~nonnah~

My first visit to China was for a Demolition and Blasting Technical Support Seminar in November 2007. I stayed for a month and visited 4 different yet lovely cities.

Nanjing was where I mostly spent my time in a dingy hotel, surrounded by the Chinese Army. My Chinese language was nada. I had to "talk" in sign language most of the time. We did have a young interpreter, who I had to correct her grammer every now and then.My favorite person was the seminar coordinator, who was an army man. His English was weak, but boy oh boy was he a great bargainer. I used to take him with me shopping. Because of his army attire, the sellers would respect him and wouldn't turn his bargained price down. That way, I saved a lot of Yuan:)

When classes are done at 6:00pm, I'd take a cab downtown Nanjing. I discovered an underground shopping center (totally forgot what it's called). The shopping was great and cheap. I really stood out with my tanned skin, dark hair and big eyes. They used to call me "Miss Princess". I remember once 10 Chinese ladies circled me to touch my hair and to look at my eyes. They thought I was a celebrity and wanted to take a picture with me with their funky mobiles. When it first happened, I was scared, but then I got used to it. On my last days, I learned to smile and walk away. I'm not surprised if I found a picture of myself with a Chinese lady on one of their websites hehe..what an experience.

My second city was Hangzhou. They call it "heaven on earth". I just can't explain how beautiful and serene it was. Just breathtaking. I wish I can share how it felt, but no matter how descriptive I am, it won't give it credit. You need to be there to feel its beauty :)

Shanghai was great. It felt so European. I used to call it "home" when I was in China. The diverse culture made me blend perfectly. It's a great city to walk around. Shopping for brands was great, but I preferred the Chinese authentic bazaars.

My last visit was Suzhou. It's an old city. The coordinators had to take us there to show us the real Chinese culture. I didn't like it much; the rain ruined everything.

I still cherish every moment I spent it there. The sad part is losing all the pictures I took. I couldn't retrieve a single picture. Oh well, there's always next time.

So long, China.
Ta.

Labels: China, Hangzhou, Nanjing, Shanghai, Souzhu

// posted by nonnah @ 3:01 PM 0 Comments

(This picture is taken when I was @ Monsoon last week)

• 2 cups green papaya, shredded
• 5 green beans
• 1 tablespoon palm sugar
• 1 clove garlic
• 2 chili peppers
• 5 cherry tomatoes
• 1 1/2 tablespoon fish sauce
• 3/4 of lime
• 2 tablespoons of toasted peanuts

It's best if you buy a shredded papaya, but if you could not find that, just peal the skin of a whole papaya and shred it with a cheese grater. Using a clay mortar, crush the garlic and add the green beans and halved cherry tomatoes. Make sure you softly pound on the tomatoes to get the juice out of it and maintain it's shape. Add the chili peppers and start crushing. If you don't like it hot, remove the seeds from the peppers and crush them tenderly. Add the shredded papaya, lime juice, fish sauce, peanuts and palm sugar. Use the pestle and the spatula to push the mixture up and down. This way, the juice will seep through the mixture.

Really easy to make, isn't it?

Enjoy.

Labels: Bahrain, monsoon restaurant, som tum

// posted by nonnah @ 9:10 PM 3 Comments