Prince's Gardens was a scene of white when I stepped out of Linstead this morning... wheee... more snow!!
We went to Hyde Park during our one-hour break, and again after lunch. It was so beautiful! We had fun with the snow, making mini-snowmen, throwing snowballs, kicking up snow piles...
More pics are up in the Imperial College and London photo galleries.
Ps. Happy birthday, Jed!
The Straits Times today had an article - "
Migratory birds to blame? Infected birds on long flights may have spread the virus" - which prompted me to post here this particular email I received yesterday. More research and stats will be needed to confidently, and with all justification, point the finger at the migrants. I hate the power of the media sometimes.
.................................................
Date: Wed, 28 Jan 2004 16:21:48 +0000
From: xxxxxxxxxxxx
To: xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [OB] avian influenza outbreaks: what migrant species could possibly be responsible?
Dear... and fellow OBers,
As the "bird flu crisis" becomes increasingly reported by national and international media, and calls for wild bird culls likely become stronger through the region, I would also very much welcome any informed opinion or further useful links to pass on to media and colleagues ( in this case here in South Korea).
Lacking any specialist knowledge on avian flu, and not having read the Time article that Annette refers to, I would also like to add a simplistic response to points 4 and especially 5 of her mail:
"Looking at the East Asian Flyway...should this route be connected to what Time Magazine writer say as contiguouity of afflicted countries to China (who is believed to be the source of the avian flu virus)?"
Looking at a list of the countries known to be affected by the latest outbreaks it is surely tempting for non-specialists to lump all these countries together and claim (ironically, as we conservationists often do!)
that they are all linked by migratory birds. As China lies - kind of - in the centre of this region and the flyway, and as there was an outbreak of avian influenza in early 2003 at least in Hong Kong, it may also be
tempting to speculate that it is wild birds somehow migrating (radiating?) out of infected areas in China that are responsible for the rapid and devastating spread of the disease.
But a simple consideration of the dates of the outbreaks (allowing for differences in government openness and media reporting), seems to get in the way of such a line of argument.
Supposing first that Indonesia with its initial outbreak in August was indeed the origin of the pandemic, can anyone name a single wild bird species present in August in Indonesia that is then known to migrate north
to Korea, arriving in November or December, when the virus broke out here in full? Or, instead allowing for the China-is-to-blame-for-all-such-diseases theory, can anybody name a single species that migrates out of China and arrives in Indonesia in August but only reaches neighboring Korea several months later? Or even a single species that migrates north from China into Korea in winter? Following on from the December outbreaks too, is there any real possibility that infected migrant birds then carried the virus south from Korea and Japan to Vietnam and Thailand, and Cambodia (and even as far west as Pakistan)?
Again, I cannot think of a single wild species that migrates so far south from here so late in mid-winter (such migrants mostly pass through much earlier in the autumn): can anyone else?
The dates of migration seem to point away from wild birds on the flyway being the cause of the present spread...seems to me instead that the rapid spread of outbreaks is rather more coincident with seasonal periods of increased "production" and consumption of poultry and ducks - in time for Christmas, New Year, Tet etc.
Always the birds and other animals to blame, and never the people that abuse them.
With very best wishes and birding.
XXXXXXX
Wetlands and Birds Conservation Specialist
South Korea, and East Asia
.................................................
Last night - hmm. Fencing again with Amar.
Today - ahhh... never have I felt so satisfied and contented.
Three events are worthy of note -
Talk by Sir David AttenboroughHave you heard of Sir David Attenborough? No? *smack!* Famous British naturalist, host of documentary series such as Life of Birds, the Blue Planet, Life of Mammals... etc etc... and imho the next best thing to Charles Darwin himself. Well anyway... today, he, himself, in person, gave a talk at the Royal Society, and I was there! 'Twas about '
Perception, deception and reality'... the online on-demand video of the lecture's available. It's extremely educational, full of good humour, selected video clips from his documentaries, and it makes you think. It has changed the angle from which I view nature documentaries.
