Birthday Bash

Dad's 70th birthday party was this past weekend in SF. The weekend started with a Chinese banquet dinner at Great Eastern restarant in Chinatown on the actual day of his birthday (Dec 5), followed by the birthday (observed) dinner, and rounded up with dim sum brunch on Sunday at Canton Restaurant south of Market. Am I full yet?

We started planning for this months ago, of course. IWOM put the venue negotiations and menu in motion; Dad slowly filtered names for this invite list to me. I sent a "Save the Date" email consisting mainly of one of his baby photos. Later, Dad and I selected and ordered the invitations online (note to self: October is rush season for card-printing due to the holidays) and then he went out of town, leaving his near-career-long admin and me to address the invites and send them out. Thankfully, they turned out great - another victory for the internet!

Once he returned from his trip, we went to design the cake, and I was struggling to think of something appropriate. Something from Dad's professional career, like a microbe or infectious agent? Or maybe something travel-related, like the glass pyramid at the Louvre? I finally hit on it as he told me about his most recent blue-and-white purchase, a Ming plate in the shape of a lotus. We showed the cake folks what we wanted, and they said they'd give it their best shot. Dad went into their storefront wanting passion fruit flavor, and thankfully it was one of their options. Done!

Meanwhile, I had a dress and matching necklace made in Shanghai. The dress was based on a design by Valentino from the Neiman-Marcus website and the necklace was made of weird pearls that looked like teeth. I felt like an extra from "Conan the Barbarian" wearing them.

The actual party was a tremendous success, which I judge mainly by the sheer bliss exuded by Dad. He's not someone to get emotional, but he was clearly happy to be surrounded by friends, and they were happy to get a chance to celebrate their experiences with him. Toasts were funny, heartfelt, and exemplified the diversity of his experiences. One of his oldest friends, S, had a typed copy of a letter that Dad wrote to him in 1960 after a trip to Europe with comments that had the audience howling. His sisters were generous and sweet, and I learned that I'm not the first relative he's subjected to his opinions on opera (apparently he lectured Auntie P. on a number of musical topics before he left for college). The reception started at 6:30, and the last guests wandered out around 10:30, whereupon the aunties and cousins and our family migrated to the lobby for drinks. Dad disappointed by not falling asleep at that point (an historical tendency of his), and we finally went to bed around 1am.

And the cake was totally awesome. Beautiful AND tasty!



J managed to tough it out for most of the night, and came down for a final bow in jammies before going to sleep. She was a high point of the evening.

Bah, Humbug

I hate Christmas. Well, I hate shopping at Christmastime to be more precise. I wrote more about it in another blog I've started experimentally, where I can put my thoughts around how to make the world a better place. I did say experimentally.

We had a great B'giving at Stately Rawson Manor in Oregon, with giant piles of food, multiple sets of electronics simultaneously in play (computers, Wii, drum sets), and even a plate-painting session where K created the "Caffeine Threat Levels" mug a la Homeland Security: zombie (low), human (guarded), awake (elevated), alert (high), ADHD (severe). Totally. Awesome.

Dad and I got to see the SF Opera's production of "La Boheme" last night, which was pleasingly decent. The last time we saw "Boheme" at SFO it was awful and we left early, so we were both happy that the leads could carry their arias (unlike the last time). I love the moment in this production when Rodolfo and Mimi are singing their love duet, and the sides and back wall of the garret disappear, leaving them bathed in moonlight and singing about love. It's a class-A romantic moment.

It's been a tough week at work from an attitudinal standpoint. I'm hoping I'm just suffering from post-vacation seasonal affective disorder and will be put right by consumption of massive quantities of calories. That starts tomorrow with my company holiday banquet, followed on Friday by Dad's Chinese banquet and (same night) K's company party, and then Dad's 70th birthday party on Saturday. Oh, and dim sum brunch on Sunday. Am I full yet?

Can't wait to see C & J & J - they're staying with us on Friday and have had quite an adventurous trip, starting in Hawaii to see Popo and currently in Oregon with J's family.

Rainy Shanghai

Shanghai is more familiar every time I come here; things just don't seem to catch my eye the way they used to. I wonder if this is because I am more comfortable here, or because the city continues to Westernize itself?

This time, the vendors aren't constantly shouting at us and grabbing our arms to come into their stores; they wait until we express an interest. This is VERY different from before. More shopkeepers speak English. More foreigners are everywhere, and they know how to bargain - throwing up their hands and walking out of the stores in mock disgust. There was even a Chinese man dressed in full Stanford regalia waiting for Shanghai dumplings at Xin Tian Di - on the day of The Big Game.

The air quality seems slightly better, though the rains have brought a disgusting sheen to the streets...at least until the scum is temporarily washed away. The city is also preparing for the International Expo in 2010, so there are posters showing what not to do on the streets and sidewalks: spitting, leaving construction materials, dumping dirty water and garbage out the windows, smoking in non-smoking areas...Mom wants to steal one of the signs because she thinks it's hysterical.

We're supposed to go for a walking tour near the Bund today with mom's architecture friend, but I've been having stomach problems since last night and am not convinced it's the best idea. Staying in doesn't hold much appeal either, unfortunately.

Musings

It's hot in the Bay Area. The weather conditions that are literally burning up Southern California are making for a balmy November weekend in NoCal. Some of my Red Cross friends have headed south to help with the fires - many thanks to them. My NoCal friends, meanwhile, are breaking out their summer clothes. Good thing K and I weren't fooled into switching to our flannel winter sheets or...damn.

Went to see "Boris Gudonov" at the SF Opera last night, starring Sam Ramey (no, not the horror film director) in the title role. I must be genetically conditioned to like bass voices because he had me when he started to sing. Amazingly, Sam is 66 years old. He's had an incredible career. The article in the program discussed the affects of aging on his voice, and how this might be the last time he sings the role of "Boris". I'm grateful I got to see him, and that I've seen him in a few roles over the years at SFOp. Some of his YouTube performances (including one as a toreador who loves the letter "L" on Sesame Street) are thrilling, if not priceless. I'm officially a fan.



