月圆的晚上

22/11：圣诞亮灯仪式
我们大概5点到公园。公园中间已添加了一个溜冰场。在亮灯之前，有一些风笛和溜冰表演。亮灯仪式很简单。之后的烟花倒是挺精彩的。在挤出人山人海的公园途中，靖恒看见两粒白色的气球在天空飘。他看着气球，想抓。不过气球飘远了，就像旁边那圆圆的月亮，抓也抓不到了。

挪威献给爱丁堡的圣诞树：

我们尝试带靖恒一起进一个教堂听演唱会。可是气氛太严肃了。靖恒吭一声都嫌太吵，我们只好腼腆地出去。

夜晚走在回家的路上。

Edinburgh's Winter Wonderland at the Princes' Street Gardens. The East Princes' Street Gardens has turned into a big carnival, with a skating rink as its centre piece. As it was the Light Night, which marked the official opening of all Christmas attractions in Edinburgh, it was crowded. It was also cold, but quite worth the effort (to get there and shiver). There were bagpipe band and ice skating performance. After the rather disappointing lights up, there was a spectacular fireworks display to the background music of 'Jingle Bells Rock' and one really felt some warmth then. I must try to remember, that Christmas is really a happy occasion, and not the dreary and shivery winter it comes clothed in.
Back to practicalities, we could hardly find a place to have dinner - the few available restaurants (cheap and child-friendly) were crowded. So we ended up having some hot soup at Marks & Spencers.
After that, we walked to St Giles Cathedral, for the Norwegian Advent Carol Concert held at 7pm. The choir was beautiful, the setting perfect; but it was just not possible to stay for the whole event with Ethan there. For every time Ethan spoke, we could feel the disturbance in the otherwise harmonious sound waves and we became very small. So we left half-way through.

24/11：舞台表演
我们搭巴士到一个港口观赏一个露天演出。草地上搭了两个舞台。一边是唱歌和乐队，一边是表演。演员很简单地演绎一段关于圣诞的诗。不过，它的特别之处是有起重机吊着仙女，圣诞老人，雪橇等在半空中旋转。完毕，还有烟花。今晚的月亮更圆更亮，风也更冷。什么是‘刺骨’，今天真是太能了解了！

之后，反正要换巴士才能回到宿舍，我们便搭车到举办亮灯仪式的那条街。为了让靖恒坐旋转木马，我们付了5镑。一人两镑半，（小孩没有特价，加上我得陪靖恒）。我说这里没有什么适合幼童玩的，除了旋转木马，他们当然不会放过賺这比钱的机会。

苏格兰高原和德国传统的'pasar malam':

The Ocean Terminal. There were singers and a band performing contemporary Christmas songs, and a stage rendition of the popular poem, The Night Before Christmas. The weather was so cold, especially with the wind. However, the thinly clad performers still went on, with fairies and Santa Claus flying above us (hung from two big cranes). It ended with fireworks. With the fireworks so close to us, it was barely worth it to have to bear the cold.
After that, we took the bus to Princes' Street. I wanted to let Ethan try the carousel. Although it cost us five pounds (no concession for toddlers, and we had to pay for two since one of us must accompany Ethan), Ethan and I went on it nevertheless. Somehow, I was bent on letting him sit on a carousel, even if he won't be able to remember this years from now. We walked through the Highland Village market and took photos in front of the Traditional German's market but did not stroll through it - time to go home for dinner. After Thursday's bad experience with eating out, we'll do with home-cooked HOT meals.

25／11： 两个晚上这样出去。今天下午和晚上，靖恒拿起袜子穿在手上，说要穿手套。他还自己把脚放进靴里要出门。还好他没有太吵闹。
The aftermath of going out on two evenings. He wanted to go out again this afternoon. And to demonstrate his intention, he used the socks for gloves (so very determined indeed), and put his feet into the boots by himself. Well, we told him we were not going out tonight, and he did not insist too much. Let's see if there would be a repeat of this tomorrow.

看图讲故事

故事一：表演者说了
十一月十八日我们又到国家博物馆。说实在的，这个博物馆办得很成功，小孩都玩得蛮尽兴的。这次我们是来看傀儡戏，长达二十分钟。靖恒看得挺入神的。不过，是他第一次看吧，表情似乎有点呆。说故事的表演者说得这么动听，我就不便重复了。。。

Story 1: Told by the Puppet performer
We went to watch a short puppet show held at the National Museum of Scotland on 18 Nov. It was after all a first for Ethan. He did not respond much, but did seem rather entranced by it.

故事二：由我来说
靖恒是大力士！话说建明的朋友来爱丁堡參加毕业典礼并带父母游玩欧洲，本想住我们这儿三天。所以建明把单人床搬去另一间房让她睡。她来了后说有另一个朋友可以让她借宿。于是，建明从研究室回来后，又把床搬回去。靖恒很“热心”地帮忙（毕竟是他的床嘛），竟搬起床架来了！虽然，建明说其实那是挺轻的，不过，看靖恒提起来还是蛮恐怖的。。。

Story 2: Let me tell you
It happened that Jianming's friend was to come and stay with us for three days before her parents arrive to travel with her and attend her convocation. Jianming moved the single bed to the other room the morning before she arrived. But when she arrived, she told him she would be staying at another friend's place, so the same day, after he got back from his office, he moved the bed back again. As this is Ethan's bed, he's rather enthusiastic at helping to move. He even managed to raise one end of the bed frame! Although according to Jianming, it's quite light, that's just so scary...

