Baking Pineapple Cake

Today, I went to Shilin to Kou Yuan Yee Culture Museum of Bakery and Pastry to bake pineapple cake. Pineapple cake is a typical Taiwanese pastry and I choose to go today so I can bring the cakes back home as a gift. Unfortunately, I signed up by myself and got into a class with around seven years old children that were very good at screaming. S who has been here before with her chinese class made the dough by herself but I just got ready made dough which was a disappointment 'cause I want to do everything from scratch. Anyways, it was quite fun and when the cakes were put in oven we went to the museum which had an exhibition about Chinese traditional wedding. In Chinese weddings cake is a must.

The dough in the front and the pineapple filling in the back. The only thing one has to do is to wrap the filling in the dough, not very advanced.

There were several different of figures but I just wanted rectangular shaped.

The result! I haven't tried them yet, but I hope they're good.

After the baking I went back home to Shida to have lunch.

Ma Po tofu with rice Donburi.

In the evening I had dinner with Linda and Syaorie at a noodle place and rounded up with some fika because I'm leaving tomorrow. Very nice, indeed!

Chocolate mousse cake, strawberry tarte and banana mousse crumble cake.

I won't miss...

Things I won't miss about Taiwan:

• Girls talking with five-years-old-super-cute-voices.
• The heavy traffic.
• Rush hour at the MRT.
• My tiny room.
• The air pollution.

Packing

So, only two days left in Taiwan. I began to pack today and I do the last laundry now. Folding all the light and thin clothes reminds me of this wonderful summer and all the adventures. The hot days where the only thing you craving for is AC and an iced green tea.

My bag is quite big so I don't think I'll have any problem to put everything into it, but I do fear over weight...

Traveling Back In Time...

Today, I went to Lin Family Mansion and Garden in Fuzhong. The garden is from the Qing Dynasty (year 1644-1912) and when I walked around there among the small trails, trees, ponds and pavilons, it really felt like I had traveled thousands of years back in time. The garden was beautiful and guess if I become sad when my camera screamed "out of battery".

A Long Day

Today I met up with Hank to have lunch. We went to a Korean place (because I said I wanted to try bibimbap). Bibimbap is rice, meat, vegetables put in a burning hot stone bowl and with a cracked egg on the top and you should mix everything around. It was good! There were also some cold side dishes. Then we walked to Sun Yat Sen Memorial Hall and we came just a few minutes before the guard change procession which was quite fun to see.

Beef bibimbap.

Korean sidedishes such as kim chi, peas, leek and cabbage.

Outside Sun Yat Sen Memorial Hall.

The guards.

The plan for the afternoon was to have a fika with Linda and Syaorie at the Hello Kitty restaurant at Zhongxiao Fuxing. When we got there they said it was full so we had no choice but to go somewhere else. I took some pictures of the so-cute-I-almost-puke restaurant. Everything is in pink and some cakes have Hello Kitty. It would have been fun to eat there, but I'm not a Hello Kitty fan so I wasn't too disappointed.

Feels like they look better than what it tastes...

Instead, we went to a dim sum place, it was quite good and so nice to just sit down and chat.

Steamed shrimp dumplings and steamed bao with curd filling.

Then me and Linda went for shopping a while but I was so tired so I went back home quite soon by MRT (I've been walking around in what feels like the whole Taipei today). For dinner I tried the new taco place near my place called Macho Taco. I ordered tofu tortilla and chicken with crispy nacho shell. I must say it was tasteless and so many ingredients were left out, they didn't even had SALSA.

Tofu tortilla.

Taco shell, without sweet corns, salsa, cheese, cucumber... so it was not a hit.

To the last. I want to be in Sweden now. Now as in this very moment.

Jiu Fen

Today Gin and Hsin took me and Syaorie to Jiu Fen old street. I'm so happy to meet them again! I gave them pepparkakor as gifts (all credit to IKEA). Jiu Fen is located outside Taipei on a hill so we first went by train and then took a bus from Rui Feng to uphill.

The transportation and streets were so crowded, because it's Saturday today. If looking from the bright side one can also say that it was lively. There were lots of shops with different delicacies and souvenir shops and everywhere hung red lanters.

