Nagasaki Lantern Festival- Gong Hei Fatt Choi!
As family and friends ushered in the Year of the Pig on 初一, i was thronging the streets in Nagasaki City trying to soak up whatever atmosphere there is at the famed Nagasaki Lantern Festival.Due to the city's status as the only port of call in the closed door policy during the Tokugawa era, interaction with Chinese and other foreigners goes a long way back and at a point in time, there was a rather sizeable Chinese population living in this part of Japan (the other 2 places being Yokohama and Kobe, of which both are port cities as well). Although their presence are not as prominent as in the earlier days, the Chinese left behind some heritage and cultural legacy, the Lantern Festival being one such fine example. It has been a major affair in the city's calendar of events for many years now. With the passage of time though, the meaning and purpose of the celebration has diluted and the festival is viewed by many as being a 2 weeks long event aimed at attracting tourists to visit this part of Japan.
Spending my first ever Chinese New Year (as a minority) away from home and as i strolled through the lanterns-lined streets, a myriad of feelings surged through me. I count myself lucky, compared to the others scattered all over Japan, that i still get to immerse in what is a semblance of the chun jie spirit here in Nagasaki. The whole atmosphere and the decorations actually look and feel more traditional (I felt like i was in some province in China) than the River Ang Pow or Chingay back in Singapore. The lanterns when lit at night lent a pretty and romantic mood to the city. However, it is just not the same feeling when one is abroad and alone during this period as Chinese New Year is essentially a family affair, a time of reunion and thanksgiving. I remember when i was much younger, CNY didn't hold that much significance to me. Then, it was a time where new year goodies abound, you get 'rich' for a period of 2 weeks and used some of the money to 'gamble' with your cousins. These days, i really appreciate and enjoy the few days of holiday spent with family at home over good meals and catching up with good old friends over a yusheng lunch. To me, these are really all part and parcel of being a Singaporean Chinese.
While neighbouring Korea still celebrates the same new year as the Chinese, the Japanese had over the years, out of social and commercial expediency, shifted their new year's day in line with the Gregorian calendar. Though the older generation remember the days when they celebrated new year in accordance with the Lunar calendar, the younger generation only know it by the term 旧正月 which literally means 'old new year' but has little inkling of what it is all about.
Earlier this year, I had the opportunity of being on the island and was able to observe how the Japanese spent their new year. My initial thoughts were that being at somewhere relatively remote and where people are generally more conservative and human relations still strong, the new year mood and celebration would perhaps be more traditional too. However, what i witnessed was rather different from what i had anticipated. Unlike our 15 days long affair, where during the whole duration, you can still pretty much experience the cny mood everywhere you go, receive ang pows and lao yusheng throughout, here the new year celebration only lasted for a grand 3 days. Of which the bulk of the time is spent watching noisy Japanese new year variety shows and lazing around the kotatsu (it's winter remember). They do visit relatives and friends too but it's way much low key compared to the ones back home. I asked many friends how do they normally celebrate new year and the general consensus is to eat, watch TV and get as much rest as possible. After the third day, life simply return to normality and the decorations were torn down almost immediately. Somehow it strikes me as being quite anti-climax given the 2 weeks long pompous preparation for the new year only to have it over in a flash.
The entrance to Nagasaki Chinatown and a picture of the altar and various offerings.
I thought it looked extremely traditional with all the roasted pigs and pig heads!
It was quite gross looking really, to think that this is the Year of the Pig and there at the altar are so many slaughtered pig heads :(
More sights of the lantern lit night and vendor selling not so Chinese 'Chinese' fare :p
Finally one of my favourite picture of the whole festival. As always, i pray for the safety and good health of my family in the new year and may everyone find happiness and contentment in all that you do.
Gong Xi Fa Cai once again! Missing all of you here but no worries cos I'll be back to celebrate the Year of the Rat next year! :)
Happy Chinese New Year in advance
By the time i made it back on the island next Monday afternoon, it will be the second day of Chinese New Year. As such i shall wish everyone a Happy Chinese New Year in advance. For those who've been overworked or been studying too hard recently, do take the next few days to get some proper rest and of course indulge in the new year goodies :)
Although i will be having exciting plans over the weekend (yes! I am going to watch a Kabuki show in Fukuoka followed by the Lantern Festival in Nagasaki City) i will certainly miss the festive season and everyone back home.
Will write more again when i am back. Till then, have a good new year everyone!
