hike to lion rock

Today was a perfect day for a hike -- blue, cloud-free skies (and to think that Freddy predicted rain!), sunny, yet surprisingly cool, and very very clear by HK standards. I felt like doing something a little more challenging than the short hikes I go on around my house, and since the weather was so exceptionally good, I decided that it was a perfect opportunity to go to Lion Rock. Another reason I chose Lion Rock, is that I know the trail to be a well-frequented one, even on week-days, so I felt safe about hiking it alone (even after all of those scary government commercials about the dangers of hiking solo...). For some reason, there are usually hoards of elderly people on this trail -- always a great ego boost to encounter cane-carrying old men and women casually making their way down the mountain that you're huffing and puffing to get up!


A view of Kowloon and HK island from the saddle of the mountain.
On the way up to the top. I think that Lion Rock looks especially lionish from this angle.

A sign warning of the dangers of falling. For some reason, I've always found these signs mildly amusing, but I realize that the danger is real. I think it was just a few weeks ago that a middle-aged woman fell to her death. Yikes!

View from the top. I took the next eight shots in succession, and one day might try to photoshop them together into one big panoramic shot. But for now, they're still separate.
We start with a view of Ma On Shan ("Horse Saddle Mountain") off to the left.

One of those is Kowloon Peak, and that's Eastern Kowloon below.

Kowloon and the Eastern part of HK island. You can see the old Kai Tak airport in the middle.

The Kowloon Peninsula and HK island.

Western Kowloon and the outlying islands. I think you can just barely make out Lantau. And that's Beacon Hill on the right.

More of Western Kowloon, and maybe even Tsuen Mun? And Tai Wai below.

Tai Wai and Shatin. The big mountain in the background is Tai Mo Shan, HK's tallest peak.

Shatin and Ma On Shan (far right, back where we started from). You can just barely make out the "Eight Fairies" towering above Tai Po in the distance.


On my way up and down, I was surprised by the lack of monkeys. But judging from all the warning signs, they still must be making appearances on weekends and public holidays, when people have picnics and barbecues here.
I've never understood why they use the word "stockade" for this place to dump your trash. Maybe it's all part of the "war against the monkeys" mindset.
More informational posters about monkeys. Sorry about the glare.


This poster is my favorite by far. Especially the pictures captioned "do not stare at monkeys" and "avoid eating while monkeys are watching."

gabriel john: future broadway star

Amy, Gabe and Anna went back to Tianjin on Sunday. But since Amy's birthday is coming up this week, we decided to go out for an early birthday dinner. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of the birthday girl herself, but have quite a few of her progeny. :) Here is Gabe enjoying some ice-cream.
With Grandma.
After we'd left the restaurant, Amy and I noticed that Gabe was singing a song, and after some close listening, we determined that the song was most definitely a Gabe original. But then I could be wrong. Has anyone ever heard a song with the lyrics "golden deliciously warm" repeated over and over again?

Here he is singing it.


As you can see, "Golden deliciously warm" is quite a catchy song. Soon I was singing it along with him, and after we got the technical side of the music down, we started working on choreography.

the many faces of anna irene

distractions

I'm always amazed at how many distractions I can find when I'm trying to do something that I don't really want to do (i.e. write a paper). Thankfully, after I'm done with this course, I probably won't be writing many more papers...

Most recent distraction: I walked into my parents' room and found Templeton curled up inside the space at the base of their portable fan. He looked so funny, I just had to take a picture and post it immediately...

bombay dreams

I have a paper to write for tomorrow (!!), but felt the need to post these photos first. I've become such a slave to my blog!!

Anish will be leaving for the UK on Friday, so a few of us got together yesterday for a little farewell bash. We went to a great Indian buffet called Bombay Dreams for lunch.

Here we are.

My first plate from the buffet... wish I could identify all of these curries and sauces, but alas I cannot. But they were all delicious!

Anish and Fredo.
Kai getting full.


Sal and I posing with some left-over naan and chutney.
I have some more photos and videos of Anna and Gabe to post, but will save that for after my work is done...

don't let the pigeon drive the bus!

