Year Of The Horse

Today, January 31 is the beginning of Chinese New Year.

Each year corresponds with one of the 12 Chinese zodiac signs and animals. Each sign is believed to influence the personalities of those born in those years.
In 2014, it will be the year of the Horse.
"People born in the Year of the Horse are talented and popular, strong minded, energetic and sociable. They have good communication skills, but sometimes talk too much. They work hard and are good decision makers..."

Horse: 1930, 1942, 1954, 1966, 1978, 1990, 2002, 2014

I was born in the year of the Rat. I wonder what will the year of the Horse bring?!

Rat: Born in 2008, 1996, 1984, 1972, 1960, 1948, 1936, 1924

Chinese New Year lasts two weeks and is traditionally a time to honour ancestors and Chinese gods. The centuries-old celebrations end with the Lantern Festival on the 15th day of the New Year.

Chinese communities consider Lunar New Year to be the biggest and most important festival, so a huge number of Chinese from across the world go back to their home country to celebrate the New Year. This phenomenon is called the biggest human migration in the world.

via Baidu

What If ...3

"WHAT IF elections focused less on manipulating the negative and more on the emergence of positive new ideas - ideas that are not already society-accepted homilies?"

* reference Shirley MacLaine's book

"Blue Jasmine"

This time I don't really want to write anything about this movie, just to recommend it. Really, go and see it!

I love Cate Blanchett's performance in this drama/comedy. I have to watch it again!

 

 

 

What If... 2

 "WHAT IF our subconscious controls our destiny?"

* reference Shirley MacLaine's book

Candy

Candy is North American expression for what is in the UK, Ireland, South Africa and other commonwealth countries called confectionery...or sweets in UK and Ireland, and lollies in Australia and New Zealand.

*Also refer to Sugar Love post

Jewellery vs Jewelry

The different spellings of jewellery in British and American English can cause confusion.

The British spelling jewellery adds -lery to jewel.
The American spellinɡ jewelry adds -ry.

Silver jewellery from Europe

I never liked gold. I don't know why, but I wouldn't even buy a bag or a jacket that has a golden zip, buttons etc. Until recently...

As I was really looking hard for some nice and quality silver jewellery for a reasonable price here, and couldn't find anything that looks more sophisticated than the silver for kids, I decided to visit Pandora jewellery.

-PANDORA designs, manufactures and markets hand-finished and modern jewelry, and has the headquarters in Copenhagen, Denmark.-

I knew Pandora before mainly for their charm bracelets, and was resistant to them as I normally like something more original, you see the bracelets everywhere.

So, when I visited my local Pandora store the first time I was nicely surprised, as they were also offering a different silver collection at that time. I was lucky to receive a couple of pieces of that particular one as my birthday present from my husband.
At the same time I had a look at the charms closely, and fell in love with them. So, now I am also a 'Pandora charm collector' :-) You can generally get the charms in silver, gold, glass, wood etc. but also, as I discovered,  in a silver-gold combination. That is when I realized that this Two-Tone style is my favourite . I am still a silver lover, but I opened up to just a bit of gold. I love it!

my recent addition - Love Struck charm - from my husband :-)

Cuisinart PeftecTemp

I needed a new electric kettle, but was preoccupied with other things, so I kept forgetting about it. And what happened over the Holidays? I got one from my husband. Well, this particular kitchen appliance is definitely a very special one.
It is The Cuisinart® PerfecTemp™ Electric Kettle, and has 6 preset temperatures for different varieties of tea and coffee, fast heat-up and "keep warm" option that maintains the set temperature for 30 minutes, 360° swivel power base, it beeps when your water is ready, and more.

It is a perfect addition to my kitchen. If you know a tea lover and are looking for a present, this is it!!!

What If...1

I am reading another book by Shirley MacLaine.
She has appeared in more than fifty films, has been nominated for an Academy Awards six times, and received the Oscar for Best Actress. She is an advocate for civil rights and liberties, and the author of ten international bestsellers.
I have read two of her books so far (you will find them on My Books page), and now I am enjoying her latest one with an interesting title: "WHAT IF..."

