~Video~

One of my tasks is making video for Jiucyong Hu~
I started the task with Angela at the last week I'm in Jiucyong Hu~
We decided to record short video and add on with some photos that we took in Jiucyong Hu~
Early in the morning, we went to the entrance of Jiucyong Hu to record the starter of the video~
Woo~ I felt nervous because I'm not used to talk in front of recorder~
Angela was better than me~ She can speak well and confident although she felt nervous too~
After that, we went to Pitang Wo to record the video of Pitang Wo and the ending of the video~
The process of record was done and we need to edit the video lah^.^
We used long time to edit the video because my laptop keep on freezing when we almost finish~Arg!!!
We keep on trying and trying and finally done~Yeah~~~~
So happy because can done it before I back to Malaysia~

P/S: The video is funny >.<

Liu’s Restaurant 劉家燜雞

13 years old tradition of Hakka Cuisine ever since it was founded 1997 in Liu’s Restaurant has maintained its original quality of Hakka cuisine and become a place of interest frequently enjoyed by many people.

Where is the location of Liu’s Restaurant? It is located on Jiuqiong Lake in Xinpu Township. Before Mr. Liu runs this restaurant, Mr. Liu was a business man. He is a friendly and humor person, he always invite friends come to his orchard to pick some fresh fruits and treat them a meal with dishes cooking by him. Mr. Liu cooking skill is good and his friends recommend him to run a restaurant. Hence, Mr. Liu started to run his own restaurant with few simple Hakka dishes. There are none expected situation had happened which is more and more customers come to have meal because of the delicious Hakka cuisine. Finally, Mr. Liu decided to put all his effort to run this restaurant.

Liu’s braising chicken restaurant specializes in braising chicken which is original creation of Mr. Liu. He use high quality free range chicken and each must meet four kilograms. Season the chicken with secret flavoring; put it into a special iron box and braising with high temperature of wood fire. Wait for an hour, a golden brown and gleaming, tender and juicy chicken is ready to serve -- engages each sense. The crackle of chicken as it cooks and the wondrous aroma that perfumes the environment provoke a feeling of satisfaction and fulfillment. Besides braising chicken, braise bamboo shoot and crispy spring roll are also signature dishes of this restaurant. The must try dishes when you having your meal here.

Liu's Restaurant~

Mr. Liu~ The Boss of the restaurant~

The yummy braising chicken~

Braise bamboo shoot~

Crispy Spring Roll~

Hakka style cuisine~

Yummy vegetable~

Show the step of braising chicken~

A lot of customers~

Enjoy the meal~

Guatemala's tourists~

 P/S: The dishes of Liu's restaurant are really yummy and delicious especially the braising chicken ~ Must come and try~ Don't miss it~ ^.^

金谷農場 Golden Valley Farm

Golden Valley Farm is a poetic farm with its graceful environment. Golden Valley farm planted a lot of butterfly attracting plants and became habitat of butterfly. Many butterflies fly at the garden during April to November. So you can see different kind of butterflies at Golden Valley Farm almost all the year.

If you come Golden Valley Farm in summer. You can see the endangered insect - unicorn beetle (scientific name: Allomyiina Dichotoma). That’s because Golden valley farm has planted Fraxinus griffithii (光臘树) which the tree snap is food for unicorn beetle. If you are lucky enough, you can see the battle between male unicorn beetles to fight for a spouse.     

Besides butterfly and unicorn beetles, there has another unique feature in Golden valley farm – Southern Cypress (scientific name: Taxodium Distichum (L.) Rich). Southern cypress will change color with different season. Leafing out in spring, green in summer, yellow in autumn and red in winter. You will have the illusion of living in the North Country especially when you come in autumn and winter.

Golden valley farm has playground and a Ming pond that really suitable for family activity. Parents can accompany their children play at playground or feeding fishes at pond. If you feel thirst or hungry, don’t worry! Here has a delicate coffee shop and Hakka food stall, you can have lunch or afternoon tea and indulge yourself in such relaxation environment.

Apart from a recreation farm, Golden valley farm also sell flowers and plants. The master of farm, Mr. Huang has made sure the flowers and plants that sell are beautiful and the price is lower than market price. So, don’t forget to buy some flowers before you leave Golden valley farm. It can be souvenir for friends or decoration for your own garden.

P/S: Hope you all will like the pictures I had took ^.^

埤唐窝生态园区Pi Tang Wo Ecological Park

In the previous articles~ I had mentioned fews spots of Jiu Qiong Lake~ Now, i want to introduced these spots but I will just introduce Pi Tang Wo in this article~ hehee~ 

Pi Tang Wo is an ecological Park which planning well by the Soil and water conservation and residents of Jiu Qiong Lake. Pi Tang Wo is an abandoned farm before develop. The planner transformed this farm by guided the farm’s pond drainage that originally will flow into the river into four artificial ponds that built at the abandoned farm. Each pond has different environment for different aquatic plants. The path of Pi Tang Wo covered by wood chips, you will feel comfortable when you walk on the wood chips path. You will see many kinds of butterflies and birds at Pi Tang Wo. With the effort of well planning, Pi Tang Wo had become a very beautiful and fantastic ecological park that suitable for learning and relaxing. Don’t miss this place when you visit to Jiu Qiong Lake.

