He will upload videos of the yummy things he makes, in English and Mandarin, hoping to help English speaking kids learn Mandarin, and Chinese speaking kids learn English, all through simple cooking 🙂 So click on the link above and subscribe, coming soon will be his Lemonade Scones 🙂
Here is his latest upload, Mandarin Chef’s Tomato Soup (English and Chinese, together with the pinyin transcript to help learners below)
You will need to watch how to make Mandarin Chef’s special spice mix also for the Tomato Soup recipe, but once you have made a batch, it will be a good spice mix to marinate meats, fish, and add to soups 🙂
Transcript of Tomato Soup Recipe:
Peel the onion, then dice, jiāng yáng cōng qù pí qiè ding 將洋蔥去皮,切丁
Put a splash of oil in the pan, zài guō lǐ fàng yī diǎn yóu, 在鍋裡放一點油
Turn the stove on high, bǎ zào wēn dù tiáo gāo, 把灶温度调高
Put the onions in the pan, bǎ yáng cōng fàng zài guō lǐ, 把洋葱放在锅
Finely chop three cloves of garlic, 切碎三瓣大蒜, Qiē suì sān bàn dàsuàn
Add it with the onions, Jiā shàng yángcōng, 加上洋蔥
Sauté for a little, chǎo yī diǎn, 炒一点
Add one tablespoon of Mandarin Chef’s special spice mix, Jiārù yī tāng chí Mandarin Chef tè bié de xiāngliào, 加入一汤匙Mandarin Chef特别的香料
Watch my special spice mix video for the recipe, 观看我的特别香料视频以获取食谱, Guānkàn wǒ de tèbié xiāngliào shìpín yǐ huòqǔ shípǔ
chop two zucchinis, qie liǎng gè xī hú lu, 切两个西葫芦
Put it all in the pan, Fàng dào guō lǐ, 放到锅里
Chop Two carrots, Qie liǎng gè hú luó bo , 切两个胡萝卜
Add them to the pan, , 将它们添加到锅中, Jiāng tāmen tiānjiā dào guō zhōng
Chop 750g of tomatoes, 切碎七百五十克西红柿, Qiē suì qī bǎi wǔ shí kè xīhóngshì
Add them to the pan, 加入锅中Jiārù guō zhōng
And mix 并混合Bìng hùnhé
Add a 400g tin of diced tomatoes, 加一罐400克切成丁的西红柿 Jiā yī guàn Sìbǎi kè qièchéngdīng de xīhóngshì
Add 1L of chicken or vegetable stock 加入一公升的鸡肉或蔬菜汤, Jiārù yī gōngshēng de jīròu huò shūcài tang
And stir it in , 搅拌一下 Jiǎobàn yīxià
Bring to the boil and simmer for an hour 烧滚后改用中慢火焖一个小时 shāo gǔn hòu gǎiyòng zhōng màn huǒmèn yī gè xiǎo shí
Use a strainer to put your vegetables in the blender 使用滤网将蔬菜放入搅拌机 Shǐyòng lǜ wǎng jiāng shūcài fàng rù jiǎobànjī
Then you can blend your vegetables 搅拌蔬菜 jiao bàn shūcài
Mix the blended vegetables with the remaining tomato juice in the pan将混合的蔬菜和剩余的番茄汁一起放入锅中Jiāng hùnhé de shūcài hé shèngyú de fānqié zhī yīqǐ fàng rù guō zhōng
Serve it into a bowl 放入碗中 Fàng rù wǎn zhōng
Garnish with some basil, 装饰用罗勒 Zhuāngshì yòng luó lēi
Our goal of trekking around the Annapurna is our ‘Everest’. We have been reading biographies of Alyssa Azar (youngest Australian to climb Everest) and Jordan Romero (youngest worldwide to climb Everest at 13!!!!!), sharing their journey of achieving their goal, and inspiring kids to go for their own ‘Everest’ whatever their dream might be. We learn so much from their stories, from their experience travelling new cultures, planning, failing, hard work, training, safety etc., and especially BALANCE.