Choco choco everywhere!
Happy Valentine’s Day! February the 14th may mean oversized and overprized bouquet, silly looking stuffed toys and glitzy presents, a romantic dinner, or simply a day where you celebrate friendship in Singapore.
Valentine's Day remains firmly the Day Of Chocolate for many Japanese. Indeed, V-Day is a very odd and overly commercialized day in Japan. If you step into any departmental stores, supermarkets big or small (even my minimart here in Narao) you will see acres of floor plan being dedicated to chocolates of all varieties. For the month of February, chocolates dominated the supermarket scene and you can find local chocolate and sweets giants like Meiji and Glico alongside Godiva and other fancy gourmet chocolates. Besides chocolates, other related products such as cocoa powder, cream and confectionery chocolates sell especially well during this period too as there are those who prefer to make their own truffles just for that special one.
On this day, the ladies are made to feel obligated to hand out chocolates called giri (義理) choco (or obligation chocolate) to people they don’t particularly care about (e.g. bosses and fellow workers etc) as well as to their real love interest while males anxiously wait to see if they get ‘enough’ chocolates to satisfy their egos. Exactly a month later on March 14th, an artificially created and termed “White Day” is designated as the males-give-back-to-females day where another round of chocolate exchanging will ensue.
While i certainly do not feel obligated in any sense to hand out chocolates to my colleagues at school, i feel very obligated to try out several chocolate recipes which i had collected along so far.
One simple style of homemade chocolate called パブェ．オ．ショコラ (Pave au Chocolat in French) or more commonly known as 'nama' choco (生チョコ)is especially popular in Japan and there are so many recipes going around. The name is as such because all you have to do is to simply cut up the required amount of chocolates into small bits, melt them in warmed-up 生クリーム(fresh cream), adding any liqueur if desired and put into the fridge to harden. After which you just cut them up into little squares and powdered every cube with thick and pure cocoa. If you still cannot imagine what i am talking about here, think the very popular cocoa powder coated Royce chocolates and you'll more or less get the idea.
Although not that complicated a task, grinding the chocolate bars into smaller pieces took a much longer time and required more strength than expected. The cutting up of the hardened mixture proved to be challenging too. Despite my best effort, it was really difficult to get them to be equal size. The taste however is so marvelicious that i had to summon every ounce of self-discipline to avoid gobbling up the entire plate!
And so i packed those precious pieces and brought them to school as part of my 'giri' :P
Minestrone Magic
The taste of the somewhat sweet and tangy tomato based soup, cooked with loads of fresh vegetables, beans and peppered with just a little parmesan cheese and lots of parsley is among one of my favorite western style soup of all time.
Until recently, I’ve frequented places like Soup Spoon and Cedele around Raffles Place area whenever I wanted a hearty lunch of soup and bread. Needless to say, like everyone else, I paid a rather hefty $4-5 for just a bowl of soup. Then, it never really occurred to me that it is something can be prepared quite easily from home.
While they do serve minestrone soup here in Japan too, it is just not the same. If you've had the ones that they sell at Mos Burger, you'll know what i mean, it is more watery and has a lesser punch than its western counterpart.
I guess the beauty of staying on a remote island is that it forces you to do many things on your own. Not only do i have the mood and energy but also the TIME to try my hands on many recipes so I actually made this soup twice. The first time i followed one main recipe closely while referring to another one that i sourced from the internet. As it was afterall a first attempt, i prepared mostly as instructed, leaving out only the bacon (i prefer minestrone to be tomatoes,vegetables and beans only) and adding a small amount of elbow marcaroni as i planned to have it as a main dish. Overall, it turned out ok though a little more bland than i expeceted. But still something just felt amiss in the soup.
A couple of weeks later, i decided to give the soup a second try. I altered the recipe slightly, adding a little more vegetable stock and simmering it longer than the half hour as instructed. This time round, the taste was indeed the one i was looking for! The soup turned out thicker, the vegetables softer and even the color looked a nicer shade of reddish orange.
