My favorite Festival in Hong Kong-- Chinese New Year

Firework on CNY Day

February 3 is Chinese New Year, I would like to use this chance to share Chinese New Year (my favorite festival) to all of you and I hope you will like this festival! Chinese New Year or sometimes we called it Lunar New Year is the longest and most important festival in Hong Kong and China. Since I came to US, I don't really have a chance to celebrate CNY with family and friends. So I REALLY MISS CHINESE NEW YEAR!

History of this festival: This long history festival started out of fear. It is a horrible mythical story about a lion-like monster's name called "Nian" which is also the Chinese word "Year". The monster will attack the village once a year and all the people are very scared about this. There is a man ward off the monster Nian by making loud noise in order to scare the monster away. Also, people will put red paper craft on the windows and doors so that "Nian" is not dare to enter their house. And the monster never come back. Next year, the village celebrate this as"passing the Nian"(year) with the same stuff. Gradually, it became the tradtion rituals of celebrating Chinese New Year until now!

More info on this link: http://chineseculture.about.com/od/chinesefestivals/a/ChineseNewYear.htm

It is a very traditional holidays like Christmas in America. In fact, Chinese New Year is a big deal to all of us and we will widely celebrate. It is a family reunion festival, we will visit each other and spend the day together. People will spend lots of money to buy new clothes and exchange presents. Besides, there are many myths about this festival. For example, on the Chinese New Year Eve, all the members of the family will clean the entire house together. The purpose of doing this is for sweeping away all the misfortune so that luck will come to us in the next year. Moreover, Chinese believe that the colour red represent luck and blessings. Thus, we will use tons of red colour paper crafts to decorate the house.

Red colour paper crafts

For me, the reason why like this festival is because I can see all the family members at once and I can get red pockets from the elderly! Oh, red pockets are actually money! Elderly will put money inside a red envelope and then passed out to unmarried juniors. It is consider as a blessing to the juniors! We all love to get red pockest!

Red pockets

My Favorite Breakfast in Hong Kong

My name is Tsz Wai Kwok (you can call me Iris),  I was born and raised in Hong Kong. I came to United States 4 years ago to study aborad. I went to community college for two years and a current student at UCSD. I would like to use this blog to share my experiences about my home country- Hong Kong to all of you! In this blog, I am going to share my 5 favorite of Hong Kong and I hope you will know more about my city and definitely hope you will come to visit this city in the cuture!

For my first post, I want to share the food we eat for breakfast in Hong Kong. In United States, I am always hurry to go to class so I don't really have time to make a big breakfast(sometimes I don't eat breakfast). I usually eat a yogurt or a bowl of cereal in the morning. However, I don't really like having cereal for breakfast! I think it is hard to chew!

a bowl of rice congee

Here is a link of recipe of congee : http://chinesefood.about.com/od/breakfast/r/congee.htm

And a YouTube Cooking video tutorial to show you how to make congee

In Hong Kong, I usually eat rice congee or steamed bun for breakfast. Sometimes I will have rice noodle too!Why people usually eat this for breakfast? It is because rice congee is easy and fast to make and easily digestible food. Perfect for morning! All you need to do is put rice into boiling water and wait until it is cooked. You can add meat like pork or chicken to make a different flavors! When it is cooked, you can also add seasonings like salt, soy sauce, pepper or hot sauce. My favourite is chicken with rice congee and I like to eat it with soy sauce. On the other hand, congee is consider as the perfect meal for people who are sick. Besides rice congee, I will have steamed bun for breakfast. Steamed bun and rice congee are both traditional Chinese food. People use flour and water to make a dough, then we put meat inside and then steam it until it is cooked. I think it tastes really good! It is obvious that I don't have time to make a dough every morning. In stead, I will buy some frozen one. It is ready to eat after you reheat it at home.  

steamed bun

Sometimes I have rice noodle for breakfast, and I would rather have it for lunch. I think rice noodle is kind of heavy for morning and I will be so full after I eat this. Rice noodles are made with rice flour and water. I will put the rice noodle in soup. It is similar to rice congee. The only different is that rice congee is more soup like and easier to digest.   

Rice noodle

I hope all of you can have a chance to try Chinese food for breakfast sometimes! When I came to United States, I have experienced lot of culture differences between Hong Kong and US. I hope this blog can let you know more about me and share my lifestyle in Hong Kong.