We have also just read Solli Raphael’s new book ‘Limelight’. He hasn’t climbed Everest :-), but at 13 has written a book inspiring kids to follow their dreams too, this time through slam poetry! At 12 he won the Australian Slam Poetry Competition, beating Adults! Here he is performing his winning slam:
His poetry is awesome, he’s not just good at poetry though, he has a passion to rally all of his generation to help change the world for the better. He gives good advice, not just about metaphors and similes 🙂 But also about the importance of well being, balance, and BREATHING…did you hear in the above poem…Breath In, Breath Out :-). His saxophone playing, his long distance running training, his tennis playing, are not just other interests, they contribute to to his mental and physical health, a balance that makes the ideas, the words, the creativity, the nerves of ‘slamming’ all possible for him. It is this BALANCE that we are focusing on as we read Solli’s poetry.
We’re not all great poets or Everest climbers…but just as we can achieve our own personal physical goals, playing with and being mindful with words can help us to transform those goals from the words of a ‘training plan’ to discovering our goals on a more personal and emotional level, from within.
We are going to try and write our own poems about our journeys, but first we are exploring the genre of SLAM. Slam is like the RAP of poetry. So to get us warmed up, we thought we would learn a RAP. But, as we need to maintain our Mandarin while we learn Nepali, we thought we would learn a RAP in Mandarin 🙂 Our goal to trek around the Annapurna is about having a goal that will keep BALANCE in focus, a goal that we can integrate all our learning areas with a focus on our inner, local and global ‘Well being’. So we are learning a RAP in Mandarin about having a ‘Balanced Lifestyle’. Memorising this rap, and making a video to go with it, will help us to talk about the topic of having a balanced lifestyle while we achieve our goals, with friends in China. And of course it integrates LOTE, English, Health, Music, Arts and Technology. It will help us to share bilingually what we think is important to achieve our goals.
We found the site Mandarin Rap Podcast for learning how to talk about some deeper topics in Chinese through learning Rap! It’s a great site, check it out! We found a rap about Lifestyle Balance on the site.
Here is the video of Aurora and Lucas singing the Rap. They added images to help with meaning, as well as subtitles in Mandarin and English. Lyrics in Chinese characters, pinyin and English translation below.
Aiya! I’m really tired. No time to rest, no time to rest…
A balanced life is important
Students’ have such a lot of stress
Homework and revision are piling up.
So busy every day that we’re going round in circles.
The pace of life is really fast!
Lots of adults all hope
To get bonuses and promotions
All day, working from dawn till dusk
They have no way to look after their families.
Free time and leisure are always rare
But a balanced life is so important
Let everyone take action
We all need to adjust and make changes
Vegetables, fruit – eat them every day.
Drink more water; drink less coffee
Never set foot in McDonalds
Give up smoking and limit drinking – that’s the way.
Don’t forget to do enough sports
Keep on burning calories
Exercising every day is good for your health
Early to bed, early to rise: you won’t grow old!
Aust Curriculum Links
Media Arts
Yr 7 – Plan, structure and design media artworks that engage audiences – selecting footage, editing the footage into a sequence and applying a soundtrack that matches the edited sequence’s pace, rhythm and style
English
Yr 7 Use interaction skills when discussing and presenting ideas and information, selecting body language, voice qualities and other elements, (for example music and sound) to add interest and meaning
Analyse and explain the ways text structures and language features shape meaning and vary according to audience and purpose
Use a range of software, including word processing programs, to create, edit and publish texts imaginatively
LOTE Chinese
Yr 5/6 Create short bilingual texts on topics of personal interest and on key content from other learning areas and provide subtitles or commentary to assist meaning
Yr 7/8 Analyse, compare and present perspectives on topics of interest, identifying the different ways emotions, intentions and ideas are expressed
Health
Yr7/8 reflecting on the physical, social, emotional and spiritual benefits to health and wellbeing of being outdoors and of being active in a natural setting
The Hokey Pokey song in Mandarin is called 唱歌跳舞 (chàng gē tiào wǔ) which is literally ‘sing songs and dance’ in English!
This is just full of grammar learning opportunities, and also gets the kids up and dancing like they are at a party!
It has position/location sentence structure (inside, outside), left and right, and body parts.