So, is it shallow of me to enjoy opera so much in the middle of a meteoric economic crash, in a period when our presidency is undergoing seismic change (thank goodness), and when my work just laid off some longtime colleagues on Friday? Fiscally, these opera tickets are something Dad and I invested in at the start of the year. From a human standpoint, it's nice to have something to enjoy - especially my Dad's company as we approach celebrating his 70th birthday this December. I prefer to think that human experience is a collection of large and small events, positive and negative, and it's best to take it all in with equanimity, an open mind, and gratitude. I am grateful for my friends, my family, and opportunities to support and value them, whether that's by spending an evening together at the opera, or writing them a recommendation on LinkedIn.

Another Sunday night

...another weekend chock full of stuff!

Let's start with last weekend:

Friday
-Dinner with R & R at Zachary's. Yum.

Saturday
-Bay-Friendly Gardening seminar on low-water plants. Lotsa good learning.
-Voluntered at the Alameda Country Community Food Bank
-Dinner with S and C at Soi4. Dessert care of TJ's - molten choco cake. More yum.

Sunday
-Raider tailgate (as described in the previous post)
-Party planning and dinner with Dad at Camino. Super yum.
-Experimental clearing of slow drains using vinegar. Sadly, did not work.


Now, on to this weekend:
Friday
-Dinner with Mom to belatedly celebrate her birthday, at Cortez. Amazing small plates. Really delicious.

Saturday
-Composting with Worms class. Dirt! Worms! Fungus!
-Chinese Lesson
-Dinner at Paul K in SF (nice Mediterranean food...delicious beets)
-San Francisco Symphony featuring Joshua Bell on violin. That boy can play.

Sunday
-All day sewing in preparation for Halloween. (check later for photo)
-KB rocks the chores with grocery shopping, garden shopping, laundry en masse, cooking, and mopping. That's my sweetie!

Oh, KB also attend an industry charity dinner, black tie optional. He borrowed a plaid cummerbund & tie set from Dads, and then proceeded to terrorize folks who knew him before he shaved and cut his hair. Totally awesome. I picked up my tipsy sweetie from the St. Francis around 11:30pm, whereupon he presented me with the lovely flower centerpiece (red roses...odd for a charity event but great for a spouse consolation prize) and told me how much he appreciates me. The latter is something he tends to do when tipsy. My friend J rightly pointed out that this is a rather cute trait.

Fall Sunday

It's freezy out. (For me, that means 55 degrees.) Yesterday it was sunny and warmish, but after the sun set, all bets were off. Today in the sunshine it was freezy! Phooey! Now I have to go find my turtlenecks and scarves and warm things...

We joined our Raider mostly faithful friends today at the tailgate (but not the game, we don't have tix anymore) and enjoyed a carb fest. Or as K dubbed it, a CARB WRECK followed by a CARB CRASH. (Yes, he was killing himself laughing at this joke.) There was a token slab of meat, but until that was ready we had pumpkin bread rolls, pumpkin bread loaf, bagel chips, bolani, garlic bread, and grapes. Uuuuurrrrgh! It was nice to catch up with the peeps - this is only our second home game of the year, and the weather was good.

Even better was walking through the parking lot to take BART home; we passed a mind-bending variety of people and displays. Parents and kids selling candy for their schools next to the party boys shotgunning beers. Variously "decorated" Al Davis posters. Men in silver masks with wigs smiling in posed pictures with kids. (In some odd inversional rule, the most insanely dressed Raider fans are invariably the nicest). Skeleton Halloween bodies dressed in Raider gear, and sitting in chairs at tailgates. Raider grills. Raider steam cookers 8 feet tall. I didn't see any portable living rooms (sofa, rug, TV set, satellite receiver, power generator) but we have in the past. It was a sunny day in Raider Nation...made even sunnier by the eventual astonishing win against Brett Favre and The Jets, thanks to Janokowski's record-setting field goal.

Fall is really here. Now, how come we haven't played the World Series yet?

Red-Letter Day!

Went to see the Giants game. Got the sweeeeeeet company seats. w00t!

Yes, that's my view 3 rows back from the field. Close enough to say things the players and umpires could hear! I sat up in the front row for a few innings too.

And then we came home and made cheese from scratch! Like, for real! We bought some cream-top 2% organic milk from TJ's and followed the directions in our Cheesemaking Kit, and less than an hour later, fresh mozarella cheese! How cool is that?

Om nom nom.

It's that time of year

Driving home tonight from work, the freeway traffic warning sign on the Dublin grade read:

Oakland Coliseum
E V E N T
Expect Delays

First game of the season, Oakland vs the hated Broncos. Monday Night Football. Yes, we love our HD TV.

Goooooooo Raiders!

La Frida Bonita y otras cosas

Went to see the Frida Kahlo exhibit at the SF MOMA this weekend. I was surprised by how many paintings were included in the exhibit, and frustrated by how many people were also moving through the rooms. It was hard to read the information displays, and hard to get in close - even sometimes see from a distance - the paintings. But what paintings! I know Kahlo mostly for her self-focused imagery, her struggles with pain, her representations of inner anguish. The exhibit showed her earlier portraits (straight-up, 30s modern), her later still lifes (vibrant, beautiful, static) and many candid photographs from her years in SF and Mexico...in addition to the amazing images you already know. There was good biographical information about her marital to-and-fro-ing with Diego Rivera, as well as her sojourns in America. Altogether she painted some very beautiful, symbolic, thoughful pieces. I was surprised by my enthusiasm. And while she herself was beautiful and charismatic, and she was tragically in love with Diego Rivera, a doughy dumpling of a man - what was she thinking???