We tried the taro flour riceballs at a famous place with view over the shore. It was quite good. We strolled around and also visited the old cinema. I also bought some gifts back.

Outside the old cinema.

We went back to Taipei in the late afternoon to have dinner. We went to a fantastic all you can eat hotpot restaurant. The meat, seafood and vegetables held a high standard so it was really good.

Sweden in Taiwan

Sweden may be a small country but every now and then I see things that comes from Sweden. I become happily surprised every time and think "how did it get here?!". Besides IKEA there are for example young people carries Fjällkånken backpacker, the DVD "Jalla! Jalla!" with Chinese subtitle and there is even a Swedish restaurant called Milo Milo (I haven't eaten there though). I've taken the pictures at different days the last month or so.

The sign outside Milo Milo. I've heard of this restaurant before but I actually went passed by mistake one day when I was temporarily lost.

Almost everything you need for a "glöggkväll" can be found at IKEA Taipei (almost because they did not have ginger bread in the orignal flavor only with orange, whole wheat or cappucino).

Stieg Larson's famous triology in the local book store.

Outside a pub at Shida.

Interestingly enough, almost every Taiwanese that I've talked to know Sweden has a good welfare system, IKEA and, of course, that it's cold in Sweden. According to C, who is a local student at NTU they even bring up Sweden as example when teaching economics and society.

No More School...

It was the last day of school today, we just did some review and then watched the movie Infernal Affairs, which I think was a well done movie. At the end of class we gave a card to our teacher where everybody had signed to thank her. I felt sad to say goodbye to teacher as I said so many times before, she's professional yet funny and the classes were not boring as language classes tend to be. I wonder how my selfstudy will go without her.

We got a taro mochi (rice flour pastry with taro filling) for fika during the movie.

I took a long walk in the afternoon and snapped some pictures in Daan forest park. I will miss this place for sure, all the bamboos and palm trees and beautiful flowers. I picked some flowers and put them under some books to bring them back home. I felt rather rude that mashed the delicate petals of the flowers and destroyed the magnificent 3D form that I'd admired during the walk. Though, it'll be nice in an album later.

The name of this flower is Bauhinia blakeana and it grows on trees.

The coolest tree stem I've ever seen.

Cricket. They all look so cool.

The only thing that reminds of snow was this white bird with feathers like newly fallen snow.

I had dinner with Linda at Vietnamese restaurant at Shida. It's great to share the life here with someone that experience almost the same thing.

At the restaurant.

A Bala bao, which is a fluffy bread with sweet crust like top from a very popular place at Shida.

Ice Cream and Dinner

Today, was a mahjong day in class. So after a crash course in mahjong (I knew a little since before, but the teacher taught us different rules than what I'm used to) we played and I won three times! Very fun and exciting.

After class med and R from my class went to Ximending and had an ice cream at Cold stone. I took a strawberry icecream with strawberries, pie crust, banana and white chocolate. So good!

At Coldstone enjoying our ice cream.

By the Red House in Ximending.

In the evening we had dinner with the whole class and our teacher. It was really good times with great food. I'll miss the class and our teacher. She's the best teacher one can have and I feel very lucky to be in her class this term.

We ordered so much nice things- tofu, shrimp, squid, chicken, fish, wok...

One Week Left!

I feel like a Bumbi bear! Too over-excited for my own good that I'll go home in next week. And it's only one month till Christmas Eve. :)

Presentation About Danshui

The presentation about Danshui in Chinese class is over. I could have done much better but at that moment I actually felt nervous, perhaps because of the video recording. I normally never get nervous. Well well.


Yesterday was the last time for me on the Dancehall dance class. And guess what? The teacher had made a choreography to a SWEDISH SONG, of every possible songs in the world! I couldn't help myself smiling when I listened to the first few seconds and heard them singing "Efter regn kommer solsken...". Just imagine a small dance studio in Taipei, about 8600 km from my hometown and hear this song. Totally absurd situation. The song is called Leva livet by Miss Relli, listen to it here.

Last Week In School

Today we had our last test in Chinese. We have finished the second textbook and I've bought the third one to study by myself back in Sweden. The last school day is on Friday so this week look very different from our usual classes. After the test today we watched a Chinese movie, tomorrow we'll review all the stuff we learned. On Wednesday we have our final presentation (which will be video recorded!). Our teacher has promised us to teach us how to play mah jong (a chinese game) on Thursday, that'll be really fun. Lastly, I think Friday will either be movietime or we'll do field trip. Not too exahausting week.

