Chinese New Year

Today is the first day of the Chinese year of the mouse, or the rat - in Chinese there is no distinction between them. I have never heard anything like last night. A continuos bombing. After visiting Tian Yao's grandparents we took a bus home after ten o'clock in the evening. It was quite frightening to walk home from the busstop, in front of the big restaurant just before our house there were some explosions when we were approaching. But we got home safely. Ilma didn't dare to look at the fireworks through a window eather so we closed the curtains and went to bed. To read a book was difficult because of the noise so we just turned off the light and Ilma fell asleep on my arm during the biggest firework I've ever heard.

Now it's the next evening and they started again when it became dark. Not that they had properly finished actually but now it's again like a new year's eve. Both beautiful firework and different kinds of bombing, firecrackers and big ones. The beautiful fireworks can be seen through our window and they really are beautiful, many of them, not just the normal ones we used to buy in Finland. The big bombs almost in front of our house hurt Claire's ear when she sat by the window. Ilma is afraid of course. I guess this will go on for some days, nights.

But yesterday we had a nice time at Tian Yao's grandparents'. Ilma seemed to be quite happy in the company of Tian Yao's relatives, even though she only knew a part of them from before. The middle generation, Tian Yao's parents and her mother's brother with her wife had prepared the meal so that we had many dishes that were not very spicy, Ilma even had a special designed dish of corn, peas and tiny bits of meat, she liked it very much. She is always so well treated by Tian Yao's mother and other family.

The general program in almost every Chinese family was to look at the special New Year Eve's TV program with sketches, singing, dancing and acrobatics, also reading some very important messages wishing everybody a good new year, from the Chinese embassies abroad and from some big companies. And to eat. We had meat with vegetables, pork, some white pieces made of rice with spices, not too hot for me, beef, vegetables, fish, rice for the old and me, 60 % famous and typical alcohol for the middle generation's men and me (to taste, it didn't taste any good), Ilma's dish, green vegetables again, tofu (that is not my favourite). As usual I didn't taste the dishes with something red on them because it's usually chili, like the fish, but there was very plenty of good food even for me, oh yes and the gabbage soup was delicious. Ice cream in a sticky rice shell for dessert.

Tian Yao's grandfather has been ill and has been living in the hospital for a while like every winter, he is 84 and the problem is in his lungs. His wife has got a white hair like Ilma and she doesn't remember very much, but she and Ilma got along very well. Tian Yao's father showed us how to use a traditional Chinese top that is put to whirl by a stick with a ribbon, it is then used as a whip to speed up the top. Ilma enjoyed it very much, even if it was far too difficult for her. She was also playing with a pink metal box with a lock and a key, she got it as a present when we went home, filled with sunflower seeds like a treasure box.

In the evening, Tian Yao's mother came with a enameled basin of warm water, she took it first to grandfather who washed his hands and face in it, then she gave it to grandmother who also washed her face and hands in it, then she took it back to grandfather who washed his feet in it. Tian Yao's mother wanted to take the basin away but grandfather wanted her to give it to grandmother, so grandmother washed her feet as well. Tian Yao's mother always helps them to wash themselves like this if she is visiting them in the evening. I think it is convenient for the old who maybe have it difficult to move and do things.

Normally Tian Yao's grandparents have too girls helping them, they sleep in the smallest room in the same appartment, but now they had traveled to their homes for the spring festival like everybody else.

(This is sent a day too late.)