This is probably the only day of the year that everyone wants to be Irish if they’re not. So in honor of St. Patrick’s Day, here are some Irish sayings and blessings that I enjoy and hope you do too.

• There’s nothing so bad it couldn’t be worse.
• However long the day, night must fall.
• You must take the little potato with the big potato.
• You’ll never plough a field by turning it over in your mind.
• A best friend is like a four leaf clover: hard to find and lucky to have.
• May your home always be too small to hold your friends.
• May the saddest day of your future be no worse than the happiest day of your past.
• May you never forget what is worth remembering or remember what is best forgotten.
• May you live as long as you want and never want as long as you live.

and finally…

May your blessings outnumber
The shamrocks that grow,
And may trouble avoid you
Wherever you go.

Happy St. Pat’s!

I didn’t have to watch the gold medal hockey game between Canada and USA to know that Canada had won. Perhaps Americans right across the border may have heard the roar of Canadians across Canada as they erupted in deafening cheers. I wasn’t in downtown Vancouver to witness the crowds gathered to celebrate the win of what is considered “Canada’s game,” but the cheering and horns honking did not escape Burnaby either. Fans on the streets and those half hanging outside of cars were waving their beloved red and white maple leaf flag and honking their horns as they passed other visible Canadian hockey fans.

The win, considered to be the most important game to Canadians, was the perfect ending to the Vancouver 2010 winter games. Breaking the record of the most golds won by any nation during the winter olympics, this victory was the icing on top.

These games brought out a side of Canadians that I’ve rarely seen. In the three years I’ve lived here, I’ve never seen so much pride and patriotism. I barely knew the Canadian anthem until the games began and during the olympics it could be heard everywhere. Fans would spontaneously break out singing “Oh Canada…” and everyone would join in. The streets of Vancouver were filled with red and white maple leaf flags waved above heads and draped across shoulders of adoring fans throughout the games. To outsiders it may be just a game, but for Canadians everywhere the gold medal win in hockey, both men’s and women’s, cemented their belief that it’s great to be Canadian.

With all the excitement that these olympic games have brought, not everyone is a supporter and they have protested against them declaring the history of the games to be rooted in racism and a money-making machine that benefits greedy corporate giants leaving the city to foot the bill. According to protesters, the games displace the homeless and erode our civil liberties with the money spent to strengthen security for the event.

Before the games started, it was reported how the events were made more riskier and dangerous by making the slide the fastest in the world, the ski courses slicker for speed and the half pipe much higher for bigger jumps to attract viewers. Flirting with danger cost the life of an athlete right before the games even began. It’s hard to discount that these efforts to inject more risk to the events are driven by sponsors that only see dollar signs.

And although great strides have been made in gender equality with women competing in ice hockey and in almost every sport except for ski jumping, you have to ask why can’t women compete in ski jumping? The argument that the sport is not at a mature and competitive level for women is a weak one. Perhaps a better answer is that it isn’t popular enough to attract big-money sponsors. No money, no luck. Is that the fault of the olympic committee? Not entirely. Hey, nothing’s free in life, right? Not enough support from the fans and there’s little interest from sponsors. I’m not saying it’s our fault either. It is what it is.

There will always be protesters to the olympics and some may be labeled extreme in the way they draw attention to their message, but to protest for the inclusion of MukMuk as an official mascot to the games is a bit bordering insanity. First of all, why does it even matter? MukMuk apparently is just a sidekick to the official mascots—Sumi, Miga and Quatchi—and exist only in cyberspace. Mascots have sidekicks? Who knew. Second, mascot or sidekick, they’re made up characters whose purpose besides cheering on the athletes is to generate income by being sellable. They don’t really exist! Third, surely there must be something better to protest against that’s worth all the effort and attention.

Well, the protesters certainly succeeded in drawing attention to their cause because it made it on the news. You can read it here and here and here. No joke. A Facebook fan page has even been created for MukMuk. Talk about passionate supporters for a cause. Is it a worthy one or are these people wasting their time? I’ll leave that for you to decide.

No tickets to any of the olympic events? No worries. There are certainly enough free activities all around the city set up during the winter olympics so anyone can participate. That’s if you are willing to wait in long lines. Some say I show considerable patience, but when it comes to lining up for anything, I have no patience for it.

One of the popular free activities in downtown Vancouver is ziplining over Robson Square. That is a superbly fun activity and a great deal considering that it usually costs around $100 to do. But would you be willing to get in line at the crack of dawn and wait six to eight hours for it? Crazy, huh? There seems to be lots of people willing to do just that. I guess they have nothing better to do than to waist most of their day waiting in line to do something that will only last a few seconds. Incredible!

Happy Chinese New Year! For the first time in my life I made the effort to go catch a Chinese New Year parade in Chinatown. I woke up pretty early for a Sunday, which I usually sleep in, but this time I dragged my butt out of bed to get there by 9am. The parade was moved up earlier in the morning to accomodate the traffic that was expected for some of the olympic events nearby.