I decided to quote some of her 'what ifs' - label What If...
_________________________________________________________________________________

So, let's start with this one:

WHAT IF common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen? -- Albert Einstein

Correction

I apologize for an incorrect information in my post today "Not only today's news on shooting"
where I was talking about number of school shootings in the USA in 2013. I listed 14, but missed one page, there were actually 30 shootings in 2013. It is even more disturbing, but it is reality. Amazingly, there are still many Americans who believe there are not enough guns among the public.

Here is the list from Wikipedia:

"This is a chronological list of school shootings in the United States. It consists of incidents in which a firearm was discharged at a school infrastructure, including incidents of shootings on a school bus or near school property while school was in session. This list contains shooting incidents that occurred on the campuses of K-12 public schools and private schools, as well as colleges and universities. This list also contains incidents of where a person intentionally shot him or herself in a suicide or suicide attempt. The incidents below are classified as "school shootings"."

1. Fort Myers, Florida
2. Taft, California
3. Detroit, Michigan
4. St. Louis, Missouri
5. Hazard, Kentucky
6. Chicago, Illinois
7. Houston, Texas
8. Midland City, Alabama
9. Atlanta, Georgia
10. Orlando, Florida
11. Southgate, Michigan
12. Cambridge, Massachusetts
13. Cincinnati, Ohio
14. Santa Monica, California
15. West Palm Beach, Florida
16. Decatur, Georgia
17.S ardis, Mississippi
18. Winston-Salem, North Carolina
19. Gray, Maine
20. Lansing, Michigan
21. Pine Hills, Florida
22. Austin, Texas
23. Sparks, Nevada
24. Greensboro, North Carolina
25. Lithonia, Georgia
26. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
27. Rapid City, South Dakota
28. Winter Garden, Florida
29. Centennial, Colorado
30. Fresno, California

St. Louis, Missou

Not only today's news on shooting

As I was watching the news a while ago, breaking news appeared on my screen. Another school shooting, this time in in West Lafayette, Indiana, the next door state. It is happening right now, so I don't have many details yet.

What I have information on is that according to Wikipedia there were 14 school shootings in 2013, and already 5 (including this one) this year! Five! - in 3 weeks!
I wonder what is wrong with this country. There have been many heated discussions regarding gun issues but in my eyes, no matter how you look at it, something is definitely not right.

Goro - Ôgon no inu



My today's post about dogs reminded me about this Japanese series that was very popular in my country when I was a girl. It is about Reiko Kitamori from Tokyo and her dog Goro. I am sure if you are around my age and from the Czech Republic you will recognize the song from the YouTube immediately :-)

 

(I hope I have the names right)

 

 

Director: Shigeyuki Yamane
Stars: Koji Tsuruta, Yôko Shimada Isao Natsuyagi

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

American Eskimo

I miss having a dog. I used to have a breed that is in Europe called Spitz, but I was told here it is American Eskimo. I am still confused, as you can see from the pictures below they are also called Japanese Spitz. Anyway,  this is how mine looked like. Could you resist this face? I love this breed. But be aware, these dogs are not for everyone, they look like angels, but can be a bit tricky :-) You definitely have to be a pack leader.





via Google Images





via KONALAE www.konalaejapanesespitz.com



I haven't had a dog for a long time. I didn't want to because of our constant relocating. It was unthinkable.
Now we have our own house with a big garden, so it should be perfect scenario for a new dog, BUT... I don't really like to keep a dog inside of a house (most of the time anyway), and after living in Chicago for a while I realized that it would be difficult. I can't keep a dog outside during the extreme weather that we experience here especially in winter and summer. Also, I am used to, from back home, taking a dog for a walk in a countryside where he can run free. Here it is pretty much on a leach or a dog park, behind a fence. The rest of the time inside of a house. I don't know, somehow it is not for me. Will I ever have a dog again?! I hope so, but for now I am still undecided.

my local dog park at Whalon Lake

 

 



Barnes & Noble

One of my favourite stores is Barnes & Noble. Today it is the largest book retailer chain here in the US, since the closing of Borders in 2011.
Borders was and international bookseller based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Unfortunately, they applied for bankruptcy protection, and because they were not able to find an acceptable buyer they closed in September 2011. Their competitor Barnes & Noble acquired Borders' trademarks and also customer list, so when you log onto Borders' former website today you are redirected to Barnes & Noble's site.

