A Feast of Festivities

Santa made a surprise visit to Harbin. He and Mrs. Claus want to wish all our readers a very merry Christmas and especially, a Snovum Godum.




One of the best things about living in a multi-cultural setting is the opportunity to celebrate. A month or week does not go by when we do not have an excuse to celebrate a special occasion occurring in one of the dozen countries represented by our little group.

Canada's Thanksgiving rolled into Halloween, followed closely by China's National Teachers Day with a big dinner put on by the provincial government. We were just slimming down when American Thanksgiving arrived and another dinner, all be it with a shortage of turkey. A pause, then Yalda, an Iranian celebration of the Winter Equinox and another great meal at Abbas's and Solmaz's. We had time to let out our belts before a 30+ birthday celebration that included the "Knife Dance".

The Persian knife dance involves dancing/gyrating around the birthday cake with a knife, offering it to the birthday person but then pulling it away at the last second when they reach for the knife. Dancing is strictly voluntary but greatly encouraged. The birthday person eventually must ransom the knife by making a donation to the last dancer with the donation based on the number and quality of the dancing. Once they have the knife, then the cake can be cut. The knife dance is done at any celebration with a cake including weddings.

Just days after the birthday celebrations we were hit by Christmas/New Year's week or as it is known in Russia, Веселого Рождества и счастливого Нового года. As I have previously written China, has begun to embrace Christmas as a holiday (See our Dec. 2008 blogs) and for the first time, the Chinese Government declared New Years day a national holiday with people receiving Saturday, Sunday and Monday off. We enjoyed an early new years celebration dinner hosted by the Foreign Language Department and received some lovely gifts. Dinner included a lovely chicken soup with all the trimmings.

Christmas started with a brunch at the Cornell's which led into an early dinner at a local restaurant. If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck and looks like a duck but has a lovely brown glaze, then it must be a Peking Duck. Turkey was available but priced for only a select few in the restaurant of the 5 Star Shangri La Hotel. (See October 2010 blog for more on the Shangri La). The cost of the buffet ticket was just under 20% of my monthly salary. Budgets decreed that Christmas duck was our cheapest option. A Peking duck is world renowned in duckdom. It starts life as Pekin duck. Pekin duck is a breed of duck that has evolved in China over the last 1000 years. It spends the last 15 days of life being force fed to a fighting weight of 5-7 kg. The demise of the duck usually occurs about 24 hours prior to the oven. The first phase in becoming a Peking Duck is to be eviscerated and have it's skin gently separated from the body fat by blowing air up into the neck cavity. The duck is then meticulously washed with water and boiled for a short period of time. After boiling, it is hung to dry for 24 hours. While hanging it is glazed with a layer of maltose syrup. Traditionally the duck is cooked in a closed, wood fired brick oven. Gaoliang wood is used for fuel and when the fire has gone out the duck is slid into the oven.

About 45 minutes later, the Pekin duck becomes a Peking Duck and is served in three stages. The duck arrives with a chef who gently removes the skin, which is then served to the guests along with a dipping sauce of garlic and sugar. The chef then carves off the meat. The sliced meat is eaten with thin steamed pancakes and bean sauce. You spread the sauce over the pancake then wrap it around the duck meat along with some vegetables. The remaining meat is pulled from the duck, finely minced with a sweet bean sauce and served along with small buns. You stuff the meat into the buns and voila, Chinese quarter pounders.

We celebrated New Years a few days early, attending a wonderful musical and dance celebration organized by our Russian colleagues and their students. Snovum Godum! The phonetic translation of happy New Year in Russian. (See Cyrillic version above) This was followed by a cast party that sadly we had to pass on. My buffet pants had finally met their match. New Years saw us follow our usual tradition and we enjoyed a quiet evening at home with one of my favorite dinners and a bottle of wine. Sadly but happily we will miss the Russian Orthodox (January 7) and Chinese (February 3rd) New Years as we are returning to Canada on January 4th. I can only imagine what other festivals and celebrations we will miss till we return at the end of February.

We managed to fit in the ice festival on our last day in Harbin and of course this included a dinner to close out the evening. I do not have the eloquence to describe this annual Harbin event. I encourage you all to Google, ice festival, Harbin. You will be amazed. The only downside for this event is the sub-zero temperatures required to make this festival possible.

We spent our last night in China in Beijing. We got together with Edoardo and Karen, two of our extended Chinese family and Terry another ex-Harbiner for a dinner in a100+ year old restaurant. Edoardo and Karen have embraced the big city life of Beijing but confess to missing Harbin a little.

A 10 hour flight and a two hour ferry ride found us celebrating a belated Christmas and New Years dinner with Great Grandma and 20 family members. As at most de Lucia dinners, the buffet pants were put to the test and suffice to say they were up to the test. Thanks to Dee and Harv.

For all our Canadian family and friends, we look forward to seeing you all soon and enjoy your festivals. Our adventure continues.