Afterwards we got the super-bonus of an exhibit of modern Chinese artists - including Yueh MinJun whose works shows hordes of painfully grinning Chinese men (on ostriches, as fields of near-identical statues, sitting around, etc.). They are somehow perfect - identical, falsely friendly/happy, artificial, vaguely off-putting. Ai WeiWei had taken Neolithic clay pots (5000-3000 BCE) and painted over them with garishly-colored paints. Sacrilege! What a waste! Or...an interesting point about history, conservation, consumerism. Sui Jianguo created "The Sleep of Reason" - my new favorite, a statue of sleeping Mao (very unusual, as the link explains), and filled the room around him with waves of colored toy plastic dinosaurs, radiating outwards in dreamlike technicolor trip-out patterns. Way cool.

Afterwards we had dinner on Fillmore street at SPQR, a mixed-up Italian joint. It was good, but I can't tell you why. The desserts were confused (the "panna cotta" was a delicious chocolate mousse with chocolate cake on the bottom), and I think we paid too much. I was fascinated by the clientele; Mom had commented recently that people eating out in the East Bay are somehow different than the people eating out in San Francisco - more casual. Sitting there in SPQR, all I could see were white people, all the women were blond (almost none naturally), all from a very high socio-economic stratum, healthy, wearing very nice clothing, and not necessarily enjoying themselves. I felt pretty ghetto in my shorts and stringy yoga top. The couple to the right of us complained the whole time about the food, and the woman to the left of us spent almost the entire meal nattering away to her absently listening partner. Dad and I barely needed to talk for all the entertainment we had. Yes Mom, diners in San Francisco are different. I'll stick to the East Bay.

Change is good, mostly

I've just concluded a rather interesting month. The short(ish) version: I realized that my workplace had changed strategic direction in a way that really didn't need my skill set very much. So I went to S, the guy who runs the place, and said, "I'm not asking you to fire me, but honestly, you don't need me. Is it okay if I make a few calls?"

My thinking is pretty straightforward. I'd rather work where I'm needed, not just where I'm liked.

So he gave me permission, and I put the word out that I was available. Something must be in the proverbial water, because it seems like I got calls from damn near every major player in my industry within a few days.

Also within a few days, S called me into a meeting to tell me, with a hangdog expression on his face, that he had done all he could, but my position had to be eliminated. My last day was to be in two weeks, at which time I would be handed a very generous severance check.

Weirdly, he was the one who needed to be comforted. "S, man, why the long face? You just got done telling me I get a fat check for leaving, which you know damn well I was doing anyway. Corporate HQ got a camera in here or something?"

I continued interviewing. Either they were all desperate, or I still got mad interview skillz, because each interview resulted in either a followup interview or an offer. Perhaps I shouldn't have done so many interviews...pretty soon I had a lot of deciding to do.

I've chosen one now, and for those who have heard me talk about the options, I chose the one that I can take the train to rather than the one I need a Chinese visa for, or the one I could bicycle to, or the one that might involve exotic foods.

I've learned a lot through this process. Turns out I can make hard decisions after all. Apparently I also have senior-management-level strategic thinking. I definitely have the Best. Wife. Evar.

I haven't ruled out going overseas for work one of these days. Probably will, in fact, before the next summer Olympics. Learning Chinese and French in the meantime might be a good investment of my time....

Twenty Year Time Machine

Had a really good weekend (which is good, because this week so far has been uphill both ways).

Friday night: Gaming. D&D 4th edition with some of K's tribe members. I manage to convince KF to join us at the last minute, thereby preventing him from mouldering in his office until the wee hours. J brought Fred's Burgers and old-fashioned fat-tacular ice cream. (First two ingredients: butterfat and buttermilk.) I conked out at midnight.

Saturday: Haircut, violin lesson, volunteering at the Alameda County Community Food Bank, and dinner with the Dads. I was exhausted after shelving food for 3 hours, but cheerful. My co-volunteer spoke mainly Spanish, so I was kept mentally entertained by struggling to remember vocabulary.

Sunday: loafing about, including some minor house chores, reading in the sun, and a vegetable-tacular trip to the local farmer's market. K made a giant egg bake full of broccoli and cauliflower.

The highlight of the weekend was really the violin lesson. I played violin semi-seriously when I was a kid: started when I was 9, stopped when I was 13. I like to think I was a decent violinist, and the main reason I stopped was because we had moved to San Francisco and it seemed clear to me that it was time to decide if I was going to be really serious about violin or let it go. I decided I didn't want to be yet another Asian Girl Who Plays Violin.

I've always harbored a desire to play again, Sherlock Holmes-style, and so have kept the violin with me, as well as my sheet music and stand. I even had the poor thing repaired at a local violin store a few years back. But mostly it hid in its dark case.

Earlier this year I looked for violin teachers on Craigslist and found one who just happened to grow up in the same region of LA as I did, and even played with my Junior High orchestra conductor. He's a Berkeley grad, lives not far away, and was very kind and encouraging. He seemed pleased that I still remembered a few things (including a general sense for when notes are out of tune), and had lots of good advice about my bad thumb posture (BOTH hands, drat the luck). I was really encouraged and heartened.

So, now I'm back to practicing. K says it isn't too bad, and I find it very enjoyable. Some of the stuff even seems to be coming back, which is great. Many thanks to Mom and Dad and C for tolerating the whining and screeching of my practicing all those years ago, and paying for the lessons!

Mistaken Identity

K just told me that he had to undelete some items from my gmail. Apparently I had left it logged in. He went to send an email and saw all these messages from people and companies he didn't know! delete, delete, dele-- oh crap! This is C's email!!!

Note to self: remember to log out from K's machine.

Point Reyes - On Hard Difficulty

Meaning (for those of you non-gamers), not on "Easy" or "Medium".

Been looking forward to this hiking weekend for some time. Though none of our usual camping buddies was able to join us, K and I decided to go it alone (and miss E's birthday shindig, sorry E!). I needed the mental rest.

