Food drive update

ELL parent center food drive was a success. Thank you for all the families who donate canned food for Niles Township food pantry. When we loaded up the food to the car, we were really happy about what we accomplished.
Here are pictures for our food drive.

Banner on ELL parent center

  

  Devonshire school collection box

 

Old Orchard Junior High

ELL parent center, all the canned food we collected.

If you couldn’t make your donation this time, you can always donate food or money to any local food pantry or organization like feeding America. It is never too late to help others in need.

My Mother's Day

Mother’s Day is a good time to honor all the mothers’ hard work for her family and children. In China, children are educated to respect their parents and older people.

On Mother’s Day, I called my mom to say Happy Mother’s Day to her. After I moved to the USA, I missed my family even more for every holiday. Therefore, I always call my family whenever I'm available. 

I still remembered when I was in Hong Kong on Mother’s Day, my siblings and I were always spent the whole day with my mom. Early in the morning, we would go the restaurant having Dim Sum together. Then we would go shopping and after lunch would play Mahjong because my mom loves to play. In the evening we'd go out for a nice dinner with my mom. Of course we would give her a gift, too. Although my siblings in HK are still doing the same thing to my mom, I can’t join them.

This year I celebrated Mother’s Day with my husband and kids. We had a nice dinner in a Japanese restaurant. The Japanese food was delicious. I ordered a Beef Teriyaki and Salmon dinner set that came with Miso Shiru (soybean paste soup), salad, shrimp and vegetable tempura and a bowl of rice.

My husband ordered a sashimi (raw fish eat with soy sauce mixed with wasabi) dinner box with soup, salad, shrimp tempura, shrimp cocktail and a bowl of rice.

And my kids ordered Chicken Teriyaki and Beef Teriyaki.

We all enjoyed all the food and had a good time together. I hope everyone had a Happy Mother’s Day.

Food Drive

When I looked at CHILD HUNGER ENDS HERE's web site, I learned that there is over 16 million of Americans still facing hunger. I just can't believe it and I am really shock by those facts too. They said nearly 1 of 4 children is hungry everyday.

I never think about that in 21st century in America people still struggle with hunger.

I didn't experience hunger before. But I remember in my childhood, every time when I couldn't finish my food, my grandma always told us her story. Long time ago in China, they had been gone through a very difficult time because of food shortage. People didn't have any food to eat. My grandma had to look for tree root and tree bark to eat. Can you imagine how they taste like? They must really tough to eat. So if we couldn't finish the food, we always save for next day.

Even now, when my kids waste food, I will tell them their great grandma's story and also out there a lot of kids don't have food to eat. So they cherish what they have.

In our Niles township community, there are families struggling with hunger. Because of the hunger issue, our group of moms in this blog are going to organize a food drive for Nile Township pantry.

The FOOD DRIVE will take place on May 10 to May 15. We will have collection bin in ELL PARENT CENTER in Skokie. Please spread out our food drive event to anyone you know. Tell them to stop by and drop off some canned food to help our community fight child hunger.

Come visit our blog often, we will have more update about our food drive.

Chinese Food

Living in America it is hard to have delicious Chinese food in restaurant or at home. That always makes me miss the delicious food in Hong Kong.

In Hong Kong, you can always taste different kinds of Chinese food.

The foods from north side of China, the tastes are with heavy seasoning. And also most of time they will eat dumplings (Jiao Zi) and noodle. They love spicy too.

Beijing Roast Duck is a unique dish. They peeled up the skin with thin slices meat. When you eat, you need to use a thin tortillas rolled up with duck slices, hoisin sauce, spring onions and cucumbers. Yum…

For the foods from south side of China (Guan Dong), people eat simple and light tasty dishes. I liked to have Dim Sum with my family or friends in Sunday morning in Hong Kong. We drank tea and ate Dim Sum. There are so many choices, like shrimp dumplings, pork dumpling, egg tart, steam bun stuff with roast pork, rice roll with shrimp, roast pork or beef, bake seafood tart….

Steam rice top with salty duck
Rice noodle with fish balls and seaweed. There are millions of street foods in Hong Kong. My favorite one is egg puffs. That reminds me when I was little; I always eat this for snack. And also the seafood in Hong Kong are very fresh and yummy too.

There are so many delicious Hong Kong Chinese foods, can’t type anymore because that makes me really hungry. I have to get some yummy food to eat.

Wonderful Spring Break

It was really nice to have a break and spent some good time with family.

This spring break, my family and I went on an eight days road trip from Chicago to South Carolina.

On our trip, we drove through eight states which started from Illinois and continue on through Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Ohio and Indiana.

Our first stop was Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky. We joined a two-hour tour to discover the cave. The tour name is New Entrance Tour. So we entered the cave by the New Entrance which is on top of the cave. When we went in, we couldn't see anything. It was very dark inside. My favorite part of this tour is the Frozen Niagara. See picture below.

Second stop was Smokey Mountain. Because of the rain, when drove up to the highest point of the Smokey Mountain, we couldn't enjoy the beautiful view of the mountain. All we saw was fog around us. And we saw snow too.

