So what is involved in hot pot and how do we eat it?
Hot Pot is a communal style of eating. Numerous people may share one "pot". The pot is basically (and usually) a large pot or bowl which contains soup of some sort. The pot is placed over some type of cooking device. The food is served raw and usually is a mix of seafood, meat, and vegetables. The food is cooked in the pot with each person contributing what they want to eat. Sometimes there are sauces for you to dip your food into. Upon finishing or at any time during the meal, people may serve themselves soup from the pot.
Because hot pot is communal, there are some rules that need to be observed.
1. Because it is soup based, be careful! The soup is hot. If there are sauces, be careful too! You might make your meal mates angry if you stain their clothes.
2. If possible, use a spoon or some other utensil to help you scoop food up that you have difficulty picking up with chopsticks. It's quicker, you look less silly, and it prevents splashing and food waste.
3. If you add meat in, WAIT until the soup boils before eating anything in the pot. You want to make sure that your food is fully cooked and that any possibilities of bacteria from raw food is gone.
4. Don't try to grab all the food. It's communal for a reason.
5. If your utensils touch raw meat, you should hold them in the pot and give them a little cook. Safety first!
*Sometimes, under more formal situations, you may want to have a common pair of chopsticks or utensils for everyone to share. It's more sanitary and polite. But that's up to your group's discretion.
Here are some tips for having a good meal:
1. Make share everyone has an opportunity to try what's being served.
2. People should come away from a meal happy and satisfied, so do your best to either help make that happen or don't do anything that can prevent that from happening.
3. Watch what other people do and imitate when you're not sure.
4. If people are explaining the workings of the style of dining, Pay Attention.
5. and of course, ask questions when you're not sure.
Tips on food:
1. dumplings, meat/fish balls, and some mushrooms may take longer to cook. Take that into consideration. Once you pull it out of the pot and bite into it, you can't put it back.
2. Cut the noodles if you have them. Longer noodles are harder to pull out and can be quite messy.
3. Beef cooks relatively fast and tastes best when not over cooked. It also tastes best hot. Cook one or two pieces at a time for yourself or your friends.
4. Vegetables (the leafy and root ones) get softer the longer their boiled. If you prefer them hard, eat the at the beginning of their cook time.
5. Try the soup from time to time. The flavor changes after you add each new ingredient. All the wonderful and savory goodness.
6. USE a bowl to catch your food. It's cleaner and you'll likely to be able to eat more.
Enjoy!
Note: You can also enjoy DIY Hot Pot at home!
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Sunday, March 15, 2009
CollegExperience.net
Today I became a blogger for CollegExperience.net.
It's "College Experience is a college advice blog that offers an inside look at real college life. Unlike your typical book or website, we tell you straight forward how it is and we keep it real. Who better to receive advice from, than from actual college students? We offer our own college experience in all aspects of college life, from classes and grades, to parties and drugs. So go check out what we have posted and educate yo’ self!"
Anyways, due to legalities, the stuff posted there won't be posted anywhere else...and here's the link to my first post! For those of you that are interested of course.
How to go about Studying Abroad.
It's "College Experience is a college advice blog that offers an inside look at real college life. Unlike your typical book or website, we tell you straight forward how it is and we keep it real. Who better to receive advice from, than from actual college students? We offer our own college experience in all aspects of college life, from classes and grades, to parties and drugs. So go check out what we have posted and educate yo’ self!"
Anyways, due to legalities, the stuff posted there won't be posted anywhere else...and here's the link to my first post! For those of you that are interested of course.
Just for Harley.
Rules of thumb:
Relationships are a two way street. Period.
Relationships are built on trust and communication.
Proximity helps.
Good relationships have many components, we all know that. But the two that I think are the most important are trust and communication. Without trust, there's doubt, which can lead to insecurity, paranoia, and trouble, etc. Trust is the "firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something". In this case the someone being your significant other and the something, the relationship you're sharing and or developing. It's probably a mix of factual and instinctual. Regardless, if you have doubts in the other, I think there's a great possibility that the relationship won't work. Trust also plays in communication.
