Food Tasting - Zongzi

粽子，Zongzi (sticky rice dumplings), are traditionally eaten during the Duanwu Festival, which falls on the fifth day of the fifth month of the lunar calendar (approximately late-May to mid-June, for 2015, it was June 20th).

Our club members loved the Zongzi that I brought to the class! We talked about the legendary story associated with this traditional food. It is possible that we can make them in the classroom by ourselves. Next time! 

Here's a wikipedia link to Zongzi, if you'd like to know more about this food and its cultural significance:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zongzi 

Ready-to-eat Zongzi

Chinese Name Practicing

唐诗：咏鹅 Tang Dynasty Poem: Song for Goose

Following is one of the key pieces that we've been studying in June: Song for Goose (yong-e 咏鹅), a classic Chinese poem by Luo, Binwang in early Tang Dynasty. It was believed that this poem was composed when the poet was merely seven years old. Yet it was so perfectly written and rhymed that even nowadays almost all the school age children in China can recite it.


咏 鹅
Song for the Goose
（唐）  骆 宾 王
(Tang Dynasty)  Luò Bīnwáng

鹅， 鹅，鹅，
Goose, goose, goose,

曲 项 向 天 歌。
She is singing towards the sky, with her beautiful neck bending in such lovely curve.

白 毛 浮 绿 水，
Her pure white feather coat floats on the Jade green water

红 掌 拨 清 波。
Her red feet stir crystal wave on the lake surface.


Instead of merely reading the poem, we now actually can sing it. Here's an online link to the song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrvA59XR4dY

Suggesting A Family Field Trip to a Chinese Art Exhibition In Town

Chinese Art Exhibition: Dream of Tang The Confucius Institute at UC Davis is delighted to present a special art exhibition by Chinese artist CHANG Fang. This event is free and open to the public; registration is not required. The exhibition is from June 12 to July 7; there will be an opening reception on June 12.   The Tang dynasty was a golden age of ancient China due to its flourishing economy and cosmopolitan culture. In addition to working for livelihood, people had the leisure to appreciate beauty of myriad forms. Among flowers, they admired peonies rich in form and color, as well as lotus flowers, which "grow in mud yet remain pure and uncontaminated." They were considered auspicious in people's daily life and became the favorite subjects for poets and artists.   The exhibition showcases Grace CHANG Fang's recent work inspired by Tang culture, which embraces such elements as peony and lotus flowers, Tang poetry, and the Buddhist flying Apsaras. Her basic media are Xuan paper, sand and fiber. Xuan paper is typically made of rice straw and has been used in  traditional Chinese painting for thousands of years. By applying a special method to Xuan paper, the artist produces fabulous textures. Sand gives depth and layers to the paintings, creating a unique texture. Last but not least, fiber gives colorful visions.   The artist CHANG Fang is an associate professor of Art and Design at Wuhan Textile University in China. She is now a visiting scholar in the Design Department at UC Davis where she conducts research on textile arts. With over two decades of teaching and studio experience, professor CHANG's artwork is collected in two books and many periodicals. she has exhibited in China, the United States, Germany, and Korea.   Exhibition: June 12- July 7, 2015 Reception: Friday, June 12, 2015 5:30 - 8:00 p.m. International House, Davis 10 College Park CA 95616

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Learning Chinese Pinyin Finals

Hanyu Pinyin is the official system to transcribe Mandarin Chinese sounds into the Roman alphabet. Pinyin is considered useful for teaching Mandarin Chinese, transcribing names and places into the roman alphabet, as well as inputting Chinese characters into computers.

Here's a more complete introduction to Pinyin @ wikipedia:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinyin

Another useful online resource site of learning more about Pinyin: https://chinese.yabla.com/chinese-pinyin-chart.php

At our club meetings, we have been studying six basic, important "finals" in the past one month or two. They were: a, o, e, i, u, ü

There are a total of nearly 23 initials and 24 finals in Hanyu Pinyin system. We are taking baby steps by learning one at a time and trying our best to get them pronounced right! Some of them will be easy since we have the same or similar sound in English already; others may be more difficult and require much more practice. All club members are doing amazingly well and working hard in our Pinyin units. Way to go! Keep up your good work, kiddos!

 

 

Cooking Project: Making Chinese Dumplings 包饺子

饺子 (Jiao zi) is the word for dumplings in Chinese. This Tuesday, we had an opportunity of learning how to make jiaozi, using pre-made filling and store-sold dumpling skins, 饺子皮 (jiao zi pi). 

Before the hands-on wrapping, together we read Wikipedia entry on Jiaozi, learning about the history, origin, meaning and variety of jiaozi in Chinese culture.  We also watched pictures of Jiao zi yan, dumpling banquet, and got inspired by all those colorful and different shapes of jiao zi.  Therefore, when its our own turn of making them, we were able to be so creative that you may not be able to recognize what we are actually making! Just kidding. ; )  Actually, we did an amazing job of making jiao zi, considering it's our very first time of doing this. It seems a fairly easy task for the most part, if we are not doing any fancy seal. 

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However, I have to admit that this was just a simplified version of making jiaozi. If you'd like to try it from scratch, here's some step-by-step instruction online that looks pretty thorough on this topic:

http://www.travelchinaguide.com/tour/food/chinese-cooking/dumpling.htm 

I hope you enjoyed not only making them at school but also cooking and eating jiao zi at home! I'm looking forward to hearing your feedback on Thursday!