A Shaney Christmas!
A few weeks before Christmas the TAs spent a couple of weekends decorating the entrance of the building. This involved 8 people spending 12 hours making by hand: a Christmas tree in one window with a Santa Claus popping out a chimney. Three snowmen on the other window, a few thousand snowflakes bordering the windows, and two dozen stars hanging from the ceiling and a Christmas greeting. On top of that there was a real fake
tree at the bottom of the stairs decorated in everything a Christmas tree needs to call itself festive.
So the school certainly felt festive even if the rest of the street didn't. Most staff working in chain stores were wearing Santa hats and some even had some tinsel in the windows. I even managed to find a "Christmas shop" in the middle of Yuanlin selling stocking shaped candy bags. It
wasn't quite big enough to fill with little gifts, but it was close enough!
On Christmas week itself, the staff held auctions throughout the day, for students to bid for toys, with money they had been given for being good in class. Favourites included squishy hammers, crocodile snap game and magic tricks.
On the Thursday of Christmas week we took about 50 kids down to a restaurant to have a 'Christmas meal' We had spent the week before pre-teaching all the language they would need to order food. The meal comprised corn soup (nice), a fruit salad (looked nice, but seemed to have a scoop of ice cream in the middle with hundreds of thousands on top... don't worry though, it was mash potato and carrot with hundreds of thousands on top) then pork fillet with veg (very nice) and a jelly for dessert. The kids enjoyed themselves. my only complaint was that we had to serve them and not eat anything but cookies and tea. Still I guess I was getting paid.
I got the cutest little Christmas card from one of my kids, so I thought I'd better get them one too. I found a place selling little cards at 40% off. That covered everyone.
On Christmas Eve I was thinking about joining everyone down at the bar, but I was just exhausted so I headed home for a chilled night in front of the box.
On Saturday I opened all my present with Tin Tin. She seemed to appreciate the stocking thing. She bought me a Chinese dictionary which is so amazing... its got bpmf and English... its the missing link to my learning. I tried on my new Hull T-shirt and we enjoyed the real chocolate of home.
It was a nice crisp day, so we went for a walk up the mountain and then drove into town for a curry. As it was nearly 3, the only place open was an Italian. They were doing a Christmas special - steak steak steak I was hoping - buy a main course and for 2 pounds they would throw in a fruit salad in red wine, peach wine, and 2 truffles. Not quite steak, but the wine fruit salad took me right back to mulled wine in the German market in Manchester last year. Tin Tin didn't have the same love for it.
She had made plans to see her friend in a different town. So I thought I would pop down to Sam's house. He had invited me to a cheesy evening. Cheese is a rarity in Taiwan therefore when you are offered some, you take it! "Cheesy eats" the name of a food place that covers everything in a white sauce that distinctly lacks cheese. They have plenty of plastic slices for burgers and sandwiches, but it just isn't the same.
At Sam's house there was Stilton, Edam, Brie and blue cheese. There was a bowl of eggnog, which tasted a bit like baileys and lots of alchojellies. I recognised Mere, Andrew, Rix, Alex and Gail, but most people I didn't have a clue who they were. I got accused half way through the night of being a hermit as I didn't spend my weekends in Yuanlin bars with them. But after spending 6 hours with them, the idea of spending more time with them doesn't appeal.
On Sunday I slept in until nearly 12. Pascal had promised to cook up a Boxing Day roast dinner.
I offered to assist. When I said I was in all day, he asked me to keep an eye on the Turkey to make sure the cooker didn't turn itself off. It had been 2 hours since Pascal had left and the Turkey wasn't in the oven yet: Was that my job too? I couldn't remember. I rang Pascal and of course he turned up just as it was ringing. He brought some veg with him so it was game on: Peel and Chop time. The main problem when cooking a roast dinner for 12 at our place is that there is only 2 hobs and 2 very small ovens. You could tell Pascal had been dealing with this issue for a few years now. The turkey was cooking away in oven one. We parboiled the spuds and put them in oven 2. Then we cooked the greens very slowly on top of the spud oven, giving us hob to do the gravy (with a splash of red wine - gorgeous). The stuffing was heating up on top of the turkey oven... and then like magic it was ready to eat. Daniel (the guy who used to live here, had joined us, with Christian, Walter (landlords son) and his wife and kids, Sam and Gail. It was the perfect number of people: plenty of seconds for everyone! And Sam brought two cakes for pudding. Perfect end to a Christmas weekend.