Part of making a relationship work is the ability for each partner to express their concerns, insecurities, and needs to the other. By doing so, the two can work out the kinks and reaffirm their bond. As a male, you might think it's tedious, but face it...men and women are just that different. Men respond to physical touch, they show their feelings, whereas women tell their feelings; they need to literally hear it from the male. Signs get mixed all the time, it's important that your intent is clear.
When there is doubt or mistrust, communication declines. It may start as lack of interest in talking to the other, to reluctance to tell them what's been happening (important or not), to not talking at all. But the less you talk, the more distance there is between the two partners there is. It makes it easier for the other to wonder, what else is out there? It makes it easier for them to drift and focus solely on their own lives, instead of being part of yours. And this is one possible explanation for why so many long distance relationships fail.
When you're abroad, there can be more than just physical distance. There can be time differences and of course life style differences.
For example, I'm in Hong Kong and Jon's in California. Not only is there thousands of miles between us, but the time difference as well. It's 9 pm here and 6 am over there...yesterday. Lifestyle differences include Hong Kong being a city of the night, whereas everything closes earlier in California.
But all of these things play an impact on any relationship. Being apart from each other, it's hard to be part of someone else's life. They have no idea where places are, who people are, or in general what's happening. Everything has to be imagined. It's hard to be excited or interested in something you have no knowledge of. Common topics can become few and far in between and conversation can become monotonous. Hearing "how's your day? what time is it? what have you been up to?" every time you converse with someone is boring and gets old quick. So what does that leave you with to talk about? In a way, it allows you to explore deeper facets of the personality, but at the same time, it's difficult to get that far when most people are out for instant gratification, something easy, or short term.
When you lose interest in conversing because there's nothing to talk about, you lose interest in talking to the person. This creates a tangible distance between the two. From there, it's easy to start looking, which according to Henning, is when you know that it's over or that the end is coming (I disagree with that, I think it's possible to look and appreciate without straying). So without one partner being there to physically ground your interest, and failing communication, your attention turns to only your life. You focus on what has been happening to you and around you. You begin to see others who you may not have noticed before. And of course, that's trouble.
But before all that happens, let's look at the beginning. How do you meet? Of course on any level, attractiveness plays a part. But it doesn't matter how attractive a person is, when you first enter a room, what do you notice; the attractive person standing next to the wall or the one laughing, smiling, and having a good time? Most people will notice the latter. When a person's confident (but not overly so) in themselves, it shows, and it's sexy. Besides, if you survey a group, most people when asked what they want out from 1 to 10 scale, they don't need a ten and realistically won't say 10 (people do avoid extremes).
So first impressions do matter. But of course, do everything in moderation. You want to catch good attention not be seen as an attention getter. You want to talk enough but not known as the one who won't shut up. Being able to listen and reading in between the lines is more important than talking. Everyone likes to talk about themselves, but everyone likes better the one who can listen to them.
You asked, "how do I get her to notice me?" and while there's no sure answer, I do have this advise for you:
Make her laugh, maker her smile, but most importantly, make her feel good about herself.
People ask me, why do you like Jon, and I always reply, "because he makes me feel good about myself. He makes me feel beautiful inside and out. He doesn't care about my flaws, my imperfections. To him, I'm beautiful and perfect. He gives me confidence and empowers me as I do him." Notice that my answer has nothing to do with how attractive he is or how much money he has, or how skilled he is, but rather, how he makes me more confident and feel like a better person. And that is your goal.
Also note that if there is constant fighting or lots of crying from either partner, something's wrong with your relationship... it's not healthy to be constantly fighting nor constantly upset or crying. Being in a relationship isn't supposed to be a hardship.
Now how do we do that? That's for another time and place. For now, let's look at the impressions. You need to remind her you're a guy and you are available and desirable (not necessarily in the lust filled sense). You need to make her see you in a light of a potential boyfriend rather than just another nice guy. As much as we fight for female independence and rights and what not, we do like it when you buy us dinner, when you open the door, etc. A lot of the times, attraction is in the little things. Remember my example?