What is making me nervous now is the information that I found last year. Barnes & Noble Inc. plans to close 30% of its stores, which is about 20 stores a year, over the next decade! The list of the stores that would be closed wasn't provided. The company has 689 retail stores and 674 college stores.
Do I have to worry now about my local Barnes & Noble?! It is so sad. Don't people read books anymore? OK, I admit I am the owner of the Amazon Kindle e-book reader as well, but I somehow still prefer books. I love books!

I sometimes visit the store in Naperville, but prefer to go to the one in Bolingbrook at The Promenade. I will write about The Promenade later.

Barnes & Noble in Bolingbrook

Barnes & Noble in Naperville

 

I visit often. They also have a Barnes & Noble Café where they offer the Starbucks beverages and a selection of the pastries and cakes. To be honest, there are no other real coffee shops, how you find them in Europe, in the suburbs. Unless you came across a Starbucks or a Caribou Coffee, you would be looking for another one for a long time.

This option is actually a perfect combination. You can have a cup of tea or coffee or whatever else

you fancy while you read a book or a magazine, and you can stay as long as you want. It is how my husband and I spend our time on a rainy day or other days quite often. And when he joins me, we almost always have a chocolate cupcake - we share it as I can't eat the whole thing. It is quite sweet, so after a few mouthfuls it doesn't taste so good anymore, plus it has 440 calories!! Otherwise I really enjoy it :-)

I like my Barnes & Noble, please don't close it!

 

London time

When I turned 21, I decided to go and live in the UK.  It was a big deal for me at that time. It was just a couple of years after my country went through the Velvet revolution, so we were finally allowed to travel. After that event and before moving to the UK I only went for vacation in Greece. It was my only abroad experience.
This was very different, and it took all my courage. I was going to stay there for a year working as an au-pair, but mainly improving my English skills. So I did, and arrived in London. I could hardly communicate, I had only textbook English, and literally almost everything was new to me, but today I can say that it was one of the best decisions I have ever made.

My host family was not originally British, but I actually didn't mind. On the contrary. It was quite an 'international house' :-), and they were great. I stayed in touch with them for years.

At first I lived in Mill Hill (A), and later moved to Totteridge (B). Both of these areas are part of the London Borough of Barnet in North London.

(Note: Unfortunately, my photos from this time aren't digital yet. I am planning to convert them in the future. So, I am using pictures from the internet)

Mill Hill

"The area's name was first recorded as Myllehill in 1547 and appears to mean "hill with a windmill". However, the workings of the original Mill are in the building adjacent to the Mill Field. Mill Hill Village is the oldest known inhabited part of the district, a ribbon development along a medieval route called 'The Ridgeway'. It is thought that the name 'Mill Hill' may be derived from a mill on The Ridgeway, built on an area of open ground (now a park) known as The Mill Field.
The village is bounded on the north and the south by Green Belt land, and its High Street, at 100 yards, is the shortest in London. The area's proximity to the city made it popular as a country retreat from the 17th century onwards, and large houses and quaint cottages survive.
William Wilberforce (MP, and abolitionist of the slave trade) and Sir Stamford Raffles (founder of colonial Singapore) both briefly resided here, the former being the patron of Mill Hill’s first church, Saint Paul’s. As late as 1960 five shops existed in the Village (Griffin's sub-Post Office, The Blenheim Steps, Cook & Son (sweets and groceries), Hawes Brothers (grocers) and Vincett's (butchers)) but although the buildings survive, they have all since been converted into private houses, as the retail focus in the area shifted to Mill Hill Broadway." - Wikipedia