故事三：靖恒来说
我们也不知道为什么，靖恒会想让恐龙晒太阳。照片是晚上拍的，因为白天忙着出门，没想到拍下来。

Story 3: Only Ethan knows
We really don't know what made Ethan decide that the dragon must take a suntan. The photo was taken at night though, since the idea of taking the picture to show you did not occur to me when I first saw it in the morning.

消防队和比萨午餐

15/11
火警又响了。时间是傍晚6点40分。我给靖恒穿上了棉衣，外套，袜子和鞋子，才抱他（‘着火’了嘛）走下楼。等了半个小时，只看到在宿舍部门值班的人员走来，不像上次，有消防车和救火员。我和靖恒都好失望。没想到，接着就来了三辆！还有第四辆没有转近来，也许是看到已经够了吧。。。大伙儿都不约而同的笑起来。这回真让靖恒看个够了！

The fire alarm rang again for the 4th time since I came. 6.40pm. It's going to be cold and we might have to wait for sometime. Higher chance of catching a cold than getting burned I presume. So, I took my time to wrap up Ethan and myself before carrying him downstairs. He's excited to go out and to see the firemen again. Alas, after waiting for half an hour, only the man at the accommodation office came. We couldn't hide our disappointment that this time, no firemen came. Well, we shouldn't have doubted the great British system. Very soon after, three fire engines turned almost simultaneously into our street. I think the firemen themselves were rather confused. A fourth fire engine peeped in and decided not to turn in. Everyone laughed, and Ethan had a great time.

17/11
今天决定做比萨，因为建明买了黄梨，还买了掺好材料的面粉。我备好放在上面的料后，便轮到建明做比萨饼皮。由于我在忙着输入一些资料进电脑，没有陪靖恒玩，久而久之，他跑到建明那儿缠他。结果，做比萨变成了三个人的事。那也好，可以让他了解一下煮东西的过程。

制成品：

我吃我的pizza。

We decided to make pizza today. We had gotten quite a lot of ingredients from the stores, like ready-mixed pizza flour, pineapple, ham, mozzarella cheese and mature cheese left overs, tomato puree, tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, canned salmon (which we only used a little in the end because there were just too much stuff), last bit of courgette, onion, garlic, mushroom, green pepper, sweetcorn, spinach...

While Jianming was making the dough, I was busy at the computer, so Ethan drifted to the kitchen, and a chef was in the making. He really seemed rather serious at it. However, he did ask to eat it at every stage - when the dough was standing to rise, when we finished putting the toppings, when the pizzas were in the oven, when they were just out - trying my patience in exlaining why we could not eat yet.

(Incidentally, I was typing out some recipes for kids doing the cooking.)

记两次外出

十一月十一日是纪念在战争中殉命的人的日子。我们带靖恒到爱丁堡大学的一间学院外，看乐队吹风笛，还有军人操行。虽然典礼只有半个小时，靖恒直到今天还会不时吵着要看 “bagpipes”（风笛）和 “marching”（操行）。

We brought Ethan to the Old College on 11 Nov Remembrance Day. We timed it so that it was right after the service at about 10.40am and we did not have to stand too long in the cold for the parade and band to begin. The whole ceremony out in the court was about half an hour. Many had the poppy pinned on their coats, which were pretty formal. We seemed to be the only ones with a toddler who couldn't keep quiet, who kept asking for the trumpet to be blown again, or the band to blow the bagpipes. Well, it appeared to have given him a lasting impression, that half hour of music and marching. He's still buggering me about bagpipes and marching now.

15/11。“妇女协会”主办了一个‘郊游’- 到国家博物馆去。这是靖恒第二次到那儿。不过，我想他是不记得了。这次不同的是，多了许多小朋友，所以他玩得比上次还疯呢。过后，还在那儿的咖啡厅吃茶点。我叫了一碗汤和面包，几乎都给靖恒吃光了。之后还陪他到处跑。他挺喜欢博物馆展览的火车，古老的汽车，还有那些按了钮会动的机器。到了1点半还不肯走，好不容易带他出去。半路上睡着了，抱得我手酸腰酸。总算到家后，他竟然大声地哭了起来。断断续续哭了大概半个小时才肯睡。之前准备好的午餐只有放进冰箱留给明天了。

The Women's Club organised an outing to the National Museum of Scotland. This time, with Joshua, Grace, Eugene, and a whole lot of other kids around, he had more fun and had it more wildly t. We ended up with leek and potato soup at the cafe within, which Ethan almost finished. Then, as he did not want to go home, we wandered around the museum a little, around the pond and at the Connect gallery where he had lots of fun pressing the lighted buttons that test your reaction time and moving the trains. At about 1.30pm, I contrived to get him out of the museum. Suspect that's the reason for the howls that precipitated later when we reached home. Shouldn't have bothered with carrying all (15?) kg of him when he fell asleep on the way home since he did not end up sleeping peacefully when he got home.