This is the plan of Pi Tang Wo:

Let's see the differences before and after develop~

The environment of Pi Tang Wo~ 

P/S: The other spots are coming soon~

Xinpu Baliguo 新埔吧哩啯

This is what I had read in the book about the history of Xinpu Township~

Xinpu with a former name of Baliguo (is indigenous people language) means “new prairie”, originally is hunting area of Pingpu. Han Chinese developed this area since 1725 AD. In 1784 AD, this area has become a small market and the name of Xinpu Village appeared on the official literature. Early of 19th Century, Xinpu has become a distribution center for sugar, tea and camphor. Nowadays, dried persimmons, flat noodle, pears, citrus and tangerines are famous products of Xinpu.

Besides that, Xinpu has many historical spots are worth to visit such as Xinpu Heroes Temple (褒忠亭义民庙), Liu’s family ancestral hall(刘家祠), Catholic Church(天主教堂) and many others.

From my point of view, Xinpu is a small and traditional township~ Here don’t have shopping centers and high buildings~ same as other small townships~ Xinpu facing the problem of aging population, most of the young people are moving to city for their career and education~ when you walk around at the township, you will see most of the pedestrian are old people.

Although Xinpu not lively as city but it has its own special attraction that I had mentioned at the first paragraph. Many tourists will travel to this little and traditional township because of the foods and historical spots. That’s why you will see a different picture between weekdays and weekends or holiday~ A lonely street during weekdays and a lively street during weekends and holidays~

Residents of Xinpu are hardworking and healthy, they wake up early to work and sleep early too~ I almost remain the same lifestyle when I staying here~ wake up and sleep early~ Hehe~ I’m very healthy for the moment~

Overall, Xinpu is a special township for me because I had stay here for almost 4 weeks~ will back to Malaysia after 2 weeks~ Not a long period but is enough for me to fill in a part of my memories~ No matter it is sweet or bitter~ ^.^  

 

 

 

Interesting day~

Date: 7/12/2010

Location: Jiuqiong Lake

Today was a interesting day in Jiuqiong Lake~ There was two different groups came to visit Jiuqiong Lake~

Group 1: Jhongsan Elementary school

Group 2: Tourists from Guatemala

They came in different period, so I joined them to take some pictures for my writing ^.^

Student group

This is their school trip and totally has 3 buses~ ~ They came here to see something they can't see in the class room like real insects and plants~ The most important thing is have FUN~  

Because of some reasons~ I just took some pictures when they are doing DIY and lunch~

Let’s have a look how cute they are~~~ ^.^

Some of the students

Their uniform so colorful~

DIY started~ Ingredients are soil, plant, flowerpot, and fertilize~

Their teacher teach them the steps~

They are so concentrate when planting~

Finished planting~ Is time for lunch~

Finding their place~

Getting foods~ the lunch is fried mee, fried bantiao and gongwan soup~ They brought their own tableware   (a good action that should learn by all of us)

After lunch, they have fun at the garden of Golden valley farm~

feeding fishes~

They are so cute!!! I want to back to my childhood days!!! No worries and innocent~ ^.^

Guatemala group

They came here sure for travel lah~ so I don’t explain so much jor~ When they came, I got it that almost all of them don’t know how to speak English~ Luckily they had translator to help them translate~

They had lunch at Liu’s stewed chicken restaurant when just arrived here~ They are surprising me because most of them know how to use chopstick although not so expert but good enough~ This is their 1^st time had Hakka cuisine, according to some of them, they like it!!! :O

After had lunch, next station is Pi Tang Wo and Golden valley farm, Pi Tang Wo is the eco-park that I had mention at my previous article~ so I won’t repeat again~ :D

They look very interested because there has many plants that can’t grow at their country~

Mr Huang explain the park in Mandarin ~

The translator translated to Spanish ~

They walked around~

Explanation about Golden valley farm~

The famous fruits of Xinpu~ 

Last station~ Chen’s Farm, they DIY Hakka ground tea (擂茶) and mashu(麻薯)~

I’m interested too because this is my 1^st time DIY Hakka ground tea and mashu~ The Hakka ground tea is different with Malaysia Hakka ground tea~ I will give further explaination when I free~ Haha~ Now move on to see the happy and excited expression of Guatemala tourist when they are doing Hakka ground tea and mashu~

Ingredients~ i'm not sure all of its, so din't mention at here~

Showed the steps to them~

They try by themselves~

These guys work hard XP

Doing Mashu~

Ready to serve~

prepared the Hakka ground tea~

Hakka ground tea~ taste nice~

Mashu~ Nice too~

She can speak English~ 

Take a picture before leave~

Gracias~ Thank you~谢谢~

This is Spanish i had learned today^.^