It started off badly, as I ended up needing to do about 3 hours of work on Friday. (Boo! Vacation delayed!) That took me until 10:30, whereupon I started gathering my stuff for packing. K had already given us a good head start (with my verbal commentary) during my work phase. We headed out around 12:30, stopped by TJ's for jerky and fruit, and got to Point Reyes around 2:30. After some initial administrivia at the Visitor Center to get our camping pass, we went to the Five Brooks staging area, parked, and hit the trail. First leg: 4.4 miles up, up, up! It was a nicely graded drivable road (Stewart trail) that went up to Firtop Mountain at 1,324 feet. Oof. Oh, and it was 82 degrees out. Double Oof. And there were yellowjacket warnings. Yikes! A few groups of horses passed us, and at one point K spotted a mountain lion. Double Yikes! We considered turning around, but another group of horses gave us courage (and cover) to proceed.

At Firtop, we met a group of cyclists celebrating their ascent of the mountain. As we proceeded down the steep trail, I marvelled, "They _cycled_ up this?" We took a hiking path down the aptly named Greenpicker trail, and made it into camp in plenty of time to pitch our tent and feel exhausted before having dinner. We couldn't find our tent pegs and it was so warm out, we happily slept under a fir tree with no rain fly. We also started a steady diet of ibuprofen. Total Hike Day 1: 6.4 miles.

Some uncomfortable tossing and turning during the night. We agreed we need new sleeping pads.

Since we were both prety wiped (we both had had migraines late in the week for one thing), Saturday we decided not to go for a longer trek down the coast but to look for ocean views from the Coast Trail. We don't normally stay at this end of the park, so were looking forward to different terrain. We hiked out via Glen Trail to the Coast Trail, and saw...lots of fog. Fog, fog, fog. We were very glad not to be hiking in heat like the day before, but the vista points were sadly obscured. Finally we turned a corner on the trail and saw...a mound of white rock jutting out of the ocean. K promptly gave his best voice-over: "And now on our left, Bird Poop Rock..." as that was what clearly gave it its color. Moments after that, the fog cleared and we were able to see the coastline down to Wildcat Camp and the faint coloring of Alamere Falls in the distance. Beautiful! We had lunch at Arch Rock and ambled tiredly back to camp. K found a nice stout walking stick and cleaned it up. Napping, dinner, and some bedtime reading. The sun never really broke through, and it was spitting fog when we went to bed. Total Hiked Day 2: 5.7 miles.

During the night: incredibly loud chatty neighbors, more painful tossing and turning, the slow increase of drips in our uncovered tent.

Morning dawned gray and drippy. The fog continued to condense into spitting near-rain, so once it was light enough (and we could no longer stand the water splups in the eye) we got up, took stock of our soaked items, and decided to head out as soon as we could. K made stand-up breakfast, while I slowly assembled our things and kept them as dry as I could. Mostly, our approach was to "put everything into a white plastic bag and walk." We'd already agreed the night before that we were going to take the shortest route back to the car. Not long after leaving camp, Kyle saw another mountain lion - much smaller this time, but unmistakably a mountain cat. This plus the very damp Greenpicker brook - er, trail - convinced us to change our route out from the shorter hiking paths back to the main Stewart Trail. We would have a clear view of the road and the horse traffic, leaving much less chance of cat encounters or slipping on the wet terrain. Slog, slog, slog, 6.4 miles and we were back at the car.

This was a tough trip for some reason. Our other stays have been at campsites that are far more accessible (Sky and Coast are 1.3 and 1.8 miles from parking, respectively, with not much elevation change); this trip we started by climbing 4.4 miles in 82 degree heat. We'd both had migraines recently. We were both uncomfortable sleeping on our pads. We got soaked. (Oh, it turns out the tent pegs had landed under the tent and we just hadn't noticed. "No wonder the ground was so uncomfortable!" K said half-jokingly, half-painfully.) And we didn't see much wildlife, except for K's mountain lion sightings - not exactly encouraging. I did get to greet a few big black offrushing beetles and a banana slug, but there were none of the usual deer.

Maybe we'll try again in October, or let it rest until next spring.

Rabbits on the Runways?

At a birthday dinner in honor of my cousin K last weekend, we were discussing my Aunt P's pet rabbit. It's quite taciturn and fuzzy. I mentioned that there was one time when (my) K and I were driving through SFO's Long Term Parking Lot, and I was scanning the aisles: no space - no space - no spaces - brown hare - no spac--what?! There was a big brown hare sitting there, chilling out. In Long Term Parking. Cousin A chimed in that she had seen them at Chicago (O'Hare?!), and someone else mentioned they'd seen them at yet another airport. What is it with bunnies and planes?

K hypothesized that rabbit/hare populations are usually kept in check by predators like raptors...who probably wouldn't do so great in the airport environs. Could there be a raptor shadow around airports that allows for bunny proliferation?

CalTrain!

Took my first ride on Caltrain yesterday. Yep, first. It was civilized, clean, quiet on the inside, and efficient. I felt quite smug about the entire experience. I was on the express train, so I felt smug when I passed the local stops and slow local trains. I felt smug when I could see all the slow traffic on the freeways. And I felt smug walking from the train station past street traffic to my friend's house.

Go public transit! Now if only Muni weren't quite such a harrowing experience...

Nuthin' Much

Just sneaking in another post before the month ends (wait for it...) so I can feel like slightly less of a slacker about this so-called blog. I look forward to the day when I have an always-on, conveniently-placed, fast-connected computer-or-other-device that lets me update my blog more regularly. And I'm sure that, even with all those facilitative items, I will still find ways to procrastinate on posting!

Not much new around here, though we seem to be busy. We got to catch up with a bunch o' friends last weekend - it was the parade of babies, actually. R and J and delightful daughter A. We had a surfeit of melon and potato puffs, and good laughs. I especially love J's "She'll be fiiine" approach to mothering - seems very sensible to me. K and A and little A (a different A!) rolled into town in their spiffy new Minivan (how did we ever get by with rolling doors on only one side, that we had to roll by hand?) and spent some time watching A toddle around our backyard. It was really nice to get to see all of them.