The only downside was that we were all back at work on Monday!
tree at the bottom of the stairs decorated in everything a Christmas tree needs to call itself festive.So the school certainly felt festive even if the rest of the street didn't. Most staff working in chain stores were wearing Santa hats and some even had some tinsel in the windows. I even managed to find a "Christmas shop" in the middle of Yuanlin selling stocking shaped candy bags. It
wasn't quite big enough to fill with little gifts, but it was close enough!On Christmas week itself, the staff held auctions throughout the day, for students to bid for toys, with money they had been given for being good in class. Favourites included squishy hammers, crocodile snap game and magic tricks.
On the Thursday of Christmas week we took about 50 kids down to a restaurant to have a 'Christmas meal' We had spent the week before pre-teaching all the language they would need to order food. The meal comprised corn soup (nice), a fruit salad (looked nice, but seemed to have a scoop of ice cream in the middle with hundreds of thousands on top... don't worry though, it was mash potato and carrot with hundreds of thousands on top) then pork fillet with veg (very nice) and a jelly for dessert. The kids enjoyed themselves. my only complaint was that we had to serve them and not eat anything but cookies and tea. Still I guess I was getting paid.
I got the cutest little Christmas card from one of my kids, so I thought I'd better get them one too. I found a place selling little cards at 40% off. That covered everyone.
On Christmas Eve I was thinking about joining everyone down at the bar, but I was just exhausted so I headed home for a chilled night in front of the box.
On Saturday I opened all my present with Tin Tin. She seemed to appreciate the stocking thing. She bought me a Chinese dictionary which is so amazing... its got bpmf and English... its the missing link to my learning. I tried on my new Hull T-shirt and we enjoyed the real chocolate of home.
It was a nice crisp day, so we went for a walk up the mountain and then drove into town for a curry. As it was nearly 3, the only place open was an Italian. They were doing a Christmas special - steak steak steak I was hoping - buy a main course and for 2 pounds they would throw in a fruit salad in red wine, peach wine, and 2 truffles. Not quite steak, but the wine fruit salad took me right back to mulled wine in the German market in Manchester last year. Tin Tin didn't have the same love for it.
She had made plans to see her friend in a different town. So I thought I would pop down to Sam's house. He had invited me to a cheesy evening. Cheese is a rarity in Taiwan therefore when you are offered some, you take it! "Cheesy eats" the name of a food place that covers everything in a white sauce that distinctly lacks cheese. They have plenty of plastic slices for burgers and sandwiches, but it just isn't the same.
At Sam's house there was Stilton, Edam, Brie and blue cheese. There was a bowl of eggnog, which tasted a bit like baileys and lots of alchojellies. I recognised Mere, Andrew, Rix, Alex and Gail, but most people I didn't have a clue who they were. I got accused half way through the night of being a hermit as I didn't spend my weekends in Yuanlin bars with them. But after spending 6 hours with them, the idea of spending more time with them doesn't appeal.
On Sunday I slept in until nearly 12. Pascal had promised to cook up a Boxing Day roast dinner.
I offered to assist. When I said I was in all day, he asked me to keep an eye on the Turkey to make sure the cooker didn't turn itself off. It had been 2 hours since Pascal had left and the Turkey wasn't in the oven yet: Was that my job too? I couldn't remember. I rang Pascal and of course he turned up just as it was ringing. He brought some veg with him so it was game on: Peel and Chop time. The main problem when cooking a roast dinner for 12 at our place is that there is only 2 hobs and 2 very small ovens. You could tell Pascal had been dealing with this issue for a few years now. The turkey was cooking away in oven one. We parboiled the spuds and put them in oven 2. Then we cooked the greens very slowly on top of the spud oven, giving us hob to do the gravy (with a splash of red wine - gorgeous). The stuffing was heating up on top of the turkey oven... and then like magic it was ready to eat. Daniel (the guy who used to live here, had joined us, with Christian, Walter (landlords son) and his wife and kids, Sam and Gail. It was the perfect number of people: plenty of seconds for everyone! And Sam brought two cakes for pudding. Perfect end to a Christmas weekend.
The only downside was that we were all back at work on Monday!
posted by Dunx @ 7:42 AM
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