This year I want to accomplish a few things, namely:
1. Lose those 10 lbs, finally.
2. Travel to Vietnam.
3. Be more loving, be kinder in my words and actions.
4. More hiking.
5. Learn CSS.
6. Keep in touch with friends.
7. Get a smartphone.
8. Upgrade my Chinese level.
Let's see how we go.
Friday, January 13, 2012
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Saturday, October 8, 2011
and then 8 months later
i look back on some of the old things i've written in here and wonder at the weeks and months that passed in between some posts. what did i do? what have i forgotten? what pictures didn't i take, what words didn't i scrawl down? what made me laugh and cry? who was i?
i've been in china (third times a charm!) since february. did a semester at yunnan normal university, had some amazing times with the wonderful, diverse group of friends i made there. i miss them all dearly and once again have realized how painful it is to be in this constant state of transit, here and there a few months, a year, then off again - new people but the vestiges and memories of the old still clinging to you like smoke. kunming was a beautiful place. the sky was that painful, dizzying blue, the people kind and quick to smile. i loved the food, the drinks, the walks along wenlin jie. mornings spent crammed onto the bus headed to school. it was good to be a student again and i really enjoyed studying mandarin. i forgot how much i loved languages.
i got engaged in kunming, too.
in july the fella and i were strolling along hongshan lu after sitting out on the patio of a cafe, enjoying a pot of good strong yunnan coffee and having a Serious Talk about the future. on the way home we made our way into a little park area, all green and shady with the road a few feet off. i noticed c had stopped behind me - i turned and there he was on one knee(!), his face splitting into the most enormous smile and those blue eyes so big, scared, excited. there was a will you marry me and then i remember bursting into tears and saying of course, of course i'll marry you. we hugged, i cried some more, we walked to a vegetable market to get stuff for dinner then realized we were too excited to cook. we ate out instead and celebrated with cold beers and phonecalls and smiles that would not quit. i haven't looked back.
in august i made the move to chengdu, hot on the heels of an events and communications position with a chamber of commerce. it started as internship but will turn into paid work pretty soon - still need to find part-time teaching job to help supplement my income a bit though. i'm having fun with this position. there have been good perks - nights out, free meals, cocktail parties and interesting workshops. i'm learning how to put together and edit a magazine, optimize a website, prepare for an event and fit in with chinese co-workers. they are a laid back people in sichuan province.
unfortunately c had to head back to australia for job training but he will move back out here in early november to start a year long australian government-sponsored position with an energy company. i'm excited for 2012. will be with the man i'm going to marry, will be continuing on with this work that i love more and more, will be planning for the future.
january 2013 we hope to get married in canada, in my little hometown with its pretty old church and 3 feet of snow on top of everything. after that, who knows. toronto - fingers crossed. i miss home but right now things are good. chengdu is kind to me. the weather's awful but i have the feeling that this is where i'm supposed to be, right here, right now.
i've been in china (third times a charm!) since february. did a semester at yunnan normal university, had some amazing times with the wonderful, diverse group of friends i made there. i miss them all dearly and once again have realized how painful it is to be in this constant state of transit, here and there a few months, a year, then off again - new people but the vestiges and memories of the old still clinging to you like smoke. kunming was a beautiful place. the sky was that painful, dizzying blue, the people kind and quick to smile. i loved the food, the drinks, the walks along wenlin jie. mornings spent crammed onto the bus headed to school. it was good to be a student again and i really enjoyed studying mandarin. i forgot how much i loved languages.
i got engaged in kunming, too.
in july the fella and i were strolling along hongshan lu after sitting out on the patio of a cafe, enjoying a pot of good strong yunnan coffee and having a Serious Talk about the future. on the way home we made our way into a little park area, all green and shady with the road a few feet off. i noticed c had stopped behind me - i turned and there he was on one knee(!), his face splitting into the most enormous smile and those blue eyes so big, scared, excited. there was a will you marry me and then i remember bursting into tears and saying of course, of course i'll marry you. we hugged, i cried some more, we walked to a vegetable market to get stuff for dinner then realized we were too excited to cook. we ate out instead and celebrated with cold beers and phonecalls and smiles that would not quit. i haven't looked back.
