Ally Gong

Allyinspires

lifestyle

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving from the Gong family!! This amazing family is one of the things that I am most thankful for in my life. I know that my personal growth over the years is all due to their patience and endless love. They are so supportive towards the things that I try to pursue and we always have a blast together. Bridgette, my sister, is one of my closest friends. <3 I am incredibly thankful to have her as my little sister! We talk and laugh and get hysterical, uncontrollable bouts of laughter at so many things. Some mornings I jump onto her bed and we play with Apple Gong for hours. She gives me the funniest advice and helps keep me on track when I go off on tangents or get silly ideas. Love you Bridgette!

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Sunday in Paradise

I love food, and the cuter and prettier the food, the more I love it! That is probably why beautifully made sweets are one of my favorite things on this world. I treat myself to sweets when I want a “sweet” experience. I just love sitting down in an adorable cafe and enjoying amazing food. Half of the time I can’t even bring myself to start cakes sometimes because they look too perfect! Sitting at this cafe-Sakura Cakes- with my best friend Tiffany made me miss Shanghai so much! I ate at cute little cafes in Shanghai so often, and they are abundant among the streets and malls. Thankfully, there are some awesome ones around Palo Alto too! 🙂  I loved seeing all the fall and Halloween decorations and paintings all over the windows of stores in Los Altos downtown-absolutely lovely!

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Shanghai Reads (Mian Mian, Wei Hui, Lisa See)

One of my favorite hobbies is reading books! A lot of people might not know this about me, but I grew up reading all kinds of different novels. In the past few years, I’ve done a lot more exploration of translated cultural novels. Some of my favorite authors are Haruki Murakami, Wei Hui, and Ruth Ozeki.

I always spend a lot of time browsing through bookstores in Shanghai. On second thought, visiting local bookstores is a constant motif through out my travels, because I think there is almost no better place to read a book about a specific place for the first time than the city itself! Shanghai, like many other asian cities has a lot of various “bookstores” in the residential neighborhoods. However, these are actually more of student bookstores- selling mainly textbooks, workbooks, and stationary. Most of the bigger bookstores can be found in shopping districts and the upper levels of malls.

 

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