However, during the time I've been here it has never been stressful. I'm used to have lots of school work and I'm happy that learning Chinese has not been so strenuous so I've had the oppurtunity to enjoy my stay.

Melissa Horn Concert?

Melissa Horn, one of my favourite singers has a tour in Sweden right now. I want to see her so badly, but I'll miss the gig in Linköping. But, she's playing in Norrköping on 11 Dec... it's not impossible that I'll go.

Chinese Afternoon Tea

Today was another rainy day, it seems to be neverending. I didn't feel like going anywhere but stay in my room the whole day was not a choice (I would probably turned crazy). It's impossible for me to stay indoor a whole day. I did some homework and in the afternoon I went to a place nearby to have dim sum i.e Chinese afternoon tea.

Radish cake, spring rolls and steamed cake with egg custard filling and jasmine tea.

Food Coma

Yesterday, Friday and the beginning of the weekend. I went to Xīngbakè (also known as Starbucks. Many loan words from English are directly translated to Chinese characters with similar tones such as cheese and chocolate.) to try out their praised coffee and had an iced café latte. I haven't had a coffee for months and I felt a small caffein kick. Here people nearly live at the cafés, besides chat, read and study some even take a nap. Me myself sat and composed a letter in Chinese. It was Christmas songs in the background and the café was decorated with Christmas decoration, it would have been really cozy if I did not look out and saw the greyish sky and the rain pouring down and people hurriedly passed by (some wearing flipflops). I almost finished the writing before I went to meet up with S and L to have a dinner.

We went to several restaurants at Shida but they were full. The good thing is that there are so many restaurants here so we finally went to a noodle place. The noodles are freshly handmade with a special technique. The noodle maker holds the dough and slices off bites with a knife into boiling water.

pic source : http://farm1.static.flickr.com/225/536083683_b59045a7d9.jpg

I had the restaurants specialty which was noodles with soup and three sorts of meat. Or it was actually meat and intenstines from cow and I must say that intenstines are not my cup of tea. I liked the flavor and noodles were ok. I prefer thin noodles. I've tried so many kinds of noodles so I feel like a noodle master now. The funny thing is that we discussed noodle preferences. Haha.

Last but not least, I had a cranberry pie which was heavenly good (swenglish?!) with crispy crust, cream cheese, cranberry sauce and macadamia nuts. (No, I don't have dessert everyday even if it sometimes may seem like that...)

My Afternoon

I finished the report writing yesterday so I felt that I wanted to do something after class today but I didn't know what. So I took a walk to Gongguan and ended up doing an eye examination for contacts and ordered so I'll go back tomorrow to get the them.

Then I had a pearl milk tea. It's is a typical Taiwanese beverage. Believe it or not but this was the first time I had it and it was quite good, a little bit too sweet for me though. It's always a long line to this shop, seems to be a popular place.

It's only mid-November and 24 degrees outside but some salesmen already wear Santa hat... that kind of had an effect on me and I actually found some nice Christmas presents. I really look forward to Christmas. To be with my family, to bake a lot so the entire house smells lovely, to light candles, listen to Christmas songs that I heard so many times before and just enjoy the cozy Swedish winter. Oh, I must not forget to ice skate some day. And ride "pulka".

你越胖，我越喜歡...

...means: "The fatter you get, the more I like". I love Chinese classes, our teacher rules.

And talking about alike and like. Me and my dear sister are so different. She's a half head taller than me and thin and has long hair while I'm the opposite straight through. We have different hobbies and think differently (people has question more than once if we really are sisters). But no matter how different me and dear sister are, I love her. Nobody can make so many crazy faces and make me laugh so violently so I almost choke. We lived together for three years before I moved here and we did not have a real fight (so far as I remember). I have the best sister in the world!

Picture from this summer, the cool sisters!

When writing this I recall something from the very back of my head. We read Antigone by Sofokles in upper secondary school. And she said something like in a lifetime one can have limitless number of partners and as many children as one wishes but the number is (of course) out of ones control.