But it is the repeated 把 construction that is the winner for me! The 把 sentence pattern in Chinese is tricky for older students to get their heads around, yet little kids get to hear this sentence pattern in this song, and so many other songs and classroom instructions, so many times that they will never have a problem with understanding the grammar of it when they get older!
Here is a video of us singing the song at our Mandarin Song and Story Time, with the words below.
Here are the lyrics:
把右手放里面
把右手放外面
把右手放里面
摇摇你的手
Chorus: 唱歌跳舞, 转个圆圈, 大家笑哈哈
把左手放里面
把左手放外面
把左手放里面
摇摇你的手 (Chorus)
把右脚放里面
把右脚放外面
把右脚放里面
摇摇你的脚 (Chorus)
把左脚放里面
把左脚放外面
把左脚放里面
摇摇你的脚 (Chorus)
把自己放里面
把自己放外面
把自己放里面
摇摇你自己 (Chorus)
bǎ yòu shǒu fàng lǐ miàn
bǎ yòu shǒu fàng wài miàn
bǎ yòu shǒu fàng lǐ miàn
yáo yáo nǐ de shǒu
(Chorus) chàng gē tiào wǔ zhuǎn gè yuán quān
dà jiā xiào hā hā
bǎ zuǒ shǒu fàng lǐ miàn
bǎ zuǒ shǒu fàng wài miàn
bǎ zuǒ shǒu fàng lí miàn
yáo yáo nǐ de shǒu (Chorus)
bǎ yòu jiǎo fang lǐ miàn
bǎ yòu jiǎo fàng wài miàn
bǎ yòu jiǎo fàng lǐ miàn
yáo yáo nǐ de jiǎo (Chorus)
bǎ zuǒ jiǎo fàng lǐ miàn
bǎ zuǒ jiǎo fàng wài miàn
bǎ zuǒ jiǎo fàng lǐ miàn
yáo yáo nǐ de jiǎo (Chorus)
bǎ zì jǐ fàng lǐ miàn
bǎ zì jǐ fàng wài miàn
bǎ zì jǐ fàng lǐ miàn
yáo yáo nǐ zì jǐ (Chorus)
Translation is much the same as English with a few changes: You put your right hand in, you put your right hand out, You put your right hand in, and you shake it all about, sing and dance and you turn around, everybody laugh. Repeat with left hand, right foot, left foot and whole body, and add your ‘bottom’ (pigu) for a fun one at the end 🙂
This particular translaton was taken from ‘Sing and Learn’ by Trio Jan Jeng and Selina Yoon. You can purchase the whole CD on iTunes.
This week at our Mandarin Song and Story Time, we read 大卫, 不可以!(Dàwèi , bù kěyǐ!) the Chinese translated version of ‘No, David!’ by David Shannon.
It is a simple book with the ‘No!’ and ‘’Don’t!’ things that adults often say to children. The illustrations are fun and convey all the meaning needed for reading in a second language, will encourage lots of discussion in both English and Chinese, and lots of repetition in the text to reinforce some key Chinese phrases.
不可以玩食物!(bù kě yǐ wán shí wù) ‘Don’t play with your food!’
Chinese doesn’t really have a word for ‘No!’ So instead the translators have used the modal verb ‘Can’ to translate ‘No’ in this context as ‘You can’t’. When we say ‘can’ in English, it can mean ‘you know how’, or that you ‘are able to’ or that you are ‘allowed to’, all depending on the context. In Chinese, there is a different modal verb for each one…’会 (huì), 能 (néng), and 可以 (kě yǐ)’. It is 可以 kě yǐ that is the one used to say that you are permitted or allowed to do something. At pre-school in China, when teachers are telling kids what ‘not to do’, it is this ‘不可以!’ (bù kěyǐ!) that is used…No! Don’t! For English learners of Chinese, learning how to use these different forms of ‘can’ in Chinese can be tricky. So this book is also great for older students of Chinese to reinforce the usage of one of these ‘can’ modal verbs. It will only take a couple of readings and some fun discussion of the illustrations to remember that ‘不可以!’ is the ‘can’ that means ‘allowed’ or ‘permitted’.
不可以挖鼻孔!(bù kěyǐ wā bíkǒng!) ‘Don’t pick your nose!’
