Ear piercing and children’s autonomy

I was two years old when I got my ears pierced. My mom took me to the doctor’s office, where they pierced my ears, and my mom took care of my ear piercings until they fully healed. There are many photos of me when I was 2 where you can see little shiny gold dots that are on each of my ears as proof of my piercing. At some point, my mom switched my earrings to small 24K gold hoops, which stayed in until I was about 3rd grade. This was when I started getting curious about other types of earrings and wore other ones (and immediately got infected because of the cheap metal on those earrings).

I looked back on my mom’s decision and actually liked it; I have zero memory of feeling any pain at the piercing or dealing with the healing of the piercings. My mom completely took care of it and remembers it. So I thought that eventually one day, I’d do that for Kaia and get her ears pierced at a similar age so she wouldn’t have to remember the pain of the piercing, or deal with the healing and treatment of the piercings after; this seemed so logical to me, as I’d be sparing her of the memory of the pain. The problem with this approach, as many people say today, is that this removes the child’s decision making from consideration; maybe she doesn’t want her ears pierced? If she doesn’t, then why are you as her parent putting her through the pain of going through this? Extremists compare ear piercing before an age of consent to things like genital mutilation or child marriage. I’ve always thought those comparisons were insane and senseless, as ear piercing is hardly in the category of either of those atrocities.

But now that Kaia is 2, I’ve had second thoughts about this. I don’t know if I want to do this to her and watch her go through the pain, even if it is brief, not knowing for sure whether she even wants it. Sure, I’d love for her to get her ears pierced and (like me) have no recollection of the pain or the healing of the piercings. I would love to buy her earrings to wear when she gets older and even go earring shopping together. But now, I think I’d be more comfortable doing it when she’s actually says she wants to have it done, and ultimately consents. And caring for the healing — this could just be part of her process of growing up and “taking care” of something of hers herself, with my supervision. And that’s not such a bad thing now, is it?

Every family has their decisions to make, whether it’s on big things like vaccinations, circumcision, and the smaller things, like ear piercing. I totally respect their choices (okay, minus the vaccination piece; if you aren’t getting your child vaccinated on a typical AAP schedule if you’re in the US, you’re just being selfish and sick), and to each their own. But I think I’ll wait until Kaia says she wants her ears pierced before we proceed with it. I’m happy that my mom got my ears pierced before I could remember. It’s like a bit of blissful ignorance in my childhood for me, especially since as a teen and an adult, I’ve loved having pierced ears, as earrings are my favorite type of jewelry. But I don’t want to look back one day and have Kaia begrudgingly remind me that I pierced her ears “without her consent” and that she’s traumatized that I subjected this to her before she could agree to it.

Mandarin Chinese private immersion school right in our neighborhood

This morning, we attended a private school program orientation for 2s through 8th grade in our neighborhood. The biggest selling point of this school is that it’s a full immersion program for either Mandarin Chinese or Spanish. I had passed it multiple times during weekend walks in the neighborhood, attempting to get Kaia to fall asleep in her stroller, and so today they hosted an open house. It really was a real school “open house” in the sense that not only did the principal and multiple staff members present and participate, but they even had guest parents (who participate in the parent association) and guest students speak about why their program was so special. And yes, they even had refreshments. The orientation in the gym was about an hour long, and after it concluded, we were whisked onto a 30-minute school tour, one for Spanish immersion, and one for Mandarin immersion. 

It was hard not to be impressed with the school after all the other daycare/school tours we have done, but it felt unfair to compare given the others I had attended were fully just daycares or public schools. The presentations were very comprehensive and well put together. The biggest differentiator with this immersion program is that up to age 3, the kids are 100 percent immersed in Mandarin/Spanish; from ages 3-5, they have instruction in Mandarin/Spanish 90 percent of the time, and it starts going down to 80 percent and then 70 percent in subsequent years as they get into higher elementary/middle school years. No pinyin is taught until second grade for Mandarin, since pinyin is obviously not used for native speakers – I was pretty (pleasantly) surprised to learn this during the tour. It’s mainly introduced to allow the students to use Chromebooks to type Chinese (using pinyin to indicate which characters you want to use). Both Chinese/English are on the walls, so it’s not just spoken that’s constantly reinforced like in the immersion school we saw in Chinatown, but it’s also the written that is emphasized everywhere. From a language enrichment/immersion standpoint, I’d never heard of any program that quite “immersed” children into the “target language” like this. And well, as they said during their presentation, theirs was the only program in the city (if not the country) that approaches language learning in this way. 

