Ever since I started to learn Swedish, I have been fascinated by everything about Sweden. I have already celebrated Christmas like the Germans. When I was younger I often received an Adventskalender from a German friend at the end of November, which is a box with 24 little windows one for each day from Dec 1st to Dec 24th. There were usually small pieces of candy or chocolate hidden behind each window. It was fun to get a little gift while waiting for Christmas to arrive, and it used to be the first thing I did when I got up. ;-) Swedes borrowed a lot of tradition from the Germans as well, for instance, they also have Advent, for which they will light a candle every Sunday, and people will also hang an Advent star symbolizing the Star of Bethlehem as decoration.

On Dec 13th, a special Swedish tradition called St. Lucia  takes place where an elected Lucia wears a crown of candles (of course nowadays it is powered by batteries, especially when it’s supposed to be worn by small kids), and dressed in a white gown with red girdle comes with her handmaidens and star boys, singing the Lucia Song. St Lucia brings light to the darkness of the world. I fell in love with it when I first saw the Gothic version of St. Lucia in Absolut Vodka’s Nordic legend advertisement series.

Since the Middle Ages Swedish people have been known to drink glögg during Advent, a spiced mulled wine. The word “glögg”comes from an older verb “glödga” which is not commonly used in Sweden anymore and it means “heated up”. The drink is usually served warm, and comes in different flavors, but the most common one is made of red wine and different spices, and this helps fighting the cold in chilly winter. Almonds and raisins also go with the wine, as well as ginger thins (a thin gingerbread-like crackers). “Glögg” also has a non-alcoholic version which is made from the juice from dark berries instead of red wine. In the winter time it’s easy to get “Glögg” in the local market or a grocery store in Sweden. In China, of course the best place to find it is Ikea. You can warm the bottle in a pot of hot water, then serve the warm contents. Or, you can also try to make it from scratch. ;-)

 

The fall is finally here and pomegranates are freshly available in the fruit stores. In China, we’re taught to suck the juices out of the seeds then spit the stones out. The same with watermelon, and sunflower seeds with shells, the common Chinese snack, and grapes. I just think it’s so gross to spit all the time that is why I always hated eating fish when I was young, because you are supposed to figure out all the tiny little needle-like bones hidden in the fish with your tongue and spit them out. I often ended up swallowing the bones and they gave me an awful hard time by sticking to my throat. >.<

Nowadays we know that seeds contain valuable nutrition, and they’re antioxidants so we should actually eat them. The only thing is that you need to chew them more, and you might not be able to break them all down. This is where the blender comes to your rescue. When I blend the pomegranate, I find it less dreadful to eat, haha. By the way, I also found those fresh dates, they’re not as sweet as medjool, but they’re equally fresh and tasty. I either eat them raw or blend them into smoothies, both are palate pleasing to me. :D

Recently I went for my final weigh in for the WHS Fitness Challenge. Much to my surprise, my BFI had remained exactly the same. I was greatly disappointed, but I knew why. Firstly, despite the fact that I had tried my best to make it to my three selected fitness classes every week, I did fail to attend some of them for various reasons. Secondly, I stopped my Pilates routine because I thought I did enough. Obviously it was not enough, otherwise, my BFI would have been cut down to my ideal.

Being a vegan, I am definitely not overweight, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have any extra fat. I do have some around my belly, waist and legs which is perhaps common to many modern city dwellers. Though, to shed the extra fat, the normal routine I do is not enough. My friend had introduced P90X to me previously but just watching the introduction I didn’t think I would survive the intense workout routine considering I am not a person that is very active. >.<

Although it is clear that I will not win any awards this year I still need to do something in order to reach my goal of reducing my BFI and getting the body shape I desire. So, what I do is to make a healthy smoothie for myself, get back to my Pilates routine and add Shaun T’s Hip Hop Abs. ;-) I will let you know how it goes. If you’re doing the same thing, don’t give up yet, just treat yourself a healthy nutritious shake and get back to the battle!

 

I was so delighted to meet my friend QW again. We got to know each other through my Chinese blog. We are of a similar age, and are both open-minded to new cultures and experiences, so we became very good friends almost immediately. When I first met her she was quite depressed because she wanted to go back to Norway but her visa was not approved. She worked in Norway for a year and was fond of the country and she dearly missed her friends there. I was sad for her, but there was nothing we could do. Eventually I encouraged her to move to a big city where she would be happier than living in the small city in the north-west China, where her parents are. She did eventually move and was happy to start a new life.

