Category: Nebulous Items
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7 Reasons Why Sri Lanka is More Badass Than You Could Ever Hope to Be
Sri Lanka is kicking our ass. Yes, this elegant, soft-spoken, fragrant and verdant island is far tougher than it appears on the surface (and I’m not even going to go into the whole civil war thing here). How do I know for sure that Sri Lanka is a true badass disguised in a waft…
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Kandy: Whoa, I Think I May Have Entered a Parallel Universe By Mistake
I was going to title this post Kandy Says, but I doubt anyone would get (or favourably appreciate) the Velvet Underground reference. But you know what? I have no clue what Kandy is saying. Seriously. This town is a riddle wrapped in an enigma wrapped in a really awesome fresh chapati. It’s not just the…
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Final Notes on Having Gone Home- Aw, Dang it, Canada!
It’s a funny thing writing about Canada from an internet cafe in Kandy, waterlogged and slightly dizzy from the monsoons, with bejajs sputtering past and Sinhalese pop music blaring. I’ve had a follow-up post fomenting in my head since, well, since about a week into my three week trip back home. I even took…
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Not a Top 10 List: My 7 Favourite Posts
It’s a funny thing about going home again after a relatively long absence (a year and a half this time), even if it’s only for three weeks: Everything is just so normal and calm and sane and utterly non-extraordinary that I really don’t have much to say about it. It’s just home, you know?…
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Pan-Fried Goat Milk Paneer with Chilies, Garlic and Ginger
Yesterday’s goat milk paneer recipe may have ended on a cliff-hanger. That final photo of the cheese cloth wrapped bundle of freshly drained cheese was only the beginning of the story. Paneer is a beautiful thing, and goat paneer has surprised me by being even better than cow paneer. It’s creamier and milder and a…
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How To Make Goat Milk Paneer (and a few meditations on place and purpose)
I’ve been back home for just over a week. The skies have been all sparkly and bright blue and the sun shines so brightly that, well, I have to wear sunglasses a lot more often than I’ve ever had to in Shanghai. Have I ever mentioned how grim Shanghai can be? Maybe once or…
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9 Notes on Re-Entering Canada After Quite a Long Time Away
I have evaded jet lag! I have traveled four hundred bazillion light years from Shanghai to Vancouver to Vancouver Island, crossed the International Date Line, stayed up for 34 hours continuously during my journey and initial arrival, and seem to have righted my circadian rhythms unceremoniously and efficiently. I was in Vancouver over the weekend…
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Notes on Going Home Again
One thing I’ve learned over the past seven years of blogging is to not post when you are sick, exhausted or pissed off. If you are sick or exhausted, it inevitably comes out in a strained, rather incoherent stream. If you are pissed off, the tone is all wrong and you’re likely to offend (even…
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Further Adventures in Chinese Baking: Chocolate Coconut Cookies
I think the Plum Rains have started. This has been the driest year so far since we arrived in Shanghai in early 2009, though the low lying grimness hasn’t eased up. When I first moved here, I lived in a 4-story lane house out in the wilds of Pudong. My laundry line was a…
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A Totally Impractical Expat Interview #14: Amber Roshay- Teacher, Writer, Traveller
Welcome to the 14th edition of the expat interview series. This one is slightly different from its predecessors in that it comes from a woman who is actually a friend of mine here in Shanghai. Yes, Virginia, I actually do also exist in the physical world. I am not composed solely of ether and urls,…
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Baking in China (and other improvisational activities)
A few weeks ago, we came across a hand-me-down counter top oven on www.unclutterer.com and decided to test it. Not a toaster oven. Not a microwave oven. An oven oven. The kind that can, like, bake stuff and roast stuff and grill stuff. But I knew I was better off grilling in one of those…
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A Totally Impractical Expat Interview #13: Kate Bailward of Driving Like a Maniac
Welcome to the lucky 13th edition of the Totally Impractical Expat Interview series (hello baker’s dozen!). Today we have Gerald the Bear’s favourite expat, the lovely Kate Bailward of Driving Like a Maniac, a.k.a @katja_dlam. One of the unexpected by-products of this series has been the constant shock of recognition I’ve felt when reading people’s…