And, as you would imagine, the tuition is NOT cheap. The annual tuition is only for the school year, so from September through June. For summer programs, this, of course, would be extra (and would only go until 3pm; if you want “after care,” you will also need to pay for that… because you have to pay… for everything). Well, if you want nice things… 

Chinese public immersion preschools in Manhattan

This morning, we did a couple tours of 3-4K schools in the Manhattan Chinatown area, one of which is a Mandarin Chinese immersion program that is also part of the Universal Pre-K program in New York City. The class is taught in English and in Mandarin, with emphasis on verbal Chinese communication (listening and speaking). In the afterschool component of the program if you opt in, the teachers support and teach children how to write in beginner-level Mandarin Chinese. I loved looking at the walls and seeing all the activities and art projects these young kids did in Chinese. Given the season, they made Valentines for their mothers and fathers in Chinese, did some painting and paper craft projects to depict spring (春 chun) in Chinese, and also decorated dragons for the Lunar New Year / Year of the Dragon. From the book shelf, it also looks like they get story time in both English and Chinese, as well, and sing Chinese nursery rhymes and songs. I will say that I was a little surprised there was far more English than Chinese on the walls, but it sounds like given this is all public/DOE run, they had to comply by those standards.

In an ideal world, Kaia would be fully bilingual; hell, I would be fully bilingual, too. Looking back, I always wish that I was put in an immersion program like this one where I was exposed to both culture and language from a young age. I got plenty of exposure to culture given I grew up with my grandma and followed all her traditions, plus our schools were very progressive and proactively taught us about Lunar New Year, along with other cultural traditions of other countries. I was exposed to Toisan and Cantonese through my grandma and my relatives, but I didn’t learn Mandarin until I was in college, and that learning was fully my choice. In some ways, it does make me a bit sad that Kaia will be very unlikely to know or understand any Cantonese or Toisan at all; those are actually my father tongue languages, not Mandarin. Though language does evolve, understanding a language is not just simply understanding a language: knowing a second language also exposes you to cultural nuances that you cannot simply know just by exposure to cultural traditions. Chinese is notorious (and famous) for its endless idioms and word plays, and understanding them brings you closer to understanding the culture itself better.

The 3K applications are due on March 1. Who knows if Kaia will place anywhere at all, much less a Mandarin immersion program. But I do know that the ideal situation would be if she had consistent Chinese language exposure outside of my barely-basic Mandarin skills.

Taro sago dessert soup – a good gateway dessert for littles

For our Lunar New Year lunch on Saturday, I originally wanted to go *all* out and do two desserts: one would be the simple taro sago dessert soup (芋香椰汁西米露/Yù xiāng yē zhī xī mǐ lù), which would be easy to make; the second would be the more challenging tang yuan, or black sesame glutinous rice balls in brown sugar-ginger soup. After having several of my dough balls get completely crumply and destroyed a few nights ago (I hadn’t made this in ages, so I was out of practice with how to properly roll the glutinous rice flour dough), I decided to forgo the tang yuan finicky mess and go with the taro sago dessert soup, which even a young child could make.

