Christmas in Korla
Well Christmas has been and gone, another year almost over and another about to start.
We celebrated Christmas with a dinner party, hosted by Michael and Dominic on Christmas Eve with a good little group of Chinese, Uighyr and foreigners. Dominic with the expert aid of Linc and a fleet of helpers cooked up a storm with the pea soup and the apple crumble being top notch. Even our Circle English bosses got into the spirit of things although it was the infamous Mr. Han who was the real highlight of the evening posing with his gun.
Christmas Day and Dominic cooked up some wonderful french toast topped with maple syrup his mother had kindly sent over from Quebec. Not sure if maple syrup is available here in Korla, or even in Xinjiang, and certainly, I have never had maple syrup quite as smooth as that - Quebec maple syrup is certainly something special.
Christmas evening and the Korla Evening Newspaper organised a Christmas Party. We were invited along with a number of the papers advertisers and assorted other foreign teachers. The evening was an interesting window on the way that the Chinese view Christmas and our relationship to it.
Games were the order of the evening, with the 2 resident santa’s dishing out Christmas decorations and little santas as prizes. The evenings entertainement included such activities as fishing marbles out of water with chopsticks, musical chairs, “how many times can you fold a piece of paper while still standing on it with your partner,” balloon stomping, and hot potato karaoke - where the person with the hot potato when the music stops has to sing a song. My boss, David Symington, did a wonderful rendition of a Chinese classic.
The food was terrible as expected with very little in the way of vegetarian options (if one wasn’t after dessert). Treats like tomato and whipped cream on bread were a first for us.
The evening as a whole was a cultural experience. One could either view it cynically as the Chinese exhibiting their foreign friends (and the story was covered in the paper the next day - front page and inside). Or, more positively as being a sincere gesture of friendship, sharing with us a happy time when we are away from our home countries, families and friends.
The story, as I said above, made the front page of the evening paper, with our boss on the front page, and inside more photos of us.
Boxing Day in China is not a holiday - most Chinese do not know about it. So it was back to work and then dinner at a Chinese restaurant we call the Red Lantern. They have good vegetarian dishes - a couple of eggplant dishes are outstanding. We haven’t been eating Chinese much, strange as that may sound - and with most of the teachers leaving Korla over the next couple of weeks, I doubt we will again.
Yesterday was our third wedding anniversary. We have spent all of our wedding anniversaries in different countries - Japan, New Zealand, and now China. I wonder where we will spend our fourth!
We went to a “western” restaurant in the basement of a nice hotel (suites 3200 RMB a night). Got them to cook up some plain old tomato pasta - just tomato, garlic and herbs in the sauce. Took a little bit of explaining but they did a fantastic job. Definitely the best pasta I have had here in China - and it was in Korla.
After the meal we went for a walk in the subzero night, had a beer at “Little Bar” and then onto “Empty Bottle Child” for a nightcap. A good night for a happy occasion.
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