Please take a minute and vote for Jenny Bowan to carry the Olympic Torch in Beijing. Jenny is the founder of the Half the Sky Foundation which is dedicated to the children in China that are still in orphanages. The program has done some incredible things-increased the number of foster parents, improved orphanage conditions dramatically, provided education and medical care. In short, this organization is performing miracles. We would love to see Jenny represent the orphans of China-usually girls. They are a group that is often forgotten. Please vote for Jenny today-and pass this onto anyone you think might be interested.

Vote here:http://pub1.chinadaily.com.cn/olympics/torch/members.shtml?mid=212

Good Monday morning and welcome to October. October is a busy month-the Supreme Court begins its sessions today, harvest festivals begin popping up all over the country,kids gear up for Halloween-second only to Christmas in terms of retail sales.
Beijing is choosing their Olympic torch bearer and people all over the world put their own unique spin on the transition from summer to autumn.

We celebrated Asian Mid-Autumn festival last night-albeit a few days late-we ate moon cakes (we liked the winter melon the best), the kids made dumplings and we ate delicious, homemade and authentic Chinese food. Seated at our table were three Shanghai natives, one girl who’s mom is Chinese and her father white, one woman born in Uruguay, a couple of plain old Americans of European ancestry and a girl who joined her family via adoption from China.

It was quite exciting-people speaking in Chinese and Spanish, the kids trying to communicate with the the non-English speaking group, the English-speaking rolling Chinese words around on their tongues, and the non-English speakers doing the same with English. Of course, there was plenty of Spanish thrown in to the mix.

As I was shooed out of my kitchen when the Shanghaiense women took over, I was able to sit back and watch the show. Not once did I hear the kids-or adults-become frustrated by the difficulty in communication. Not once did I hear anything about the ‘unusual food’. The kids-and adults-listened in awe as they were told the story of the Mid-Autumn festival communicated in Chinese, Spanish, English, and pantomime.

Of course, there were some goofs-we forgot to treat the older women with the respect they deserved. We should have seated them at the head of the table-but everyone sat down willy-nilly. But in general, we managed the evening without international incidents.

We were lucky to truly bring authentic experiences to our children. It broadened their horizons and gave them insight into a distinctly different cultural experience.

With more of these kinds of experiences the kids (and their adults) will truly be able to understand and respect culture, choices and ‘abilities’. We are five kids closer to a bully-free future!

Since everyone, everywhere has to eat a great way to get kid jazzed about cultures other than there own is to cook food from different cultures with them! Before you go screaming into the hills-it is not necessary to be a gourmet chef to cook with your kids. It does take a little planning, though.

When you cook anything with kids, you have to follow some basic rules:
1. Your kitchen and everything in it will be dirty

2. The recipes have to be kid-friendly-they will get bored and cranky if there are too many steps or the recipe is complicated.

3. The kids have to be ‘hands-on’ with the entire process.

4. You will probably end up cleaning the kitchen yourself while the kids slink off to watch TV.

5. To really be fun for kids-and less frustrating for you-have everything you
will need close at hand.

Last night we made jiaoze (Chinese dumplings). It was a messy and fun experience-and the dumplings were delicious. It gave us the opportunity to talk about dumplings from all over the world-ravioli, pirogi, kreplach, etc. Everyone was amazed at how many people ate dumplings. It really illustrated how similar we all are….and with that, we created one less bias.

In all-it was a home run!

Here is Min’s Shanghai Dumplings-you can find all of the ingredients at your local grocery store:

In a large bowl mix together (preferably with your hands)
1. 1 lb ground pork
2. 1 small bag (1/2 pound) of fine shredded coleslaw
3. 1/2 lb baby shrimp (cut them into pieces if they aren’t small enough)
4. 1/4 Cup of Sherry or cooking wine
5. Ginger root juice-smash some fresh ginger with the back of a knife and then squeeze the juice into the bowl
6. 2 tsp Salt (or one chicken bullion cube
7. 2 T soy sauce
8. 1 T sugar
9. 1 T sesame oil
10. Won ton wraps (you will need to trim the edges to make them round for dumplings)

Making the dumpling:
Take a tsp of filling and put in the middle of the wrapper. Fold the wrapper in half. Dip your finger into water and use the water to seal the dumplings.

To Cook:
Boil water
Put dumplings into the water and cook until they puff up-about two minutes.

Let me know how they turn out.

With respect:
Deb

I’ve learned that one of the best ways to fight racism and bias in my family is to introduce diverse and culturally interesting things into our daily routine. One of the easiest ways for us is food.

Dumplings are found in nearly every culture-and I have never met a dumpling I didn’t like! We stumbled on this SIMPLE recipe for mandu (Korean Dumplings) and thought I would share it.

Ingredients:
1 lb chop meat
1 stalk scallion-chopped
1/2 head Chinese cabbage-chopped
1/2 tsp. sesame oil
3 tsp soy sauce
2 eggs, beaten
1 package mandu or wonton skins
vegetable oil

Directions:
Dice all of the vegetables and mix with the meat.
Add soy sauce and sesame oil.
Put 1/2 tsp of the mixture in the center of the mandu or wonton skin
Coat the edge with beaten egg
Fold to seal edges and pan fry in vegetable oil until golden brown

Now, I don’t believe that eating dumplings is going to cure bias and it effects-but it can’t hurt, can it?