Taro sago dessert soup was one of my favorite Chinese desserts growing up. When we used to have big family meals with my cousins, aunt, uncle, and grandma, the banquet-style table would always be filled with endless and sumptuous seafood, meat, and vegetable dishes. Looking back, I realize that I took it all for granted, as we never have meals with this much variety now at all. At the end of the huge meal, there was usually a complimentary dessert soup, usually in the form of red bean. While I did enjoy sweet red bean soup growing up, it was not my favorite. I was always pleasantly surprised when the massive bowl of dessert soup would come out, and the waiter would ladle out steaming hot bowls of taro sago soup. It was always this pale purple color with small chunks of taro and tiny translucent tapioca balls bobbing up and down. The soup had a hint of coconut milk flavor and just enough sweetness to let you know this was certainly dessert. I never realized then how easy it was to make this soup at home with just a handful of ingredients.

So I made it for Saturday, and it was very well received; several guests had a second helping. Yet we still have quite a bit left over since the recipe made a very, very large batch. So while eating it tonight, I offered Kaia some. She initially rejected it, but gradually grew envious the more she saw me spoon it into my mouth. So she came closer and asked to “try some.” I gave her a small spoonful; she ate some and made a face, ran away, then tentatively came back to me to ask for “more?” She proceeded to have about a quarter of my small bowl of taro sago soup and clearly loved it, constantly repeating “taro yummy, taro yummy.”

I thought more about (East) Asian desserts, and I also thought about Chris (and many people who think like him) and criticize them, saying that East Asian countries like China and Japan don’t know how to do dessert well, and “that’s why they put shit like red bean” in their desserts. But I actually think this thought is flawed. East Asians thought about putting legumes, seeds, and roots like red bean, black sesame, and taro in desserts; from a health perspective, this should be embraced, because you’re not only having a sweet and indulgent treat, but combining it with something that will nourish your body. Who is to say that something like sesame or beans should be used in only savory applications? Why put arbitrary limits on different types of raw ingredients? With these raw ingredients, East Asians pair them with just enough sweetness so that your teeth don’t ache after, but your belly still gets a sweet hit. And that’s actually a great way to introduce sweets to young children like Kaia, especially as we want to limit their sugar intake but still not feel like they’re being left out of sweet treats. Kaia can be indulged with a dessert with a small amount of sugar, yet still have something healthful that her parents can feel good about. And that all sounds good to me.

Lunar New Year lunch at home: home-style banquet

When I decided to host a Lunar New Year lunch this year, it was the first time I’d done this in years, likely since 2018 or 2019, so pre-pandemic and pre-baby. We hadn’t hosted any meal here in ages, and I thought it would be fun to go all out and re-create a banquet experience of lots of different New Year’s foods for our small crowd of friends. With just 2.5 of us eating most of the time, it’s a bit overkill to make so many dishes for just a small number of people. It’s more fun when you have many, many mouths to feed. So these are my opportunities to really recreate that banquet dining experience. It took weeks of planning, three grocery shopping trips to Chinatowns, and over a week of food preparation, but it all turned out well from a taste perspective. This is what I served:

  1. West Lake beef soup – with minced beef and egg whites 
  2. Thit kho – Vietnamese caramelized braised pork ribs and eggs 
  3. Do chua – Vietnamese pickled julienned carrots and daikon 
  4. Steamed whole black sea bass with ginger and scallion
  5. Luo Han Jai / Buddha’s Delight: Stir-fried glass noodles with various vegetables, mushrooms, and tofu 
  6. Chinese sticky rice with Chinese sausage, cha siu, shiitake mushrooms, and dried scallops 
  7. Longevity noodles / yi mian, made with king oyster mushrooms, chives, and carrots 
  8. Blanched gai lan with oyster sauce 
  9. Dessert: hot taro sago dessert soup; pan fried slices of New Year’s cake (nian gao), homemade peanut sesame candy  

The thit kho and do chua were the two Vietnamese dishes I served and are meant to complement each other. The thit kho was a huge hit; everyone raved about how good it was. No one had eaten it before, which made sense: it’s usually a home-style dish that’s made by families during the Tet Lunar New Year. I’ve actually never seen it on any Vietnamese restaurant menu before. It’s amazing what magic happens when you pair the sweetness of young coconut water with the savories of pork ribs and a little fish sauce.