Mill Hill Broadway

Mill Hill Broadway

Totteridge

"Called Tatarige in the 13th century, the settlement is probably named after someone called Tata. The ridge is the high ground between the valleys of the Dollis Brook and Folly Brook. Over the centuries the rural qualities of Totteridge have attracted well-to-do families. Cardinal Manning was born at Copped Hall in Totteridge in 1808. With the opening of Great Northern Railway station in 1872, late-Victorian and Edwardian mansions were built around the old village. In line with overall trends in the late-1930s, following the conversion of the railway station (in operation from 1872 until 1941) into an underground station (from 1940) on the Northern Line, smaller properties were built within walking distance from the station (Totteridge and Whetstone tube station). In 1968 much of Totteridge was designated a Conservation Area, and no major developments have taken place since then.
Totteridge was a civil parish of Hertfordshire covering an area of 1,604 acres (6.49 km²) and formed part of a thin protrusion into Middlesex. It became part of Barnet Rural District and had a parish council from 1894 to 1914. It then formed part of Barnet Urban District from 1914 to 1965. In 1965, the parish and urban district were abolished by the London Government Act 1963 and the area was transferred from Hertfordshire to Greater London, to become part of the London Borough of Barnet.

Saint Andrew's church stands on the ancient circle site, with a chapel known to be located here from 1250. The ancient yew tree in the churchyard is about 2,000 years old (as estimated by Kew garden's experts) and is the oldest tree in London (also included in the book "100 Greatest Trees of London).

Totteridge has many spacious detached properties in a green setting that are highly valued; some of them are among the most expensive houses in London. Thus its past and present residents include the rich and famous, such as Arsène Wenger, Frankie Vaughan, Des O'Connor, Cliff Richard, Mickie Most, Hank Marvin, David Dein and many top footballers." - Wikipedia





Totteridge Lane - my way home, almost at the house

 

 

When I wasn't spending time in the West End = central London I would hang around Hendon, Edgware, Finchley, or my favourite Hampstead Heath.




Hampstead Heath - a large, ancient London park, covering 320 hectares

In the end I stayed for almost 3 years, it felt like home. I had a great time, but it wasn't always easy and fun. I guess I was experiencing typical ups and downs, but it definitely changed my life.
I have so many memories! I have just remembered how I tasted the typical British black tea with milk  for the first time and immediately loved it. It was also in London where I had for the first time salted butter - on my croissant, and immediately hated it. I just couldn't understand that combination. I guess that my topping it with jam didn't help :-)
....It was just a begging. I had so many experiences!

It is about fork

I am one of these people watchers, so when I moved to the US I noticed one thing right away, they eat differently! At first I thought it was just that particular person's way, but no, they all eat that way. So I investigated and realized that it is the American way.
We Europeans have a different method, so called European style. The fork is held in the left hand, the knife in the right and both by thumb and forefinger, so the palm hides the handle. Once you cut a piece of food, you just put it straight to the mouth by the left hand while pointing fork down.



European style

In the American style the fork is shifted between the left and right hand.  It starts the same way, the knife is held in the right hand and the fork in the left, but once you cut food on the plate into bite-sized pieces, you put the knife down on the plate and transfer the fork from left hand to the right hand and then move food to the mouth. The fork is held almost like a spoon or worse with clenched fists.
Also, what I see all the time, whenever food is soft enough to cut with the edge of the fork it is done so. You only use knife for cutting steak etc. So what you normally see are people sitting at the tables with one hand on their laps and the other hand "forking" their food.
To be honest, to me it looks horrible, like you don't know what to do with your hands when you eat. Maybe it is because it reminds me how we teach children to eat. Their motoric skills are not yet developed for this task, so an adult usually precuts everything first and a child tries to deliver the food in the mouth with whatever way they can find.
Well, I got used to it. I mean, I got used to watching the American style, I am still feeding myself using the European way :-) It is also considered the proper style everywhere else.