The lecture synopsis reads:
"Once, technical inadequacies led natural history film-makers to distort events or even invent them in their attempts to convey an impression of reality. Today, film and video equipment has reached such perfection that most of those early problems have been solved. Now it is possible to show things that are not only invisible to the naked eye but that have never in fact occurred. How far can - or should - film-makers manipulate images and events in order to convey deeper truths?"
While waiting in the cloak room, a stream of VIPs came down the stairs. Xiyu and I were reading their name badges. Lots of famous people - Richard Dawkins, this-and-that Professor, the 'Tax Collector', and some other names which I've definitely seen before, either on T.V. or from books and journals. We felt so priviledged... hehe. Too bad we didn't take any photos.
-------------
The Last SamuraiAt first I thought I had to sacrifice it to attend Attenborough's talk. But apparently the timing was just right - so we made it. Nothing much to comment on this one though... I don't know what to say. One part of me shouts out, "Hollywood fairytale-ending-type fiction story!" and the other gives a big nod. Gory (though still nothing compared to Black Hawk Down or Band of Brothers) and lots of people with bright red blood splurting out... shown in slow motion... it's a little too dramatic. A sea of Japanese Samurai... and one American in the midst. The whole cinema giggled when they saw Tom Cruise in the Samurai armour. And the Japanese couple behind me laughed at the simple, but overly-formal Japanese used in the dialogues. But it was still a good film... you come to feel for the Japanese, and for their Samurai culture. Cinematically-speaking, it was great. The themes are too common though - honour, the struggle between duty and personal beliefs... that kind of thing. The events and ending are all too predictable... the title says it all. It wouldn't have made it had Cruise not been in it.
-------------
It snowed in London!Yep, it snowed last night, and it snowed again when we were waiting outdoors to get into the Royal Society! Little drops and specks of ice... "let it snow, let it snow, let it snow..." ;) What fun! Our coats and umbrellas were covered with snow... my fingers were so cold, I could hardly feel anything. When they warmed up and turned red, I felt like I just went skiing. Brrr... everything was carpeted with snow - cars, statues, the pavement... the streets were so slippery that the snow actually started to get annoying. On the way back from the cinema, Lu, Wing Kit and I tried throwing little snowballs at each other. Hahaa... hope it'll snow again... and in the daytime. But just once will do. It's getting too cold.
Here's a shot of Prince's Gardens with my hall in the background:
[click!]
The
2004 Oscar Nominations are out!
Where I stand:
Among the Best Motion Picture nominations, I haven't seen
Lost in Translation. But needless to say... I'm going for LOTR... can't imagine any other film that's better than it!
Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role... *raises hand for Johnny Depp in
Pirates of the Caribbean*
Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role... the young talented Keisha Castle-Hughes for
Whale Rider has my full support. Beautiful, touching performance there.
Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role. Hmm. This one is hard. I'll save it till I've watched
The Last Samurai.
Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role... I'm undecided.
Best Achievement in Directing... LOTR!
Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen... I've only seen
Finding Nemo.
Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published... definitely LOTR! Or actually, maybe
Seabiscuit.
Best Achievement in Cinematography... my vote goes to
Master and Commander.
Best Achievement in Editing... LOTR again. Of course lah.
Best Achievement in Art Direction... as before, I'll wait till I've seen
Samurai.
Best Achievement in Costume Design... I dunno? Erm... LOTR again?
Best Achievement in Makeup... this I know. LOTR rules!
Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score... either James Horner or Howard Shore.
Oh yeah... to my Aussie friends (yeah yeah... I know you're still having your hols), or those in Sydney:
Happy Australia Day!
My parents and Jane have returned safely home from Zurich, only to discover that two more hamsters, Winter and Sunshine, have died. Winter was a beautiful white female from one of the earlier batches, and Sunshine was our only normal, cinnamon-coloured female. Poor Jane's so upset; Sunshine's her favourite. I don't get why... it's so early though. For them I mean. They're of the 3rd generation and beyond... Sunshine's only 7 months' old. My mom says it might be something the maid did (or didn't do)... we don't know.
Here's a sleepy Winter. I don't even know if I've got a picture of Sunshine. :/
They'll be missed.