We had three kids in total: a near-6-year-old Ivy, an 18-month old Seneca, plus Kaia. I met my friend’s boyfriend for the first time. I handed out red Pepa Pig envelopes (hong bao) to the kiddos. Kaia got a new Chinese New Year book to add to her growing book collection. It was a fun afternoon of eating and conversation. But I would say that for me, the biggest highlight was when most people had left, and it was just us plus my friend, his wife, and their 18-month old. I was deboning the remaining fish, and both Kaia and Seneca wanted fish. So I took turns putting boneless fish in both of their mouths. Kaia got competitive and wanted more. Seneca tried to share with Kaia and hand her fish I had given Seneca; Kaia refused, saying, “No! No share!” The whole scene became like a bit of a fish-eating competition to see who could get and eat more fihs than the other. It was cute and sweet to see them not only enjoy my food, but act silly and toddler-like with each other. Kaia also proceeded to have an unprecedented amount of West Lake beef soup; her diaper was extremely, extremely wet after dinner that evening.

Chinese New Year flowers: the beautiful plum blossom

There are many flowers that are considered auspicious that welcome in the Lunar New Year, ranging from orchids to chrysanthemums to lilies and peach blossoms, but the one that I grew up with and know intimately because my grandma had a bush of them is the understated yet gorgeous plum blossom. Plum blossoms, or mei hua 梅花 in Chinese, are these huge, thin branches of small, dainty white or pale pink blooms. They initially appear unassuming, but once their little tiny buds bloom, they are like welcome sprays of warmth and happiness along seemingly bare and austere brown stems. If you are lucky enough to display them in your home, not only will they last quite some time (assuming you cut or buy them when the buds are tightly closed), but you’ll definitely need a large and sturdy vase to store them in, as the branches are quite long and big.

I grew up in a flat in the Richmond District of San Francisco, where we had a backyard that was once filled with gorgeous flowers and a handful of Chinese vegetables my grandma grew; this assortment included the gorgeous mei hua/plum blossoms, which grew in the top right corner of the yard. Although the Richmond is known for being in the colder and foggier part of the city, somehow, my grandma always made her garden bloom. But once she died, many things died with her, from the garden to all her amazing recipes and cooking. My dad attempted (and failed mostly) at growing a number of things, always blaming the weather as opposed to his own efforts/choices in flowers. I always wondered: if it was really so hard, then why did Grandma always succeed?

After my grandma died, my dad decided he didn’t want the plum blossom tree anymore. So he hacked it. I didn’t realize exactly how sad it was until years later, when I had vague memories of those plum blossoms and realized that they were never going to be anymore because my dad stupidly decided to kill it for zero reason. It’s not like he replaced it with some other beautiful tree or shrub. The yard continues to look like a haphazard waste land of weeds and random crap growing with no rhyme or reason. And recently while in Flushing, I asked a flower vendor how much a couple of branches of these plum blossoms would be. I was shocked: she told me she was charging $60 for a couple stems! If only my dad had realized how valuable these were, then maybe he wouldn’t have killed the bush.

Maybe at some point, I will buy some plum blossoms to display around Lunar New Year, in memory of my grandma. Whenever I see them, I am reminded of her and her green thumb. And I do quite love them even though I never have them. Plum blossoms are a sign of the beginning of spring, so it makes sense that they would be a part of Lunar New Year, or what in China is called the Spring Festival.

Peanut sesame candy

Around Chinese New Year every year, my grandma used to buy a big plastic tray of togetherness with all the traditional Chinese sweets and candies that would bring in an auspicious year. While I always thought most of them were chalky and sickly sweet, occasionally, I did enjoy the candied coconut meat strips, as well as the red-and-gold-foiled candies that had a homey sweet flavor. One thing that we also had around Chinese New Year was a store-bought peanut-sesame candy, similar to peanut brittle. I see it all the time being sold around Lunar New Year in Chinatown today: It was always cut into long, thin, flat rectangles and individually wrapped. This was one Lunar New Year sweet I remembered eating and loving. The nuttiness paired with the slight sweetness from the caramelized sugar base was really addictive. Sometimes, the candy was made of just sesame seeds, while other times, it had a combination of peanuts and sesame seeds. I’m sure it’s one reason I had so many cavities at my first dentist appointment.

