Gung Hay Fat Choy
Last Monday was Chinese New Year. For those of you who don't know, it is the Year of the Ox. We always do a big celebration at school and this year, since I have a student who was born in China it was even bigger than usual. When I got home, it felt like it was only right to continue the celebration with Sydney.
Jeremy and I took Sydney to my favorite stir fry restaurant, Fire Bowl. It's not actually authentic Chinese food, but it is as close as I will eat, and they do have chopsticks, so that's closer than the Shanghai wings at Chili's anyway.
Sydney enjoyed eating the rice and veggies in the stir fry and of course the fortune cookie is always a tasty treat. When we got home, she had some treats my student had sent for her... a rice cake snack and some panda cookies. She also got a lucky red envelope with some money in it from my student that went straight into her special things suitcase.On the one hand, it felt a little silly to dress my very Anglo daughter up in a Chinese dress and go get suburban "Chinese" food on a major Chinese holiday. On the other hand, I thought about how I would feel if I were running some pseudo American restaurant in China and a Chinese family came in wearing red, white, and blue on the Fourth of July. I would think that was pretty cool. So I hope the Chinese folks we ran in to that day understood I was trying to show my daughter a bit of their culture and thought that was a good thing. I think it's a good thing.
I think that it's super, duper (is that how you spell that?) awesome that you dressed Sydney up for CNY. Teaching children about other cultures and their holidays is fun. Especially dressing them up for the occasion. Sydney looks adorable!
ReplyDeleteBTW, S.G. wanted me to tell you hi on your blog, as she was reading over my shoulder.
Thank you. We did have a lot of fun. Tell S.G. that Mr. N was really pleased by his own red envelope and put his away in a special place as well. He thought it was really sweet that she thought of him.
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