Home Spa

Yesterday I walked downtown to make some errands. It was so stormy and the cold wind sweeped through my jacket and my blood seemed to freeze into ice. Guess if I was happy to come back home and just hear the wind whining outside. The coldness didn't want to let go so it ended up with a hot and bubbly foot bath and then sauna. We almost never use the sauna in the basement, but it is very good for winter days like yesterday. The termostate was set on the hottest temperature, which was incredibly hot and efficient against the coldness and stiffness. Indeed.

Snow!

I arrived home-home last night and it was cold and dark outside. It's lovely to be at home again. My first impression was that it was so spacious, one can actually take more than three steps without hitting a wall (in contrast to my room in Taiwan). After a good night's sleep I woke up and looked out through the window and saw that it was all white outside under dark sky as the sun hadn't really gone up yet. I went up and lighted some candles and turned on some Christmas songs. I love the time before Christmas as much as Christmas Eve itself, it's so cozy. Swedes are really good at creating a cozy atmosphere, perhaps because it's so dark in winter time and flickering candles light up beautifully. This year, unlike previous years, I won't come home from university like two days before Christmas more or less apathic and stressed up after all the exams and I'm so happy about it.

The view from my window this morning. I like when the snow stays in the tree tops and glisten as the sun comes shows up.

We've had this tiny Santa house candle as far as I remember, so nostalgic.

Basically every home has at least one lamp of this kind.

I bought some 3D Christmas cards from Taiwan. There were a whole lot of creative and fun cards, so it was not easy to pick out just a few. This is one of my favourites:

Before one opens it...

After...

I had breakfast with mum and dad. How can something so simple be so pleasurable? I even find preparing my own breakfast enjoyable (may sound totally ridiculous) ... I cannot wait till I make a comeback in the kitchen for real.

The Flight Home

The flight back to Sweden via Beijing and Frankfurt went smoothly (except for the check-in in Frankfurt which was slighty stressful due to short of time) and time passed more quickly than what I expected. I was little bit nervous before as it is the first time I fly by myself so I'm happy that I didn't end up in Brazilia or something like that...

Air plane food is... a catagory of itself. Noodles with fish (they might have forgot the seasoning), bread, salad, yogurt and cake.

The waiting hall at Beijing airport. The first thing I did when I sat there and waited was to start my computer and by reflex log into Facebook before I realized I was in China and Facebook is banned. I couldn't even blog from there. It's terrifying both that something so widely used in the world is banned and the fact that I almost forgotten how to communicatie without FB (and without cell phone).

On the flight Beijing-Frankfurt it was mini-TV on every seat so one can watch movies, TV and listen to music. High-tech and quite impressive and made the time pass faster.

The view over Stockholm in the morning.

Finally back in Sweden, I took the bus to Linköping and my sister met up me. We went to her place and had some lunch. The sun was shining and it was wonderful to see the familiar surroundings and breath the fresh air. It's not as cold as I thought (about 5 degrees) and no snow (!) but enough to be freezing in my thin spring jacket. We went to buy some "julvört, julskinka, lussekatter, pepparkakor" and clementines to have some "julfika" in the evening which was totally all I wished for. At 7 pm the jetlag kicked in so I went to bed and slept like a baby for like 13 hours (the five last hours were more sympathy sleeping as I didn't want to wake my sister up at 3 a.m. Haha.).

I enjoyed every single bite!

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.