This weekend we've got two, count 'em, TWO days of gaming planned, and two, yes TWO birthday parties to attend. Okay, I'll be sitting in our friends' pool while K is gaming on Saturday, but still. And at some point we get to clean the house. yaaaay.

I seem to be connecting with a lot of old friends on Facebook these days. It makes me happy. It especially makes me happy to find them doing well.

Our veg garden continues to entertain us, and while I'm sure I'm not doing a thousand things that could make our plants bigger, stronger, and more prolific, I am quite pleased that we've seen produce at all. We've had two delicious zucchinis, a pile of lemon cucumbers, and an early tomato that leapt off the bush and into K's hand (or so he claims). More tomatoes are clearly on the way, ditto zukes and cukes, and hopefully someday my organic blue lake beans will turn into...beans. The basils continue to bask on our back stairway, with oregano and mint sprouts coming up. And the supposedly "dwarf" sunflowers have grown large in our front porch. I'll post some before/after photos soon. It delights me that I've managed to drop a few seedlings into the ground and they've turned into food sources. Major props to K who honestly does most of the watering. We've decided that one of his mutant powers is the ability to slog through necessary tasks. Go Slog!

Nip Family Reunion Redux

Location: Honolulu, HI

Attendees: legion

Weather: hot and humid

Thursday:
Flight delayed. We arrive at our hotel at 3am PST in an enormous white SUV, the Buick Enclave. Yes, it's a housing unit on wheels.

Friday:
Breakfast on the terrace at the New Otani hotel. It's warm and there are brief rain showers on us, but no one seems to mind. Ah, Hawaii! Dad heads off to
meetings about Popo. I wrestle with a nasty migraine, K and I stroll on the
promenade towards Wakiki. We meet up with Aunt P., Aunt S., Uncle R., Dad, and Popo for lunch.

Evening: Tsukiji Fish Market buffet. The games begin! Cousin S (or rather, her husband M) has made blueberry butter mochi for Dad and Uncle W (the hosts of dinner and both turning 70 this year)...evil evil stuff.

Saturday:
Breakfast: malasadas. YUM.

9:30am ceremony at the graves of Ah-Po and Ah-Gung, my great-grandparents (the parents of Popo). There are mosquitoes, cockroaches, broken pavement...and lots of food and fire to appease our ancestors. We burn paper money (fake), kowtow in generational order, and stand around in the humid Manoa Valley air eating the food - pork, chicken, red bean buns, jai, and some weird gelatinous rice stuff I've never had before and didn't like. Dad shows us the graves of Gung Gung's parents (the Young side), which have "superior" feng shui, i.e. a better view of the ocean. He tells us of the time when he was a boy running through the graveyard and fell about four feet into one of the grave plots. Spooky! Before leaving Manoa we drive up to Gung Gung's memorial garden and spend some time there. It looks well-tended and the lilies are in bloom. We leave a lei on the plaque and take lots of pictures.

We visit Popo again and tell her about the morning's ceremonies, then head off to the Diamond Head Memorial Park where we put some flowers on Gung Gung and Doreen's spot. We drive by the house on Hakaka as well. It looks pretty good, though the driveway and roof are aging, and the garbage cans no longer fit into the nice concrete cubby where they used to live, back in the day. I guess we just have more garbage now!

We drive out to Kaneohe and, after missing the two main turns, make it out to Uncle G and Auntie H's place there to celebrate Uncle G's 80th birthday. (He's not techically my uncle but my Dad's uncle; he is Popo's brother.) Dad heads to the harbor to join the glass-botom boat tour, and K and I alternate helping to set up the tables and napping. I join a flat-bottom boat ride out to Coconut Island, the same one featured in the opening scenes of Gilligan's Island. After I get back to the house, K and I take a brief kayak paddle around the nearby bay. I learn how to husk a coconut (WORK!!!) while others fish without results. The party is great fun. Tons of friends and relatives, a great catered poi supper (rice, tuna poke, lomi salmon, Korean short ribs, kim chee, chicken long rice, lau lau, pineapple, baked taro, and of course poi!), and even some ukelele and hula entertainment from the relatives. There's a cake, more butter mochi (cherry this time) and fruits - long an, lychee, and incredibly delicious mango. We are all seriously stuffed.

Sunday
Breafast: More malasadas. More yum.
The Tinman Triathlon threatens to block our ability to get anywhere on Sunday morning, but thankfully it's mostly over by the time we head out for family photos at the Hawaii State Library. More mosquitoes, and more photos. We take a walking detour to "the Westminster Abbey of the Pacific", Kawaiahao Church and browse around the graveyard. Lots of old Hawaii families and missionaries.

Lunch is at the Mandalay Restaurant, where we have some great dim sum and are treated to a lion dance. This brunch is in honor of my cousin R and his new wife, N. N has been a trooper throughout the weekend with all the relatives and everyone offering their congratulations. After brunch we get chocolate-covered fortune cookies, more cake, and a slideshow from their wedding.

We visit Popo one last time, and while we are there more cousins show up to chat as well. Popo is very bright and active, and even jokes and smiles a bit. It probably helps that she's benefitting from all the good food leftovers!

We make it back to the hotel for some brief beach time (in fact, my only time on the beach - K stays near the air condtioner inside). Dad and I enjoy the sun and splash about, before getting ready for that night's banquet dinner in honor of Auntie T's 80th birthday. More food! More feasting! We all keep our eyes open for the noodle course - usually the last one before dessert. Kyle and I sneak out unobtrusively to catch a cab to the airport, and secretly aren't all that heartbroken to miss dessert - we really don't need the calories!

