Tourist guiding, Aikido class & Swedish dinner

Aron's parents and younger sister were here in Shanghai for Xmas and New Year. So the two of us acted as the host of the city taking them to all kinds of touristy sites: the bund, french concession - our favourite, jing'an temple, people square, the old town & yu garden. We also went to Hang Zhou which is a beautiful garden city built around a huge lake called 'the west lake'. Luckily, we stayed at a youth hostel inside a big garden called 'Zhao Gong Di' which reminded me of the famous slogan for the city - as nice as heaven. =) Food is what you cannot afford to miss visiting China. According to the book 'China Inc.', due to the long-standing dictatorship, people are not taught to think and innovate around social topics, a lot of the energy of innovation was put into food. Each day, we took Aron's family to explore different cousines in Shanghai: Hotpot (in traditional version with coal pots), Uighur food (plus the singing and dancing), barbeque, cantonese dim sum, Thai, Japanese ramen and Korean. Most of all, my mum's fantastic home-cooking dinner which is always followed by ice cream and wisky drinking.

It was not easy to guide a big Swedish family which made Aron and me reflect on the differences between Chinese and Swedish personalities. As much as the Swedes are concensus based, each individual still voices out different opinions and choices. The key is to bring everyone to a sensible common ground. However, the Chinese who dares to voice out his/her opinion will get the decision making power because the rest might be stunned by his/her courage or aggression. Not understanding the difference often puts me in dilemma - what shall I do to make everyone happy?

While taking Aron's family around, I became more realistic to the environment I am living now, compared to how I feel during the first few months. I guess, in a way, living in China is about putting up with crazy drivers, pick-pockets and people trying to cheat you all day long. Not that I out of sudden fall in love with the dark sides, at least I can save some energy to not get upset by them.

Yesterday, I tried out an aikido class by a famous Singapore dojo's branch in Shanghai. People there were nice and warm. 4 of us were new comers. The teacher gave us some special attention which reminded me of the 2 trials I made in Rotterdam. However, I am a bit disappointed because the teacher did not connect the aikido philosophies with leadership development and daily situations - the sensei in Rotterdam often do so which inspired me a lot in continuing. However, the sensei (taiwanese) will be back tomorrow. I'll go and try out once more.

Last night, Aron and I cooked a Swedish dinner for my parents - meatballs with potato mash and lingonberry sauce. The dinner turned out nice though my parents did not like the glögg post dinner. For me, this reminded me a lot of the life and traditions I lived in Stockholm. To get some special ingredients of the dinner, I went to IKEA on Sat afternoon. IKEA itself reminded me how crazy the Swedes are for interior design. Most of all, the food section brought me some sweet memories of Sweden: ginger bread, knäckbröd, glögg, daim chocolate, dill flavoured chips, lingonberry sauce, etc. Though not sure if I'll ever be able to once again live in Stockholm - the most beautiful one I have ever lived so far, I was at least happy that IKEA brings back some good old taste.