This post is dedicated to LOBSTER DINNER-part II

Are you ready for the real feast? This is only half of the 3-pound lobster we ordered. By this time, I was up to my nose with food, but haven't exploded yet, so, I dove in with utmost satisfaction.


I know it's super cheesy wearing a bib with picture of a lobster imprinted on it, but the food tasted especially tasty that way too, believe it or not.

Viva!

Nope, it's not over yet. Since there was appetizers, there was dessert. I was literally over my head with food at this point, so, I couldn't enjoy the full set like I did with appetizers.

This was all we could handle in terms of dessert, but it was light and fluffy, which drew our dinner feast to an end. I hope you enjoyed and envied our food tour. Too bad you can't have it~

This post is dedicated to LOBSTER DINNER-part I

Still the same day, but this post is worth a place by itself.

Matthew the superb found an amazing lobster dinner for two the first night we were on PEI. We bought a 3 pound lobster and that comes with all your can eat whatever you see below:


Haha, what? you think I am stupid or something? Trying to stuff me with all you can eat butter buns? so that I can't have any more of the rest? Try again!

Besides the lobster, I would say my favourite is the seafood chowder. The seafood chowder, unlike many restaurants, the ratio of seafood and soup is 2 to 1. I can still feel it in my mouth, yum, yum.

The waitress asked us "would you like a bucket of mussels or half a bucket?" We were super hungry, and thought, why not, so, we ordered a bucket. It was literally a bucket full of mussels...

Last appetizer before the main dish was salad. It was delightful and perfect to settle or stomach for the star of the night.

To be continued...

PEI-day 1

August 5th, 2008, cloudy and very windy

Can you guess where I am? Nope, not the Green Gables, not yet anyway. Matt and I arrived Charlottetown PEI on a very tiny plane that seats approximately 50 people. I was worried that the flight might be wobbly, but sleeping is the best medicine for everything, so I slept through the entire trip, didn't feel a shake.


My first impression of Charlottetown was like I was back in Tsawwassen. Everything is so close together and everyone is so friendly. Mmm, I like it.

After walking around town for a bit (I think we covered pretty much the whole town central in 30 minutes), we landed on this restaurant called Flex mussels for lunch. This restaurant is famous in town for its 35 different ways to cook their mussels. Also look at the picture on top, they even teach you this cool way to eat your food! It really works.

Here is a shot of our delicious lunch. We ordered to have our mussels steamed with white wine and celery.

Niagara Falls-revisited

August 2nd, 2008, sunny with many unexpected thunder showers

I visited the world famous Niagara Falls last winter when I visited Matt during new year's holiday. It was too cold for me to describe the magnificent landscape of the falls on the blog then, so I decided to go again this summer. This time, Matt drove me ^^v.

Here is a shot of the not too amazing falls over on the American side. If you have a map handy, you would see the side with the smaller fall draws the American border.


Whereas the giant side marks the Canadian border. Below is a picture of the grandiose horseshoe falls. If you watch closely, there is a small boat that seats about over 100 people to the right of this picture. As you can see the scale of of the fall compared to the small boat driving toward it. Are these people suicidal? No, they just wanted to get splashed by the MIST of the falls. Here is a beautiful picture of another one of the same boat going towards the fall, with an arch of rainbow. Ah, I am in dreamland.

Back to reality. Matt and I got a bit pekkish after walking around the falls for a while. So, he treated me his to paw...No, I mean, bear paw. It's basically donut shell with some chocolate syrup dripped over; perfect snack for a relaxing afternoon.

Before we left the falls, Matt and I took a picture with Nikola Tesla. Who is he you ask? Well, according to Matt, he invented everything else the Chinese didn't. Look him up!

Eastern Canada- RBG (not the colour code)

July 30th, 2008, sunny

The day after I arrived in Hamilton, Matt took me to RBG (Royal Botanical Garden). Yup, Matt drove me ^^v.

We first walked around a hot house with authentic plants from all over the world. I can't name them all, but the first thing that caught my attention was a cork tree. The whole trunk is literally a giant cork. I wonder how big should a bottle be to fit it?

The next plant that caught my eyes was this silver leaf plant you see the picture below. I know we find leaves with this texture sometime. It's just great seeing how the picture looks almost black and white.


The next two photos are just some shots of beautiful, vibrant colours of some summer plants. Imagine how much more colourful the garden would be in spring time.




Here is my honey stopping to smell honey. Sweet~~

The weather was so nice that day, but it was HOT. We couldn't finish walking the entire garden. I really enjoyed it.

Alberta- day 4

July 21st, 2008, sunny

Our last day of travel consisted mainly driving back to BC. We were all so tired that I think everyone was driving only half awake. Amazing how we made it back alive eh?

Here is me in front of some other lake along Lake Louise.

Here is a shot of railway track in Kamloop. Apparently it is a major stop between BC and Alberta for goods across Canada.

This concludes our family trip of 2008.