Yoink Birthday Dinner at Chez Panisse

A half-bottle of Pierre Peters blanc de blanc champagne

Cherry tomato salad with handmade mozzarella, anchovies, and curly endive

A half-bottle of 2005 "village" burgundy

Tagliata di manzo Grilled Cannard Farm Dexter beef with creamed wild greens and vegetable fritto misto

Boysenberry, peach leaf, and apricot bombe glacee

Mint and lemon verbena tisane


Thanks Dad!

Tokyo Food Lineup, cont.

Memory is fading a bit already, but I'll do my best.

Day 4, dinner: Restarant Engaku in Daikanyama, a kaiseki joint run by The Plum Lady. The proprietess knows everything plum, and there's even a book about her plum knowledge. Dinner starts with homemade plum wine, and continues through many beautifully arranged and tasty courses. Sad to say I can barely remember what most of them were, though there was definitely an assortment of seafood and meats, a delicious rice porridge, and traditional frothy tea at the end. The hostess even treated us to some incense listening - apparently serious incense people don't smell it, they listen to it - where tiny slivers of wood were set on a glass plate over a heat source packed in sand. Precious and very delightful-smelling. She even shared records of incense-listening sessions much like wine tastings, where guests took guesses at the sources and similarities of the incense sources. Whew.

Day 5, lunch: we stroll through the Asakusa district, admiring the Golden Turd atop Philippe Stark's Asahi building, and the temple, and the kitch stalls stretching to the horizon. We duck into a tempura restaurant and have truly mediocre tempura. A bust!

Day 5, dinner: Dinner definitely makes up for lunch. After watching a performance at the Tokyo Symphony, our gracious hosts take us up to the Ark Hills Club where we enjoy a parade of beautiful, delicious, and extraordinary sushi. Just awesome. The chef even shares a particular eggplant with us, which can be eaten raw - and tastes delicious. We're all completely stuffed, and wander about the club in a sushi high, admiring the views of Tokyo and the art by Le Corbusier.

Day 6, lunch: After discovering that the neighborhood tempura joint (recommended to us by the hotel staff) is closed, we settle for noodles in Ebisu, 99-something. It's crowded and noisy and Mom doesn't like it much, but I'm happy to have tasty noodles on a rainy day. Plus, the table is fully of funky additives.

Day 6, dinner: We return to the site of previous exploits, the yakitori joint. After a week of glorious feasting, we decide to tone it down and stick (mostly) to vegetables. Wrapped in bacon. Asparagus, tomatoes, and enoki mushrooms. Once again, delicious.

Mom heads back to Shanghai, but I stay on a for a few days of work in the Tokyo office. Sunday night I meet up with a colleague and we enjoy noodles at Ippudo. They're so big they've started a restaurant in NYC. One feature is they provide cloves of garlic and a presser at the table so you can have fresh squashed garlic in your noodles. Serious yum.

Monday night, another colleague and I go to Ninja in Akasaka. This turns out to be a theme park and a very good restaurant - we are led by a ninja through the "dangerous" path to our table, and served by various server ninjas, and entertained by a ninja magician. The food is really good in spite of the kitch factor - foams and flavors put together in an updated fusion mix. The only real miss was the dessert - one of them had a delicious flan on top of what can only be described as "snot noodles". Ew.

Tuesday before getting on the plane, I follow my colleagues to a tempura joint not far away. It's fabulous. While I wouldn't ordinarily consider paying $30 for a set tempura lunch, this is totally worth it. We have 4 different plates of piping hot tempura, plus rice and crunchy vegetables and tea. Finally! Light, melt-in-your mouth tempura that doesn't obscure the taste of the food inside!


Other notes from the trip:
On the way back from dinner one night, we sample the local hole-in-the-wall-yet-very-famous tako yaki - octopus balls. They are puffy, creamy, scorching hot dough balls with a morsel of octopus inside. I can't say I was an instant fan, but they weren't repulsive either.

The money-washing shrine in Kamakura, where you put your yen in a basket and use the shrine's stream to "wash" it. Copious incense fires nearby help you (carefully) dry your damp yen. Money so washed is supposed to return in multiple, so we're advised to spend it wisely.

Mom and D and I hit the town, and check out the Art Deco Teian Art Museum. The exhibit there features export ceramics (not so interesting), but the building itself is a beautiful Art Deco confection, with really lovely details in things like the stairway railings and radiator covers. We also tromp about the garden a bit, deserted due to the rain showers, and smelling slightly of ginko.

We tackle another neighborhood museum, the Meguro Art Museum. It's a small space and no translations are available, and we're the only ones in the Museum. We eventually figure out that the works are by Japanese artists in the style of impressionist painters and have a reasonably good time.

I bought a few pairs of Japanese split-toe socks, with the idea that I like wearing my flip-flops in the house but sometimes it's chilly. They're working out grandly, and I'm wearing them now. Yay, warm feet!

Sumimasen...Om Nom Nom

This trip to Tokyo has been in the planning for something like a year now (or rather, in the discussing...planning only got serious about a month ago) with Mom and her friends. A stated goal of the trip has always been consumption of great quantities of high-quality Japanese food. So far, so good.

Day 1, dinner: We head into the neighborhood (Meguro-ku) for sashimi. As M says, "In Japan, even the worst sushi is better than almost anything you can get outside of Japan." We are each presented with an amuse bouche of a giant snail of some kind. I pass. I opt for the uni instead, which is as delicious as everyone always says it is. Essence of umami in a squishy orange blob.

Day 2, lunch: Noodles in Kamakura, suburb of temples. After a morning of slightly taxing hiking amongst the hills and temples, we duck into a noodle joint on the main drag and everyone has cold soba. Except for me. I need the protein, so opt for an oyaku-don (chicken & egg over rice) instead. Yum. On the way towards the train station after visiting the Big Buddha, we get green tea soft serve ice cream.