Thanks Tay (for the pic) and Jeanne (for sending it to me).
Meet Mr Dile, aka Bob. aka The Croc. Ok, frankly, we aren't even sure he's a he, but ah, what the heck. It's a croc... the little croc that escaped from some croc farm (somewhere... it might even be from Johor) and made Sungei Buloh its home. It's been there for a long while... well over a year... it might even be close to two years now... can't remember. They say he's making regular appearances recently, and this was a shot of him near the Main Bridge! Usually, he stays deeper in the Reserve... around the ponds at Route 3.
Good luck if you're visiting SBWR. You're lucky if you get snatch a sight of him or the happy otter family.
[click to enlarge]
Whee!! Thanks GS for telling me! Did a search on ST online:
Big draw, big bang - firecrackers have been unbanned in S'pore after 32 years!
Haha... S'poreans are deprived no longer. Whatever took the government so long to act? :P
Before I forget... we've decided!
This Easter hols we'll be going to Italy... just Italy. Paris, Scotland and blah blah blah are all so close that we can visit them over one weekend, so we'll do just that - save them for the weekends! We'll be going to Rome, Pisa, Florence and Venice. Some others are going to Austria, Germany and the other countries. Actually, I don't know... hmm... all of them sound so tempting!
Chinatown today was, in one word, crowded. It was absolutely "people mountain people sea"... comparable to HK.
Organised by the BBC and the Met Police, this was a one-of-a-kind
festival considering that this is London. But then again, this is Chinatown, and I reckon Chinatowns all over the world are more or less the same. Still, it's an experience. At least we got to watch live firecrackers (which are banned in S'pore) going off, and a display of fireworks in broad daylight. It was interesting, seeing blasts and sparks exploding around the statues in Leicester Square. Imperial College's Malaysian Society even had a part in it - they formed the lion dance troupe!
Grabbed hold of a goodie bag and a balloon... haha... Year of the Monkey... I see monkeys everywhere. We didn't stay there for long... it was too crowded... walked to Covent Garden in an attempt to find a 'place with space' for lunch... everywhere was too crowded, and given that there're 11 people in our group it's a hard task. In the end we split up (the DSTA girls disappeared a long time ago, and then Alex, Lionel and co. wanted to stand in front of a jacket potato stall which had a t.v. to eat potatoes and watch soccer) and the rest of us - just 4 of us - went to Maccas... Macadees... whatever. McDonald's.
After play comes work (my have I got my priorities laid out wrong!), so here I am, about to start on my cell bio essays, due this Tues. And the work starts piling in...
2 rice cookers, plastic bag-fulls of Chinese lettuce and cabbage... plus some salmon and meatballs... we had a continuation of the steamboat dinner from 3 nights ago. With entertainment too. We ate and watched Jet Li's
Wong Fei Hong: Once Upon a Time in China II, going 'whoo' and 'ahh' at the impressive fighting scenes.
We enjoyed some
nian gao... with people fighting over the pieces... each wanting more. It was followed by tubs of ice-cream... and more late-night chats along the corridor on the topic of trips and destinations, while some others watched
Home Run in room 'Delta 10'. We're gonna start planning our Mar/Apr holiday... going around Europe... comparing the experiences of those who've been to France, Paris, Venice, Rome yadda yadda...
Gonna attend some festive celebrations at Chinatown tomorrow (erm, today). *yawn* And I thought this'll be a quiet weekend. How wrong I am. Hmm... time to get more
nian gao...
Spent a few hours coming up with a new layout for this site. It's better now, with a uniform template and colours... better than the old one which was kinda like a few bits and pieces coming together. TH, forgive me for using *your* colour theme. :P But mine's different enough... no copyright issues here ehh?
The bar last night was so packed... there was hardly any place left to walk. It was a scene of red. We played Chinese music from our laptops - a selection of Mandarin, Hokkein and Cantonese oldies and contemporary music, plus CNY songs of course. There was a whole range of CNY goodies... kueh bankit (sp?)
juu yook gon aka
bak kwa, pineapple tarts, almond biscuits, sotong strips, peanuts, mandarin oranges, and the traditional '
lou heh as well. Others from our hall risked funny tastes to have a go at our Chinese foodstuffs... good on 'em. We passed those few hours idling around, chatting, playing cards, and making a mess of the bar.
