Cynthia's Personal Blog
Cynthia Fung, a computer engineer for almost 8 years turned chef owner of Restaurant Furenzu in 2005. It is her passion and her dream to open her own restaurant and to share her love of food. With the encouragement from her friends, she finally took the challenge and made her dream come true. Therefore she dedicated the restaurant to all her friends and named it "Restaurant Furenzu". "Furenzu" is a made up Japanese word means "friends". Cynthia is not Japanese but she picked "Furenzu" was also because "Furenzu" sounds like her Chinese name: "Fung Yan Shuen". Restaurant Furenzu was a place for friends to gather and to make new friends.
Though Cynthia had sold Restaurant Furenzu in July 2008, she has not stopped cooking and entertaining. Please feel free to contact her for her private dinners and workshops. She is still hosting many cooking, catering and dinners with wine and sake pairing events. Come back often to check on her latest!
Cheers and Bon Appetit!
« January 2009 | Main | March 2009 »
February 26, 2009
February 12, 2009
Does this dog look fierceness to you?
Or would you any how describe him as, "wild", "aggressive", "frenzy", "menacing", "barbarous", "ferocious"? I'm running out of vocabularies. My customers know him, my UPS, Fedex guys all know him. However how do you get to know him first? It's because he is super friendly!
It was not the first time, that his little life is being threaten by a mail carrier. The first time happened about couple years ago. When he was only about 4 pounds! And today he is 5 1/2 pound.
Monte and I was in the restaurant, it was before service. I opened the front door to water the planters. He sure followed me from my back, not on leash obviously as we were hanging around inside to start with. However I didn't know the mail carrier was coming down the street. While I was watering the planters, he spotted the carrier and started running up to him thinking he would play with him. I screamed at Monte to come back. Before I could say another words, the mail carrier already held his mails high and hit him so hard that Monte flew back with a back flip and landed on the ground.
I took Monte with me and drove right to Emeryville post office to report that to the Post Master. I understand a mail carrier needs to protect their lives and watch out for themselves. However I also believe a "normal" person can justify and should be able to judge if their life is being threatened?
Last week, I got a notice in my mailbox about I missed a certified mail. First, I know I was home the day it was delivered. I had been home the whole day, therefore I didn't think the carrier had come up to the house to deliver it but just left a note in my mailbox for me to go pick up at the post office. I called this morning, complained about it and arranged for a redelivery with a note for the carrier to be sure to go upstairs.
Around 3PM, my door bell rang. Whoever that was, had just let themselves into the building without ringing the front door. So I have no idea of who would that be. By the time I got to the door, it was only less than a minute, but this person had already left to the elevator down the hall. I poked my head out from the door and that's when Monte walked out from the door behind me as well. We both saw the mail carrier, and Monte started running down the hall to him. I was screaming at Monte to call him back and at the same time I saw the mail guy held up a metal chain to hit him! I then screamed at the mail carrier instead to tell him "the dog's alright, don't hit!" He wouldn't stop. In fact he was walking toward Monte to reach out to hit him! At this time Monte was already started to run back. I picked Monte up and questioned the mail guy about his action was totally unnecessary. He started giving me a lecture about as long as he's in his uniform, he's entitled to do anything. Implying it's legal even if he killed my dog, as long as he's in his uniform. I was so upset, I just told him to give me my mail and leave.
Again I understand if it's even my last dog, a labrador, or any big dog. Even if Monte was furiously barking. However Monte was totally showing his friendliness, wagging his tail, with his bouncy run and hadn't made a noise. If I know it was a mail carrier at my door, I wouldn't even let Monte get close to the door, just in case. Just like when my UPS or Fedex guy came, when they rang the front door, I would pick up Monte everytime when they got to my house door. However this carrier made a mistake and didn't come in with normal procedure to ring my front door intercom but let himself in. It's my home, of course my dog is off leash in the house!