To my surprise crowds of people were already gathered in Chinatown ready and waiting for the parade to start when I arrived. The parade was filled with colorful costumes, dancing dragons, beating drums and the explosive pop of firecrackers. City officials greeted spectators and handed out red envelopes and balloons.

After the parade, crowds continued to roam about Chinatown snapping photos of old buildings, people in costume and street performers, which is exactly what I did! (More photos here.) The man in the photo above was followed by a mob of people all wanting to get a photo with him. He must have felt like a celebrity.

On the skytrain, all over downtown, in the office, at malls—wherever I go, all I see is red and white. With the arrival of the olympics, the city seems to have suddenly transformed overnight. Usually the city has a very laid back kind of vibe, but now there’s so much energy and excitement. Vancouverites and Canadians from all over are on fire rooting for their athletes. It’s quite amazing to see the sudden transformation take place within 24 hours of the opening of the games. Even though I’m not a Canadian, it’s so great to see all the hope, joy and pride Canadians bring to the olympic games.

The olympic torch relay came through my neighborhood today and I had the opportunity to witness the excitement as crowds gathered on the streets waiting for the torch bearers to come through. With only a day away from the opening ceremonies the atmosphere is brimming with fervor. The media has all arrived within the past week along with the world’s top athletes. Vancouver has been preparing and waiting for this moment and it’s finally arrived! I haven’t seen so much Canadian pride until now. The Canadian flag is visible nearly everywhere I look. It’s plastered on side of buildings, hung inside shopping malls and stuck on the windows of every other car in the city.

Everything is set and ready for the olympic games except for the snow. Vancouver is melting under all the rain we’re getting and mother nature does not seem to want to cooperate. It’s been the mildest winter I’ve experienced since moving here three years ago. If the olympics were held last year, lack of snow would not be a problem. There was so much the city was buried in it, but ironically this year it’s the opposite. Olympic organizers can’t seem to keep the snow on Cypress Mountain from disappearing. They’ve been trucking in snow from miles away and flying it in by helicopter from peaks of nearby mountains. Hopefully there’ll be enough for the competitions.

During the course of the Olympics, I plan to document some of the excitement around the city and post the pics to my flickr account. Unfortunately tickets to the olympic events are hard to come by and not cheap so I won’t be attending any in person, but will watch them on TV like most people.

It’s been five months since our road trip and I finally have the video completed. It took longer than I had planned. I decided to try iMovie to cut the whole thing together and ran into some complications when I upgraded to Snow Leopard before finishing the video. I thought I lost everything I’d done, but turned out I had to update all my thumbnails in iPhoto and iMovie. I think I’ll stick with Premiere from now on.

By the time I’ve published these videos, I’ve probably viewed them a few dozen times during the editing process that I’m so ready to post it and be done with it. I can’t watch it again until much much later when I’ve sort of forgotten parts of it that I can almost see it like the first time. These videos are an aid for my memory and though it doesn’t capture every single moment, at least it captures the essence of my experiences.

It’s fun putting them together and I still have a few more that I haven’t done yet. The hardest part is finding the music. Sometimes I think it would be so much easier to make your own music (if I only had the musical talent.)

It seems I’ve gone AWOL since my last entry was back in early October. I assure you this isn’t due to a scandal of the Tiger Woods nature or fleeing to Argentina to be with a mistress. No golf clubs were swung or trees hit. I’ve been busy and not been busy so that’s not really an excuse. There’s not much I wanted to say so I didn’t. Now that the end of the year is coming upon us (and since I can’t sleep), I thought I’d write something. Not that anyone cares, but this is more for myself to look back on.

Looking back on the year, it wasn’t as bad as what I thought it would be. Sure, the economy is not so great, but there seems to be signs of hope. The world isn’t in complete shambles and it’s not ending yet. At least not until 2012, so we have a couple more years left. So they say…

The year began with lots of snowboarding and new responsibilities at work with our project manager leaving. It has certainly been a year of learning and traveling. Work was busy for most of the year except towards the end. Doing mostly project management this year has been a learning experience with its ups and downs. I’m glad to have the experience, but know for sure that it’s not something I want to do full time. Two road trips within a month, four visits by friends and family, a dozen or so trips to the slopes and two grand in winnings to close off the year—I feel quite lucky to say the least.

Did I accomplish all the goals I set at the beginning of the year? No, but this gives me all the reason to try harder in 2010. Mainly working harder on the list of personal creative projects I’d like to do.

2009 went by in a blur, but I’m ready for 2010. Hopefully it will be a year of achievements, just as the winter olympics is set to take place in Vancouver. It should serve as good inspiration and motivation to reach for the “gold medal” in all the things I set out to do.

