Dragon's Junket: Middle Age/Middle Kingdom

So according to an alarming report by The Telegraph (UK broadsheet), middle age begins at 35. I have successfully reached this milestone and frankly, I want a badge. In an attempt to embrace the fact that I am now in my mid thirties, not my mid twenties and that I am now 'middle aged' and not 'young' blah blah blah, I embarked on a delightful week of celebrations, made special by the people around me.

First stop were some new threads provided by Lori at her pot-luck evening. This entailed showing up with wine/food, eating, drinking, talking nonsense, drinking and rummaging through the goodies that she was getting rid of. I acquired an excellent brown leather bag, among other things, and following a similar generous share-fest by Michele earlier in the month, now have a reasonable amount of wardrobe fillers with very little shopping involved. Miser's paradise.

Photo by Jana Franke

Next stop was dinner at the Quesadilla Queen, Madeleine's house. I was duly filled with chilli, cheesy tortillas and 4.7% stout and Heineken. A most excellent evening ensued.

When a friend in China has a block of real cheese this size, you do not turn down an invite to dinner.

My reputation has firmly entered the minds of the inhabitants of this far off land.

My actual birthday involved getting to work with a slightly fuzzy cheese-laden head, only to be told that I wasn't needed so I had a surprise day off. Win! I met the Lianyungang Ladies at the park and we had a very lovely champagne picnic thankyouverymuchtopmeupplease.

Coconut Carnival! Drinks, candy, and coconut toffee from Lori and some home made coconut muffins from Jana. What better gifts for me, Coco the Coconut-addicted Clown?!

Lori baked a delicious vegan coconut cake. I only managed three portions....;-/

The evening was spent with my good friends Summit and Harry who cook for me every week and Harry teaches me a little Chinese. He's the smartest kid I've ever met and she's perpetually surprised at everything in a very endearing way, so I love spending time with these two. I decided that the most sophisticated thing I could do on the evening of my 35th birthday would be to take Harry to the park to play on every single contraption there, so that's what we did.

My excellent gift from Harry; it's an enormous key-ring which opens to reveal a mirror and comb. What girls' handbag is complete without one of these?!

I finished off the evening with a little tipple at the local bar and was asleep before 11 which is a record for me; I spent my 18th in a skip.

I rounded off the week by hosting... what else but a dumpling party at my new apartment. Traditionally women gather to make jiaozi and talk and generally be female in female company, but in the name of equality and modernity I invited a couple of honorary women: Andrew, Harry, Glenn (Jana's hubby) and Sean (Fish's hubby) who all (wo)manfully got stuck in to the messy task of making/eating jiaozi. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jiaozi

Step one: Ask Fish to help you buy all of the ingredients. Going with someone Chinese means you get a goooood praaaaaaaiiice!

Dried shrimp. These will be shrimp and celery Jiaozi.

Buy giant quantities of chilli, soy sauce and vinegar, otherwise your dipless jiaozi will SUCK.

Chives, ginger, shrimp, celery, lotus root, garlic, eggs and a whole bunch of other stuff. READY!!

JiaoziFest was a blast and I had yet another of those moments where I saw my life objectively and realised how fantastic things are and how lucky I am. I had a lovely group of around twenty friends, new and even newer, from Xinpu, Donghai and Ganyu, of different ages and nationalities who all turned up to eat, drink and be merry with me; I was bursting with birthday jollity and gratitude for my good fortune. I'm only sorry that there weren't more photos taken but we were all, literally, up to our elbows in flour and gloop and in the case of the children present, paint, but I have many lovely memories of what will hopefully be the first of many jioazi parties.

I fashioned a little taste of home into a light shade, so that Wales would be shining down upon the heads of my ~~slaves~~ friends.

My Jiaozi factory. WORK MONKEYS!

We eventually produced over 200 dumplings and ate every last one :)

How not to eat...

Angel and Harry, by far the coolest friends I have.

Watch the master at work. Each dumpling must have three folds at the edge to give it an elegant finish and to ensure it doesn't fall apart.

This was by far one of the loveliest birthdays I've ever had and the only thing missing were the people that weren't able to be here due to being inconveniently thousands of miles away, but you were all there in my dumpling-addled thoughts. NOM! NOM! NOM!