American style

There are different eating techniques around the world - with hands, chopsticks and so on, and it is great. We all have traditions, I just didn't expect to find differences in this area in the US.
What is interesting, as I found out, is that the "American style" originated in Europe, brought to America by British colonists and is still used in the US today while Europeans moved on and modernized their utensils style.
Funny thing is that when you watch American movies, everybody typically uses the European style. Has the Hollywood modernized too?!

I have found the above pictures at the following website, but even there, what you normally witness in the American restaurants, is described as incorrect hence the red cross = wrong. I guess we all need to refresh our Dining Etiquette skills.

By the way, the utensils... a knife, a fork etc. are commonly called silverware in the US, but don't be surprised when you get a plastic knife and fork, ....and everything else - a plate, a cup etc. It is definitely the world of plastic here. It is more sophisticated plastic I guess, nevertheless still plastic. This is how it looks like. There are many versions...in restaurants and hotels too. It drives me crazy, I am not camping!  I suppose I could write a whole new chapter on the topic of 'American Dinning'.

How we got to Colorado

When I lived in Nebraska, one day I was thinking, "There must be something else that happened during this stay here!", so my husband and I decided to visit Colorado.

We started our trip in (A) Lincoln, Nebraska and headed towards (E) Denver, Colorado on I-80. It is about 8 hours in a car, but takes much longer because you have to make several stops, so here they are.

I must tell you travelling that part of the Interstate 80 was probably the most boring time I have ever spent in a car. This is what you see for hours and hours...you just feel it will never end.

(B) Great Platte River Road Archway Monument - Kearney

Being on the Mormon, Oregon, California Trails, the Pony Express and the Lincoln Highway Kearney is home to several museums. One of them is Great Platte River Road Archway Monument, which spans Interstate 80. It contains exhibits that trace the history of the Great Platte River Road from the Oregon Trail days to the present.

(C) North Platte - Bailey Yard

North Platte is a railroad town and home to Union Pacific Railroad's world's largest rail yard Bailey Yard.
North Platte is served only by freight trains today, but during World War II the city was famous for the North Platte Canteen. Tens of thousands of volunteers from North Platte and surrounding towns met the troop trains passing through North Platte, offering coffee, sandwiches and hospitality.

The Golden Spike Tower and Visitor Center is an eight-story building which overlooks the railroad staging area. The tower and visitor center are open to the public year-round.

(D) Ogallala

The town's name comes from the Oglala Sioux tribe. It is also known as Nebraska's Cowboy Capital and it first gained fame as a terminus for cattle drives from Texas during 1875 to 1888. These trails are known as the Western or Great Western trails. Cattlemen met in Ogallala's hotel and saloons with Texas cattle drovers and haggled over prices to be paid for cattle which were used to stock Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming, the Dakotas and Montana, and were also shipped east on Union Pacific. The business boomed during summer months. Today you can visit Ogallala's Front Street Museum depicting the era. It is open year-round at Front Street and is one of Ogallala's western and historical attractions.

http://www.ogallalafrontstreet.com/index.htm

Lake Mcconaughy is located 9 miles north of Ogallala. It is a reservoir named after Charles W. McConaughy - a grain merchant and mayor of Holdrege, Nebraska. It is a popular location for fishing, boating, water sports, camping and hunting.

I also got myself a souvenir at Ogallala. At that time we were about to relocate, and I wasn't sure whether it would be to Chicago or China. Yes, that is how crazy my life was at that time. So, I wanted to have something from Nebraska, just in case I was moving to Illinois - another US state or from the USA, in case I was moving to China. I wanted something that would represent both, and this was perfect - a photo album, but it is not your typical photo album. This one is made from a recycled car license plate made by Littlearth http://www.littlearth.com/home.html

And when it seemed that we would never leave the flatlands, here it was in front of us, out of the blue - the peaks of the Rocky Mountains. That is the moment when an entirely different adventure started...in Colorado. I will write about it later.