Finally back in office from a wonderful trip in Germany. Well, I had no idea what to do for the remaining 2 days in office. I remember Anatole wanted to talk to me about the results of the experiment and so I had to wait for him. Hence while waiting, all the while I was doing my personal stuffs like typing blog, uploading pictures, etc. He came near lunch and asked about my Germany trip. He then said that he would treat me a restaurant tomorrow night for the wonderful job I had done here. But of course I declined. Still I would want to have a dinner with him tomorrow. Tonight was not possible because I had something on. One of my participants, a student from INSA invited me to his house for dinner. He is a Cambodia Teochew called Kwan Meng.
During lunch, I told the guys about my adventures in Germany, esp. the random sex in the hostel. As my last day gets nearer, I felt that I wanted to talk more to the guys here. After lunch I continued to zobo until Anatole came and told me that he had just talked to the other guy, Jean-Marie about my data. He told me to make some changes and said that tomorrow he would need to do a final clean up of everything. He said I could ask the people in Siames to join us for the dinner tomorrow night too. I went around asking the guys and realised that their soccer only ends at 10pm! That meant that we could only have a drink. Hence, I sent out an email telling the guys that we will be having a drink at O’Conneil the Irish Pub at 1030pm tomorrow. It was already 5pm then and the response wasn’t good as it was too last minute.
I left the office to meet Kwan Meng who drove to INSA to pick me up. He said he also invited another Cambodian Chinese, named Hui Zheng who came to INSA for one year of Masters study. Soon we reached his house which was a bungalow in fact. First we met his mother, a fat cheerful lady. Then his father, a short, tan and also very friendly man. Luckily his parents can speak Mandarin because they speak Teochew at home. In fact, the parents spoke better Mandarin than Kwan Meng, who was actually born in France. As for Hui Zheng, he spoke very good Chinese because half of his education was at a Hua Xiao, or Chinese School. And he watched a lot of HK, Taiwan and Channel 8 variety shows. He liked Wu Zhong Xian as much as I do and he listens to 933 too!!! Even here, he listens to 933. Wah. I didn’t know Cambodia has access to all these. I always thought they were poor and backwards. In fact, Kwan Meng’s family is quite well to do because his father is a businessman.
I then realised that they were staying at the border, called Jin Bian. Kwan Meng is going to Cambodia tomorrow for 2 months of attachment, and will be going to the university where Hui Zheng used to study. After that, he would perhaps visit China. In fact, he had already been to China when he was 17, alone!!! His mother told me he always likes to go travelling on his own. Very wu ji. Kwan Meng said he is keen to find out the root of Teochew. I told him me too and he said we could organise a trip together to the hometown of the Teochews. It was time for dinner and his mother made some traditional Teochew dishes which I had never eaten before. I guess these dishes contain Cambodian-taste and hence not really traditional Chinese Teochew dishes.
I learnt that Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos were all once French colonies and when the communist party Rouge Khmer (I think spell like that) came into power, a lot of them fled the country. So his parents fled to France and were refuges here (nan ming, that’s what they called themselves). That happened in the mid 70s. Something new to me. One of the dishes was really special. It is Bopiah or spring roll. But the way to eat it is unique. I had to wrap it with cabbage, xiang cai, and some dong fen, then dipped into a bowl of don’t know what funny water with chilli seeds. It was tasty but nothing special except the troublesome way of eating it. We also had sui jiao mian.
They asked me about SG but actually they knew more about SG’s in the olden days than me. Kwan Meng asked if I watch Wang Sa Ye Feng comedy and I said rarely. He said he has the VCD and find them super funny. Of course lah, their jokes are all in Teochew mah. I can understand just a bit. But after this meal, I think I would want to pick up my Teochew from now on. While eating with them, they were all conversing in Teochew and I had a feeling of eating Reunion Dinner because I only meet my paternal relatives during CNY and they always speak Teochew.
Soon it was time to leave because Kwan Meng hadn’t packed his luggage for tomorrow. They had a cherry tree outside his house and his mother just plucked some for us to try. It was very fresh but not very sweet because according to Kwan Meng, it would only be sweet next week. His mum said once ripe, they can pluck them and sell at good price. Kwan Meng then drove us back. It was really a big bonus to get to know these 2 Cambodians. All thanks to the experiments that I had to conduct. We exchanged personal emails and said will visit one another some day. I would want to go to Cambodia because they have that Ang Kort don’t know what old palace which is world famous. Another thing that I learnt is that these people from the poorer countries are actually not as backward as we think (or at least as I think). His mother who is working in France, travel around Europe every year because she has 5 weeks of leaves. But their taxes are very high. Income tax is about 25%. That explains why they have so much family aids, free education, medical subsidies. Anyway, now I am beginning to collect emails of international friends and hopefully I can build a worldwide network of friends.