Our next stop was Myrtle Beach. Too bad it was not a good time. It was cloudy, windy and cold. So we couldn't enjoy the water.

The next day the weather was beautiful. We went to Charleston, South Carolina. We took a ferry boat ride to Fort Sumter where the Civil war began. After the tour we drove around Charleston’s old town. We saw rainbow row there the houses line up in rainbow color. Then we visited The Market on Market Street. There were a lot people selling all kinds of stuff like clothes, scarves, jewels, paintings, rock paintings…. But the special one is some African American women using dry straws making baskets, bowl, vase and flowers in the market. The products are really beautiful. They all are hand made in front of people.

The following day we went to Atlanta in Georgia. We visited World of Coca Cola. There we learned Coca Cola’s history and all the products that Coca Cola make around the world. We watched 4D movie which is Search for Secret Ingredient. It was a fun movie. After that we got to taste all the drinks that they make all around the world. Some of them taste very good, but some of them I don't like. One of my favorite is from Asia which is Watermelon flavor.

Nicknames in Chinese

In Chinese, we call nicknames 綽號 (Chuo Hao). In my family my mom’s nick name is YUE (月) means moon. And my brother is JIAN (堅) which means strong. And one of my aunts is call LIU (六) which means six that is because she is the 6th sibling in the family. My other aunt is call FEI(肥) because she was chubby when she was born.

People give other people nicknames based on how they look or what they like, such as chubby baby is XIAO PANG ZI (小胖子), beautiful little girl is XIAO MEI REN (小美人), baby is BAO BAO (寶寶), tall guy GAO LAO (高佬).

When I was still in high school, one of my best friends liked to eat fish roll very much. At that time in a cartoon show, there was a lion dog (SHI ZI GOU) who like that fish roll, too. So we called my friend Shi Zi Gou (獅子狗). She wouldn't mind. Even now we still call her that funny name.

How about you? Do you have any funny nickname to share?

US citizenship

Becoming a US citizen is every immigrant's dream. There is no exception to me too.

I still remembered that day I went to the Oath ceremony. There were more than hundred immigrants who passed the interview and came to the Oath ceremony.

Everyone was very happy and excited because after the ceremony, we would all be US citizens. Some of them even brought the whole family to witness that important moment. But I was by myself because my husband was at home taking care of our kids.

After the Oath ceremony, I got my US citizenship naturalization certification. And I registered to vote. This is one of the US citizen's rights. Now I have right to vote for the senators and also the US president too. That makes me feel I'm really a part of America.

A brand new life!

Today is Chinese New Year that reminded me about thirteen years ago. I was celebrating Chinese New Year with my family and friends back in Hong Kong. But today I celebrated with my own family in America. Things are totally different. I still remember that day,I left Hong Kong. All my family and friends came to airport to say goodbye to me and my husband. At that moment, I was sad, nervous, excited and happy.

I felt sad because I had to leave my family, friends and the place I grew up. I felt nervous because I was going to live in a country that speaks different language and has a different lifestyle. But I was happy and excited because I was going to start a brand new life and live with a man who loves me so much.

By the time the airplane landed in Chicago, I knew I was going to face a lot of challenges and have a new adventure. Just couple weeks later, I felt homesick. I was really missing my family and friends in Hong Kong. I missed the delicious Chinese food even though we had dinner in Chinatown every week. But the taste is still not the same.

When my husband went to work, I got lonesome at home. I didn't have any kids at that time. Therefore, the telephone let me reconnect with my family and friends again. TV was good entertainment for me and also helped me listen and understand more English.

I went Chinatown's grocery stores to make Chinese food recipes that make satified my taste-buds.

In order to comprehened to the new life faster in America, first I have to improve my English skills in talking and listening. So I went to ESL class. In the class I was not only learning English, I also made friends from other countries too. Second, I have to get used to the freezing cold and snowy weather in Chicago. Hong Kong's weather is warm in winter and is hot and humid in summer.

In retrospect, I'm lucky to have my husband to encourage, support and take care of me. I'm proud of myself been gone through those difficult times. Now I have a happy family with two lovely boys. I really enjoy my peaceful life in America.

About Us

Guloona
I am a Pakistani immigrant and I came to America in 1995.
I have three kids, and am a housewife.
I hope I will learn something that beneficial for me and my family's life. (inshallah)


Baran
My name is Baran. I am from Pakistan. I am a mother of 4. I have been living in Skokie, Illinois for past ten years.

Osmanthus
I'm a stay home mom from Hong Kong. I've been in U.S.A. for more than ten years. I have two boys. Other than take care of my family, I like to do cross stitch in my spare time.

Elena
My name is Elena. I am from Russia, from Saint-Petersburg. I am living in USA for 3 months. I am living in Skokie. I am not working now. Now I am studying English. I have 3 kids: my youngest daughters are 12 and 6. They are studying in the school in Skokie. My oldest daughter is 20. She is studying in St.-Petersburg in university.

Vinou
I am a Haitian women I have been in america for 5 years. I have a daugther . Before l lived at Philadelphia now I am in Chicago for 1 year.