The Ching-lish

As we know...the Chinese are not the best group of people when it comes to English language. We encountered quite a number of interesting mis-use of the language..

To start with...even the bank can use the wrong WORD in their ATM. I might have posted this pic before but its to good to be true hehehhe.
Its written there " Transferee account BUMBER" huahauhauahhahauahauha 'Bumber Bee' kalii yeeee....



Next is the sign board in front of a condo which says that " No Entry of The Bagman" --> which actually is saying that Salesmen are not allowed to enter.
And below it "Please Got Off" --> which actually is trying to say that we are not suppose to ride our bicycle/motorbike when entering the area.

What a misleading sign! Kirain lg ngusir tuh bagman?? Piye tohhh...
ps: hmm someone ada bakat buat jd guard di sana tuh...u certainly have the look hihihihii...

Btw...we are wondering why they have the gate while they put such a big space around the flower pot which we can squeeze in and enter.





















Last but certainly not the least...is the sign on the playground "Children playing with the adult" while what they mean is every child has to be accompanied by an adult...hahahah




Guess...pictorial language is understood better than Ching-lish around here :)

The neighborhood part 1

I've always liked the neighborhood around the house. Its always so lively especially at night time (bukan night life lohh). It is strategically situated around wet market, supermarket, banks, mama-shops, salons and good food ")

This is how it looks in the afternoon (front view of the house).













At night (when we r too lazy to cook) we'll just stop by the restos outside the building which offers a variety of local dishes such as:


BBQ ala China hehehe (you should be grateful that it was dark out there..)

This is a stall selling all parts of chicken and ducks (never tried tat...and will not be trying it for the near future :P )








Well..this is was one of our favourite. Its called ma-la fish. The soup was this much (about 1 pot) and it is mixed with a BIG plateful of dried chili (top). So the composition is almost 50-50! Hah... Imagine the taste hehehe...but we like it still!





There is also the fish & flower shop. We started to raise these 2 ikan cupang di aquarium kecil. At first was skeptical about their survival but they are alive till date hehehe. We also started to decorate our living room with the lilies (which cost 2SGD/stalk).


We also have toko buah langganan right in front of our house. Not one day passed without us buying their fruit hehhe. We found this weird-looking papaya one day:




We called it pregnant papaya.





There is also this gerobak tukang buah around the area. We found him one day during our evening stroll. People are crowding around the cart to but his sugarcane. No..not for the juice but to be eaten JUST like tat! (Reminds me of my childhood days bitting sugarcane stick hahah). So we stayed and watched the tukang buah in action. People are buying the sugarcane at the price of around 5RMB/stick. Then he'll help you to cut off the skin & cut them into bite size pieces.

















See that kiddo enjoying his sugarcane there? hehehe Wonder how his tiny mouth can fit the sugarcane :P U'll be surprised...


Out of curiosity..we gave it a try













Looks like someone was enjoying the sugarcane so much...wink wink

ps: taste good tho...crunchy :p but not false-denture friendly..








Another interesting view here during the morning or evening walk is the group of moms or even grandparents who bring their children for a stroll. They will just crowd in groups along the street and chit chat (alias ngegosip! hihiii). This was the view at 5pm daily:














Even with China's one child policy...there are still a LOOOOTTT of kids out there...and somehow all of them looked like of the same age to me!
ps:believe it or not but 99% of these kids are boys...haizz..

The Churches

Since we arrived in Xiamen we've been hunting for church and fellowship around the area. Our first week...we went to the Xiamen International Christian Fellowship aka XICF. They hold their fellowship @ Bayview Hotel. Interestingly...the government regulation require us to show our foreign passport before we can join the service. Thats how strict the communists are. We found lots of expats and Caucasians there..not to forget quite a number of Africans too! Most of them are either working here or in case of the Africans, they are exchange students from Xiamen University.




We met some Indonesians too..
But the 'interesting' style of this fellowship is that during worship...we will be standing the entire half an hour. And during this worship they don't have any emcee or worship leader to lead the whole congregation. But they have pemain musik and backing vokal hehehe. Interesting huh...





