Ngoh Hiang

The time has come for Ngoh Hiang making in preparation of the arrival of CNY. A Lims' family tradition and especially since we are blessed to be able to find all ingredients in Boston, we just have to roll up our sleeves and get our hands dirty.

It's not exaggerating to say that it was a multi-day process. It began with preparing shallots and garlic. The former was always challenging because of the pungent vapor which would make you tear. We minced the pork beforehand too. The next day, we went to both H-mart and C-mart to gather other ingredients, which include carrot, water chestnut, prawns, beancurd skin. After hours of chopping, mincing (thankfully with the help of the fine Cuisineart food processor given to us by our parents), we finally assembled them into yummy rolls of Ngoh Hiang.

I wish I can write down a recipe for it. But truly, there are many steps where one has to make the judgment and decide what seasoning to add more. Although yummy, it can also be unforgiving at the same time, and needs a rather precise mixture of seasonings to get the right flavor. For example, the amount of prawns is not enough this time and it affects the texture. Anyhow, it is still delectable and marks the festivity of CNY without fail.

Happy Lunar New Year 2010

The season of feasting has begun and only within two days, we had the luxury of great food with great company. Happy CNY everyone!

Curious George exhibition at the Children’s Museum

In October of our first year here, I reluctantly agreed to dc’s plea to buy a TV. I stopped watching TV in my upper primary, mostly at the influence of my very motivated and studious cousin who was staying with us at that time. Subsequently, I found little interest and in fact, felt uneasy about sitting in front of the box and doing nothing. So anyway, in the first couple month’s of owning our TV, we randomly switched channels and found a rather cute cartoon that revolves around the life of a monkey living in a city and the people (and animals) around him. We didn’t pay much attention at first, but soon we got addicted and learnt the channel and time it comes on every morning, and its name – Curious George. Now if dc and I are at home when it comes on every morning and afternoon, we will definitely tune in. :) We even bought the movie DVD last year! (Weird for two grad students, I know, but you should also realize that the White House respects George too!)

(Source: wikipedia.com) 2003 Christmas decoration at the White House was Curious George themed!

So naturally when two little kids came to Boston last summer, we were only too eager to share our joy of watching Curious George with them. Now everytime Josthan and Tenessa watch Curious George, they will always think of me *blush*. I even received a Curious George birthday card from them! When Tricilia invited us for a members-only preview of the Curious George exhibition at the Boston Children’s Museum, I had to jump at the opportunity (to meet my favorite monkey)!

Our entrance verification – cute stamp :D And Tenessa inspecting the stamp on her hand.

We went to meet Curious George before the crowd came. Pity the mascot was not as cute as the cartoon.. I think the eyes made the difference. George hardly paid attention to dc and I – I suppose he didn’t realize that I am the fan there… LOL)

 

 

The children engaging in play before we enter the CG exhibit. Tenessa immediately set about sorting all the cups by colors when she was done building her tower haha, very unusual for a kid. I know for sure that I was a messy child.

Curious George haven!

Chef Biscotti and Jumpy Squirrel. Chef makes the best vegetable minestrone and Jumpy… startles at everything.

Fan giddiness aside, dc and I thought the Children’s Museum was really educational. There were many scenes from the cartoon, but each of them has an educational theme behind them..

Wind energy.. (dc and Josthan made this pinwheel)

Pulleys.. 

Conveyor belt (at a construction site)

Shapes (drawing a blueprint for the construction!)

Learning is so fun at the Children’s Museum. dc and I were really impressed by how they incorporate learning points into their exhibits, and momentarily wanted to become a museum engineer – to design exhibits. :(  Pity we belong to the more boring and lowest paying class of engineers.. the research kind.

More photos of cute CG!

 

And since the writers of CG moved to Cambridge, MA after WWII, we have the only Curious George shop (in Harvard Square!) and hence the special CG exhibition.

Alright gotta stop here, becoming giddy with excitement. A big change from the TV-snob me in the past huh. It’s amazing what grad school can do.

End of Week 1 Spring Semester 2010

Only one word, Phew! What a week it has been, despite being only the first week of Spring Semester. For one, it began basically on the wrong note. The first day was MIT registration day which we were supposed to meet our academic advisors to discuss the classes we would be taking. Of coz, MIT professors being MIT professors, advising students would naturally be on the last thing on their priority list and most, if not all, of our advising has always been done in a rush-rush manner, with faculty reciting the list of classes we have pre-registered for (hello, we pre-registered for them, do we need you to read them out again to us?), smiling when we discuss how we would want to take another class instead of the required list of classes, perhaps thinking "why are you so troublesome, cant you just take that class?" or hand-wavingly direct us to the department administrators for more details. This time was better. He asked me if I had any questions (he had signed my form, I could just take it and leave) while he was put on hold over a phone conversation. Talk about multi-tasking, who beats MIT.

Well, our schedule isnt too great either, esp for myself. It's very disruptive for research work and makes me wonder if I should adopt a night shift after a class which ends at 4pm. Anyway, we already downed a few packets of instant noodles by the end of this week (not that I'm complaning because I love them, but deep down, I do know they are not the best thing to eat all the time) while fantasizing the wonderful french dishes we saw when we watched Julie and Julia. Maybe we should be more disciplined like Julie too. Start a CYDC Julie and Julia Project blog and force ourselves to cook proper meals all the time. But again, Julia Child used tons of butter for all her recipes. Maybe on that note, instant noodles are healthier.

I don't even know what I'm blabbering on because the last paragraph is almost like pond-skater, scraping the surface of so many things without a strong connection. Anyway, just to continue the random blabber, I was looking through a grant proposal today which explains the objective of the grant as "Success is not a specific output, but rather a change in the culture and style of our community." Wow... something Singapore can use more when giving out money. Sadly it's always a vicious cycle. People with style and culture think about improving them. People without seldom think about them.

So thank God the weekend is here (and without the 2 feet of snow which has gone to Obama's town).