I was doing some research for my upcoming Lunar New Year lunch when I went to the Woks of Life website, one of my go-to sites for authentic Chinese recipes, and the feature recipe was for this exact candy – peanut sesame candy! I was floored. People actually MAKE this regularly around Lunar New Year? It only takes THREE ingredients? I was sold!

But me being me, I tweaked the recipe a bit, and I ended up mashing three different ones into the one I ended up using yesterday. And… it was a bit of a disaster. The rock sugar took ages to melt fully. The recipe said it would take only five minutes. I was standing there, stirring the pan for at least 40 minutes. And by the time the rock candy fully did melt, it seemed like the sugar had burnt a little. When I finally poured the candy mixture onto my silicone mat to roll out, it was a huge, sticky mess. I barely had enough time to roll it flat and cut it before it started hardening. I was not happy with the result. While the toastiness of the sesame seeds and peanuts came through well, Chris admitted that the candy had a slightly burnt aftertaste. This was just take 1.

Maybe, just maybe I should use regular granulated sugar and forgo the traditional rock sugar. That was a huge blocker in getting this recipe correct, as I spent too much time trying to melt the “rocks.” I will try again in the next week and see if I can perfect it so that I can have a nice, sweet Lunar New Year bowl of sweets to share next Saturday.

Mummy and Pookster’s fun Sunday morning of cooking and eating

Yesterday morning, Chris had to go out for a dentist appointment, so Pookster and I would be home together. Sunday is usually my vegetable cooking day, so I made sure to get her involved in the cooking and prep. Plus, I had defrosted the shrimp stock I got through my local Buy-Nothing group, as well as kabocha squash I had roasted before we left for Australia, and I wanted to use that to make kabocha squash soup. Kaia was involved in the full process, as she watched me saute all the vegetables for the soup base and simmer the stock. She watched with intrigue as I poured the hot mixture into the blender to fully puree. And as I poured the pureed soup into my Instant Pot to reheat and simmer, while adding some frozen coconut milk cubes, she asked, “Want some? Want some?” So I gave her a spoonful of soup, which she happily grabbed and shoved into her mouth. She then took it out of her mouth and handed it to me and said, “Mummy have some soup?” But then, she took the spoon back, still with a little soup in it, and ate the rest. She handed the spoon back to me, asking “More?”

At that point, I decided that she could just eat lunch while standing on her little step stool at our kitchen counter. It would change up the context of eating, and she was already enjoying herself so much since I was involving her in the full cooking process. Pookster proceeded to have three decent-sized helpings of kabocha squash soup, a massive amount of freshly blanched and lightly seasoned yu choy (you cai) greens, as well as a handful of Cheerios, which she happened to see on the counter. She decided to use that as “croutons” to add to her soup. Interesting. As she ate the soup, she kept on saying “yummy soup, yummy soup.” And as she got closer to the end of her bowl twice, she asked for “more?” And once she was done with the soup and moved onto her greens, she always indicated she wanted me to cut the long strands of yu choy into smaller, bite sized pieces, and told me whether she wanted the stem part or the leaf part… or both. She finished her lunch with blueberries and strawberries.

While Kaia is obviously tiring at this two-year-old stage, with her demands and stubbornness, as well as her full out toddler tantrums that result in her body being splayed out all over the floor in a silent (or loud) rage, enjoying these moments with her always is a reminder to me how fleeting each stage is. It is so sweet to see her caring side, like when she wants to offer me a taste of something she thinks is delicious. I also love that she’s always curious about what’s going on at heights she cannot always see, whether it’s at the kitchen counter or above the stove. I do hope that she will love and embrace cooking, as well, and not just want to outsource it to someone else. Sometimes when I am cooking with her, I am reminded of all the delicious things my grandma used to make that no one can quite recreate anymore since she’s gone, and none of her recipes were ever documented. They are only a distant memory to those of us who were privileged enough to try her pro-level Cantonese cooking.