It took me a while to put this little video together of my road trip through the Canadian Rockies, but I’m finally done. Work has been busy, which has taken up a lot of my free time and when I do have some time to myself, I need time to decompress. Luckily I have a bit of a lull with work, but not for long. We have a long weekend here since Monday is Thanksgiving in Canada. Yay! Three day weekends should be the standard in my opinion.

The long days at work had me wishing that I could rewind back to the time this summer when I was exploring the Canadian Rockies. There are no words to describe the grand and humbling experience of this natural landscape that’s existed over millions of years. These mountains have existed way before humans set foot on this planet and will most likely still be around long after we’re gone. Just thinking about this helps me think of how all the stressful things in life are really so insignificant.

These bento box lunches are so cute that I want to make my own! It makes eating lunch so much more fun. Imagine if someone made these lunches for you everyday. They’d be like little surprises waiting to be eaten. That would just make my day. If you knew you had a surprise waiting for you inside your bento box, wouldn’t you be excited to have lunch?

Somehow we’ve branded our annual get-together trips with the Joy Luck Club moniker. It started with JLC 2, which took place last summer in Vancouver and Victoria. Although the numbering may throw you off, it’s actually the first JLC trip (our trips being the sequels.) This year we hit the road with JLC 3 on Highway 1 from San Diego to San Francisco. What better way to honor our Asian heritage than to revisit the cities that were built by our ancestors. Quite fitting, don’t you think?

The weather gods seemed to be on our side. We had the good fortune of experiencing the lovely California sun most of the time on our road trip except the last couple of days in San Francisco. I’d like to think of it as the weather gods helping us transition back to reality. The nice sunny California weather got us quite tan. So tan in fact that I was mistaken for being Filipino—twice. Now that’s a first!

Ang and I got up before the birds to catch an early flight out of Seattle to meet up with Merles and Sclee in San Diego. When we met up with them in SD, they were way too peppy for the little sleep they claimed they had to catch an early flight. That didn’t stop Sclee from waking up at 4am the next morning all showered and ready to go hit the streets of San Diego. Unfortunately she realized too late that she woke up at the right time, but in the wrong time zone.

We saw all of what we wanted to see in San Diego in two days. It’s not as nice as I imagined it to be, but about an hour drive north to La Jolla and it’s just perfect. The beaches, the view, the little shops, the weather… everything. Santa Barbara is also another beautiful place where worries don’t exist. If I were homeless, I’d live here on the beach and be the happiest person on earth.

We “camped” in the wilderness for a night in Santa Barbara at the lovely el Capitan Canyon resort. Ang found her “Mr. Rugged”, who escorted us to our furnished tent, and fantasized about working and living at the resort.

It’s a fact that anyone who lives in Laguna Beach is just spoiled by the good weather, sand and incredible views of the ocean. They really have no reason to leave or to complain. Maybe just some of the really steep hills can be a bit scary, but how else are those nice houses going to get such a lovely view from high up? I guess the same goes for houses in Big Sur. Residents there have a way of living on the edge, quite literally. The guidebook informed us that there was no need to do anything in Big Sur except to enjoy the “weepingly beautiful” vistas. We did just that and shed a few tears along the way.

By the time we reached San Francisco, we had logged a little under 900 miles by car. Besides spending a day outside the city in Napa to tour the Domaine Carneros Chateau, we spent most of our time on foot throughout the City by the Bay. I revisited many of the sites I’d been to five years ago like the Golden Gate Bridge, but this time in better weather and less foggy conditions. Also, I had more time to stroll through the special exhibits of Georgia O’Keefe, Ansel Adams and Richard Avedon at the SFMOMA—one of the best museums for modern art on this side of the coast.

What a trip! We had ten fabulous days exploring the coast of California together. I can’t think of any better way to end the summer. The JLC tradition will live on. More photos are linked here and a video will come later.

Aunt Betty and Uncle Buck were in town soon after my return from Chicago. We met up a few times over the week they were here and filled our stomachs with some of the best food in town. I still have a gut to show for it and one that I’m trying to get rid of now.

On a rainy Wednesday we had all-you-can-eat hot pot like I never had before. It was the best in terms of variety of dishes offered. Then over the weekend we ate Shanghainese food for lunch at a joint favored by locals for its authenticity, and had dinner at one of the best restaurants known for its peking duck among other things. Although we opted for the roast duck, it was the best tasting duck ever. And dessert is the best at this place—baked tapioca pudding. Don’t come for the ambiance because there is none as it’s located in a dinky strip mall with a parking lot enough for ten cars only. But do come for the food ‘cause you’ll be smacking your lips and belly all the way home.

We also checked out some sights. The buddhist temple in Richmond was like stepping onto a different continent. Once inside, it felt like being in China. The temple is funded by generous donors and is a grand sight off the highway. Interestingly it seemed small from the inside, but maybe that’s because I’ve been to larger temples in the East. Photos of the food that was consumed and places visited are posted here.