The Trotter Question

Its been a while since I've written anything about living in a different culture, so I thought I would take a little break from the cute Sarah photos and write about a conversation I had tonight that I think highlights an interesting cultural difference between American culture and the culture I live in.

Tonight, David and I were having dinner with a close local friend of ours, when out of the blue he asked me, "Do Americans eat pig trotter?" Now, a couple of years ago, I would have answered definitively, "No," but these days David and I have been watching celeb-chef Anthony Bourdain, and so I know that, at least in the "gourmet" world, some Americans are becoming more adventurous, and even eating pigs trotter, etc. So I said, "Not very often. Its pretty rare, but yes, some Americans do eat pig trotter."

"Have you ever eaten pig trotter?" he asked me.

"No, I haven't eaten it. But I have heard some Americans (actually only Anthony Bourdain) say they like it," I answered.

"Oh! It is so wonderful! There is a lot of skin, and eating the skin is really good for your skin!" my friend raved, going on and on about the benefits of eating pig trotter to one's skin. "I eat it all the time!" he said.

This conversation is similar to many I have had before, where the central question an American wants to know about what he or she is eating is firstly, "Does it taste good?" and secondly about nutrition. Maybe that is not true for every American, but I do believe generally that if you wanted to get an American to eat something truly exotic like the hoof of a pig, you'd need to convince them at least that it was pretty yummy in addition to its supposed benefits to your skin.

My local friends, on the other hand, are always up for trying something new if they have heard it has supposed benefits for this health aspect or that one. I have serious doubts about exactly where their information is coming from (tradition, superstition, science, some weird combination of all three?), which doesn't make me exactly super eager to jump on the pigs' trotter/fermented eggs/whatever it is bandwagon.

Its important to note, this whole conversation/thought process was NOT happening over a dinner of pigs trotter. This is all theoretical.

Still, I asked myself, would I be willing to try pig's trotter? I actually think, after only seven years of living abroad, I might actually be willing to try it. Its taken quite a while, but I am finally willing to branch out a little (only a little, mind you!) in the area of food adventurousness. I ate frog for the first time last spring, and it really was good! It tasted like chicken, as they say, but actually better than chicken--juicier, more flavorful, more tender. The only annoying part is that the pieces of meat are so small and there are so many little bones. Still, its an accomplishment I am kind of proud of!

So, yeah, I am not making any plans to try pig trotter, but I have decided I am officially willing to taste it. Though I still think the fact that Anthony Bourdain likes it is more persuasive than my friend's gushing about its supposed nutritional benefits. I guess I just can't escape being an American, or the influence of celebrity chefs.

Bed Head

This is what Sarah looks like when she wakes up from her naps these days. She finally has enough hair to have some decent bed head!

When she first wakes up she is often still sleepy and a little disoriented. Its usually a nice time for a snuggle with mommy. In fact, she often asks for a snuggle these days--"Mommy! Snuggle!" I like it. :)

Harvest Festival

Friday night we took Sarah to a Harvest Festival put on by one of my good friends for all the expat families in our city. They have one of these every year, but we have never been before because we either didn't have kids yet, or last year Sarah was still too little to enjoy it. So it was finally time for us to have some Fall Family Fun!!

Sarah wore her bunny costume, imported all the way from America by my mom, though I am sure it was actually produced in this country. She got lots of compliments because it really was adorable and totally worth shipping halfway around the world, in my opinion! :)

So, how did Sarah like the festival. Well, she LOVED the balloons!! She was still too young to really play any of the games or do any of the booths (they had things like bean bag tosses, cake walks, cookie decorating, etc.), but the general atmosphere, energy, and excitement of being around so many other kids who were having a good time made Sarah very happy. She mostly just ran around, checking everything out.

Here she is (wearing my necklace) with my good friend Anita's kids, Callie and Zane. Zane is two weeks younger than Sarah, was also born in Chiang Mai, Thailand, while we were there. I think he looks dashing in his superman costume and slick-backed hair!
This is Anita's youngest, Jude. I thought this costume was so creative! She covered soe of the kids balls with green fabric, safety-pinned them to the baby's swaddle blanket, and then used the rest of the fabric as the outer shell of this little pea in a pod!

