Sign of the times

Christmas is coming. In Hong Kong that is clear for anyone with functioning eyesight and hearing. This means, if you're not blind you can't miss the cheesy over-done Christmas lights and decoration; if you're not deaf you can't miss the cheesy Christmas tunes playing everywhere.

The irony is: the more they try to 'create' Christmas, the further they stray from what would be more authentic.

In fact, the only place in Hong Kong that even slightly has a 'Christmas'-feel to is the decoration outside one big office building, The Centre. There, simple layout of lights, white light in the trees, blue lights in the bushes, and no damned pictures of Santa Claus everywhere with his merry faggoty reindeer, and no damned "Christmas cone" (a Christmas 'tree' so overly decorated that it just looks like a cone with flashing lights and shiny decorative balls). Yes, The Centre is simplistic and hence much better than anything I've seen so far.

And that's all about that.

I made some rice porridge yesterday. I wanted to try how it comes out with the local rice and local milk. Albeit I probably kept it over the stove a bit too long, making it a bit dryer than it should be, I think it came out alright. The taste was good, and adding some sugar and cinnamon made me feel almost like home. A warm and fuzzy Christmas feeling. Add some cookies and a Christmas ham and you'll have all you need for a Merry Christmas.

Anyway, I offer some to Chi too. She, at first, is worried I'm again trying to poison her with the exotic foods from Finland. However, having a small taste of the porridge, she finds it surprisingly eatable, and even familiar in taste to the rice buns locals eat during Dragonboat festival. Then she added some soy sauce and tuna to the porridge. Come again? Yes, soy sauce and tuna.

Next time she cooks, I'll add ketchup to everything.

And to stop you wondering what's so awfully wrong about having some Christmas lights around, gaze upon the picture below and tell me it's not wrong, wrong, wrong.