When we're walking on the street and he tells me, "walk on the inside, it's safer". It's not that he's saying that I'm weak that he's domineering or whatever you called it, but it's that even though he knows I'm capable of protecting myself, he's caring about my well being. Yes, he's doing the male thing of (providing and ) protecting, but it's sweet.
Earlier, you had also mentioned two things: 1. you wanted to build some muscles and 2. competitiveness is attractive.
1. Muscles are not everything. You see plenty of attractive people with not so attractive people. Muscles are a plus, yes, but personality is more important. For girls, personality can make a guy go from okay, to super damn hot. But it also goes both ways, it can make you really unattractive as well.
I could care less how muscular Jon is, but I find him attractive when he's doing tasks he considers menial such as shoveling snow, or protecting our food from bears when we're camping. He's also adorable when he's slouched on the couch watching TV after a long day. And that definitely does not show off his muscles, and really, I could care less. When I look at him, I see his warm and caring persona, etc.
Although I will admit, girls like a guy who's aggressive to a degree. It's nice to be in charge, but at the same time it gets tiring. It sucks to always have to decide, to motivate, to initiate something. So sometimes, what you call the asshole, the one who just orders his girl to do something, we like it. It takes responsibility from us. It can be thrilling at times, to just go along for the ride, not knowing what's going to come next.
2. Competitiveness is attractive...but it depends on the type of competitiveness. The competitiveness playing sports and the competitiveness in winning arguments is different. Competitiveness in the field shows confidence in skill, aggressiveness, and ambition to succeed, to win. Competitiveness in always winning the argument, per say, is definitely not cool. It's annoying and can be frustrating at times. Don't you just hate the person who always has to be right, who always has to have the last say? In the end, you'd rather not talk to them at all knowing that if you did, you had to deal with that personality, that trait. Besides, you know that saying, "just say yes, the girl's right". Sometimes you just have to do that. Just shut up, even when you know you're right.
You appease the girl. Keep her happy, and she'll keep you happy.
If she's annoyed or angry with you, you can guarantee that your life will probably be frustrating or difficult for as long as she's unhappy with you.
Now here's something I mentioned to you. I have generally observed that the chiller (laid back, easy going, etc.) you are, the more of a high-maintenance girl/guy you can date or end up dating (High-maintenance refers to either time consuming, emotionally consuming, or materialistically consuming). Now why do I say this?
I don't if you've noticed, but high-maintenance people usually end up clashing. Their personalities are so big, drama ensues. Both want to the center of attention, so who's going to step back? Both want to lead, to motivate (initiate). On the other hand, two really chill people, don't get anything done, neither really takes charge. Of course, there are always exceptions to this. So like I said, if you've noticed, the chiller the person is, the more high-maintenance you can handle. The chiller one is happy to listen and follow (provided that they get their opinion in and their share in the relationship) the more opinionated significant other, who is happy to be the center of attention, to lead, to talk, etc. Although, I have noticed also that two similar people can work out too (ex: Sarah and her boyfriend).
So anyways, all of this is just my opinion and not anyone else's. Take it for what it is, an opinion, and make your own decisions.
Relationships are a two way street. Period.
Relationships are built on trust and communication.
Proximity helps.
Good relationships have many components, we all know that. But the two that I think are the most important are trust and communication. Without trust, there's doubt, which can lead to insecurity, paranoia, and trouble, etc. Trust is the "firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something". In this case the someone being your significant other and the something, the relationship you're sharing and or developing. It's probably a mix of factual and instinctual. Regardless, if you have doubts in the other, I think there's a great possibility that the relationship won't work. Trust also plays in communication.
Part of making a relationship work is the ability for each partner to express their concerns, insecurities, and needs to the other. By doing so, the two can work out the kinks and reaffirm their bond. As a male, you might think it's tedious, but face it...men and women are just that different. Men respond to physical touch, they show their feelings, whereas women tell their feelings; they need to literally hear it from the male. Signs get mixed all the time, it's important that your intent is clear.