Pics are up
here.
--------------------------
During the night, a bunch of Singaporeans walked into the bar. I thought that one of them looked extremely familiar... someone from my secondary school.
Later, I ventured to their table. "Erm... are you Audrey?"
She looked at me and blinked, "What are you doing here?"
We burst out laughing.
She continued, "... aren't you a few years younger than me?"
I nodded, "Yeah, you're my senior. But... I went to Australia, remember? I skipped a year."
She's in UCL (University College London), and it's her fresher year too. We exchanged numbers, and I asked if she knew of any other TKGians studying in London. Apparently, two of my other prefect seniors -the closer ones, too- are here. Sam and Gladys, one my direct mentor, the other my Class Prefect in Sec 1. Hahahaa... now I can't wait for my batch to get into uni... and see who'll end up in the UK.
Happy Chinese New Year everyone!
Had an excellent steamboat dinner last night, with over 20 other Linsteadians - Singaporeans, Malaysians, Hong Kongers all. Packets of fish and meat balls, crabmeat sticks, prawns, chicken, pork, salmon... corn... veggies and
fun xi... dumped into 5 rice cookers (yep - those are our 'steamboats') across two tables. I think our YUM XING toasts echoed through the hall... each lasted more than 35 seconds (I know 'cos I filmed it, and overshot my video limit and we still hadn't reached the 'xing' part)... it was fun... the guys (well, mainly the guys) downed goodness knows how many bottles of tequila, pimms, rum and vodka... and could no longer walk along a straight line...
More pics are up in the gallery.
There're gonna be more celebrations down at the bar tonight... this time with all the CNY goodies and edibles. All are welcome!
The past few days...
SatHitched a few rides on the open-top buses of the Big Bus Company; went on (another) tour of the City of London and Westminster... around London Bridge, Tower Bridge etc etc, London Eye, Trafalgar Square, Picadilly Circus, St Paul's Cathedral, etc etc... bringing my parents and my sis around... feeling like a tour guide...
Simple Japanese dinner in Chinatown...
SunWent on the near-3 hours' journey down south-west to Winchester to visit my cousin Justin who's studying at
Winchester College... went on (also another) tour of the little town of Winchester and the
Cathedral, as well as the College. Mom was impressed...
Dinner at Shanghai Knightsbridge; my 9-year-old sis Jane was so tired that she fell sound asleep in her chair.
MonSkipped the second lecture, only to go with my Jane to the Natural History Museum... I've been there so many times that I hardly need the map anymore... we took 3 hours to complete two exhibits... Jane reads almost each and every word on the panels! Quick lunch at the Earth Galleries Cafe, then... went back to the hotel to send my dad off... who left for Zurich for some business matters.
Mom, Jane and I made our way to the famous
Madame Tussauds wax museum... spent some time there admiring the life-like figures and taking pics with the celebrities... they look so real! That area's also home to Arthur Conan Doyle's character Sherlock Holmes... there's a
Sherlock Holmes Museum but we were too late and didn't make it for the last admission for the day.
ICSS had a CNY dinner tonight... but since my family's here, I didn't go. Heard it's really good though - especially the dessert.
TuesSkipped the second lecture again. Went to Buckingham Palace to witness the Changing of the Guards ceremony (which, unfortunately, did not take place due to the poor weather... but we did manage to see two little parades of the Queen's Guards and the Horse Guards).
The Cell Biology tute with Dr Lamb in the afternoon wasn't as boring as expected... but it was more of an English lesson than anything else... complete with 'worksheets' for us to 'spot the errors' made in English grammar, spelling, punctuation, sentence structure etc. Dr Lamb is a good mentor... and from what I heard he really cares for his students... but I just wished he wasn't so egoistically occupied with his seemingly-perfect command of the English language.