This is a really cute book, and I've been very entertained seeing and hearing it read to Gabe.
On the back cover is the following sentence: "Finally, a book you can say "no" to!" And judging from Gabe's responses, it's true! Check out the video:

ugly

My mom and sister were watching a "documentary" about the world's ugliest animals. Here are some of my favorites:

elephant seal

wart hog


proboscis monkey


star nosed mole


naked mole rat


hag fish



templeton

"One of these things is not like the others,
One of these things just doesn't belong,
Can you tell which thing is not like the others
By the time I finish my song?"

oops

It's become a tradition that whenever my sister comes home for a visit, she looks through any clothes that I might be getting rid of. This time, I had quite a large collection (I'd decided it was finally time to sever ties with any and all clothing items I hadn't worn in 3+ years...), which pleased her greatly. But her excitement was turned to sadness and bitterness when she found the bridesmaid's dress that I'd worn at her wedding almost 8 (!!) years ago among the pile of unwanted clothes. She was deeply hurt, and very confused as to why I wouldn't want to keep it. Here she is using the dress to wipe her tears.**For anyone who is confused and thinks I would actually blog about such an incident, not to mention take a picture of my sister crying because of my actions, no, this is a joke. But the part about me wearing that dress at Amy's wedding and now wanting to get rid of it was true.

anna banana

I just hung out with Anna a little bit while Amy was putting Gabe to bed. This is the first time I've seen her since she started walking around a month ago. And as a petite 11-month-old, she's pretty much the tiniest thing I've ever seen on two legs!

Chillin' on the couch.

Smiling for the camera.
This next one was right after she ran down the hallway to the kitchen to meet MT. She might look pretty big next to him, but realize that she's in the foreground of the picture. In reality, she's probably about twice his height.

gabe and his puzzles

Amy, Gabe and Anna arrived this evening from Tianjin. As soon as Gabe got through the door, he went straight for the puzzles that my parents keep here for him.

Working on the puzzles in my room.

Getting some help from Anna.

Puzzles completed!

today's small successes

Believe it or not, this is my 80th post! That's not one of the successes I originally planned to write about, but I must say that I am proud of myself for posting as much as I have. Granted, many (or even most?) of my updates aren't exactly enthralling, but considering my previous experience with blogging on Xanga, I'm very proud of my improved consistency as a blogger.

Small Success #1: Successful Baking Experience
Double chocolate mint chip cookies -- yum! For me, the mint and chocolate combination ranks up there with peanut butter and chocolate, and I think these are possibly my favorite cookies ever. They were made using a recipe on the back of the Hershey's mint chocolate chips package. I made them for the first time about a year ago, and then was severely disappointed when I could no longer find the chips at City'super. But they suddenly reappeared a few weeks ago, at which time I immediately bought myself a small supply. I don't usually do much baking when it's just my parents and me around, but my sister and two of her kids will be coming down for a short visit tomorrow, so I figured that she could help us shoulder the calorie load.


Small Success #2: Organizational Feat

I've never been the most organized individual, yet good organization is something that I've always aspired too. I probably have a higher tolerance for disorder than a neat freak, but even so, I've realized that being disorganized creates a certain amount of stress for me, not to mention sucks up time whenever I need to find something that's gotten misplaced. I've also realized that not being a naturally organized person doesn't mean that there's no hope for me. There are measures I can take to train and help myself improve my organizational skills. Today I took some steps.
This is rather embarrassing, but I'll share it anyway, in the hopes that it will encourage others who are still fumbling in organizational darkness. Ever since I started taking classes at HKU in September, I've been given a variety of papers for my reference. These papers -- articles and handouts mainly -- gradually accumulated to the point at which they outgrew the folder that had been intended for their storage. And this is when the story starts to get embarrassing... instead of buying a new folder to store my burgeoning paper collection, I allowed the folder to evolve (or devolve? is that a word?) into a large pile on the floor of my bedroom. This pile continued to grow -- being knocked about and pushed out of order -- until recently when I gathered it up to put it into hiding. But though it was out of sight, its formless piling presence still haunted me. So today I decided enough was enough. I went to a stationery store and bought a large binder. Once I was home, I got the hole puncher out and finally removed the infamous pile from its dark hiding place. After about 20 minutes of sorting and hole-punching, I had a nicely organized binder with tabs delineating the different courses. Like most things that I put off doing, I was surprised by how quickly and easily I was able to accomplish this task. Another lesson learned? I hope so!

catherine tate

I was telling a few friends (and faithful readers) about The Catherine Tate Show today, and thanks to Youtube, will embed a few videos here. They're only a couple minutes each, and very entertaining.