When there is doubt or mistrust, communication declines. It may start as lack of interest in talking to the other, to reluctance to tell them what's been happening (important or not), to not talking at all. But the less you talk, the more distance there is between the two partners there is. It makes it easier for the other to wonder, what else is out there? It makes it easier for them to drift and focus solely on their own lives, instead of being part of yours. And this is one possible explanation for why so many long distance relationships fail.
When you're abroad, there can be more than just physical distance. There can be time differences and of course life style differences.
But all of these things play an impact on any relationship. Being apart from each other, it's hard to be part of someone else's life. They have no idea where places are, who people are, or in general what's happening. Everything has to be imagined. It's hard to be excited or interested in something you have no knowledge of. Common topics can become few and far in between and conversation can become monotonous. Hearing "how's your day? what time is it? what have you been up to?" every time you converse with someone is boring and gets old quick. So what does that leave you with to talk about? In a way, it allows you to explore deeper facets of the personality, but at the same time, it's difficult to get that far when most people are out for instant gratification, something easy, or short term.
When you lose interest in conversing because there's nothing to talk about, you lose interest in talking to the person. This creates a tangible distance between the two. From there, it's easy to start looking, which according to Henning, is when you know that it's over or that the end is coming (I disagree with that, I think it's possible to look and appreciate without straying). So without one partner being there to physically ground your interest, and failing communication, your attention turns to only your life. You focus on what has been happening to you and around you. You begin to see others who you may not have noticed before. And of course, that's trouble.
But before all that happens, let's look at the beginning. How do you meet? Of course on any level, attractiveness plays a part. But it doesn't matter how attractive a person is, when you first enter a room, what do you notice; the attractive person standing next to the wall or the one laughing, smiling, and having a good time? Most people will notice the latter. When a person's confident (but not overly so) in themselves, it shows, and it's sexy. Besides, if you survey a group, most people when asked what they want out from 1 to 10 scale, they don't need a ten and realistically won't say 10 (people do avoid extremes).
So first impressions do matter. But of course, do everything in moderation. You want to catch good attention not be seen as an attention getter. You want to talk enough but not known as the one who won't shut up. Being able to listen and reading in between the lines is more important than talking. Everyone likes to talk about themselves, but everyone likes better the one who can listen to them.
You asked, "how do I get her to notice me?" and while there's no sure answer, I do have this advise for you:
People ask me, why do you like Jon, and I always reply, "because he makes me feel good about myself. He makes me feel beautiful inside and out. He doesn't care about my flaws, my imperfections. To him, I'm beautiful and perfect. He gives me confidence and empowers me as I do him." Notice that my answer has nothing to do with how attractive he is or how much money he has, or how skilled he is, but rather, how he makes me more confident and feel like a better person. And that is your goal.
Also note that if there is constant fighting or lots of crying from either partner, something's wrong with your relationship... it's not healthy to be constantly fighting nor constantly upset or crying. Being in a relationship isn't supposed to be a hardship.
Now how do we do that? That's for another time and place. For now, let's look at the impressions. You need to remind her you're a guy and you are available and desirable (not necessarily in the lust filled sense). You need to make her see you in a light of a potential boyfriend rather than just another nice guy. As much as we fight for female independence and rights and what not, we do like it when you buy us dinner, when you open the door, etc. A lot of the times, attraction is in the little things. Remember my example?
Earlier, you had also mentioned two things: 1. you wanted to build some muscles and 2. competitiveness is attractive.
1. Muscles are not everything. You see plenty of attractive people with not so attractive people. Muscles are a plus, yes, but personality is more important. For girls, personality can make a guy go from okay, to super damn hot. But it also goes both ways, it can make you really unattractive as well.