Of course the little ones at our story time will pick all this grammar up naturally just by enjoying the story!
Is this a wooden cheeseboard?
It looks like one…
Drizzle white, dark and milk chocolate on the tray, like wood grain.
Scatter jelly beans, marzipan, fruit and nuts, and marshmallows on the chocolate.
Add more chocolate!
4 kgs of chocolate
Put in the fridge to set.
Grate and rub till smooth like wood.
Put cheeses, crackers and strawberries on the chocolate ‘wooden’ cheeseboard。 Share with friends!
This is the video that the kids followed to make their Chocolate Cheeseboard if you want to try making your own!
Ed Sheeran’s Chinese name is 艾德 希兰 (àidé xīlán) or 红头艾德 (hóng tóu àidé) ‘Red Head Ed’.
There are lots of Mandarin cover versions of his songs on YouTube. So if you like his songs, try searching and singing along to some of them in Mandarin. Singing along to songs in Mandarin is soooo good for Mandarin learners. You can study the lyrics, or just sing along without knowing word for word…either way it gets Mandarin in your brain!
Here is a cool video of one of his songs ‘Shape of You’, ‘疯狂的爱上你’ (fēng kuáng de ài shàng nǐ), by Echo Lee. Below that is a link to a Mandarin version of Ed’s ‘Perfect’ by Sophie Chen. The lyrics in both videos are in traditional characters, so I have converted them to simplified below the videos for those studying simplified Chinese. I have also converted to pinyin for your singing along convenience 🙂
Jamie’s Chinese name is 杰米奥利弗 Jiémǐ Aolìfú (to see how a Chinese name is made you can click here). And this book is his 15 minute meals, or 十五分钟开饭 (shíwǔ fēnzhōng kāifàn), literally ’15 minutes serve a meal’.
Lucas loves making a ‘fancy weekend dinner’ for the family, so straight away he looked through the recipes, this is the one he picked to make this weekend for us. Lucas can follow an English recipe independently with ease now…so I have given him the task of making this dinner for us, with no help from me…from translation, to shopping, to cooking (of course I will go to the shops with him and monitor the stove top cooking bits :-))
‘Glazed sizzling chops with sweet tomato and asparagus lasgnetti’. So Lucas set to translating the recipe. Lucas can recognize about 75% of characters in a regular text. That doesn’t mean he will know 75% of all the ‘words’ in the text, just the ‘characters’ that will make up those words. His strategy therefore is to type the whole recipe out, using the pinyin for the characters that he knows, and looking up the ones he doesn’t know in a handwriting recognition tool. Once he has the whole recipe typed out, it is then easy to look up the words that he doesn’t know using online tools.
Recipe typed out in Chinese, with the English translation of ingredients written in pen for his shopping list
Lucas’s English translation of the recipe typed and printed for cooking
Some words just don’t come up in even the most updated dictionaries, because new words are being formed all the time in China. As western food products increase in the market, phonetic names are made up for them, and often different areas of China may have different names. For example 帕尔玛干酪 (pronounced ‘pà ěr mǎ gān lào”, Lucas knew ‘gān lào’ as cheese. But an element of common sense guessing had to be used with the ‘pà ěr mǎ’ bit…a word in an Italian Pasta recipe…a kind of cheese…it didn’t take long to work out that ‘pà ěr mǎ’ was a phonetic for ‘parmesan’. After spending some time in Kunming, Lucas knows that only a handful of very upmarket supermarkets with international sections would stock such an item as parmesan cheese. So words like these can take a while to appear in online dictionaries.
