The culture of China (both traditions and artifacts) is very rich and interesting. Every year Chinese people celebrate the Lunar New Year. It is by far their most important holiday. Families get together to feast and have fun. They cook enough food for five families. JiaoZi, Chinese dumplings, is the most traditional Chinese New Year dish. Everyone gets involved rolling the dough wraps, chopping meat and vegetables for the filling, and stuffing the wraps. Usually people use pork and celery or chives, but the number of meat and/or vegetable combinations is endless. We once went to a jiaozi restruant that had 100 different kinds. Families go outside to set off fireworks. Although this is illegal in some cities, people generally continue to do it (or they buy tapes of fireworks and play them loudly on their boom boxes). People generally party all night long. It's really a blast.

Here's a loose recipe for JiaoZi:
Flour and water make dough. Roll into a thin log and break off pieces. Use rolling pin to flatten into silver dollar or slightly bigger wraps. Ground pork, and celery, and mix together with seasamie oil, salt, sugar to form filling. Stuff the wraps with filling. Seal wraps tightly, dip your fingers in a little water or scrambeled egg each time. Drop the filled wraps into boiling water. Boil till they float. Add a little cold water, bring water to boil again and let the dumplings boil to the top again. Remove. As you eat them, dip them in a mixture of soy sauce, vinegar, and chopped fresh garlic. Yum, Yum Good Luck.

Eating is a very important part of Chinese culture. In fact, if all China had to offer was food, it would still be worth going. I lived near the ocean and was able to sample all kinds of sea delicacies from scorpions to squid to snails. Chinese can even make carp taste wonderful. Lovers of spicy food should go to Sichwan province. If your really brave, southern China will cook you up some stir fried dog meat. Frogs and rats are also eaten. Cooks say they'll serve anything with four legs (except the table and chairs). But seriously, there are plenty of chicken, pork, and beef dishes that are just delicious. Beijing duck is also wonderful.

Chinese people are very hospitable. You cannot live in China but a few days before someone will invite you to their home for a meal. They go out of their way to prepare a feast and entertainment. Sometimes the entertainment is you, however, and they will definately pull out the kala ok for you to sing with. Chinese students may invite you for a barbeque. They barbeque mutton skewers with hot sauce (delicious) and play soccer.

Chinese students also love to play bad mitton, ping pong, ma jong and Chinese chess. I used to think I was good at ping pong before I went to China. Chinese also love to play cards (by the way, you'll learn to love em if you live in China because believe me you won't want to watch TV.) Chinese card games are more complex (and fun) than American card games. Most are usually played with 4-6 players using 1 to 4 decks of cards. I once played a game where each person held a whole deck of cards! Whew!

With the possible exception of the holy land, China is the best place to visit archaeological sites and museums. The terracota warriors excavation in Xi An is breath taking. It features thousands of lifesize terracota soldiers in formation as they were burried with the king over 2,000 years ago. Xi An also has an exhibit of massive ancient stone tablets upon which is carved many of China's important historical events. There are some wonderful museums as well. Some of my friends in Guang Zhou were taking me to a museum and seemed a little embarrassed. They said, "we're sorry, this museum isn't as old as many others. It's only 500 years old." And they were only talking about the building. The stuff inside was thousands of years old. I told them there was no reason to apologize.

You might be surprised to learn that the Chinese were the first To either invent or discover the following:

 1. Printing press (earlier than
    Geutenburg)
 2. Circulation (earlier than
    Willian Harvey)
 3. Umbrella (earlier than Mary
    Poppins)
 4. Playing cards (earlier than
    Vegas)
 5. Paper money (earlier than
    Monopoly)
 6. Brandi and whiskey (earlier
    than Jack Daniels)
 7. The mechanical clock 
 8. The decimal system, negative
    numbers, zero
 9. Gunpowder and matches
10. The suspension bridge
11. Wheelbarrow
12. Fishing reel
13. Stirrup
14. Porcelain
15. Biological pest control
16. Chess
17. Diabetes
18. Immunology
19. the crossbow
20. the parachute
21. sailing masts
22. fireworks
23. guns, cannons
24. the compass
25. and a whole bunch more.

Source: Temple, R. & Needham, J. (1989). The Genius of China: 3,000 years of science, discovery, and invention. New York: Simon & Schuster Inc.

Hope you enjoyed reading about China. If you would like to know more about This magnificent country check out the sites I have listed on my links page.