Here Be Dragons

Dragons have featured in Chinese folklore for thousands of years, revered for their auspicious power, and can be seen throughout Chinese culture, art and myths. Along with the Phoenix they were the symbol for Chinese emperors and are the only mythical creature to be represented on the Chinese Zodiac (if you were born after Chinese New Year in 1940, 1952, 1964, 1976, 1988, 2000, or multiples of 12 years thereafter - you are a dragon!).

Similarly here in Hong Kong, dragons are just as important to local culture and can be seen throughout the territory. Kowloon was so named after the 9 dragons (gow =9, lung= dragon), that are depicted by the 9 peaks around the area. Even with new buildings, considerations with regards to dragons were thought to be taken into consideration. A famous residential development in Repulse Bay was built with a large hole in the middle which some believed was done to allow the dragon from the hills above to fly down to the sea unobstructed to drink - which of course is ridiculous, as dragons do not drink seawater. However it underscores the importance that dragons play even in modern day Chinese culture.

Today, dragons, or dragon boats more precisely, could be seen all over Hong Kong, out in their full glory to celebrate the Tuen Ng (Dragon Boat) festival. All the months of hard training today paid off for the hundreds of teams taking part in the races being held across the Territory. Having failed in our endeavours to get a company team to enter the event (the other original company participants all cried off early on in the training regime as it was too hard going), I turned up in Sai Kung at 7:00am to support the Hong Kong Amatuer Dragon Boat Association (with whom I have been training with these past few months) in their pursuit of honours over the 500m long course, in various classes.

I ended up paddling for the mixed 12's, coming in 4th in the final after a photo finish. All I will say that it was extremely hard going, through very choppy water over a very long course (they race over 275m at Stanley), - we were not even allowed a swim afterwards as sharks had been spotted in the area.

Despite our performance in the mixed 12's, the HKDBA did well all in all, enough to win several roast pigs and a few crates of San Miguel which were soon polished off afterwards!

So it is the international races at Tsim Sha Tsui this coming weekend. I have been invited to come along, however, this is serious stuff now so I do not fancy my chances of getting to race, anyway we shall wait and see. Will post some pics of today's event when I get them.

A Clear Day

On the rare occasion that the wind is blowing from Hong Kong towards the factories in China, instead of the other way around, the pollution levels drop and I get quite a good view from my window up on the 39th Floor - as caught here on Darling's new camera. (I know, if I had photoshop I could have done a better job with aligning the shots into the panoramic pic - but I don't, so I had to make to with Microsoft photo editor).

10 Years On

With just over a couple of weeks to go till the 10th Anniversary of the Handover of Hong Kong from British to Chinese rule, excitement levels in the City are rising in eager anticipation of the fun and festivities planned to mark this event.

Hong Kong’s biggest and most expensive fireworks show ever is planned for the evening of July 1st , with 31, 888 (auspicious no.) fireworks due to be launched from four barges moored in Victoria Harbour. The fireworks will be launched to explode in time to a number of songs, both old and new, comprising 10 themes, the first of which is titled “Salute to our Motherland” - an event not to be missed!

Visitors to Ocean Park will be able to see Hong Kong’s 2 new giant pandas, Le Le and Ying Ying, who will be on show to the public for the very first time, providing a special treat for both tourists and locals alike.

Visitors wishing to travel on the recently opened cable car service from Tung Chung to the Big Buddha on Lantau, however, will be disappointed. The service is currently under suspension until further notice, due to an unfortunate incident occurring on Monday evening where a gondola car fell from the support cable, landing on it’s roof, approximately 50m below. Fortunately the car was empty at the time and nobody was hurt, as the incident happened after the cable car service had closed to the public for the day. Speculation abounds as to the cause of the problem, with early rumors suggesting that the failure may be due to metal fatigue, which would be rather worrying after less than a year’s operational service.


Darling and I, however, will miss out on all the fun and excitement as we will be celebrating the 10th Anniversary of the Handover relaxing by the pool at The Oriental Hotel in Bangkok, (probably after a full morning of shopping at Siam Paragon).

Sai Kung - Scorchio!

Well, with the Dragon Boat festival is fast approaching (June 19th) and training for the event is really heating up - quite literally. Summer is most definitely here in Hong Kong and the conditions out on the water in Sai Kung can only be described as absolutely scorching!

With only a couple of weeks left to practice, the training session commenced half an hour earlier than normal and started with the usual warm up (quite ironic considering the weather) on the beach. At the start of the session another gweilo turned up and asked to join the training, (bit late now I thought), however, as the HKADBA are a very amicable bunch he was welcomed and told that he could join - just as long as he filled out the form providing his emergency contact details first. Whilst slathering myself in sunscreen, I overheard the chap mention that he used to take part in outrigger canoe racing, and had done a bit of dragon boat racing before, so this should be no problem for him (ahh I thought - this should be interesting!).

Out on the water, training consisted of the normal speed trials, anaerobic sessions, practice on paddling technique, as well as paddling with lumps of wood tied to the bow of the boat to increase drag and generally make it tougher to paddle ( I thought that the blaring sun was doing quite a good job of this). We also had a couple of bouts of paddling with your eyes closed - which actually is not as daft as it sounds. (It is aimed at making you feel the paddle rate and how the boat is moving, which becomes particularly important during a race as it is absolute chaos - drums going, people shouting, lots of barricking between boats, all with the aim of trying to put other teams off their rythym, so it is important not to loose concentration). Dragon boating is not without it's fair share of dirty tricks it would appear.