We managed to secure tickets for the West End's
The Lion King, one of the musicals which I've been wanting to watch... so... that happened in the evening. It was not bad! A colourful performance... engaging music... and it follows Disney's original animated film so closely that the scenes and dialogue are almost the same, 'cept for a few extra songs. It was interesting to see how they staged certain sequences.
WedMom and I decided at breakkie that I'd wag the whole day's lectures. So... in the morn... shopping around Knightsbridge... got me some new clothes. Just in time for CNY.
Had a humble McDonald's (good 'ole Maccas... or Macadees... or whatever) lunch... sat around in the hotel room for a while... then my mom and sis walked me back to my hall... and said our good-byes there. They'd fly to Zurich to meet up with my dad, and head back to S'pore in a few days. Poor Jane was crying all the way... from the hotel to my hall... and from my hall back to the hotel and to the airport... and on the plane also... asked if I would go back again in March. Aww... I dunno.
I couldn't play multiplayer CS, so I played something else -
Tried starting again in
Partisans, and found a few old mates and familiar names in
Onslaught. My old clans have all disppeared though. They never live long. If you've nothing to do, and would like to kill some time, go for Onslaught, if you're in for MPOGs.
Yep, J.L. is back, after more than half a year of absence.
"
Pulvis et umbra sumus" ~ We are but dust and shadow
It's over! The Biology of Organisms paper today was all right I guess; I'm quite contented. We had a little 'poll' after the exam: "Which is your favourite worm?" The turbellarians (marine flatworms) lead the way... understandably, since I don't think earthworms, leeches or roundworms have much of a charm factor.
Went to that crepe place (there's still an ongoing dispute as to how 'crepe' is supposed to be pronounced. Some say 'crap', some 'crape', and the rest, 'creep'...) for lunch... take-away, since there were 11 of us and there's obviously not enough space inside the creperie for all of us... also had some light
makan at Oriental Canteen next door.
My family arrived in London this arvo... yay! Went to meet them at their hotel after lunch. Went to the creperie -again- and the Natural History Museum after that.
Then... they came to Linstead for a while... and left... and I had dinner in the dining hall just like usual.
After dinner... spectator-ed a round of table footsie... and went back to my room to resume my bit-torrent-ting of movies. I love BitTorrent! Then the guys started a round of Counter Strike; I tried joining in, but couldn't as I had a much older version (goodness knows when was the last time I played CS! Back when I was in Abbotsleigh!)... so... tried downloading the newest patch... took nearly 2 hours... and ran into problem after problem while trying to update my version. Grrr...
Amar and I were both too lazy to fence tonight, as originally planned, so... another day...
Hey for all you technies out there in IC, have a look at this
article. It explains some stuff.
Yea... one down, one more to go. I have decidedly declined to comment about today's 25%-weighted BioChem exam. I found this amusing though:
The Chief Invigilator to the students: "It is stated that no-one leaves the examination room within the first half-hour, and no-one leaves within the last half-hour. Since this is an hour-long exam, basically it means that no-one leaves this room at all."
... ... haha...
Now, I've to get this off my chest. More rants about my college server.
Out of curiousity, I did a bandwidth test on cnet. Apparently, it's running at an extremely laughable 29kbps. Nearly half of a dial-up 56k modem, which is already fast becoming a thing of the past. Arrggh... this is *supposed* to be faster... I reckon at least 5 times faster. Hrrmph.
On a totally random note, the one huge blister that had formed from a sandfly bite from last Wednesday is still here... in that it's still not burst. Hmm... am tempted... to... poke...
Anyway, the dates are set! A little away-from-home 'reunion' steamboat dinner in Linstead next Weds, and we'll be taking over the bar on Thurs night! Mwahaha... Chinese New Year is coming...
Everything loves to happen when I'm about to leave. My reason for not being able to attend those everythings would be "Sorry, I need to pack." And I'd put on the music from my collection of mp3s and replay Eagle Eye Cherry's
Save Tonight. Saturday was the Asian Waterbird Census Day, and the Nature Society needed help with the birdcounts. Sungei Buloh also needed volunteer guides for that day, since none had signed up for duty. And there was this crazy SEC/GVN 11pm-6am walk from Toa Payoh to MacRitchie to Adam Rd... and to the Botanic Gardens. And friends of my friends would - at the last minute - ring me up (finally) to discuss a convenient time to meet up and pass me some stuff to 'topang' back to London. Well since they ended up coming round to my place, it was very convenient for me... only that I disrupted my dinner numerous times running up and down the condo. Dinner was a feast... mom had invited several of her close friends over... and I had company.
