China Learning: Study Tools

I bought an iPhone. Actually, I traded a phone a friend of mine got for me (because I helped him find a job) for the iPhone. Yes...I'm a little embarrassed by this. I feel a little "floofy". And normally, I would never be seen with such an over-priced status symbol. I would prefer to be seen with an over-priced, yet manly, computation enhanced extension of my cerebral cortex. This being said, the iPhone's capacitive-technology touch-screen is the best touch screen on the market. I need this feature so that I can draw Chinese characters onto the phone's dictionary. I use a iPhone dictionary to translate characters which I don't know...that's how I study Chinese reading.

I need to read things that will keep me interested and make me want to study. So I'm reading two Japanese "Manga" comics (which were translated into Chinese). One comic is called "Full Metal Alchemist". Its about a boy in an alternative world wherein Alchemy is a real science. In the first chapter, the boy - who is (so far) the best alchemist/wizard around, defeats evil government bureaucrats and religious tyrants. Another book I'm reading is called something I don't know how to translate. Its about a group of people who are inhabited by the souls of famous "Three Kingdoms" era (200AD) warriors. The inhabited people just so happen to be mostly Japanese school girls with unrealistically healthy anatomical features, but clothes which tend to get ripped up when these possessed warriors fight. From these two books, I learn very important vocabulary which I use on a day-to-day basis.

FYI, of course my iPhone is jail broken. Apple really does suck... I just can't believe they have the chutzpa to lock down and cripple their phones in order to promote their sales of music and cheap applications. All iPhone's in China are jail broken of course - they are not locked to a carrier because Apple and China Mobile cannot agree on revenue sharing terms (idiots). Luckily, there is "91助手". I free application that basically has the same functionality as iTunes software and it is made for Jail broken iPhones. For anyone interested in this software, you can get it here.

China Learning: Banquets and One-Month Birthdays

The Rabbi Gimlel definitely would not advice eating this.

Today we went to our (previous) Aiyi's daughter's son's 1 month birthday party. Not sure why Chinese celebrate birthday party after one month. I know that Chinese traditionally start counting a persons age as "1 year old" when they are first born (so Akiva is considered 5 years old). I think they celebrate the birth a month after birth so as to give the mother time to recuperate. Anyway, we went to the party. Which was, as far as I can tell, exactly like the daughter's wedding party (see here)

This party, like the wedding party, started at lunch time. So a lot of people there had gone through this banquet twice. We sat with about 100 other people, on flimsy plastic stools, in a mobile wood canopy-like structure between two apartment buildings. Below is a description of the dinner.

1. The food starts off with a few dishes. I think this included beef jerky, some tripe looking stuff. Assorted nuts. Chicken strips. More tripe looking stuff. Lotus stuffed with sweet rice. A shrimp dish.



2. Fish and turtle and some mushroom dish is brought out. I did not eat it; don't like fish with bones, don't like turtle, don't like pork in the mushrooms.



3. Bananas and tangerines are brought out. Aiyi's husband brought out the rice wine, which I drank. He also brought out packs of expensive prestige-brand cigarettes for the men. As I don't smoke anymore, I gave the cigarettes to Akiva to use. The women were given boxes of fermented eggs. Hmmm.



4. Lastly, the main pork fat ball thing, pork-and-radish soup, another shrimp dish, something which I suspect is pork knee-caps, crab-in-a-lot-of-sauce dish, "Birthday noodles", stir-fried Chinese bean sprouts, stir-fried spinach, and rice.





5. After dinner, we all walk up five flights of stairs to say hello to the new mother, who didn't come down for the party. Just like at our Passover Sedar, the young boys gather around to watch older boys play video games. After this, Aiyi's older-sister's son, a taxi driver, took us home. We had a great time. Even though we are bloated from pork grease and rice wine, and we smell like food and cigarettes.

Kenaz’s Favorite Words

Kenaz’s favorite word is now “You flush down on the toilet!!” He points his finger and shakes his arm and says these words many times a day. Every time cracks me up.

Another his favorite is “I jump on daddy”. Whenever Jesse sits down, Kenaz goes “I jump on daddy”. Most the time Jesse just finish his dinner and wants to sit down and rest. Kenaz won’t miss the opportunity and say “I jump on daddy!”