in august i made the move to chengdu, hot on the heels of an events and communications position with a chamber of commerce. it started as internship but will turn into paid work pretty soon - still need to find part-time teaching job to help supplement my income a bit though. i'm having fun with this position. there have been good perks - nights out, free meals, cocktail parties and interesting workshops. i'm learning how to put together and edit a magazine, optimize a website, prepare for an event and fit in with chinese co-workers. they are a laid back people in sichuan province.
unfortunately c had to head back to australia for job training but he will move back out here in early november to start a year long australian government-sponsored position with an energy company. i'm excited for 2012. will be with the man i'm going to marry, will be continuing on with this work that i love more and more, will be planning for the future.
january 2013 we hope to get married in canada, in my little hometown with its pretty old church and 3 feet of snow on top of everything. after that, who knows. toronto - fingers crossed. i miss home but right now things are good. chengdu is kind to me. the weather's awful but i have the feeling that this is where i'm supposed to be, right here, right now.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
new year, new skills?
DANIELLE'S 2010 NEW SKILL A MONTH RECAP
january: snowshoeing
february: baking muffins
march: playing cricket
april: yabbying
may: making damper
june: picking and prepping olives
july: desktop publishing with microsoft office...booooo
august: basic accounting
september: sewing up a hole in a shirt
october: cleaning and cooking mussels
november: a few words of the malay language (is that enough to count? hmm)
december: cooking a roast
now that we are into 2011 and i have a slew of new things on my plate, i'm not sure if i'll be able to keep up with the ol skill challenge. just too much new-ness in general!
at the end of next month i am jetting off to kunming, in china's most southwest province of yunnan, to study chinese for a semester at one of the universities. i am so excited to head back to the middle kingdom, pick up my mandarin and at the end of the study period, find a job that is relevant to my skills, my experience and ultimately what i want to do! i am savouring the thought of long walks in the city, ktv nights, scuzzy eateries in alleyways and exploring rich and diverse yunnan. i am also, and most importantly, excited that the boyfriend will join me there so we can actually stay together instead of being torn apart by our differing citizenships! funny how china has become the middle ground for us, a place where our relationship will be safe for a while and give us enough time to sort out future partner visas for wherever we end up settling, whether it is here in australia or back home in canada.
i have decided that as soon as i arrive i want to start a food blog about kunming. it was something i always regretted never doing while i spent my couple of years in hangzhou - after work, most of my nights consisted of dining in carefully chosen restaurants and subsequently raving about them in text messages.
generally the boyfriend was in tow as we ate our way through the city (and surrounding tea villages), trying the lowliest pork and mushroom dumplings to the loftiest banquets of fish, crab and all things succulent (when i say loftiest i mean within the constraints of an ESL teacher's salary - no bird's nest for us!). we ate mouth-numbing hunanese food - bits of chicken surrounded by an ocean of chillis - hotpots served steaming with lots of beer - pork buns for 1 yuan with a Macca's coffee, hot and cheap before Sunday morning classes - skewers of spiced lamb and little grilled fish being fanned by a Uighur outside our local - rice and vegetables packed into bamboo and cooked over flames - whole chicken baked in famous longjing green tea leaves - plus so many other things that made my experience in china so memorable and most of all, delicious!
i will not make the same mistake this time around. there will be restaurant reviews. there will be recipes for the hapless laowai. there will be suggestions of where to find what. just give me time to get my mind around kunming, settle in and figure out what's what.
anyway, back to the rainy day. library, haircut, post office.
january: snowshoeing
february: baking muffins
march: playing cricket
april: yabbying
may: making damper
june: picking and prepping olives
july: desktop publishing with microsoft office...booooo
august: basic accounting
september: sewing up a hole in a shirt
october: cleaning and cooking mussels
november: a few words of the malay language (is that enough to count? hmm)
december: cooking a roast
now that we are into 2011 and i have a slew of new things on my plate, i'm not sure if i'll be able to keep up with the ol skill challenge. just too much new-ness in general!
