My first hockey game

When I was in China, I heard about how Canadian people are crazy about hockey game. Hockey, in my mind, is highly intense and competitive and requires both smart maneuvers and excellent skills, which never fail to fascinate me.

The game is between Montreal Canadiens and Colorado Avalanche. Both teams have a glorious history and enjoy outstanding records in the NHL. Founded in 1909, the Canadiens are the longest continuously operating professional ice hockey team and the only existing NHL club to predate the founding of the NHL, as well as one of the oldest North American sports franchises. The franchise is one of the "Original Six" teams, a description used for the teams that made up the NHL from 1942 until the 1967 expansion. Following the departure of the rival Quebec Nordiques in 1995, and the relocation of the Montreal Expos to Washington, DC in 2004, the Canadiens remain the sole team of the four major sports leagues of Canada and the United States that is based in the province of Quebec. The team's championship season in 1992–93 marks the last time a Canadian team won the Stanley Cup.

It was such a dramatic and intense game that I got so deeply into and even forgot to sit down to enjoy my dinner. The Canadiens scored two goals in a less-than-1-minute span in the third period to take a 5-4 lead. But the lead was short-lived. Finally, Matt Duchene and Milan Hejduk from Avalanche scored in a shootout to give the Colorado Avalanche a 6-5 victory over the Canadians.

Everything about the game was perfect except the reality that we lost, since all Sauvé Scholars stood firmly on the side of Montreal Canadians. For me, it was an amazing and impressive memory. I should thank to our dear Sonny who not only led us to access to this amazing game but also acted as our perfect “game commentator”.

China National Evening

China is a country famous for charming culture and delicious food. As the only scholar from China this year, I feel obligated to demonstrate our culture and more important, “to feed my dear followers with delicious Chinese cuisine”.

The super star of the dinner is definitely “General Tso chicken” which is a sweet-and-spicy, deep-fried chicken dish that is popularly served in North American Chinese restaurants. The dish is named after General Tso Tsung-tang, or Zuo Zongtang, a Qing dynasty general and statesman, although this connection is tenuous. He is said to have enjoyed it, and perhaps helped create a dish, but there are no recorded recipes. The real roots of the dish lie in the post 1949 exodus of chefs to the United States. The dish is reported to have been introduced to New York City in the early 1970s as an example of Hunan cooking, though it is not typical of Hunanese cuisine, which is traditionally very spicy and rarely sweet.

Dumpling, whose mandarin name is Jiaozi, is indispensible for a traditional Chinese cuisine.

Common Chinese dumpling generally consists of minced meat and finely chopped vegetables wrapped into a thin and elastic piece of dough skin. Popular meat fillings include ground pork, ground beef, ground chicken, shrimp, and even fish. Popular mixtures include pork with Chinese cabbage, pork with garlic chives, pork and shrimp with vegetables, pork with spring onion, garlic chives with scrambled eggs. Filling mixtures vary depending on personal tastes and region. Given the various religious backgrounds of Sauvé Scholars, I choose to serve dumpiness with a mixture a ground beef and onion.

Besides the real delicious food, the presentation about Chinese culture is also a “visual delicious dish”. By playing two interesting short films about China, I seek to provide a relatively whole picture about China in controversy to my fellow scholars, hoping to further their knowledge about China.

It was a night with great fun and I am sure the coming national evenings will bring Sauvé community more fun.