-----------------------------------------
My flight was on Sunday morn. It took great control not to shed a single tear (helped by the knowledge that my family would most likely be visiting London within this week)... usually I'd sniff a little, at least. I've been through this countless times, but it's something that I can never quite get used to. Sydney is a mere 7 hours' away, but it takes almost double that amount of time to get to London. But I did gradually grow more excited as I thought of settling back into the crazy Linstead Hall life with my friends there.
The trip was average, with its fair share of bumps and 'turbulent weather'. But when the plane got to Heathrow, it had to wait on the taxiway for a good 20 minutes because another plane had occupied our parking port. And there was a terrible traffic jam on the roads... making my journey back to Linstead unnecessarily long and tiring. It could've been achieved in 45 minutes or less, but it took nearly 2 hours.
That was last night; I simply unpacked, checked my flooding inbox for new emails, and flopped onto my bed.
-----------------------------------------
I thank my bio department for starting school (btw we're supposed to loathe that word now - it ain't 'school' anymore... it's 'uni') on Wednesday instead of today. When my neighbours were slamming doors rushing off to school, I was still in bed. But Wednesday's our exams... so... I had to 'mug'.
Dinner today was... interesting. I glanced around the dinner table and noticed that everyone had a new look - new hairstyles. Waves of the hand with enthusiastic hellos... amidst our first dinner of term 2: beef, button sprouts and cauliflower. Typically British, aye? Then it was our good 'ole post-dinner chats outside the dining hall, of no topic in particular, but full of mad randomness and what Charl calls 'Amar's Amarity'. Had some good douses of humour from rather off-colour jokes. Ee-wen and I were clutching our sides with laughter. After that was a round of table footsie (just ONE round 'cos among all of us, there was only ONE 20p coin), where, in an odd occurance, the S'pore side lost to the M'sians. Meanie guys talking about playing Diablo again... till Lionel reminded me to "go and mug!" and I scooted off to my room.
The Crow-billed drongo... a lifer for me!
Yet another tick on my local birds checklist. My long day -with Tania, and initially ThiHa as well- at
Sungei Buloh was thus not wasted (it never is)... add to that an unconfirmed identification of a raptor which, through my scope, I saw as 'falcon-like', and near half the size of the White-bellied sea-eagle which was gliding above it. Checking the birdlist of the Reserve, there's only the Peregrine falcon or Eurasian hobby that resemble what I saw, so... either one of those would be excellent as well... haven't seen any of those before... :)
Took a quick walk with Tania to Kranji NT, and got attacked by mozzies, sandflies, and flies. That place is becoming worse. More dead fish and dead stuff... I wonder why. Met
Hua Qin who was there carrying out some research work with two other NUS students. Browsed some blogs and found out that they're doing projects on the
Horseshoe crabs and
shrimps of the mangrove. Interesting... didn't know NUS has such, erm, projects, for undergrads.
Anyway, other sightings to report:
- a few storks flying overhead
- a Lesser Coucal
- lots of Great and Little egrets
- a Yellow bittern
- Grey and Purple herons
- lots and lots of Cotton-stainer bugs
- numerous
Nephila species, one of which I have not seen before
- numerous juvenile St. Andrew's cross spiders
- many Water monitors (most are juveniles)
- a Shore-pit viper
- Long-tailed macaque
- Plaintain squirrels
- and unfortunately many, many mozzies as well. I'm itching so much that I feel like a monkey.
The Reserve's 10th anniversary commemorative book is out at last! Soon to be placed on sale to the public (at $29 each), they're negotiating with HSBC to let us volunteers have them for free. Heh... no matter. I've bagged my copy. It's a wonderful book... "
Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve - a decade of wetland conservation"... superb photos, contributions from volunteers, staff and the public, speeches by ministers and topshots... it traces the humble beginnings of Sungei Buloh in 1993 as a prawn farm through the ages, to become the conservation site of international importance it is today. Makes us all proud.