Day 2, dinner: An amazing feast at a place called Kamakurayama - ostensibly a "steak restaurant" in the hills above Kamakura, but somehow we manage to have the best sashimi I've ever had (this one's for you, Dad) as an appetizer - consisting mainly of shellfish I would ordinarily never eat but was fantastically, eye-openingly, fresh and delicious. The steak was a beautifully marbled slice of something divine. I'm drooling just thinking about it, and I don't eat much steak anymore.

Day 3, lunch: Roppongi Hills shopping center. We navigate our way through the slightly disorienting complex to a tempura restaurant...only to find that it's closed on Wednesdays. Doh! We navigate our way back into the main area, visually appraise the various restaurants on the food floor, and opt for sashimi. Super-bonus: weird black sweet mochi for dessert, covered in what we guess is peanut powder. Later that afternoon, between visiting the Sky View and the Mori Museum Turner Prize exhibit, we down fruit juice floats.

Day 3, dinner: We head once again into Meguro-ku for yakitori, squeeze into a local 25-seat restaurant, and pig out. We proceed to eat chicken wings, gizzards, livers, and cartilage(!); asparagus wrapped in bacon, tomato wrapped in bacon, potato, eggplant, shitake; pork rolled with shiso, ginko nuts. Yum, yum, and yum. We roll home afterwards.

Day 4, lunch: Shibuya district, Tokyu Honten (department store). We head up to their restaurant floor and once again visually appraise the options. We're planning to get tempura in Asakusa tomorrow, so we pass on the Everything Unagi place and the noodle joint and opt for more sushi. We sit at the bar and point; the chef is very friendly, and even faintly amused by our limited sushi vocabulary. "Is that ikura? Aaaaaaaa."

Tonight we're headed into Daikanyama for another local recommendation by a friend. Gonna have to work up an appetite, or at least work off some guilt at how many calories we're eating!

Sprouts!

K has been minding the garden since I took off for Asia. As part of my gardening experiment, I started a few pots of seeds - some basil, some dwarf sunflowers and, um, something else. Two weeks later, success! Sprouts! More on the veg plants soon...the pics are trapped in my camera that doesn't work on Japan's network.

Shanghai Update

Back in Shanghai for a few days before jaunting off to Tokyo. Not much new here - same old ever-present gray dust and grease, same frantic construction. Main differences: fewer knockoff vendors, more people speak English, and it was actually quite hot when I got off the plane - in the shiny NEW Terminal 2. Mmm...love that shiny new terminal smell.

K immediately went a bought himself a copy of GTA IV . His analysis: "I suck at Grand theft Auto IV. I think my problem is that I don't really want to speed, kill people, or break stuff."

Well, that's a relief.

Food and Wine

Last Saturday we went to the Kermit Lynch annual Oysters and Chablis outdoor food-fest in Berkeley. Dad was, of course, the instigator, so it only seems fair to show his happy sponsorship. From left to right: Champagne (not so great), Chablis (bought a bottle), and Aligote (very tasty). Turns out simple crisp whites go very nicely with salty things like oysters. At least, that's what I think Dad said. K stuck with sausages, and we split an strawberry-rhubarb galette and a salted chocolate cookie. Salted chocolate seems to be the New Hot Taste these days; that's the second restaurant we've been to in the last month with a salt+chocolate pairing.

Some more vacation tidbits:

Fresh housemade ricotta and buffalo mozzzarella in Campania. We had just finished visiting the temples at Paestum in the middle of buffalo mozzarela country. Serious five-star yum. On a slightly worrisome note, in addition to the garbage scandals in Campania (Napoli's "state"), there are concerns that illegal dumping is causing toxic chemicals like dioxin to get into groundwater and soil. Apparently some buffalo mozzarela has tested positive for dioxin, and the DOCG buffalo mozzarella consortium has of course been working to disprove/discredit these rumors. Their sales would plummet! Sadly, corruption is alive and thriving in southern Italy...or do they just hear about it more than we do in the US?

The fish market at Siracusa - much cheaper than Taormina, where we stayed. But we didn't have any way to bring pounds and pounds of shrimp home and cook them, which I'm sure Mom would have done given the chance. One vendor had a bucket of still-alive octopi, somewhat squeam-inducing.

Whoops, there went March. And most of April.

We're back! All the news that we make time to print. Or something.

K's had some excitement at work, where his studio was/wasn't closed, he did/didn't have a job or a project. He is, at this moment, still employed in Foster City and he even has a new project...but we can't talk about that. Officially. My work remains oddly the same yet ever-changing. I'm looking forward to a short break in early May, when I head to Asia for a week+ to hang out with Mom. I'll sneak in a few days in our Tokyo office while I'm there. The weather in the Bay Area is starting to change, showing signs of warmth (but not too much), and the trees on our street are sprouting happy green leaves. Except for the one in front of our house, which is literally retarded - it blooms later and sheds its leaves later than all the other trees on the street.

Here's a vignette from our January vacation: we were stopped in Amalfi on the way to Ravello for lunch and a stroll. The next bus wasn't due for an hour, so mom asked the local entrepreneurial taxi drivers what it would cost to get up to Ravello. We met: Elvis.

On the windy road up to Ravello, his stories of bad drivers on the narrow streets were accompanied by the sounds of "Heartbreak Hotel". He eventually had to turn it off because the road quality was so bad it caused the CD player to skip.

Groovy.

Dear lord, it's almost March!!!

Where has 2008 gone? Yikes!

Last weekend was awesome. Dad hosted his annual Burgundy tasting dinner, and actually invited us to attend! W00t! First time ev4r. There were 18 bottles of wine for 18 people, some 9 different wines (2 champagnes, 2 whites, 5 reds), and a delicious dinner. And great company! Many of the attendees hadn't seen us since our wedding, so it was great to catch up with them and witness their surprise and delight at K's "new" hair- and beardstyles. We arrived at 6:30 and didn't leave until 12:30. Decadence!