I discovered that soup really taste better during winter! There is nothing really like a bowl of hot hot soup and some toasted bread to go with, heavenly! : )
The only thing though about making soup is that it's much easier to prepare a larger portion than to simply cook one bowl. As i had enough for 4 people's share, i invited Kawasaki sensei for breakfast the next morning. As it turned out, the soup tasted even better after leaving it for a night. As planned, we had soup and salad for breakfast and Kawasaki sensei taught me how to make a simple tomato and cheese baked rice using the leftover soup. She simply boiled some rice in the soup until it thickened a little, pour it into a container, topped it with some fresh cream (or skimmed milk for a healthier version), 2 slices of cheese, sprinkled some breacrumbs over and put into the oven to bake for 30 minutes. Yes, it's really that simple. For my friends who are familiar with Japanese-style western food or 洋食，yes we made ドリア. And don't you just miss the very simple yet delicious Japanese baked rice? :)
This was how the baked rice looked like. Instead of rice, you can actually use pasta, bread or anything you fancy(broccoli, spinach, all sorts of seafood),pour enough soup to cover all the ingredients (cream soup will do too!) and you will end up with macaroni or bread (or whatever you put in it) gratin.
That's why i called it the minestrone magic! :)
Pizza delivery!
What happens when you feel like having a slice of pizza, just one slice overflowing with the goodness of tomato sauce and mozarella cheese but the only kind you can find are those frozen ones with green peas which you absolutely detest?
Solution: Make your own pizza!
It was late Decemeber last year, more than a month since i was last out in the city after sending my parents off, when i suddenly craved for some pizza. Not wanting to eat the only available ones at the supermarket, i decided to make my own using this rather straight forward looking recipe i found from a cooking magazine i borrowed from the library.
Although there are ready mixed pizza flour in the supermarket and all you have to do is just add water to make the dough, i was feeling rather adventurous that Saturday afternoon and took the challenge of following the seemingly simple steps to make the pizza dough from scratch by adding flour, baking powder, olive oil and water, all carefully measured according to instructions.
As i am without a hotplate and neither do i have access to a swanky wooden stove to bake the pizza in, i ladled the flour mixture onto the frying pan instead. It was slightly bigger than the size of a personal pan at most pizza joints so it fitted just nicely. After the crust was formed and i've decorated it with tomatoes, bell peppers, onions and some slivers of ham, i transferred the almost done pizza into the toaster oven for another 10 minutes so that it could get some top down heat as well and viola!
Verdict: Pizza tasted really good and so experiment was a real success! Great recipe and i'm keeping it for good! : )
And just in case i lose the photocopied one, i'll keep an online version as well.
Feel free to try it out at home (click on recipe to get the enlarged image), it's really that easy and yummy!
But then again, who would need to go through all the hassle of mixing the batter, chopping the veges and making their own pizza when delivery is just a dial away?
Like Mother Like Daughter?
This was how my fridge looked like during my earlier months here. My friend who visited commented that it didn't look the least bit like the fridge of someone who is staying alone. Indeed it looked as if i could feed an entire family with the content inside.
I guess unknowingly i was trying to replicate mom's fridge. Coming from a larger than average family with a full-time homemaker mom, the fridge at home has always been well-stocked. And a sumptuos homecooked meal is always just well a fridge away.
The other probable reason why i overstocked was because i seldom grocery shop around my area as price of foodstuff are generally higher than the ones in the northern part of Kamigoto. And because i depended entirely on others who would give me a ride whenever they go up north during the weekend, that was when hell broke lose and my trolley would be all piled up before i knew it! Though i soon learnt my lesson the hard way. In a pathetic attempt to save a couple of hundred yen, the vegetables and fruits started going bad at a rate faster than i could consume them.
These days though i mainly buy fresh produce from the little mini-mart around my area. There is something really special about preparing one's meal from the freshest ingredients. Not only do food taste better they look much nicer too. Though a little pricier, it is actually a much wiser move as i stopped feeling stressed everytime i opened my fridge knowing that the food are all rotting away slowly but surely.
While i helped out around the kitchen back home whenever i had the time, i've always regard cooking as being difficult, a task which requires a tremendous amount of effort and time. Looking back, i guess that was because i had the good fortune of growing up with hearty and healthy homecooked food so venturing into mom's territory was not much of a necessity. Moreover, for many of us, given our hectic lifestyle, who would really have the time and mood to whip up a meal after a hard day's work at the office.
But ever since i've started living on my own and the fact that there are very few eateries where i am here, there wasn't much of an option. With the help of simple cookbooks and home recipes which i jotted down before coming over, together with long-distance phone instructions from mom, i got down to business in my little kitchen. And that was when i discover the joy of cooking.