at the end of next month i am jetting off to kunming, in china's most southwest province of yunnan, to study chinese for a semester at one of the universities. i am so excited to head back to the middle kingdom, pick up my mandarin and at the end of the study period, find a job that is relevant to my skills, my experience and ultimately what i want to do! i am savouring the thought of long walks in the city, ktv nights, scuzzy eateries in alleyways and exploring rich and diverse yunnan. i am also, and most importantly, excited that the boyfriend will join me there so we can actually stay together instead of being torn apart by our differing citizenships! funny how china has become the middle ground for us, a place where our relationship will be safe for a while and give us enough time to sort out future partner visas for wherever we end up settling, whether it is here in australia or back home in canada.
i have decided that as soon as i arrive i want to start a food blog about kunming. it was something i always regretted never doing while i spent my couple of years in hangzhou - after work, most of my nights consisted of dining in carefully chosen restaurants and subsequently raving about them in text messages.
generally the boyfriend was in tow as we ate our way through the city (and surrounding tea villages), trying the lowliest pork and mushroom dumplings to the loftiest banquets of fish, crab and all things succulent (when i say loftiest i mean within the constraints of an ESL teacher's salary - no bird's nest for us!). we ate mouth-numbing hunanese food - bits of chicken surrounded by an ocean of chillis - hotpots served steaming with lots of beer - pork buns for 1 yuan with a Macca's coffee, hot and cheap before Sunday morning classes - skewers of spiced lamb and little grilled fish being fanned by a Uighur outside our local - rice and vegetables packed into bamboo and cooked over flames - whole chicken baked in famous longjing green tea leaves - plus so many other things that made my experience in china so memorable and most of all, delicious!
i will not make the same mistake this time around. there will be restaurant reviews. there will be recipes for the hapless laowai. there will be suggestions of where to find what. just give me time to get my mind around kunming, settle in and figure out what's what.
anyway, back to the rainy day. library, haircut, post office.
Saturday, October 9, 2010
doing well here!
august: basic accounting
september: sewing up a hole on a shirt
october: cleaning and cooking mussels
september: sewing up a hole on a shirt
october: cleaning and cooking mussels
Saturday, August 28, 2010
can't believe how long it's been!
i've been pretty negligent with this bad boy the past few months. even forgot to post my monthly skills!
i can't remember which order they were actually in, but sometime in june, i believe, i learned to make and bake damper. july i learned desktop publishing with microsoft suite (should never have happened but desperate times..) and august i learned..about australian politics! not really a skill. sorry. i still have a couple of days left though.
we're going to sydney in two weeks - really excited to see the city, do lots of walking and catch up with some old friends.
this is terrible. i'm on about 6 hours sleep and suffering the pain of chris' 30th birthday dinner of sichuan food and sketchy g&t's.
i'm off for brunch!
i can't remember which order they were actually in, but sometime in june, i believe, i learned to make and bake damper. july i learned desktop publishing with microsoft suite (should never have happened but desperate times..) and august i learned..about australian politics! not really a skill. sorry. i still have a couple of days left though.
we're going to sydney in two weeks - really excited to see the city, do lots of walking and catch up with some old friends.
this is terrible. i'm on about 6 hours sleep and suffering the pain of chris' 30th birthday dinner of sichuan food and sketchy g&t's.
i'm off for brunch!
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
from a kitchen on a cool thursday
one of the things i have become most excited about - most involved in - since moving to australia is cooking. i have always enjoyed it but i think this last year in china especially piqued my interest in making things from scratch. in the past it's always been more frozen bits and bobs with nice salads - maybe some homemade burgers or a pasta but nothing beyond that. really it was spending a lot of time with chris and trying out his gorgeous curries, stir-fries and pasta sauces rich with red wine and fresh vegetables.
since arriving on this vast chunk of land i have had quite a bit of time on my hands and have started to create my own repertoire of recipes - things i had never dreamed of trying previously. a few weeks ago i roasted an entire chicken - took out the mucky inside bits and stuffed it with chunks of lemon and olive oil and coated it liberally with sea salt and basil. it was absolutely beautiful, juicy and tender and getting all over our fingers as we just picked at it off the pan. two nights ago was vegetable and lamb moussaka - all rich layers of lamb and fresh tomato, salted eggplant and potato covered with a creamy cheese, yoghurt and egg sauce. there have been other dishes in between and before these - date and vanilla muffins, pastas with home-made roasted red peppers and today a beautiful, fragrant chicken soup with beefy mushrooms, carrots, thai chilli and basmati rice. i wish i'd documented some of these things, the recipes i can't remember now but just have some vague recollection of licking my fingers and saying i should post the recipe on my blog! too little too late unfortunately. (not to say all the recipes have been good, either - there was that gluggy mee goreng with overcooked baby squid, some tasteless sauces and dishes oilier than Tony Abbott.)
