
Xi’an has many attractions for tourists such as the Mausoleum of Qin Shi Huang and his Terracotta Army, several burial mounds and numerous Tang Dynasty pagodas including the Giant Wild Goose and Small Wild Goose Pagodas. It also has religious buildings of importance such as the Famen Temple, Great Mosque and nearby Louguantai the birthplace of Daoism, where according to legend Lao Zi (Lao Tzu) wrote the Dao De Jing (Tao Te Ching) and preached sermon.
However the most famous of the attractions is nearby Xi’an. Qin Shi Huang’s Terracotta Army (兵马俑; bīngmǎ yǒng) is one of the most famous Chinese exports and has had huge success as a travelling exhibition. The 8000 or so figures found in 1974 near the Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor, date back to around 210BCE.
Both the Giant Wild Goose and Small Wild Goose Pagodas survived numerous earthquakes, and although both have sustained damage, they remain standing to this day.
The Bell Tower (钟楼; Zhōnglóu) and the Drum Tower (鼓楼; Gǔlóu), are in the exact city centre, and is the most convenient starting point to go anywhere in the city. From this point the streets split up into the four points of the compass. North-Street (北大街 Běidàjiē), East-Street (东大街 Dōngdàjiē), South-Street (南大街 Nándàjiē) and West-Street (西大街 Xīdàjiē).
Xi'an is a city where the old meets the new, and not in the best sense...
Xi'an does have quite a funky Starbucks design though...
Xi’an is twinned with Birmingham, UK. (amongst many other cities)Xian
simplified Mandarin character; 西安;
pinyin: Xī'ān
Photo Sources: (In order of appearance)
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