School fairs and church potlucks

Rammstein and raffle tickets - TES Christmas fair

On Saturday, the Taipei European School (http://www.taipeieuropeanschool.com) held a Christmas School Fair. Not having any kiddywinklets myself, my friends (justifiably proud parental units of some gorgeous specimens) took me along so that I too could watch six year old girls plie in purple/pink leotards in front of doting parents and use all my willpower against the lure of the candycotton stall.

Immediately obvious was the stellar job the school did in setting up a courtyard with lots of lunch options, categorised by the cuisines' countries of origin. The german sausage stall was particularly popular, although I was partial to the chicken satay skewers further along. A mass of tables contained a throng of ravenous families who had coughed up the 10 TWD entrance charge and made it past the raffle gauntlet.



The centre of attention was the stage set up to house a variety of acts, from diva mothers bringing home "All I Want For Christmas", to the school choir:



To a teenage band covering Rammstein songs (just what every school fair needs, compulsory viewing and popular with a number of young fans going by the applause):



Set up around the school were various craft DIY stalls (painting, peading, Christmas decorations), physical games using blow-up bouncy structures and the usual array of balls and goals, a room of Christmas decorations for sale, and of course several rows of stalls selling everything from Christmas hampers to stuffed toys:



I managed to snaffle a rather cute sparkly red and white pendant for 150 TWD and felt satisfied that I would not be leaving empty handed. I was really thrilled though to see that the school had set up a giving tree with Christmas presents for less fortunate families - reminded me that my high school back in NZ used to do the same thing.

While on the subject of Christmas trees, the next day a very generous fellow kiwi brought over her Christmas tree for me to use as she will be home for the holidays.



You may be faintly able to make out that some of the decorations are famous New Zealand symbols, such as a kiwi and a tiki. My younger sister a few weeks back sent me a pohutakawa decoration. Pohutakawa is the New Zealand Christmas tree. By astonishing concidence it was made by the same designer as these other decorations. A little bit of kiwi Christmas to be had in Taipei!

The church potluck that never was

A major barrier to finding a church in Taipei can be language if you're not a mandarin speaker. Fortunately, there are several churches in my area with english services that I found with the help of http://across.co.nz/TawainChurch.html. Unfortunately, my particular denomination does not have a congregation in my part of the city, but recently I have begun attending a Presbyterian church where I really feel the warm welcoming attitude of the members.

This Sunday was the planned day for a Thanksgiving potluck meal. If you're not familiar with the idea of a potluck, essentially everyone brings a dish to share with everyone else. Some people might bring a dish they're particularly good at making, others might bring something that is convenient for them to source, and so forth. As no-one likes to appear stingy, this generally results in a ridiculous oversupply of food!

Being a baking fiend myself, I was pretty excited to discover from a friend of a friend on Saturday that right across the road from the Taipei European School is a little store selling various baking necessities. As well as replacing some cake decorating items that I misplaced during my move, I also managed to acquire some chocolate-making moulds. With these little beauties, making chocolates is very easy and you can have some fun with colourings if you're using white chocolate. A bit of effort on Saturday afternoon, and I made these chocolate and boysenberry beasties:



I know, not my prettiest efforts, but it was all about having fun with the chocolate moulds.

The sad footnote to this fun weekend was the development of a stonking great headcold (I'm still crossing fingers that its downward path to the lungs changes plans) and so these never made it to the potluck. Such is life!