Alberta- day 3

July 20th, 2008, sunny

Theoretically it would take no more than 2 hours to get from Calgary to Drumheller by car. So, we did not leave particularly early today for our destination- Royal Tyrell Museum. According to Google Map and our GPS, we just needed to follow highway 2 then turn onto highway 9, and then watch for exit to Drumheller. However, we got lost about 20 minutes on our way because I did not follow GPS correctly and ended up driving the opposite direction on highway 2. After finally getting back on track, we for some reason got lost 2 more times before we found the right way to Drumheller. By this time, we were all really tired and frustrated. After 3 hours of driving in circles, we finally found it! It really is not fun getting lost on the praries. Everything around is just flat land with no landmarks and no people.

Look at this magnificent landscape. The rocks are formed by cooled lava and weather changes over thousands of years ago. (When there used to be dinosaurs!)

Here I am in front of an assembled dinosaur fossils, which were found in Drumheller. Studies show this dinosaurs used to have very bad disease on the feet that it affected its walking. I wonder if it's arthritis?

The way back to Calgary was much easier. We planned on dropping by The Bay again after the museum, but since we got lost so much, by the time we got back to Calgary, the stores were already closed.

Mom wanted to treat us something nice for dinner since today was the last night of our family trip. We all wanted something Chinesey so we decided to visit Chinatown in Calgary. However, Chinatown in Calgary is not that much of a Chinatown. It is more like 2 blocks with 4 Chinese restaurants. We still managed to find something decent though, just the service was very very slow.....

After dinner, we drove to our last stop of the day- Calgary Tower. To be honest, there is nothing too attractive about this tower. Compared to CN Tower or Taipei 101, it really is just a baby. A tiny one too. We still enjoyed pretending to be scared of the glass floor nonetheless.

Alberta- day 2

July 19th, 2008, sunny

After days of planning, we decided to visit the famous Calgary Zoo. I gotta tell ya, it's been ages since I last went to a zoo. I like animals, but don't know since when I started thinking that zoos are for kids. THEY ARE NOT. I also enjoy aquariums, but that's not to say they are less appropriate for kids. THEY ARE. Anyway, here are some shots of my favourite animals of the day:

Asian elephant. That's right, ASIAN. Did you know that elephants are very intelligent? They are used as far animals in Thailand. Even though they help farmers farm, they also understand that it is much easier to trick farmers and just eat the crops they help farm.

The grandma elephant at this zoo apparently can paint pictures. The research facility behind me in the picture below is built thanks to the paintings by the grandma elephant sold to visitors. Another amusing thing I found about elephants is that elephant dung not only can be used as fertilizer, but also to make paper! I wanted to get myself a notebook made of it, but I couldn't find the right size. (yeah, right.)

Here is me hugging an elephant goddess.

Another one of my favourites, prairie dogs. They may be cute, but they would be a headache if you have even just one on your lawn.

I still have many other animals I like, but it would take days and pages to finish telling. So, I will stop here.

After the zoo, we decided to drive mom around the city of Calgary to get a feel of another city. We stopped by the stadium for the Calgary Stampede. The festival was over the week we visited Calgary. I am no cow girl, so I have absolutely no interest in this annual event. We dropped by just to see what it's like that's all. I guess if you ask me, I would say it's kind of like our PNE. It's a huge plaza with different stations of exhibits of animals and western style living.

What's that? THE BAY in Calgary?! Yup, what's a trip without shopping at the local bay company right?

Alberta-day 1

July 18, 2008, sunny

Well, here we are, leaving the house at 5 am to head to Calgary. Of course we need to stop at the old McD's for breakfast to boost up our spirits on the road. Yum yum, so greasy.

We took turn driving and taking pictures of each other dozing off in the car. Since I have no reputation to keep, here is a shot of me catching up on my beauty sleep.


and a shot of this beautiful rainbow we caught as we drove through a thunder storm before I arrived at Calgary.

Graduates of 2008

Me? of course not, I graduated from high school many years ago. This year is my first graduate class since I started teaching. I have seen with this same group of students since they first started the language program at the school. Long story short, it was a mixed feeling attending their graduation ceremony and banquet. It felt like it's been forever since I started teaching them, so it was kind of a relief. On the other hand, I know it will be very different not seeing them everyday next school term. I will miss them. I wonder how many of them will remember me? I hope I have left them so valuable lessons in life. (not just what an awesome language Mandarin is, but also how great being Chinese is, haha!)

Anyways, graduate class of 2008, here is to you!

learning

Recently I have been revising my resume for new job postings. As I was browsing the postings the other day, I realized there are just so many subjects I used to be so good at, but now I don't even remember anything I learned. I believe if I am determined to pick them up again, I would be still as good, and would be able to teach anything.

Is it possible that I be good at everything? What is the point of that? I guess what I am trying to say is, there are just so many things in the world that we may never know even after we are gone. Knowledge is renewable, and must be renewed! Life is a journey of learning. I will try my best to cherish any learning opportunities in life. For now, my new task is to sleep, and to learn the beauty in that.

