Day 6 - 358 -- Everywhere Translations

Christmas Day brought cooking a vegetable dish for Christmas dinner at a friend's home. This dish deconstructs Brussels sprouts, removing the individual leaves and sauteing the quartered cores with shallots and garlic; the leaves are added and steamed after the first mixture begins to carmelize. <yum>. The walk to dinner was not overly cold, but the wind was biting for the couple of blocks headed into the westerly breeze.

Dinner was a multicultural and multilingual event -- mainly Spanish and Chinese with some English and a smattering of Portuguese. The almost 3-year old speaks the first two with a bit of English thrown in. His English 'thank you' is impeccable <smile>. Translations between the three languages became interesting and I had a friend turn to me, say something in Chinese and then say, "right?"  Others laughed whenever that happened, too (my Cantonese is limited to thank you, I'm afraid). It was a lively evening, to say the least <smile>. Our usual hosts were away for the holiday, so we gathered at the home of another one of the usual crowd this year.

Gathering together with friends and family can bring positive emotions. Yet, not everyone can be together at this time, so there may be a bit of wistfulness added to the mix. A few lines from a song ran through my head today about gathering together and working towards harmony. Enjoy!

Christmas is my Time of Year -- The Monkees