I could care less how muscular Jon is, but I find him attractive when he's doing tasks he considers menial such as shoveling snow, or protecting our food from bears when we're camping. He's also adorable when he's slouched on the couch watching TV after a long day. And that definitely does not show off his muscles, and really, I could care less. When I look at him, I see his warm and caring persona, etc.
Although I will admit, girls like a guy who's aggressive to a degree. It's nice to be in charge, but at the same time it gets tiring. It sucks to always have to decide, to motivate, to initiate something. So sometimes, what you call the asshole, the one who just orders his girl to do something, we like it. It takes responsibility from us. It can be thrilling at times, to just go along for the ride, not knowing what's going to come next.
2. Competitiveness is attractive...but it depends on the type of competitiveness. The competitiveness playing sports and the competitiveness in winning arguments is different. Competitiveness in the field shows confidence in skill, aggressiveness, and ambition to succeed, to win. Competitiveness in always winning the argument, per say, is definitely not cool. It's annoying and can be frustrating at times. Don't you just hate the person who always has to be right, who always has to have the last say? In the end, you'd rather not talk to them at all knowing that if you did, you had to deal with that personality, that trait. Besides, you know that saying, "just say yes, the girl's right". Sometimes you just have to do that. Just shut up, even when you know you're right.
If she's annoyed or angry with you, you can guarantee that your life will probably be frustrating or difficult for as long as she's unhappy with you.
Now here's something I mentioned to you. I have generally observed that the chiller (laid back, easy going, etc.) you are, the more of a high-maintenance girl/guy you can date or end up dating (High-maintenance refers to either time consuming, emotionally consuming, or materialistically consuming). Now why do I say this?
I don't if you've noticed, but high-maintenance people usually end up clashing. Their personalities are so big, drama ensues. Both want to the center of attention, so who's going to step back? Both want to lead, to motivate (initiate). On the other hand, two really chill people, don't get anything done, neither really takes charge. Of course, there are always exceptions to this. So like I said, if you've noticed, the chiller the person is, the more high-maintenance you can handle. The chiller one is happy to listen and follow (provided that they get their opinion in and their share in the relationship) the more opinionated significant other, who is happy to be the center of attention, to lead, to talk, etc. Although, I have noticed also that two similar people can work out too (ex: Sarah and her boyfriend).
So anyways, all of this is just my opinion and not anyone else's. Take it for what it is, an opinion, and make your own decisions.
Food for thought.
This has been quite an interesting week. I've learned quite a number of new things, some of which I will share, others unfortunately for you, will have to stay a mystery.
Among my new knowledge is a set of English slang vocabulary words (thank Ali and Jesal):
1. Rough-ugly (I suppose its not hiding the beauty within according to them)
2. Fit- hot (although I'm pretty sure if you look up fit in the dictionary or ask anyone else, it has a different meaning)
3. Sleezy- flirting by means to get into her (or his) pants. (almost slutty)
4. Maccys (Mac-ies)- McDonald's.
-----
From an anonymous source:
American's are abrasive. Speech wise. Apparently, we make quite a number of people cringe, inwardly thinking "please, just shut up".
We are too in your face, too excited to the point of being excessively loud when the person we're speaking to is right in front of you.
Quite interesting food for thought, no?
-----
From Nemani and Kareen I learned:
McDonald's = Happiness. Although they differ on the taste of the food (one says it's delicious and other that it tastes horrible), both agree that 1. it's bad for you and 2. McDonald's makes them happy.
I thought about what they were saying and I realized, there must be a lot of people out there who think the same. McDonald's makes them happy. Can you imagine what kind of effort and how much money it must of cost McDonald's to create this type of image in everyone's head. In Hong Kong, I've seen plastic toy versions of McDonald's food. What kind of parent would buy that for their kids? But apparently they do.
Everyone knows McDonald's is bad for you, especially after Super Size Me came out, but everyone still eats it. Tonight alone, Ali, Haakon, Luong, and Jesal had it for dinner, and I'm pretty sure Nemani had some too. I'm not sure how McDonald's did it, but I'm pretty damn sure I think that companies out there should study the McDonald's history in advertisement and the company's past and present method for creating such a perception.