Sarah also enjoyed riding this little bouncy elephant, briefly, though mostly she just chased other kids around as they were riding them.

Here is Sarah with one of her favorite friends, Kayleigh Greene (the daughter of my good friends John and Alisa).

Can you tell how much they love each other???

Here is Sarah being adorable in order to get a free cookie at the cookie decorating booth. They gave in!

And, finally, David and our good friend Josh holding two very sleepy little girls after an evening filled with excitement!

Other interesting facts:

Candy consumed by Sarah: 1
Cookies consumed by Sarah: 2
Caramel popcorn consumed by Sarah: Lots.
Hours after her normal bedtime Sarah got to sleep: 1.5
Strange behavior produced by over-stimulation, sugar consumption, and being up past bedtime: 1 (Sarah randomly leaned over and BIT me really hard on the arm on the ride home from the festival!)

All told, it was a really fun time, though we were all thoroughly worn out by the evening's end!

Thankful

I got inspired today by a couple of blogs that I read to post one thing I am thankful for each day of the month of November (for Thanksgiving--for those of you who are slow like me. Seriously, reading the THIRD blog about thankfulness I was like, "What's this about?" Only THEN did I get the holiday tie-in. Awesome.) I know most of you come here to see pics of Sarah, or the occasional interesting tidbit about life overseas, but just as the posts I read today about what OTHER people are thankful for, made me think about what I am thankful for, I hope reading this will do the same. Hopefully, I will do one of the posts about once a week during the month of November. That's the plan, anyway. Since it is November 5 (where I am, anyway), here are five things I am thankful for today:

1) My life. OK, I know that is kind of vague, but I am almost done with "A Thousand Splendid Suns," and anyone who has read that novel, which is kind of historical fiction set in the last 40 years or so in Afghanistan, knows that pretty much every kind of tragedy that can happen happens to the two women who are the main characters. Even though it is fiction, I know the events are based on the reality of the kind of suffering that happens in people's lives in many countries around the world every day. So even though my life is far from perfect, I can see the hand of a Sovereign Father protecting me in so many ways, allowing only as much difficulty so that I can't go on being little miss independent, but I have to rely on him. And even in the midst of the challenges I face, I see so many ways he is leading, guiding, protecting, working. So I guess what I am really thankful for is . . .

2) Having a God who knows me and is working all things together for my good.

3) Losing 19 pounds over the course of this year, so far. Post-Sarah, my body held onto about 10 pounds for an entire year while I was nursing and after I stopped nursing (even though I started exercising). Two really good friends encouraged me to look at Weight Watchers, and it has been a tremendous blessing. I feel like it has not only helped me lose weight (something I had wanted to do for several years, even before Sarah, but never had any success at when I tried), but its also really taught me how to eat and live in a healthier way! For the first time in about four years, I am not technically "overweight"!!! I am so thankful to the Lord for bringing Weight Watchers into my life at just the right time and blessing me with success.

4) My Family. Yeah, cliche I know, but seriously I am so blessed! God has blessed David and I with such an enjoyable, fun marriage and companionship. This blog is basically 90% about how awesome I think Sarah is, so I don't even need to start on that topic. I love them and I am so so so thankful for them! Our extended families are full of people who support us, love us, and encourage us even though we live a gajillion miles from them. So thankful!

5) Unknowns about the future. These things bring me both anxiety and excitement about the future, but both those things are good in their own way. The anxiety is teaching me to trust in the Lord, and the excitement is just a blessing from him. I think he knows he created me with a bit of a need for adventure in my blood, so even though sometimes I am tempted to complain that the future contains SO MANY big unknowns, when I think about it, I see that they are good for me.

OK, soooo . . . those all turned out to be more serious than I'd anticipated. Hmm. Didn't mean to overwhelm anyone! But, I guess I had to get the "big stuff" out of the way. Still, this is such a good exercise. I encourage all of you to think about what you are thankful for and why. Have a great day!!

Chair

The other day, Sarah was playing with a box while I was looking at working on some stuff on the computer. Suddenly, I heard her say, "Oh! Chair!" very excitedly, so I looked up, and saw this:



Toddlers are awesome. Anyone who disagrees is wrong. ;)