She was in my area to attend a meeting, so we managed to meet for a brief time in Shanghai, before she flew home. She’s a lovely lady, and we happily chatted about what’s been going on in our lives lately. Knowing that I am a great fan of northern Europe, she brought me a pack of Ragsticks which are a type of flat, dried crackers. We talked about the beautiful cool European summers.

Because there are so many fresh berries this season I am going to make this smoothie featuring fresh organic blueberries. It makes a perfect breakfast along with the Ragsticks and lingonberry jam. The additional açaí berry powder makes it an extraordinarily powerful anti-oxidant drink, which helps keeps you looking and feeling younger. ;) This is my way of celebrating the northern European cool summer while in hot humid Shanghai. :P

I also made some blueberry and grape popsicles. It’s very easy, just drop 4 blueberries into the popsicle molds, fill them with red grape juice and freeze over night. Great to enjoy on a steaming summer day!

 

I used to really hate sports, and thought if I ate the correct foods I should be fine. That is OK when you are younger, but as I get older I certainly find eating the right foods is not enough. You will never be obese being a healthy-eating vegan, but your body might not be in the shape that you desire. I enjoy dance (though I can’t really dance…unfortunately), I always admire the tight muscles those dancers have. That led me to Pilates, which is widely known and practised in the dancers’ circle.

Unfortunately, in China where yoga is more popular pilates still remains one of the luxurious sports and so far it is not yet available to the general public. So I decided to buy a Winsor Pilates workout video and start doing it at home. It works well, the only problem is that I sometimes come up with lame excuses not to do it, however, I did set a goal for myself to achieve this year, that is to gain more weight and reduce my BFI (Body Fat Index) by transforming the fat around my belly into tight muscles. I also joined the World Health Store fitness challenge this year, which offers various fun classes for challengers to sample.

Zumba was one of the classes that I tried. It’s a type of cardiovascular exercise combining fun Latin music and various kinds of Latin dance moves. Our coaches Siri and James were really good, always smiling and cheering us up, keeping us sweating through the class. Sometimes, when we failed to follow certain moves we laughed out loud. I think James appeared particularly funny, he was such a muscular guy having to do all those sexy feminine moves in front of all us ladies. :P

Normally during those type of sweating exercises it’s necessary to replenish yourself with water regularly. So I made this delicious, high-quality sport drink. I don’t care for the commercial sport drink, as it’s just artificially flavored sugary water with synthetic vitamins added. My sport drink is easy to make at home, even though it costs more, the benefits are great and you know what you are putting inside both the drink and you!. Try it, you totally deserve this while working that hard. :-)

I highly recommend this wooden lime presser from Myanmar, it works like magic! I happily juiced all those limes from Yunnan (that’s why they became yellow because there is no express delivery in the town where my limes are from >.<).

It even produced those cute little lime “caps”! Even though they’re just waste, you can still place those in your fridge as deodorant. ;)

 

Before I knew of German yogurt, I thought all yogurt was liquid, a bit thicker than normal milk, the kind that is commonly seen in Chinese supermarkets. Later when I learnt that good yogurt is rich and thick and is supposed to be consumed with a spoon, I found the normal commercial yogurt no longer appealing to me. Not to mention, I don’t know what they put in the commercial products. @_@ So I decided to make my own yogurt.

Homemade yogurt is so good, as it’s fresh and clean and has absolutely no coloring or thickeners added. It’s also very easy, the best way to make it would be to plug the machine before you go to bed, then in the morning you will have fresh yogurt to start! Since I began making it, some of my friends also wanted to follow my example, so I have been busy buying yogurt machines for them from Taobao for a while, haha. Another friend has told me that a heater or thermos can also be utilized to make yogurt, but for hygienic reason, I don’t bother using those, as yogurt machine is not that expensive, I don’t want to spend more time troubleshooting when I have been successfully making yogurt with the machine. :P

Smoothies have always been among my favorite breakfasts. They are full of energy and nutrition that come from fruit, fruit juices and non-dairy yogurt or milk, not to mention they are easy to digest. Some people say they never feel hungry in the morning, however this is not the case with me. I need a hearty breakfast to start the day, probably because I don’t eat too much for dinner. Of course, smoothies can also be enjoyed after a hard workout, or you can drink a thick one for dinner if you eat a lot for your lunch and have snacked throughout the afternoon. ;)