Recalling a recent MSN conversation with my best friend who studied in Australia for a couple of years, both of us couldn't agree more that it is actually very therapeutic to cook. Even the simple act of cutting and slicing the food bring an unexplainable kind of joy. Not to mention the sheer exhilaration when the product of a trial and error effort turned out way better than expected; the realisation of how different ingredients come together to give a certain kind of taste and how unbelievable that there are so many ways of using and handling the same ingredients in creating a dozen other kind of dishes. The more time i spend experimenting in the kitchen, the more i enjoy the whole process of it.
Indeed, cooking is one of those skills which i consider essential and useful to have, if not for the sake of family and kids in the future, but simply for pure survival. While we all know how difficult it is to go hungry in Singapore where cheap and good food are easily available island-wide, preparing your own meals allows you to control the stuff and amount that goes into it and is thus a much healthier (not to mention cheaper) option than eating out on a regular basis.
Even though i don't find cooking as daunting as before, i am still trudging delicately around the kitchen. Right now, unless i am going for a potluck party or have guests over when i will try to prepare more local foodstuff, i usually try to cook more Japanese dishes as the ingredients are easily available here. When i get home, i will be sure to stick around mom to learn her signature dishes and all her tried and tested all time favorites that would be a waste not to be pass on along to the next generation.
While it is not my intention to turn this into some sort of food blog, do be prepared to read much on my (mis)adventures in the kitchen in the following months ahead! That having said, more pictures and recipes coming your way!
Winter Tales
This year's winter is what they called 暖冬. Indeed, the weather's been peculiarly warm on most winter days. It's a weird phenomenon considering the fact that just last year Japan experienced one of its coldest winter ever. Indeed 温暖化 or global warming has become such a fashionable term these days. Day in day out, you hear it being mentioned in the news, reports of how ski resorts and other winter related businesses, large or small, lamenting the lack of snow resulting in significant loss in revenue. The erratic temperature range has confused even the plum blossoms (梅花) which generally bloom during the middle of February, causing them to flower as early as late January. This was taken during my walk home after work when i spotted a couple of blossoming trees off the main track.
By a warmer winter, it means that the temperature is higher than the average compared to previous years but by my standard, winter is still winter be it colder or not so cold. For someone who's born and bred in the tropics (and the fact that i am by nature not good with the cold), donning a minimum of 4 layers, thermal wear, turtleneck, jacket and coat, you name it, is still a necessity for me. Though I must have looked really out of place in school where some students can still run around in shorts and T-shirts only.
This is the view of the school and the sports ground from the teachers' room; the coldest day on the island so far. It was snowing quite a bit though still no where near to accumulating the few centimeters that is common in this part of Nagasaki by early February.
Initially it took me a while to adjust to the short daylight and long cold nights. I recalled the slight feeling of despair as i watched the last ray of sunlight disppeared by around 5 in the evening and wondered how i was going to fiddle away the long night now that most activities (i.e . tennis and my weekly adult English conversation class) have stopped and will only resumed in spring.
However as i slowly got used to the winter lifestyle, I can finally say that despite my greatest fear of the cold there are certain aspects of it which i am beginning to enjoy. These days, after the walk (my sole source of exercise nowadays) home, l'll usually take a hot shower before making simple dinner which usually consists of hot soups. Some weeknights will be spend catching a couple of Japanese dramas and blogging while the weekends are generally reserved for reading a good book or long chats with family members and Alvin over the phone.
This is where i snuggle under most nights with mugs of steaming hot tea while watching tv or using the computer. A kotatsu is this piece of indispensable furniture in all Japanese households during the winter months. Unlike many places, it is more common in Japan not to have central heating system in houses and offices. At home people depended on these little heated tables to keep warm. All you need to do is to put a thick piece of blanket like cloth over the table, place the top over it, plug in the cable and stick your legs underneath and within minutes you will get all warm and fuzzy from beneath. While i rely heavily on the kotatsu to keep warm, i still can't decide if i really like this piece of invention. On many days, my back and sitting bone hurt from sitting on the floor for a prolong period of time :(
Then there is the oil-heater which runs on electricity that i use to heat up the room when it gets unbearably cold on some days. I found it hidden away in the store room some time back but couldn't be bothered then to bring it out as i was using the air-conditioner 's heater to warm the house. That is until recently when it seemed to be acting up and would stop automaticaly to leave me stranded in the cold in my own house. I had no choice but to bring out the heater praying with all my might that it still works. Thankfully it does though not after i took ages to figure how to get it started and got a bad scare in the process when it started emitting a strong smell. For someone who've never have any real solid winter experience to speak of, it was indeed a challenge and a real pain! And boy do i realized that those oil does run out fast when i left the heater on for a few hours a night. Nowadays i tend to hide under the table and only use it when the need arises.
