Archive for May, 2007

Facts about Queanbeyan

May 31, 2007 at 7:21 pm · Filed under Daily Living

It’s always a bit complicated to explain to those people who had never been to Australia or any inland city in NSW, but are keen to know where I am living. I usually tell them that I am living in a country town, but just this country town is adjacent to Canberra.

People accepted what I told them, but I can see more confusion on their faces. Canberra, the capital city of Australia, where the Parliament House and John Howard stays, and Queanbeyan, a country town, supposed to have horses, cows, pigs, sheeps, chooks, ducks and endless grassland, it just doesn’t make sense. So I guess the question in their mind is what Australia really looks like? :-)

I admit that I’ve never tried harder to explain that right, while my husband did a bit long time ago on his blog. I felt that I would be wasting my time if I did. Coming visit, having a look and taking a ride physically would work much better than describing it with thousands words.

My Mom & Dad love here, my sister loves here, and my niece didn’t complain about here, although they’ve been to big smoke Sydney and enjoyed the trip up there as well, they still put QBN as their first choice on their preference list. First impression!!! I reckon. Unfortunately I was just being naïve about others who can’t come to look and live for a while themselves. They still don’t get it, or maybe they just don’t care if they can get it.

Anyway, this morning I was bored with sitting there doing triage for this whole week, so I got on the Council’s website and found Visitor Information website had changed its layout (I love the animation picture of the running river). Also, there is a very brief but informative introduction about Queanbeyan City. I was impressed and inspired, couldn’t help doing a bit advocacy job for them.

So, here it is. Just click the link http://www.visitqueanbeyan.com/page.aspx?page=1506 and read it yourself. Hopefully it will help you to figure out which corner on the earth we are actually staying.

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Pain in arse

May 30, 2007 at 10:26 pm · Filed under Work & Social Issues

Coming to the end of this financial year, this morning’s topic at the weekly staff meeting was about money. Not the money that we wanted more and we don’t have, it was about the money that we’ve got in our pocket but impossibly spend all up before the new financial year commences.

How funny this is!!! I can’t believe that we were sitting there with frantic faces and worrying about we will underspend the money and trying so hard to figure out the ways to get rid of it. A person from where I come from, just can’t get used to the situation like this. I was shocked :-O I can’t say a word. If they had asked me my opinion, I would have suggested them to go to China, start a business, get around with what they have to deal with for starting and developing a business, all the stuff like treating people with expensive meals, giving shopping vouchers, buying things for the big bosses or key persons acting on a position; or go to Macau to try their luck at Casino :-) Or send their teenager kids to overseas to study what they are not interested, of course not forgetting to transfer enough money into their overseas bank account, so their child can buy funky cars, expensive clothes, luxury things and rent a big modern place to sleep with their girlfriends.

Hehe, you know that I was just kidding. My point was you might find it hard to earn money, but never experience difficulty finding a way to spend money. This is not something happening in a Chinese government organization. People complain about lacking of money to achieve their goals to facilitate that country all the time, although they wasted the money at somewhere else on something unimportant. However, money is always something Chinese struggle with, the motivation, the driving force behind, the possibility of making a profit that they see in their eyes, the desire for the materials, all the dark and nasty side of human being’s secret needs.

Now I was told to try my best to spend the money?!!! How????? Well, I can understand the bit about “if someone asked 4, we’d better arrange 6 or 8”, but what would be the other bits that we could do? We even shared the bills for morning teas and people’s birthday cake. How could we spend the money quickly by doing these sorts of things? :-)

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Pork Feet and Soy Bean Soup

May 29, 2007 at 9:00 am · Filed under Food & Cusine

I don’t remember who was the first person told me about this recipe. Or actually there was nobody at all had ever invented it. I feel that it’s like kind of legacy passing on from one generation to another in my country. Almost every Chinese knows that pork feet and soy beans would make a perfect companion in a soup.
We had been cooking this traditional dish for ages since I got marriedWe had been cooking this traditional dish for ages since I got married and moved out of Mom & Dad’s home. I often cooked it at our old home in Yueji Yuan over the weekend as it’s quite a time consuming dish. Normally to achieve the tender texture of pork, cooked through soybeans and best flavor of the soup, it’s better to simmer the soup for at least 3 hours in a pot.