Private vs Public

Last week, mom and I went back to my brother's Chinese school to delivery a Mother's Day card to his teacher. (My brother's been taking this intensive course that is on 6 days a week...This is probably the only one time I would say I don't miss school..) Anyways, the school was having some year-end fair to celebrate students' graduation and to recruit new students. Since this private "Saturday school" is founded by Taiwanese, all the courses are taught in traditional Chinese characters. This year, however, the school offers new courses targeted at Chinese from Mainland. Now, the same courses are also taught in simplified Chinese. As expected, many people came to inquire the new courses. As a public teacher myself, I felt it is very unfortunate that similar courses like those offered at that school and many other private schools, are not promoted. I am not trying to comment on private schools, but I just don't understand why parents would rather PAY for something when they can get it for FREE? (well, almost free)

What am I trying to say? Support public education!

Debate tournament

Last week our school had an invitational debate tournament with another school in the district. I was invited to judge the junior teams. It was my first time watching a debate as a judge, so everything was a different perspective to me. From this tournament, I learned that words are powerful and it is possible to BS way through your life, if you know the right words and say them in the right place. I had a great deal of fun watching students debate some very mature topics and interpreting difficult philosophical quotes in their impromptus. It was also very cruel to see some less able students lose their cool and "argue" their way through just to win. Debate is not about winning, it is about convincing the audience the topic addressed.

So, here is a topic for all you readers of my blog out there, "Should we agree that Udonstock is corny?". Remember, debate is not about winning....

Missing

Most of you who know me know that I have gotten into cycling in Japan. I vowed to keep it up since I got home. My mom found a almost-perfect bike for me at a charity store for 15 dollars. The only major thing that is wrong with it is the gear, and I found out that I can get it fixed in a day for around 20 bucks.
I have been waiting for the weather to warm up so I can finally get back into cycling. This weekend, I finally decided to get the bike fixed. Since we moved, I just left it in the very dumpy looking shed in the backyard of the house we are renting. I did not even lock the bike or close the shed door (the fallen door doesn't really close anyway...) I didn't do any of these things that a normal person would do to her bike because, first, the bike is so cheap and needs fixing, second, the shed is so messy... why would anyone even bother to steal it right?

WRONG


When I went to the shed ready to drag the bike out to the shop, I discovered the bike was nowhere to be found. Say, would you steal a bike from someone's dumpy shed? Or would you take a bike from an actual dump? Tell me...

New post- The Bay rocks

I realize lately that I do have some people who still visit my blog occasionally. To get over the guilt of not keeping up with my blog, I have decided to slowly get back to putting things up, even if it's just my everyday thoughts. I hope those people who still visit my blog will keep reading and will come more often!

Here's what I wanna share with everyone lately. The Bay rocks, no matter what language it is written in, or where it is!

Laptop crash

It's amazing how much you become dependent on your laptop once you possess one. I for one, turn on my laptop as soon as I step in the house after work. My laptop crashed for no apparent reason last week. So, what have I been doing since? In fact, I find myself a lot more productive and more sociable when I am at home. Even when I sit in front of the desktop! That is why I am writing this blog now, to tell everyone, I am totally not addicted to technology and I can still function normally without it.

Last bit of Japan

After Matsuyama and trip with sis, my days in Japan went back like a flying arrow. All I could remember is saying goodbye to people and getting as much Japan as possible.

First was the Pacchin parade. Every summer in Oita, corporations and associations would build historical heroes, warriors out of lantern floats and parade down the main street downtown Oita city. This is a picture of my favourite character in Samurai Warrior 2, Tadakatsu Honda 本田忠勝. Go get them Honda!

One night during my last week in Japan, SJ, Matt and I met up with two elementary teachers we worked with, and had a very nice last dinner together. I admire the effort and passion these two teachers have toward English. I don't think I can be so persistent with my Japanese study.

Another night Matt and I made it out to watch the annual summer fireworks in the midst of crazy packing and cleaning up. Too bad my camera doesn't take good night pictures, and Matt's was out of battery (speaking of which, Matt, did you find your camera charger yet?). The fireworks were alright; it was the occasion that was memorable.

Hey, we were also able to meet up with Takako's best friend Shinobi for lunch before we left. We had our all time favourite Okonomiyaki too! Even though we all lived in Oita, we could only hang out 3 times, but everytime was a lot of fun. I wish I could know Shinobi more...

Thanks to Matt's romantic bug, I can put this sunrise scene from our apartment window in my memory forever.
Here I conclude my one year journey in Japan. Looking back, I feel I have grown so much in just one year. Although I did not enjoy working in Japan, I was able to meet people from all over the world and become friends with them. I would say one thing we all enjoyed is to laugh about our work life, be motivated to karaoke and play badminton. I miss it all, but I am also ready to move onto the next page in my life. I would also like to thank my family for your support and Matt, I am so lucky to have met you and have enjoyed my journey with you! I love you all.