Among my new knowledge is a set of English slang vocabulary words (thank Ali and Jesal):
1. Rough-ugly (I suppose its not hiding the beauty within according to them)
2. Fit- hot (although I'm pretty sure if you look up fit in the dictionary or ask anyone else, it has a different meaning)
3. Sleezy- flirting by means to get into her (or his) pants. (almost slutty)
4. Maccys (Mac-ies)- McDonald's.
-----
From an anonymous source:
American's are abrasive. Speech wise. Apparently, we make quite a number of people cringe, inwardly thinking "please, just shut up".
We are too in your face, too excited to the point of being excessively loud when the person we're speaking to is right in front of you.
Quite interesting food for thought, no?
-----
From Nemani and Kareen I learned:
McDonald's = Happiness. Although they differ on the taste of the food (one says it's delicious and other that it tastes horrible), both agree that 1. it's bad for you and 2. McDonald's makes them happy.
I thought about what they were saying and I realized, there must be a lot of people out there who think the same. McDonald's makes them happy. Can you imagine what kind of effort and how much money it must of cost McDonald's to create this type of image in everyone's head. In Hong Kong, I've seen plastic toy versions of McDonald's food. What kind of parent would buy that for their kids? But apparently they do.
Everyone knows McDonald's is bad for you, especially after Super Size Me came out, but everyone still eats it. Tonight alone, Ali, Haakon, Luong, and Jesal had it for dinner, and I'm pretty sure Nemani had some too. I'm not sure how McDonald's did it, but I'm pretty damn sure I think that companies out there should study the McDonald's history in advertisement and the company's past and present method for creating such a perception.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Something of Interest
Yesterday, I was reading Alan's xanga and he had written something that totally mirrored my thoughts at some time during the past couple months. He wrote,
"I think the more I live my life, the more the concept of a "best friend" become foreign to me. I know people always talk about their "best friends", the people they can't live without, the people who they talk to all the time. The people who they tell everything to, the people they can trust about anything...
When I think of the best friend, or even good friend, they're people that know you, but not only do they know a lot about you, but they want to know more about you. They're people who you can hang out with and feel comfortable around. They're people who when you're gone, they'll miss you. They say actions are more powerful than words and I think that's true. Except in the case of nothing, both are more powerful and more meaningful.
...I'm pretty sure I can count the number of times people have sent me messages or talked to me or anything to that extent on my fingers and toes. Everyone else? Everyone at home that I've talked to since I've been here as been contacted by me. Me. Me. Me. Maybe I'm just over thinking things, but to me that seems like a very one sided relationship."
I wrote back to him,
"People come and go, thats given...but take pleasure in the people who have stayed in contact with you. They are the ones to remember, the relationships to nurture. Relationships of any sort are a two way street. You tried and that's the best you can do. If they decide not to put the effort into building and keeping the relationship, it's their loss. [Alan] You are a great guy, focus on those who keep in contact, even if they annoy you. Let the others come and go and just flow with it. You can always forgive and forgive...or just forgive but don't forget who's who in the scheme of things."
And when I think about it, although what I might have written may not apply to others, it does apply to me. I want to thank Alan for writing a wonderful post, which can be found here at his Xanga.
When I think of the best friend, or even good friend, they're people that know you, but not only do they know a lot about you, but they want to know more about you. They're people who you can hang out with and feel comfortable around. They're people who when you're gone, they'll miss you. They say actions are more powerful than words and I think that's true. Except in the case of nothing, both are more powerful and more meaningful.
...I'm pretty sure I can count the number of times people have sent me messages or talked to me or anything to that extent on my fingers and toes. Everyone else? Everyone at home that I've talked to since I've been here as been contacted by me. Me. Me. Me. Maybe I'm just over thinking things, but to me that seems like a very one sided relationship."
I wrote back to him,
And when I think about it, although what I might have written may not apply to others, it does apply to me. I want to thank Alan for writing a wonderful post, which can be found here at his Xanga.
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