Then Sunday was another foodstravaganza: my Aunt E.'s Chinese New Year Party. Gong Shi Fah Zay! (Note that's the Shanghainese version of Gung Hay Fat Choy) She cooked up a storm, and Aunt J. and Mom brought even more to eat. The cousins and mini-cousins were there, and it was a great family gathering. Chinese New Year is the time to eat symbolic foods pertaining to luck, properity, and fertility. So there were lots of eggs, round things, things whose Chinese characters look or sound like money...between the fat and the family, I felt very rich! Super-bonus: my cousin Bob (who, like me, was born in the Year of the Rat - this year!) brought a bag of plush rats to hand out the the mini-cousins. Five fat, furry, buck-toothed, thick-tailed rats from IKEA. It was awesome.

This weekend we had dinner with one of K's colleagues: J and his family. We spent most of the dinner taking about games. Classic video games, new video games, board games. It was a complete geek-out. Lots of fun. K also saved the universe (playing Mass Effect), and I pulled a bazillion weeds out of our front yard. My back and legs muscles are really paying for it, but it makes me happy to have a neat(er) front yard. It was great weather, so there was also a lot of cat-like basking in the sun. With the not so cat-like New Yorker.


A quick Brussels restaurant redux:

Brasserie de la Gare - not too far from work and yummy Belgian food. Great interior decor.

Belga Queen - very chic and with very Belgian food. The bathrooms were unisex with transparent doors...until you turned the lock. I ate foie gras and woodpecker. Yum!

Kokob - the Ethiopian place. Tasty, but not as tasty as Cafe Colucci here in Berkeley. They did have a nice hibiscus, ginger, and something-else aperitif though.

The flight home was delayed at JFK (shock! dismay!) and the nice Delta folks comped us the movies and games. I spent most of the flight riveted by a Popcap game, something to do with flipping links to eliminate them. Damn those electronic crack dealers!

Next trip? Probably back to Brussels in April. Mom's muttering about going to Japan in May but the planning might be complicated.

Brussels Weekend 2: Teh Googles are watching me

They detected I'm in Belgium and gave me google.be results. They even changed my Blogger options so I had to choose between "Blog maken" and "Aanmelden" to make this post! Auuugh! I feel so geotargeted.

Anyway, I wanted to write about my weekend, mostly undistinguished except for significant stomach troubles and a glorious trip to the opera to see Handel's "Giulio Cesare in Egitto". My 10 euro ticket got me entrance to a lovely small European-style opera house, and my legs got me up the stairs to my seat. Along the way I bought an 8 euro program that consisted of two beautifully bound books, one filled with the synopsis in four languages (the Brussels standards of French and Dutch, plus English and German, super-bonus!) and about 4 different articles about Handel and the opera in French and Dutch, and bilingual cast biographies; and the other with the libretto in the original Italian, French, and Dutch. What a bargain!

From my seats I couldn't even see the supertitles, but they wouldn't have helped anyway. They were in French and Dutch, of course! Thankfully I'd done some research online and knew the gist of things. The music was truly beautiful, and the production what my Dad would call "eurotrash" - very modern, and stark, and black-and-white. Super-bonus: there were three counter-tenors onstage that night, instead of the predicted two, each with a distinct style and carriage. Neat stuff. It's very incongruous for modern audiences to hear such high-pitched voices and think of them of heroic; we're just conditioned otherwise. Audiences invariably titter when they first open their mouths. And then stop, if the singing is good enough.

Since my stomach had been a bit touchy all day, I contented myself with a quick waffle snack before the performance. Waffles and opera, a good day!

Brussels Weekend 1

Well, K and I owe some serious holiday updates, but for now here's mine. I'm camped in Brussels for the nonce, and had a very nice weekend.

Friday: stayed up stupidly late watching "The Punisher", featuring John Travolta as the bad guy and some easy-on-the-eyes guy as the Punisher himself. Plus, it was dubbed into Italian. How could I resist?

Saturday: woke up groggy and headachy and hungry at noon. I stumbled across the rainy plaza to Le Pain Quotidien and had a sublime salad of smoked salmon and lentils. Even the group of chatty Flemish folks didn't kill my buzz; the asked what I was eating and I managed to find the right item on the Flemish-language menu. In the afternoon I wandered the streets, eyeing sale displays & antiques, and eventually found a market that sells yogurt. I also gathered up a fair sampling of gourmet chocolate goodies. Saturday evening I failed to find a restaurant with availability and settled for the local bar/cafe. Turns out they've updated their menu since I last had it, and it includes some decent salads and desserts. Huzzah!

Sunday: woke up at a decent hour, chatted with K (he was up late, gaming with buddies), worked out, went back to LPQ, did some work, met a friend at the Museum around the corner to see the Reubens exhibit. Trudy Kohler, these "pink, squishy bodies" are for you! It proved beautiful and educational - apparently Reubens was so successful that later in his career he would sketch out models of large works and hand the execution over to other studios. Outsourcing it, old school! The room with his huge religious works was just gorgeous - he really packs his compositions with action, motion, and detail. Then we went to a local cafe and enjoyed some sinfully rich rasberry meringue tart. Sugar buzz!

I'll probably go back to the cafe tonight for simplicity's sake. Sometime this week I'm determined to check out the Ethiopian restaurant near the Grand Place, as well as a few more Thai restaurants and some classic Belgian joints. Though those are often hard on the arteries...can't take too much of that. I did find a Japanese restaurant, so that's on my list for when I need some comfort food. And the opera house is showing Handel's "Julius Ceasar in Egypt". Dad says if I can catch a performance, I'll have been to an opera house that he hasn't. Ha!

A few takeaways so far:
1. Nearly everyone in Brussels speaks English. I'm giving up on my shitty French for now.
2. A cold, overcast day in Brussels is a good day. At least it's not raining.
3. I need to find healthier things to eat in Brussels. Waffles, fries, beer, shrimp, mussels, and chocolate don't make for balanced nutrition.