In these first two she plays an extremely melodramatic mother...




In these next two she plays Helen Marsh, a woman who is always eager to volunteer for things that put her way out of her league...

fixing my phone

Anyone who's tried to call me within the last month or so will have heard of my cell phone troubles. All calls that I have picked up have involved an immediate and pause-free explanation from me that's gone something like this: "Hi _____, my phone is broken so I can't hear you. I'll call you back when I get to another phone. "

Since I wasn't sure if the problem was fixable, I thought briefly about buying a new phone, but was reluctant to do so. Maybe because I'm cheap, maybe because I actually prefer text-messaging to voice communication... either way, I survived about a month without a working phone.

But that has all changed! This evening, while running some errands in Shatin, I decided it wouldn't hurt to check to see if my phone was fixable. I wasn't sure what the prognosis would be, but even if it was good, I was expecting to be phoneless for at least a day or two. So you'll understand my surprise when at the first little phone store I checked at, the man told me that if I left my phone with him for 40 minutes and gave him HK$80 (about 10 bucks US), he could replace the speaker, and I would once again own a working phone! Wow. I took him up on it, and needless to say, I'm feeling quite silly for putting off for so long what was ultimately very easily fixed. Hopefully I've learned my lesson...

tagging

I came across this sign in the stairwell of a building yesterday, and am still not sure what it means. All I can think of is that they've had problems with obnoxious children chasing each other up and down the stairs and screaming, "YOU'RE IT!!" If any Chinese readers out there can fill me in on other possible interpretations, I'd be much obliged.

____________________________________________________________________
Update: My friend Kristi informs me that "tagging" can refer to graffiti, or a special style of graffiti. Thanks, Kristi!

templeton the kittenherd

My mom found two little kittens near our house, and brought them home a couple days ago with the intention of finding homes for them (or letting the SPCA do so). She put them in a cage [which we use expressly for such kittenish purposes] in the living room, and Templeton immediately took an exceptional interest in them. This morning I found him playing with them by sticking his paws through the bars of the cage. And then later we let them out to see if they wanted to play with him. The three of them did play together a little bit, but the kittens mainly just spent their time exploring, and Templeton would follow them around, almost herding them to and from different places in the house. And whenever the two kittens split up and went different directions, he would get this concerned look on his face, looking back and forth at each of them, until deciding which one needed more looking after. What a funny cat!


Looking after the kittens. Doesn't his face look concerned?

Watching them as they play.

An invitation to play.
Unfortunately for Templeton, we just took the kittens to the SPCA, so he has no more little play mates. I can't help but sense some disappointment on his furry little face...

amaryllis

I've meant to take a pictures of these flowers every spring for the past couple years. But usually, by the time I get my camera ready, they're already gone.

night out with custard and slimey

Had the rare opportunity of meeting up with Curtis and Simon (visiting from the US and Australia respectively) on Thursday night. A bunch of us got together in Soho, and I felt obliged to document the evening in photos. Here they are:

Mike and Curtis outside the yummy Lebanese place (name eludes me now).
Another *completely candid* shot.

Mike and Helen at Wildfire, the cozy restaurant where we went for dessert.
Curtis, Jen and Simon. We had fun reminiscing about our days at ICS.

Helen, Sal and I.

My yummy dessert -- chocolate torte. Couldn't resist taking a picture of it -- so pretty!
After saying goodbye, Sal and I got on the MTR where we had an interesting first. Well, it was a first for me at least. I don't know -- Sal, have you come across many Elvis impersonators on HK public transport?