For some well-known and simple reason, I stopped cooking pork for quite a while since I came to Australia. But yesterday we resumed. The reason for that was equally simple. We found a reliable butcher shop in Fyshwick which sells the pork feet at an acceptable price (two for about $1.70 AUD). So yesterday I soaked the soy beans for the whole morning, and started to cook in the late afternoon. I just made it with ingredient and steps as simply as I can. So there will be no drama.

Only ginger, white part of shallots, minced green leaves of shallot, two pork feet and a small rice bowl of soaked soy beans will be needed for the soup. Wash to clean the raw pork feet first and throw them into a pot of water with ginger and white shallots, heat to boil. Remove any dirty things floating on the top of boiled water, throw the soy bean in, then simmer them for about 2-3 hours. Add a bit of salt and at last sprinkle with green shallots on the top of soup. All ready!

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Dinner for Two

May 28, 2007 at 8:57 pm · Filed under Family & Friends

At another end of the dinning table, my husband eating his food from the bowl. Down this end, I was doing mine. It could have been a very ordinary scene and nothing special if I didn’t lift my head up and look about.

Believe it or not! For a moment, I suddenly saw something else. I saw 30 years later, there would be still my husband and I sitting at the dinning table, face to face, eating our food from the bowl and living out of our lives just like we do everyday. We are so used to the scene that we don’t need to make extra effort to communicate with each other like those girls and guys in their dates for the first a couple months. We still pass on the plate for each other from time to time. My husband would still be picking on my cooking. I would still enjoy whatever I am having.

The dishes on the table might change, our appearances might change (surely we will get older), the topic of conversation might change, and place might change, but it will be still two of us…. No matter how many things we have experienced in the past, how many children we have raised, how much money we have earned and how the memory gets faded. At the very end of it, it will be still the same persons living on their minimum requests for their lives.

All of a sudden, I felt that I have thought the things through, and was quite okay with what’s the go. I stared at my husband across the table, couldn’t help wondering in my mind if this is IT….the life, the couple things, and the way how we pass through this life and perceive it. I also wondered if this is also okay for him. I looked again.For that moment, he looked comfy, mindless, no complains at all, and all innocent off all of my thoughts that were going through my head.

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Now I am taking it seriously

May 27, 2007 at 7:17 pm · Filed under Daily Living

Well, I knew this gonna happen even before I got the new job.

It’s one of the essential criteria that the applicant has to hold the current driver’s license, so they can drive around in the region and meet people and attend the conferences and appointments to fulfill the duties. Anyway before I lodged my application, I let my boss know that actually I don’t have one at the moment, and I am going to get it ASAP.

After all it’s just a matter of time. My boss must have needed me badly:-) So I got in and on my offer letter, there is a condition states that I have to get my driver’s license within the next 6 months, otherwise it could lead to an immediate dismissal. Sounds serious? Surely they are not kidding. I’d better to deal with it seriously.

However, when I mentioned that I have resumed my practice this afternoon, I was told by my boss that it won’t really happen. She said “don’t stress it too much”on this issue as if I didn’t get it by the end of 6 months’ time, she would negotiate with HR and extend it. Wow! They do need me badly :-) It’s good news though. But for me, I think it’s better to ignore her nice offer and recognize it my first priority on my agenda and start to work on that even harder.

So today, I got on the road, having one passenger in the car, and drove it first to Allen’s at Queanbeyan, then to Fyshwick Fresh Food Market. We bought a pair of sport pants, also the vegies and fruit as we usually do over the weekend. The only difference was that I parked the car outside the market. I didn’t want to get sneaking in that narrow parking lot and spend ages getting my car stop between two lines.

So basically speaking, today, for the first time, I crossed the border of two states, NSW and ACT, got on 100ks speed limit road (although as a learner’s license holder, I am only allowed to do 90ks per hour) and accomplished my first trip to a destination that means something for me. Guess what? I got very excited when the car was moving at the speed of about 85ks. I felt that there is something in my blood actually likes driving the car fast…hehe…furious :-) !!!!

At the end of it, I couldn’t believe that I had done all this, and actually had heaps of goods in our car’s trunk and got back home. This was also the first time I didn’t actually feel that I hate practicing driving. I guess the key to what had happened was the meaning of the drive. As long as I have a clear destination, I would feel motivated to take action on it. Otherwise, I just get so fed up with repetitive turns, roundabouts and all the places in QBN that I had been for more than the times I could count.

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