During lunch, I told the guys about my adventures in Germany, esp. the random sex in the hostel. As my last day gets nearer, I felt that I wanted to talk more to the guys here. After lunch I continued to zobo until Anatole came and told me that he had just talked to the other guy, Jean-Marie about my data. He told me to make some changes and said that tomorrow he would need to do a final clean up of everything. He said I could ask the people in Siames to join us for the dinner tomorrow night too. I went around asking the guys and realised that their soccer only ends at 10pm! That meant that we could only have a drink. Hence, I sent out an email telling the guys that we will be having a drink at O’Conneil the Irish Pub at 1030pm tomorrow. It was already 5pm then and the response wasn’t good as it was too last minute.
I left the office to meet Kwan Meng who drove to INSA to pick me up. He said he also invited another Cambodian Chinese, named Hui Zheng who came to INSA for one year of Masters study. Soon we reached his house which was a bungalow in fact. First we met his mother, a fat cheerful lady. Then his father, a short, tan and also very friendly man. Luckily his parents can speak Mandarin because they speak Teochew at home. In fact, the parents spoke better Mandarin than Kwan Meng, who was actually born in France. As for Hui Zheng, he spoke very good Chinese because half of his education was at a Hua Xiao, or Chinese School. And he watched a lot of HK, Taiwan and Channel 8 variety shows. He liked Wu Zhong Xian as much as I do and he listens to 933 too!!! Even here, he listens to 933. Wah. I didn’t know Cambodia has access to all these. I always thought they were poor and backwards. In fact, Kwan Meng’s family is quite well to do because his father is a businessman.
I then realised that they were staying at the border, called Jin Bian. Kwan Meng is going to Cambodia tomorrow for 2 months of attachment, and will be going to the university where Hui Zheng used to study. After that, he would perhaps visit China. In fact, he had already been to China when he was 17, alone!!! His mother told me he always likes to go travelling on his own. Very wu ji. Kwan Meng said he is keen to find out the root of Teochew. I told him me too and he said we could organise a trip together to the hometown of the Teochews. It was time for dinner and his mother made some traditional Teochew dishes which I had never eaten before. I guess these dishes contain Cambodian-taste and hence not really traditional Chinese Teochew dishes.
I learnt that Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos were all once French colonies and when the communist party Rouge Khmer (I think spell like that) came into power, a lot of them fled the country. So his parents fled to France and were refuges here (nan ming, that’s what they called themselves). That happened in the mid 70s. Something new to me. One of the dishes was really special. It is Bopiah or spring roll. But the way to eat it is unique. I had to wrap it with cabbage, xiang cai, and some dong fen, then dipped into a bowl of don’t know what funny water with chilli seeds. It was tasty but nothing special except the troublesome way of eating it. We also had sui jiao mian.
They asked me about SG but actually they knew more about SG’s in the olden days than me. Kwan Meng asked if I watch Wang Sa Ye Feng comedy and I said rarely. He said he has the VCD and find them super funny. Of course lah, their jokes are all in Teochew mah. I can understand just a bit. But after this meal, I think I would want to pick up my Teochew from now on. While eating with them, they were all conversing in Teochew and I had a feeling of eating Reunion Dinner because I only meet my paternal relatives during CNY and they always speak Teochew.
Soon it was time to leave because Kwan Meng hadn’t packed his luggage for tomorrow. They had a cherry tree outside his house and his mother just plucked some for us to try. It was very fresh but not very sweet because according to Kwan Meng, it would only be sweet next week. His mum said once ripe, they can pluck them and sell at good price. Kwan Meng then drove us back. It was really a big bonus to get to know these 2 Cambodians. All thanks to the experiments that I had to conduct. We exchanged personal emails and said will visit one another some day. I would want to go to Cambodia because they have that Ang Kort don’t know what old palace which is world famous. Another thing that I learnt is that these people from the poorer countries are actually not as backward as we think (or at least as I think). His mother who is working in France, travel around Europe every year because she has 5 weeks of leaves. But their taxes are very high. Income tax is about 25%. That explains why they have so much family aids, free education, medical subsidies. Anyway, now I am beginning to collect emails of international friends and hopefully I can build a worldwide network of friends.
No comments:
Post a Comment