Tale of Two Hotpots

[ This post is 2 weeks late. Oops! ]

Yesterday was Chinese New Year, the first day of the Year of the Dragon according to the lunar calendar. According to reliable and generic stuff that I found on Google, 2012 is a Water Dragon year, which is just perfect for Wood Rat peeps like me... particularly for work and love (Which is more important? Can't I have it all?). I'm not particularly superstitious, but you can't help but root for yourself when someone tells you its your destiny. I'm destined to kick ass this year. #winning

My brother took us to Minni's Shabu Shabu in Flushing to celebrate our [lunar calendar] birthdays, since I was born on New Years Day and my mom was born the day after. Our family has always been rather traditional and gone by moon vs. the Western calendar, like a pack of werewolves. Anyway, because I was born on CNY, I like to think of myself as a SUPER rat. Sounds gross, but Rat people are totally awesome. The Rat beat out all the other animals in the zodiac race with its wits, which makes Rat people number one in my book. And because I'm the firstborn of the rat pack, that makes me UBER NUMERO UNO!!!!! When I was a kid what that meant was that I got a little bit more money in my red envelopes due to this birthday factor. That was awesome, too bad I'm too big to get red envelopes anymore. :(

I told my brother that I was going to name this post "Tale of Two Hotpots" (a la Charles Dickens, get it?) because after lunch we went to our grandparent's house and had hotpot again. He said "please don't?", which is enough reason for me to do it. :) Just wanted to let you guys know that I was actively thinking of cheesy post titles.

I had to coax these two prudes into SHARING one beer with me to celebrate our birthdays.

My mom told me that she felt drunk and couldn't drive afterwards, oops!

Group photo with all our spoils.

Beef, lamb, fish, clams. Pickled mustard (酸菜, my favz!), kimchi, assorted veggies.

After lunch, Andrew and I head down to our grandparent's place to celebrate CNY over hotpot again! It was so nice being home, except one has to remember that grandparents have relatively low batteries and have to recharge frequently, which means that sometimes you only get to spend a few hours with them before they start passing out. HAHA.

Grandma making me a mug o' tea.

Grandpa picking out the nuts that he likes to eat the best...

...leaving the crappy ones in the bowl for the rest of us to eat.

Andrew initiating a tickle-fest with dad.

Real men don't fight with fists.

Dad's ingenious way of ensuring that the Grands don't screw up the TV settings when they start mashing buttons. There's only 3 buttons available -- enlarge, on/off, volume.

My grandparents were quite festive decked out in CNY red. My grandma wore a really cute red-checkered headband too, and I thought that my grandpa kind of looked like a Ninja Turtle with his green puffy vest. He brought out a bottle of red wine and we poured them into any type of eating receptacle we could find -- rice bowls, mugs, shot glasses. Really classy, the lot of us!

With Big Baba.

Actually Andrew is covertly tickling dad underneath the table in this photo. The torture never ends, even at dinner.

I just realized while looking at this photo that Andrew is indeed taller than me.

I like to reminisce upon those years when Big Sis relied on raw strength and viciousness to stay Alpha Dog...

Someone (Vicki) called me a creeper for taking this photo of my grandparents passed out in a food coma, but I thought this was the cutest ever. :) Love love love. 

So yes, Vicki actually made it out all the way to Flushing after work to celebrate CNY with my family! She was nice enough to bring a ginormous mango mousse cake and a bunch of fruit. Her mama raised her right, I'm even going to write her a reference! I was really happy to be able to spend this holiday with my family and best friend. Couldn't ask for more!

Off into the wild you go, little one.

HAPPY YEAR OF THE DRAGON!!!