I just feel that if a person can't even tell or judge if his life is being threatened by a 5lb dog, he should just stay home! I understand his job nature has certain threats and I know many people got beaten before. However take the necessary measure and be real! What I experienced today and before were just plain animal cruelty! And this CANNOT be allowed!
I am not partial to my dog because I am a dog owner. It's just what is right and wrong. And common sense if you have!? I have a friend who would tell me don't approach her dog, because her dog is super protective and even she wouldn't know what her dog would do. I'll for sure take that advise! For the same reason, I know my dog! If I say my little friendly 5 lb dog is friendly and fine, then why would you still need to approach forward to the dog to hit him? I am also not addressing to all mail carriers because I had met some of them and they were fine with Monte! There were several occasions when Monte and I walked to the garage and it happened the mail carrier was at the lobby. And they were fine having Monte approached them. Therefore I take this as an individual issue and it needs to be addressed!
So who else can I seek help from, other than I will forward this note to the post master, post master general? While the mail carrier had also mentioned, "yeah, call the post master if you want!" So would the higher level executives really address this kind of issues or would they allow their staff to abuse their right?
Can someone help? If any of you agree with me, please feel free to forward this. Thank you!
It was not the first time, that his little life is being threaten by a mail carrier. The first time happened about couple years ago. When he was only about 4 pounds! And today he is 5 1/2 pound.
Monte and I was in the restaurant, it was before service. I opened the front door to water the planters. He sure followed me from my back, not on leash obviously as we were hanging around inside to start with. However I didn't know the mail carrier was coming down the street. While I was watering the planters, he spotted the carrier and started running up to him thinking he would play with him. I screamed at Monte to come back. Before I could say another words, the mail carrier already held his mails high and hit him so hard that Monte flew back with a back flip and landed on the ground.
I took Monte with me and drove right to Emeryville post office to report that to the Post Master. I understand a mail carrier needs to protect their lives and watch out for themselves. However I also believe a "normal" person can justify and should be able to judge if their life is being threatened?
Last week, I got a notice in my mailbox about I missed a certified mail. First, I know I was home the day it was delivered. I had been home the whole day, therefore I didn't think the carrier had come up to the house to deliver it but just left a note in my mailbox for me to go pick up at the post office. I called this morning, complained about it and arranged for a redelivery with a note for the carrier to be sure to go upstairs.
Around 3PM, my door bell rang. Whoever that was, had just let themselves into the building without ringing the front door. So I have no idea of who would that be. By the time I got to the door, it was only less than a minute, but this person had already left to the elevator down the hall. I poked my head out from the door and that's when Monte walked out from the door behind me as well. We both saw the mail carrier, and Monte started running down the hall to him. I was screaming at Monte to call him back and at the same time I saw the mail guy held up a metal chain to hit him! I then screamed at the mail carrier instead to tell him "the dog's alright, don't hit!" He wouldn't stop. In fact he was walking toward Monte to reach out to hit him! At this time Monte was already started to run back. I picked Monte up and questioned the mail guy about his action was totally unnecessary. He started giving me a lecture about as long as he's in his uniform, he's entitled to do anything. Implying it's legal even if he killed my dog, as long as he's in his uniform. I was so upset, I just told him to give me my mail and leave.
Again I understand if it's even my last dog, a labrador, or any big dog. Even if Monte was furiously barking. However Monte was totally showing his friendliness, wagging his tail, with his bouncy run and hadn't made a noise. If I know it was a mail carrier at my door, I wouldn't even let Monte get close to the door, just in case. Just like when my UPS or Fedex guy came, when they rang the front door, I would pick up Monte everytime when they got to my house door. However this carrier made a mistake and didn't come in with normal procedure to ring my front door intercom but let himself in. It's my home, of course my dog is off leash in the house!
I just feel that if a person can't even tell or judge if his life is being threatened by a 5lb dog, he should just stay home! I understand his job nature has certain threats and I know many people got beaten before. However take the necessary measure and be real! What I experienced today and before were just plain animal cruelty! And this CANNOT be allowed!
