新年快乐! Happy Chinese New Year!

It's the year of the Dog! Happy Chinese New Year Everyone! Here's to our cat dexter who thinks he is a dog! (It's practically his year)
























As to why the cat did not make the Chinese zodiac, here is a rendition of the popular story I heard when I was a kid:

"Once upon a time, the Jade Emperor announced to the entire animal kingdom that there would be an amazing race. The first twelve animals to cross the finish line would each be awarded one year in the lunar calendar. The news spread quickly and excitement grew everywhere.

Now Cat and the Rat were the best of best friends. They did everything together: eat, play, sleep. There wasn't a day that would go by where they didn't say "howdy" to each other. When Cat heard about the great news, he immediately told Rat whom excitedly jumped to his feet and agreed they should both enter the race. After many restless nights, all Rat could think of was winning the competition. But he said nothing to Cat who was happily dreaming about chasing butterflies. Finally, the day of the race arrived. All the animals gathered at the starting line and with a "BANG!" the race began.

With fantastic speed, Rat and Cat grabbed the lead, scurrying through prickly bushes running over grassy meadows until they came upon a vast river. The current was so strong that they could not swim across. Just as they were thinking of what to do, the sturdy Ox came upon them. Being full of ideas, Rat suggested, "Ox, since your eyesight is very poor, let's help each other. Cat and I will get on your back and direct you across the river." That sounded like a great plan to everyone. Ox was very strong and had no trouble swimming across the river.

As the party neared the other side, Rat let out an excited shriek. "Look, look! The Jade Emperor's palace!" Sure enough, bright red festive lanterns were shining all around the magical kingdom. Now, even though Rat and Cat were the best friends, Rat wanted to be first more than ANYTHING in the whole world. So without even a whisper, Rat pushed Cat off Ox into the fast moving river. "Meowwwwww", yelped Cat. "What was that?" Ox asked. "Oh...oh nothing...must have been the wind. Quick! Quick! We're almost there!" shrieked Rat. As they reached the shore, Rat leapt off Ox's back to the finish line, dancing and cheering.

The Jade Emperor rewarded Rat with the first spot followed by a very tired Ox. Shortly after, the strong and powerful Tiger roared to the finish with the lucky Rabbit hopping right behind. From the sky, the noble Dragon descended to the ground; through bushes the Snake slithered to take its place. Next came the Horse and Goat in a tight race. From the trees, Monkey swung in vine to vine. Rooster scrambled in with a few feathers ruffled, trailed by Dog who was in a very good mood. Finally, last but not least Pig trotted in wanting to know when dinner would be served. As Jade Emperor congratulated all 12 animals on winning the race, Cat, who was soaked head to paw, scampered in to the palace. Jade Emperor thanked Cat for joining the race but that he was just too late. From this day onward, Cat swore he and Rat would be enemies forever.

And that is the story of the Chinese horoscope and why Cats and Rats can never get along."

As I was looking for this story online, I found a few different versions with components that sounded very familiar to me. There is one side story where the ox took off the night before, thinking that he ought to get a head start because he moves slower than the other animals. Another familiar sounding side story is the one where the rat was suppose to wake up the cat for the race, but the rat either forgot or just decided not to. For those of you who are interested, you can read more about it here

I'll have to find my old Chinese Story books the next time I am back at my parents' house. I have this set of Chinese folklores for kids that I grew up on. It has a story for every day of the year. When I do I'll have to share some here on the blog.

Bonjour... Merci...

Traci and I ventured to Montreal this past weekend to see some of my beloved family and my friend Alex from China.

I had a chance to bust out my very limited French. (very, very limited French that I learned when I was in Francophone Africa for a month back in 2000. Here is what I did back then to express myself, say the word in English with a French accent, and if that didn't work, try the Spanish word with a French accent, all with lots of gesturing. It was like a big game of charades. Sadly enough, my French had become more limited since then) It was fun to watch my cousins switch from English to Mandarin to Cantonese to French depending on who would call them on their cell phone. These non-Americans, they all speak so many stinkin' languages!

Montreal is a very charming old city with beautiful European architecture and the whole French speaking thing just adds to the romance of the city. Sad to say that I really did not get any pictures of Montreal in our hectic weekend.

One thing we did do (as we always do around my family), is that we ate well. Since we spent much time eating, I do have pictures of some decadent desserts. If you've ever wondered how people turn out, growing up in a culture where there is so much good dessert, I will give you exhibit A: my cousin Thomas.

We show up at this nice French Restaurant, and the first thing he tells the waiter was, "please set aside one of each of the desserts for us." (Apparently they are very good and they tend to run out of them.) We teased him about it quite a bit, though to his credit, he was right, the dessert was quite good.










If you want to hear about the Chinese food we ate, check out Traci's blog entry.

Bon Appétit!

Blogging Slacker

Well, as of late, I have been a slacker at blogging. It's gone the same way as my going to the gym routine. Now that I've started getting back to the gym, I figure I should probably get back into blogging. (I must give props to Mike and Caryn and their blog The consistency of their blogging inspires me!)

Traci and I are both taking a photography class. (You can see some of her beautiful work here) She is doing Black & White photography, so doing quite a bit of dark room work (which she loves!) and I am taking a digital photography class.

Here are a couple of "motion" pictures I took today of us playing at the playground.