2-year doctor’s visit

I took Kaia to her 2-year doctor’s visit this afternoon. She always seems to know what’s happening. As soon as we entered the little office, she grew suspicious. As I was filling out some forms on her development and had the stroller facing away from me, she started silently crying. Another mom in the waiting room turned to me and said, “Is this your baby? She’s crying!”

I turned to look at her silently cry and then start moaning. She knew she was here to see the doctor, and she was NOT happy.

When we were cleared for an exam room, she got extremely fussy through the weight, length, and head circumference measurements, and then proceeded to repeat over and over, “wanna go home! Wanna go home!” She told me she wanted to get off the table, so I let her walk around the room barefoot, just in her diaper, as she gathered her clothes and futilely attempted to put them on. Then she said, “Help me! Help me!” I relented and let her put on her socks but nothing else so that the doctor could fully take a look at her. When the doctor finally came in, she tried to hide behind me and a chair so that the doctor couldn’t see her. But surprisingly, she cried the least during this visit in all her appointments in the last year. The only times she really melted down was when the doctor tried to open her mouth to see her teeth and throat, and of course, during the vaccine. And after her routine vaccination, she actually started waving bye to the medical assistants and the doctor. It was actually kind of cute.

The doctor had shared that at this stage, she’d actually be a little worried if Kaia were too welcoming and happy about being at the office. Kids her age are supposed to be suspicious of strangers, especially ones who poke and prod at them. And the fact that she gets the bad vibe as soon as we entered the office shows that she definitely remembers that the doctor’s office does NOT equal a fun place for her.

The good news is that Kaia’s head is still huge: she’s still in the 91st percentile for head circumference for her age; we do love her big head. She’s definitely getting taller, too, and is above average for height. But her weight gain dropped off, though they said it was normal for weight to slow down around 1.5-2 years, and it should pick back up again at her 2.5 year appointment. I should hope so; this child is ALWAYS eating! Where is the food even going…?!

“Ooh, this is good!”

Kaia’s toddler selectivity continues. Some days, she will accept new food as though it’s the most delicious thing she’s ever seen or touched. Other days, she will simply turn her face away and say “no!” and refuse to give a new food a second look. Yesterday, we picked up some donuts and danish from a new spot we checked out in Morningside Heights. One of the items was a very well made, flaky cheese danish. We rarely give Kaia sweets, but we do give her the occasional bite or two of a croissant or pastry when we’re out. So we decided to let her try this danish.

She was wandering around the apartment and I asked her if she wanted some pastry. Her face perked up, and she followed me into the kitchen so that she could take a look. When I presented the plate to her, she took one look, then gave it some side-eye, and said, “no!” and walked away. Yet as she walked away, I made exaggerated motions and took a big bite, making “mmmmm” and “yummy” sounds. She stopped walking away, then inched closer to me, and finally she took off a pea sized piece of the danish and gingerly put it in her mouth.

“Ooooh, this is good!” she exclaimed, with a huge grin creeping over her face. “Tasty!” She then proceeded to rip off big hunks of the danish until she’d had about 80 percent of the entire damn pastry. I barely got three bites in and had to save two bites for myself at the end, insisting “Kaia ate it all” and there was “no more! all done!” And since I insisted she sit down on the kitchen floor and eat it, when she got up to leave and I wiped her face and hands clean, there was a humongous pile of flaky danish crumbs all over where she sat. Yep – that’s my life now – constantly cleaning, dust-busting, and wiping up after my toddler.

My love has not subsided around watching her try and eat new things. Whether it was when she was a wee baby at six months old just starting solids for the first time, until now, when she’s probably had at least 500+ types of food to date, I still love watching her facial expressions and hearing her verbal assessments, whether it’s through her “mmmms” or her “this is yummy!’ statements. She doesn’t always like everything, but when she does, it’s really priceless. Sometimes, I wish I could just bottle up each of her new food experiences and stick them on the wall to revisit and watch… over and over again.