while being in oz has been tough in a lot of ways - lack of friends, no family, bouncing around from badly-paid temp jobs - having this stove-top, this oven, this market full of fresh produce - has been a saving grace, something i look forward to when i get home from work. i put my face in a cloud of fragrant steam, close my eyes and can finally relax.
since arriving on this vast chunk of land i have had quite a bit of time on my hands and have started to create my own repertoire of recipes - things i had never dreamed of trying previously. a few weeks ago i roasted an entire chicken - took out the mucky inside bits and stuffed it with chunks of lemon and olive oil and coated it liberally with sea salt and basil. it was absolutely beautiful, juicy and tender and getting all over our fingers as we just picked at it off the pan. two nights ago was vegetable and lamb moussaka - all rich layers of lamb and fresh tomato, salted eggplant and potato covered with a creamy cheese, yoghurt and egg sauce. there have been other dishes in between and before these - date and vanilla muffins, pastas with home-made roasted red peppers and today a beautiful, fragrant chicken soup with beefy mushrooms, carrots, thai chilli and basmati rice. i wish i'd documented some of these things, the recipes i can't remember now but just have some vague recollection of licking my fingers and saying i should post the recipe on my blog! too little too late unfortunately. (not to say all the recipes have been good, either - there was that gluggy mee goreng with overcooked baby squid, some tasteless sauces and dishes oilier than Tony Abbott.)
while being in oz has been tough in a lot of ways - lack of friends, no family, bouncing around from badly-paid temp jobs - having this stove-top, this oven, this market full of fresh produce - has been a saving grace, something i look forward to when i get home from work. i put my face in a cloud of fragrant steam, close my eyes and can finally relax.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Thursday, March 25, 2010
updates
we've moved into the west of melbourne, to a suburb called footscray. when people have heard we were relocating here they've called it all sorts of things from "downtrodden" to "scary" to "i've heard lots of people get mugged at the train station!". encouraging! however, we happen to live in a quiet sort of area, about 10 minutes walk to the main drag and that is where the real value, the real beauty of this scruff, 'working-man's' suburb is.
walking down paisley, barkly, or hopkins st you will see the most vast range of ethnic backgrounds, a cacophony of languages pouring through and best of all, a range of restaurants to back them up. there is every kind of dining experience to be found here, all extremely cheap, too. however there seems to be a heavy concentration of vietnamese, chinese, indian and african eateries. i think we've had pho and rice vermicelli bo la lat just about every day for the past week! it's exciting to see all these little places with their variety of exotic foods and the people that fill them.
the other beautiful thing about footscray is the market. it's massive, filled with fresh produce, meat, seafood and everything else under the sun for great prices. we've yet to do a weekly shop there (unfortunately a coles is pretty close by) but i'm looking forward to giving the market the attention it deserves.
all in all footscray has been a good experience thus far. our apartment is lovely and is starting to feel like home, as is the area we're living in. thumbs up!
walking down paisley, barkly, or hopkins st you will see the most vast range of ethnic backgrounds, a cacophony of languages pouring through and best of all, a range of restaurants to back them up. there is every kind of dining experience to be found here, all extremely cheap, too. however there seems to be a heavy concentration of vietnamese, chinese, indian and african eateries. i think we've had pho and rice vermicelli bo la lat just about every day for the past week! it's exciting to see all these little places with their variety of exotic foods and the people that fill them.
the other beautiful thing about footscray is the market. it's massive, filled with fresh produce, meat, seafood and everything else under the sun for great prices. we've yet to do a weekly shop there (unfortunately a coles is pretty close by) but i'm looking forward to giving the market the attention it deserves.
all in all footscray has been a good experience thus far. our apartment is lovely and is starting to feel like home, as is the area we're living in. thumbs up!
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
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