I am not partial to my dog because I am a dog owner. It's just what is right and wrong. And common sense if you have!? I have a friend who would tell me don't approach her dog, because her dog is super protective and even she wouldn't know what her dog would do. I'll for sure take that advise! For the same reason, I know my dog! If I say my little friendly 5 lb dog is friendly and fine, then why would you still need to approach forward to the dog to hit him? I am also not addressing to all mail carriers because I had met some of them and they were fine with Monte! There were several occasions when Monte and I walked to the garage and it happened the mail carrier was at the lobby. And they were fine having Monte approached them. Therefore I take this as an individual issue and it needs to be addressed!
So who else can I seek help from, other than I will forward this note to the post master, post master general? While the mail carrier had also mentioned, "yeah, call the post master if you want!" So would the higher level executives really address this kind of issues or would they allow their staff to abuse their right?
Can someone help? If any of you agree with me, please feel free to forward this. Thank you!
February 11, 2009
Auntie Cynthia borrowed Aryn and "playing mom"!
Had a wonderful day yesterday! First went down to Santa Cruz for a meeting. Met up with a friend, Patti Hopp; whom I haven't seen or talked to since Aug last year. It was a beautiful day, Patti showed me around Santa Cruz a bit, watched some surfing and kite boarding. We then had a leisure lunch and catching up with each other of what's been going on for the last 1/2 year. Then I drove to San Carlo to pay Christine Chu a visit.
Christine had just gave birth to her twins about a month ago. They're just so cute! And Jonas, her oldest; was a charm. She let me played mom and fed her twin daughter, Aryn. "Yummy yummy" was all I could say! Darling and precious! Sweet babies! Her twin brother Caleb sure is a talker. He likes to make lots of noises. Asleep or not. You can really just stand there and stare at them for hours!
Have I mentioned it was just nice to have a chat with Christine and was nice to see her mother, auntie Julie; in the comfort of their home? Great meeting Grace as well. Jeff looked good other than a little tired from getting up for the babies. He lost some weight, but "I've been eating a lot!" he said. Men! They're definitely from another planet. Hate them for that! See for me, ate a lot...as usual...over dinner. (I'm protesting to Jeff, so I refused to get onto the scale this morning!) Wait I actually didn't eat that much over dinner. It was after dinner with all the extra that auntie Julie made! "Auntie Julie!!"
Just a really wonderful day! Now do I really want to be tied down by having another restaurant, or should I just work for somebody and be able to have some real days off and hang out with friends?
Anyway... cheers to all my dear "furenzu"!
Christine had just gave birth to her twins about a month ago. They're just so cute! And Jonas, her oldest; was a charm. She let me played mom and fed her twin daughter, Aryn. "Yummy yummy" was all I could say! Darling and precious! Sweet babies! Her twin brother Caleb sure is a talker. He likes to make lots of noises. Asleep or not. You can really just stand there and stare at them for hours!
Have I mentioned it was just nice to have a chat with Christine and was nice to see her mother, auntie Julie; in the comfort of their home? Great meeting Grace as well. Jeff looked good other than a little tired from getting up for the babies. He lost some weight, but "I've been eating a lot!" he said. Men! They're definitely from another planet. Hate them for that! See for me, ate a lot...as usual...over dinner. (I'm protesting to Jeff, so I refused to get onto the scale this morning!) Wait I actually didn't eat that much over dinner. It was after dinner with all the extra that auntie Julie made! "Auntie Julie!!"
Just a really wonderful day! Now do I really want to be tied down by having another restaurant, or should I just work for somebody and be able to have some real days off and hang out with friends?
Anyway... cheers to all my dear "furenzu"!
More turnip cake!
The batch that I made for Chinese New Year was "Gone like the wind"! After receiving many requests, plus I was going to visit Christine yesterday, I decided to make another batch of the turnip cake. The turnip though, wasn't as good(young) as last time; I had only bought enough to make half the portion of what I made last. With the help from Elaine, it was done in only couple hours. I'm sure it'll be gone again soon as Jean and Josephine are coming over for dinner on Valentine's day!