The 'crack' on the boat during practice was fierce (for anyone reading this who is not from the UK, please see the footnote with regards to the meaning of 'crack'). There is a lot of joking and mickey taking in a mix of Cantonese and English in between bouts of paddling frenetically. The new chap struggles somewhat with his paddling technique, so the drill seargent and his second in command make their way to the back of the boat to put him right. I ignore the shouts from the other paddlers to give the chap instruction and show him how it should be done, and instead resort to throwing water over a few people in my normal mature manner.

It will be of no surprise to quite a few of you that I have ended up quite badly sunburnt again (it is rumoured by some that I can get burnt just by turning a light on in a darkened room!). The use of gloves and knee pads have caused some fairly odd looking burn patches (white hands - burnt arms, burnt legs with a white patch on my right knee, and another white patch on my left shin!). As for my face, well that is pretty much burnt all over except for the whte lines caused by my sunglasses.

In retrospect, I should have paid more attention to the very sensible advice given out by the Hong Kong Government on it's website today, some of which I have copied below.



VERY HOT WEATHER WARNING

VERY HOT WEATHER WARNING

THE VERY HOT WEATHER WARNING HAS BEEN ISSUED BY THE HONG
KONG OBSERVATORY AT 7:45 A.M.

THE HONG KONG OBSERVATORY IS FORECASTING VERY HOT WEATHER
IN HONG KONG TODAY. THE RISK OF HEATSTROKE IS HIGH.

WHEN ENGAGED IN OUTDOOR WORK OR ACTIVITIES, DO DRINK PLENTY
OF WATER AND AVOID OVER EXERTION. IF NOT FEELING WELL, TAKE
A REST IN THE SHADE OR COOLER PLACE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.

THE HONG KONG OBSERVATORY ADVISES THAT PROLONGED EXPOSURE
UNDER SUNLIGHT IS TO BE AVOIDED. LOOSE CLOTHING, SUITABLE
HATS AND UV-ABSORBING SUNGLASSES CAN REDUCE THE CHANCE OF
SUNBURN BY SOLAR ULTRAVIOLET RADIATION.

SWIMMERS AND THOSE TAKING PART IN OUTDOOR ACTIVITIES SHOULD
USE A SUNSCREEN LOTION OF SPF 15 OR ABOVE, AND SHOULD
RE-APPLY IT FREQUENTLY.


DISPATCHED BY HONG KONG OBSERVATORY AT 07:46 HKT ON 03.06.2007

Post blog note - 'Crack' is used in the UK (particularly in the construction industry)in substitution to a many a word or phrase relating to things in general. Instead of What's going on?, What's happening?, What are you up to? People would say What's the crack? (I hope this helps).

May Day, May Day!

I must say that I prefer the system of having a public holiday on the date that it is intended, such as how things are in Hong Kong, rather than the British way of shifting your day off to the nearest Monday. This way your working week can be broken up rather nicely, as it was this week, with May Day falling on Tuesday. This allowed us to have a couple of extra beers after squash (I know, it defeats the purpose), without having to worry about going into work the next day. I awoke on Tuesday morning to find that Dim Sum with the inlaws had been cancelled :-) and went promptly back off to sleep again for another couple of hours - bliss.

The day was fairly uneventful all in all, with very well behaved attendance at the May Day marches, as is the norm in Hong Kong.

In Macau, however, things were a touch more lively. The May Day protest on the other side of the Pearl River delta turned somewhat ugly with a police officer firing his pistol into the air to try and gain order. This, however, apparently escalated things somewhat and it was quite a while before order was resumed. Thankfully none of the public who were stood on the footbridge directly above the police officer when he fired his weapon were shot, which was rather fortunate.

However some poor chap minding his own business riding his bicycle some three hundred metres away ended up with a bullet entering his neck and finishing up somewhere near his lung. Thankfully he is now in a stable condition, however it would appear that what goes up, most certainly does come down, and in this case with enough force to do you some damage. So if you have ever wondered can anyone be shot by a bullet returning under force of gravity after being fired directly into the air, you now know!

Photo nabbed from Hemlock's Diary

Black Holes, Revelations and Hysteria - Muse live in Hong Kong

Well, excellent performance from Muse last night in Hong Kong.

Fantastic set, starting with Take a Bow and finishing off with Nights of Cydonia (my favourite of the night), only dissapointment was that they did not play Absolution.

The crowd was the liveliest I have seen in over 9 years of going to concerts in Hong Kong and even had us jumping around a bit (not like me at all...). The Pics posted were taken with my new Dopod PDA phone, so please excuse the poor quality. As you can see this appears all the rage at gigs nowadays, with people photographing or recording almost the entire set on their mobiles or cameras (check out the link to You Tube below).

As for my mobile I have now figured out how to lock the keypad as during the excitement of last night I managed (without knowing it at the time), to connect to the internet, reject 2 calls and phone Reedy Boy back in the UK treating him to 3 mins of the concert (sorry fella!).

Well worth seeing if you get the chance and certainly worthy of the accolades they are currently enjoying (best live band - Brit Awards, best British Band - NME Awards etc).

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=muse+%26+hong+kong

Kung Hei Fat Choy!

Dear all,
Wishing you good health, happiness and prosperity for the coming year of the pig.

I am off for a week's skiing to Canada (check out the link added to the front page), so will not post for a while, but will upload some pics when I get back.

Take care all and best regards,

Hoj.

View from the Window over Wanchai and Causeway Bay