Next Lucas had to write a shopping list of the ingredients that he needed, taking into account the quantities/measurements and making sure it’s enough for all 4 of us. So he printed his typed out list and wrote the English over the top. His translation for a ten year old is pretty amazing I think 🙂 (Please note I don’t correct any work of my children as I believe they ‘improve’ without the need of a teacher’s red pen). A few mistakes like writing ‘kg’ instead of ‘g’ they realise themselves…it is much more powerful for kids to find their own mistakes than have a teacher point them out 🙂
The dinner was an absolute hit…and an amazing feeling of accomplishment for Lucas…not only did he prepare, cook and serve a really fancy yummy dinner for our family’s Friday night chill…he had to translate the recipe from Chinese beforehand…some pretty amazing skills being developed 🙂
Ok…the work involved to get this recipe translated, shopped, prepared and on our dinner table was more like 15 hours spread over the week… not 15 minutes 🙂 But who cares…in the moment, meaningful and rewarding learning 🙂
The next morning we set off again to our next village, ‘Walnut Garden’ (核桃园 Hé tao yuán). Up high in the gorge now the views were spectacular, and passing goat herders with their herds of goats reminding us this trail is a practical way of life, not just for us to be awe inspired by.
High up in the gorge now it was a mostly flat trail to enjoy the magnificent scenery
Feeling a little insignificant 🙂
Taking advantage of the villagers’ rest stops along the way
Taking time to appreciate each other in the majesty of the gorge mountains
Crossing a waterfall…exciting if there wasn’t a sheer drop over the edge 🙂
Lee anxiously helping the kids…he was a little more scared then they were 🙂
Stop worrying Dad 🙂
Thanks to the hikers who leave little rock piles so we know we are on the right track 🙂
A descent indicating we are nearing a village 🙂
To get an idea of the ‘hairy’ parts of the trail, here are a few piks. We did have last minute parental fears that we were taking our kids on a hike that was a little too adventurous! But now we can say that we survivied, and if we had let fear take over we would never have the tale to tell 🙂 Yes it could be said that tripping over on the thinnest and sheerest part of the track in the wrong direction could have resulted in tragedy. But we know our kids are mature, sensible, agile and fit. Now we have finished our hike, I would do it again with my kids with no reservations, and they would too. Personally I feel that the benefits of such a hike for families far outweigh the risk of danger. If you are a fit family used to walking in the wilderness you would have no problems doing this hike and will have an awesome adventure to talk about together forever 🙂
This was the average thickness of the trail
You can see the trail path from this angle to get an idea of what is over the edge of the track 🙂
At some points the track does become quite narrow
If you look closely at this distant waterfall shot you can see the track, you can even see some hikers walking along…this is an example of a ‘sheer’ drop over the edge of the track
We finally get to Walnut Garden, and we stay at Sean’s Guesthouse, a guesthouse we stayed at 20 years ago! It was the very first guesthouse in the gorge. Sean runs the guesthouse with his wife Lily and his children, who can all speak really good English, and the food, both Chinese and Western choices, was just heavenly , again paired with an awesome view.
The lower courtyard at Sean’s Guesthouse
Delerious laughter…not sure if it’s the beer, the view, the altitude or the relief of finishing the hike 🙂
Dinner with another view on the upper deck
Yak cheese dumpling and fried yak cheese…yum
Water Calligraphy on our deck..it says 我爱虎跳峡 ‘I love Tiger Leaping Gorge’.
Using the water channel to navigate the best route back to the Guesthouse from the river 🙂
The farm terraces around the village of Walnut Garden
Kids entertaining themselves with toothbrushes and water to draw and write Chinese characters
The Jinsha river that forges the gorge…you can walk down to the river from Walnut Garden
Saying goodbye to Lily at Sean’s Guesthoues
We stayed 2 nights at Sean’s, so that we had a full day to explore the village and walk down to the Jinsha River. I highly recommend taking this time…especially as it meant trying more of the yummy food on the menu…and even a bottle of the ‘Great Wall Red’…it doesn’t taste too bad with the view 🙂
On our last day, Sean organised a driver for us to take us straight to Lijiang. There is a road that leads straight out of the gorge. The driver was happy to stop at Jane’s Guesthouse to pick up the kids’ backpacks on the way. There is also a bus at 3.30, but it wasn’t much dearer for the 4 of us in a private car, and this way we could leave on our own schedule.
