biking Saturday Adventure

I have been seeing this co-worker of mine for about 2 weeks. So far it's going very well!

I am happy when I am with him. 

Yesterday after work, I had my Friday piano lesson with my student. This great student of mine is teaching me how to play piano. I hope I can play like her eventually. Then I rushed home, picked up some grocery, and went to meet Matt at the bike shop. But it was closed. So it sucked biking in the misty rain and he didn't get the bike. Oh well! He came over and I made pumpkin congee (more like risotto). It was really yummy!!! It's one of my favourite dish by my mom. I had to go over to his place to shower because there's no hot water in my apartment (just like last year when the natural gas supply was low, we couldn't cook and shower). His bathroom is just dirty like a bachelor's. But there's no way for me to take a cold shower in such bone chilling weather.

Today, I got up late then I had breakfast at Matt's. He makes good coffee. We had yogurt, tomato sandwich and half a kiwi. It is a simple lunch but good. Then we had over to the bike shop to pick up his new bike.

                                            "Giant" bike shop in YC.

                                           Matt & I - First Picture of us.                    

With our bikes, we had a great Saturday biking adventure.
We headed over to Daan, which is a less developed town right next to YC.
It was very hard to bike that uphill way to Daan. But it was totally worth it.
The country/village was gorgeous. It was definitely nice to get out of YC.
Here are some pictures that I have taken along the way:

                                          Farm lands. Gorgeous view.

                       Locals butchering hogs right in front of their own house.

   Old grandmas showed us their temples and were very happy to have their pictures taken.

                                                             The temple.

Around 4-5pm, we found a hole in the wall restaurant and had a country meal according to Matt. We had fatty pork fried with tofu skin, fried eggplants, and fried peas. It was good but the dishes were very salty. 

On the way back was so much easier as it was all downhill. It was just so fun riding down. Pure excitement! Matt had some problem with his bike (he did something to it when he changed his gear). But we made it home. It was just a great Saturday afternoon. 

We saw pretty country view on our bikes. We exercised in the cold weather (good that it didn't rain). We were sweaty and our noses were red and runny when we got back. I even had mud on my face. But it was such a great feeling! Once we got home, we had nutella with banana. Then I had hot chocolate and he had his mocha. It was just the perfect ending for the day :)

Hopefully the weather would be nice next weekend so that we can go out and ride some more.

Myths about introvert

just came across this interesting article about introverts:

10-myths-about-introverts

The author has a good analysis of the introverts. I learn that introverts are different in the chemical/physical set-up of the brain compared to those of extroverts.
I also like the myths that he has discussed there.
I think I am an introvert myself. But I do like people and I like to talk. However, how much I would talk would depend on the circumstance and other factors.

Give the article a quick read...see if you change your mind about introverts!

nice Relaxing weekend

It was a nice relaxing weekend in YC that I have spend with Matt...
It finally felt like the cold winter that I remembered from last year.

Friday night, Matt came over and helped us put up the X'mas tree. We had the X'mas music playing. We listened to Michael Bolton's X'mas album, "A Swinging Christmas" online. I like the jazzy version of the classics.

But one of my favourite Christmas song is by Wham, "Last Christmas".
Whenever it's the season, I would just keep hearing it over the radio station.

For dinner, I made "mayouji mianxian" -  Sesame oil chicken noodle. I didn't have rice wine and it turned out pretty good to my surprise. Whenever my mom makes it, she would put in so much rice wine that I would always turn so red and felt light-headed. So I was a bit worried when I didn't have rice wine to put in because it wouldn't be the dish that it should be. Mianxian is one of my favourite kind of Taiwanese noodle. I brought it back here from Vancouver. I don't know if I can find it in YC.

The evening was nice. After dinner, we sat by the lit up tree. That I think brought Matt's Christmas memory back and got him sad. His favourite time of the year is Christmas spending time with the family and he hasn't done it since 2007. So I can understand a bit. I guess I have just been lucky that I always spend my Chinese New Year with my family that I haven't missed any yet. My mom would always make so much food and we always have a big feast. It might be any regular family dinner that we have had the 364 other days. But when we are all over the world and that gathering would be so precious.

We then went out for a walk and we ended the night with Dicos ice cream, just for the heck of it.

Sat & Sun, I had breakfast at Matt's. He makes really good coffee. He's a coffee addict who needs 2 cups a day. I enjoy coffee and I prefer to be like that. After breakfast, I ran/walked the stairs of my apartment. That was more tiring that I thought it would be. Then I went out with him to bike shopping on Saturday. He tested a bike that's closest to his size. He had so much fun with it and I think he's very excited about having his bike. I tried to hop on the bike that he tested but I couldn't even ride it forward (it was way too high for me). The bike is 2298 RMB which is quite pricy (but it's a very good bike by Giant).

For dinner, we had shiny hot pot as he calls it. It was a perfect weather for it. Sitting outside and hot spicy food - I just don't like how thirsty I get after.

Sunday, he watched some hockey games online. We both had things to do of our own. I did laundry, had lunch, and went to school around 3 pm. I was trying to make a test and I didn't finish making it. My friend at Dalian taught me how to use the test bank properly. So hopefully I would get it done on Monday. I went home and did grocery shopping. We also had a staff v.s. students basketball game at our new gym. I had to say I was impressed by our girls' team as I had never play with them before. They were quite good!
It was a lot of fun even though I tripped a bit and teared the knee part of my gym pants.
(The concrete floor design in our gym is just terrible).

I am feeling the soreness from playing last night.
It's getting late...I need to get ready for work now!

happy December

Wow! I can't believe it's already December!
One more month, then it will be the end of 2011.
Sometimes it still feels like yesterday when I have just started that long journey from Vancouver all the way to Chongqing.

The weather here has cooled down a lot. It's a bit chilly. But I like the cold crispy air.
Technically I should be doing my long run now at least once a week for my half-marathon and I haven't done it. Right now I can only run around the school tracks 10 laps in slow pace. I really need to step up my game. I hope that I can really run 8k - 10k with ease in the following month.

Also, I have realized that it's impossible for me to have a post everyday. So I have decided to try my best to keep up the blog but I don't think a post a day is going to work anymore.

My dear sister, Maggie is crazy hilarious. I read her blog yesterday regarding her work jokes over November. I couldn't help myself stop laughing. Gosh, she's priceless...love  her to death.

This weekend I plan to just chill out in YC and hopefully get a few things done.

-some prepping
-put up x'mas tree in the apt
-grocery shopping
-some cleaning
-organizing my photos
-relaxing


yay for December and for Friday tomorrow :)