Which brings me to the other troublesome bit of winter living: remembering to warm the bed before sleeping. A teacher lent me this electric blanket to use when the bed simply gets too cold to sleep in at night. While it's called an electric blanket, it is actually placed underneath the bedsheet with a cable that you plug into the socket. All you need to do is to switch it on half an hour before bedtime and soon you'll have a warm and cozy bed to crawl into. I've forgotten on several occasions to do just that and it was simply impossible to climb into the icy bed!
The worst bit of winter has got to be those nasty chilblains. I had my first bout sometime in early December but it healed pretty quickly. Recently the itchy and red toes were back to haunt me. It got so bad to a point that i got to put down whatever that i was doing halfway as i simply couldn't concentrate anymore, grabbed the toes (all 10 of them!) and just scratched and wriggled desperately! 2 weeks ago, even my poor fingers developed red and itchy patches. I shall spare everyone the ugly sight of those red and swollen toes, this is how chilblains look like(not too clear in the picture though), noticed the reddish parts just beneath the fingernails? The toes i can assure you is in a much worse condition that the fingers are : (
While i never understood in the past why the June and July issues of foreign magazines always feature articles on how to shed off the excess weight and attain the bikini-fit bod, the perfect sunkissed tan, now i finally understood it well. Many activities come to a standstill during the cold months and it's too easy to hide away in the warmth of your house after a day's work. As such, it is not uncommon to put on weight in winter and lose those extra pounds in the hotter months only to repeat the cycle again in year end. Can't really blame our lack of knowledge in this area can we? Afterall, the weather in Singapore does not really require much of a change to our lifestyle year long. For many ladies i am sure, winter wear certainly look very fashionable what with those real cool looking trench coats and knee-high boots but personally it feels like a daily chore to put on the many layers in the morning and to peel them off before shower. These days i really miss seeing my neck and i look forward to the days i can tank tops once more! Guess i am still very much a tropical gal at heart...
Despite all my fears and 'misgivings' about my ability to adapt to winter living, i am glad that i've survived, through a mixture of trial and error, pretty well thus far.Indeed i am very thankful for the mild winter this year and the fact that i am living in southern Japan, which makes it still possible for me to walk home daily and enjoy my weekly bike ride. Had i been posted to the cold and snowy northern region, i believe it would be an entirely different story altogether.
As family and friends ushered in the Year of the Pig on 初一, i was thronging the streets in Nagasaki City trying to soak up whatever atmosphere there is at the famed Nagasaki Lantern Festival.Due to the city's status as the only port of call in the closed door policy during the Tokugawa era, interaction with Chinese and other foreigners goes a long way back and at a point in time, there was a rather sizeable Chinese population living in this part of Japan (the other 2 places being Yokohama and Kobe, of which both are port cities as well). Although their presence are not as prominent as in the earlier days, the Chinese left behind some heritage and cultural legacy, the Lantern Festival being one such fine example. It has been a major affair in the city's calendar of events for many years now. With the passage of time though, the meaning and purpose of the celebration has diluted and the festival is viewed by many as being a 2 weeks long event aimed at attracting tourists to visit this part of Japan. 
Spending my first ever Chinese New Year (as a minority) away from home and as i strolled through the lanterns-lined streets, a myriad of feelings surged through me. I count myself lucky, compared to the others scattered all over Japan, that i still get to immerse in what is a semblance of the chun jie spirit here in Nagasaki. The whole atmosphere and the decorations actually look and feel more traditional (I felt like i was in some province in China) than the River Ang Pow or Chingay back in Singapore. The lanterns when lit at night lent a pretty and romantic mood to the city. However, it is just not the same feeling when one is abroad and alone during this period as Chinese New Year is essentially a family affair, a time of reunion and thanksgiving. I remember when i was much younger, CNY didn't hold that much significance to me. Then, it was a time where new year goodies abound, you get 'rich' for a period of 2 weeks and used some of the money to 'gamble' with your cousins. These days, i really appreciate and enjoy the few days of holiday spent with family at home over good meals and catching up with good old friends over a yusheng lunch. To me, these are really all part and parcel of being a Singaporean Chinese. 