Managed to get the biochem notes (which comes bundled with cell bio, chem, and animal husbandry notes) off Tania, based on her lectures at USyd. So it'll be back to studying for me for the remainder of my vacation in S'pore. Gahh... am really losing self-discipline...
My mom knocked on the door and just now and yelled out that a MTR train in HK had been set on fire. It's scary. I might have been on that same train yesterday or two days ago. Admiralty is the station closest to our hotel, and Tsim Sha Tsui was where I went for breakfast with my friends.
From the Straits Times:
14 hurt in HK subway fireFrom Ming Pao:
鐵首被縱火警方通緝狂徒While I'm on the subject of news, I should not forget to mention the
death of HK popstar Anita Mui. The news was (and still is) everywhere when I was in HK. That's all I'll say for now, for I do not know what else I should say about it. My mom's been following the HK channels of cable TV closely for the past few days.
This trip to HK wasn't as bad as my previous ones. Partly because it's only 3 days' long and I didn't fall sick, but mostly because now, I have friends there. It was absolutely great being able to meet up with my Aussie high school mates again. I spent the majority of my time there with them... and didn't even step into my grandma's or my aunt's homes! Naughty me. But I now know HK a lot better. Or at least I've been to places where I haven't been to before. And also, at least I spent all the dinners there with relatives.
The next day when I had the little reunion with Cynthia and Jenny, one my ex many-term-roommie, the other my former English class classmate, we had difficulty deciding what to do and where to go. We ended up strolling through Hong Kong Park and its 600-bird aviary (which I never knew existed), and eventually trotted uphill and down again to visit the HK Botanical and Zoological Gardens. The latter was rather pathetic, sad to say, having in its 'collection' one lone jaguar, several species of primates, birds, and a reptile enclosure which was closed for upgrades (hrrmph!). It was also then that I noticed that despite it being winter, HK wasn't at all that cold. In fact, if one were to describe the weather then, the word 'cold' was hardly applicable. It was warm. I was wearing only one layer of clothes - a top that I could have worn on the streets of tropical S'pore - and I was sweating. The local HKgers were all in typical winter gear: boots, jeans, a thick top, a big jacket or coat... and one or two wore a scarf or even a beanie. My reasoning for this was twofold - that Hong Kongers have lost the ability to perspire, or, as a 'fashion statement', they wore winter clothes for the sake of the name of this season.
Cyn and I met again the next day, and this time we went to a more memorable destination - the
Goldfish Market, where aquarium stuff and fish (plus chinchillas and other pets, including newts!) shops line both sides of the street from end to end... or the
Bird Garden, which is actually more like a very packed bird market (if a place such as that existed in S'pore, it would most certainly be pounced upon by the hawkish government... well in the first place, it wouldn't exist for the simple fact that the government authorities wouldn't allow it to exist on the grounds of cruelty - cages consist of birds packed into it like sardines... fledgings have their wings and tails clipped and thrown into plastic boxes, sometimes with a sheet of hard plastic covering it... parrots being kept in cages so small they can hardly spread their wings without hitting the bars on the sides... and more). I took videos and photos of their poor conditions and environments... they resemble the photos typically used in articles on the illegal bird trade.
That night, I had a sleepover at Cyn's place. We chatted till late, just like old times... like the days back in the boarding house. We chatted till very late... past 3am. We talked about many things, many of which were close to heart. The next morn saw through our sleepy eyes a breakfast with more friends. We said our goodbyes after that. Lunch with the relatives of my dad's side, afternoon tea with the relatives of my mom's side, and after checking out of the hotel, we were headed towards the airport, on our way back to S'pore.
I'm going to Hong Kong! This was decided less than 3 hours ago. We fill in the gaps (there are many) when I return, or if I have the chance to do so when I'm there.
Stay tuned to the phlog section... if I have the time... I'll be phlogging. My, everything's so rushed.
Oh, and happy new year by the way.