We were enjoying the hike so much, we wanted to pop our packs on and carry on through the gorge (you can do to get to the Shangri-La end), but we had an overnight train booked in Lijiang. Maybe next time 🙂
Here are some tips we can think of if you go:
Yunnan weather is hot and dry, even in winter during the day, so take sun screen, and lip cream. We saw other western hikers with red faces 🙂
Gorge weather is unpredictable, is always cold Winter mornings and evenings, and can be cold in Summer too. We wore the same hiking clothes each day, and took one spare set of clothes to be comfy in for the evening….including thermals, polartec jackets AND big down coats. They take up a lot of room in packs…but it’s nice to be able to sit outside in the evening 🙂
Take instant coffee or coffee/tea bags if you like a cuppa before setting off, there are kettles in the guesthouses.
Don’t underestimate the walking times…they are not exaggerated like some western NP walks are. Allow the recommended time plus a few extra hours to get to your planned village before dark, especially if with kids. Take a headlamp though just in case 🙂
If with kids, allow at least 3 nights to do this section of the hike. Not because they are slow….my kids were at the top of climbs way ahead of me! But if you are not rushed you will enjoy your family time together and be safe 🙂
Follow in our family’s Mandarin learning journey on our Facebook page Mandarin Motion
We will read this book this week: 听, 是谁在唱歌? (tīng, shì shéi zài chàng gē ?) ‘Listen, who is singing?’
It is full of Onomatopoeia, or words that make a sound like the sound they are trying to describe. They are called 拟声词 (nǐ shēng cí) in Chinese, or literally ‘imitating sound word’. These are great for young learners of Chinese, because just like in first language acquisition, these words can allow children to explore the ‘sounds’ of a language. You will notice that most of the characters in the table below for these ‘sound’ words, have the 口 radical on the left side of the character, which is the ‘mouth’ radical…often giving a clue it is an onomatopoeia word!
The children will have to try and guess which animal is making the singing noise!
Below is a table that has a list of the animals in the book, and the animal sounds that the children will enjoy, but till Story Time enjoy this song! The words to the song are far too long to post here, but this link will take you to them 🙂 You will note some of the animal sounds in the song are a little different to some of the animals in the book…like the Rooster goes ‘ wowo’ in the book and ‘o o’ in the song…but just like animal noises in English…there is no law!
here are the animals in the book:
Cow
牛
niú
Moo
哞哞
mōu mōu
Duck
鸭子
yā zi
Quack
嘎嘎
gā gā
Dog
狗
gǒu
Wuff
汪汪
wāng wāng
Cat
猫
māo
Meow
喵喵
miāo miāo
Lion
狮子
shī zi
Roar
嗷呜
áo wū
Sheep
羊
yáng
Baa
咩
miē
Rooster
公鸡
gong jī
Crow
喔喔
wōwo
Horse
马
mǎ
Neigh
嘶嘶
sī sī
Pig
猪
zhū
Oink
哼哼
hēng hēng
Frog
青蛙
qīng wā
Croak
呱呱
guā guā
Here is another more familiar song to help us make those animal sounds! The first sound in the song is a chicken, which is not in our book (we have a rooster in our book crowing ‘wōwō!’. The chicken says 叽叽 ‘jījī’, more like the ‘cheep cheep’ sound of a baby chicken. Lyrics to the song are under the video. Old MacDonald in Chinese is 老王先生 lǎo wáng xiānsheng, the ‘lǎo’ is a polite address of a senior, the ‘wáng’ is his surname, and ‘xiānsheng’ is the word for ‘Mr.’ In Chinese we say ‘Wang Mr’, not ‘Mr Wang’ 🙂 Enjoy!
wáng lǎo xiān shēng yǒu kuài dì yī yā yī yā yōu
王老先生有块地,咿呀咿呀呦
tā zài tián lǐ yǎng xiǎo jī yī yā yī yā yōu
他在田里养小鸡,咿呀咿呀呦
zhè lǐ jī jī jī nà lǐ jī jī jī
这里叽叽叽,那里叽叽叽
zhè lǐ jī nà lǐ jī dào chù dōu zài jī jī
这里叽,那里叽,到处都在叽叽
wáng lǎo xiān shēng yǒu kuài dì yī yā yīyā yōu
王老先生有块地,咿呀咿呀呦
Literal English Translation:
Farmer Wang had a plot of land, yiya yiya yo
On his land he raised little chicks yiya yiya yo
With a cheep cheep here, and a cheep cheep there,
Here a cheep, there a cheep, everywhere a cheep cheep