The week after that...we attended this PD Daniel which is a fellowship for Indonesians studying in Jimei University.
Its pretty much similar to our ISCF in Sg heheh (nostalgia bgt). They hold it in the University's canteen heheh. We feel rather old and ngk nyambung soale all of them are Jimei Uni students while kita cmn nimbrung doank hehehe. But so far...we have a good impression and see a good prospect in this fellowship hehhehe.


The last church which we tried was GRII. As we have known that they hold their Sunday service in a small, humble apartment near Jimei Uni. So we gave it a try once. It came as quite a shock for me thou (well i was too pampered with my huge and comfortable GPO..hehe).

There were about 10 of us (the other 8 are all students btw :P). And karena ngk ada gembala..so we end up watching DVD kotbah nya Pak Tong yg d jkt.







Well...now we've seen the struggle of wat they called 'underground' churches. And as i reflect back...i was soo fortunate to be able to attend GPO every Sat and Sunday like nobody's business hheheh. Well..the next challenge is to attend the local, registered churches which speaks either chinese or Mi nan hua (dialect). It will be interesting to hear the Word of God in Chinese -a language which i think oh so highly :) I bet it can paint a much clearer and more beautiful picture than other language.

The Silent Killer

Another interesting finding which i found out in Xiamen (or maybe in whole of China hehe) is the transport which the local people use daily and very very commonly.

Its some sort of bicycle except that it uses electricity instead of fuel.











Everyone in Xiamen use this...ibu2..bapak2...enci2...om2...apek2..
anak2 muda...aa..teteh...smuaaa dehh

And this is how you charge the thing...just plug the adapter to the power plug and voila! You just leave it there like when u r charging your HP :p
And when you run out of battery when u r using it...all u need to do is pedal them like a normal bicycle...no pollution and very efficient (also cheap too i assume).




But why do we call them the 'Silent Killers'?? Well the story goes like this...

These bikes are very very quiet as in it doesn't emit any sound during operation (NONE at all!) unlike the normal motorcycle or even a bicycle. It is so soundless that you wont notice any of these coming near you..even at dangerous speed! And these people just wont bother to honk or give us any signal of them nearing or smth...So most of the time we had the shock out of our lives or we had to avoid them within split second else we'll be 'kissed' by the Silent Killerrrrr ")

What have i been doing

So...wanna know what i've been doing here in Xiamen?

Well to start with..im currently a part-time tourist and a part-time blogger which makes me a full-time 'lawyer' alias pengacara hehehe

When we are at home (which is like 90% of the time)..this is what we do:

1. We play cards...




















2. or we play Wii (right san? heheheh)





This is her favourite game..hula hoop (she can do 3500 turns wow...)


And if we ever go out...we would....EAT. Well our place is nicely located near all the restaurants with good food. One of our favorite is the BBQ stall where each stick cost like 1RMB (=20 cents people!)













We also enjoyed this Pu-tian resto with its famous ma la fish where each ma la (when bitten) tasted like a BOMB in your mouth! hahhaha...its really an experience..you should try on of those!














Intermezzo: China's bean sprout is like twice the length of the normal size we've seen huh...its abnormal!












And guess wat we found?? And indian guy cooking prata! hah... whom by the way speaks better chinese than english! toenkk....ANd the prata..for the first time i saw prata with corn-filling and peanut butter!



















We called this the original chinese food which consist of a blandly tasted clear soup with eggs and tomato (u'll normally find this on the menu in the tour to china)




They have bee cheng hiang too in Xiamen...Came all the way here to buy this heheh

What have i seen?

What are the interesting things i've seen lately? Hmmm..


Well..to begin with..every morning and evening..there'll be a lot of these young mothers carrying their children to hang out with fellow mothers just in front of our apt gate. And you know wats the similarity among these childrens (or infants i should say)... its their HOLLOWED PANTS!

And mind you the hole is not just on the back..its also on the front side of the pants..guess its for easy access huh...hahahahah













Next..its the "Lesportsac" of China...they called it Aidipu (Read: I tipu...mau aja ditipu! hihiiii )

But China also has great food...one of them is our favourite: Taiwan 手抓饼。It tasted pretty similar to prata (ohh i miss prata house) but better!










And it cost u only less than a dollar! (SGD)










And being so near to Taiwan..it has its own advantage: good bubble tea!
Its only 3RMB by the way...which is like 60cents?