Olympiaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!

The night of the opening ceremonies in Beijing, Sorina and I went out on the town. Actually, it was more like I followed her around while she picked up some jewelery she had made, and visited some stores she wanted to see. We were supposed to celebrate the last night in Hong Kong but ended up at a massage place at 9:45pm and we weren't out of there until 12:30. It was a tiny little place with faded reflexology posters on the wall and it felt like someone's living room. The guy had to call in a friend to be the other masseuse. I missed all of the awesome ceremony dances and so on, but did see a lot of the parade of countries. While this woman was pounding on my back with her elbows, I remember thinking "Hey that sounds like Sarah Brightman" and then nothing but agony. I did get to see that guy fly on cables and light the Olympic torch.
On Saturday those of us who didn't leave early went to Stanley market. This was my second trip to the market and tomorrow morning I have to go a third time because I'm having a dress altered. The bus ride up there is worth the trip alone. The double decker bus climbs over and around the mountains towards the south side of the island and you get some fantastic vistas and panoramic views.
And then everybody went their separate ways. Most stayed in or nearby to pack and get ready to leave the next morning. I was doing a practice pack because I was changing rooms and figured I might as well make sure that I had enough space in my luggage for all of my stuff. In the middle of that, Adam got in touch with me and we ended up meeting for a drink downtown. The next day I followed him and Jerry around in the afternoon while they tried to promote Beerlao to the some of the bars on Lantau island. Even though I've been to Lantau island a couple of times that was my first time taking the ferry. After about 40 minutes we arrived at Mui Wo village and I took pictures while they walked around giving away beer and speaking to bar owners. We took a taxi deeper into the island and enjoyed a very fine pizza and a very fine bitter ale at one of these places. It took us a while to get back to Mui Wo because we had to wait for the bus for a while and it was Sunday. There are wild cows around Hong Kong (I heard it was because farmers just let them go when they had to shut down their farms!) and I saw a couple of them putter across the road and almost get hit by a giant bus as it tore around the corner. And then a few minutes later I saw someone's dog have a similar near-death experience. I don't know how there are not more accidents on these roads. The Hong Kong drivers might be crazy, but the are really, really good.
Adam and I then met up with a friend of his who was in town and we watched the US vs. China men's basketball game on a big screen. The US won but it wasn't as easy as everybody thought it would be.
Today was seriously raining and I first went back to Sham Shui Po to return a cell phone that I bought that did not work. I don't want to talk about it. All of my experiences with phones on this trip has been highly frustrating and I know when I've been beaten. Anyway, that sort of set up the day because I thought it would be cool to check out the Hong Kong Heritage Museum because I heard it was fantastic. And it was, but it took me 2 hours of walking around in the rain to find. I don't know what I was expecting but I was thrilled when I realised that a big chunk of it actually dealt with the actual formation of the landscape and it started billions of years ago. They had artifacts of dinosaur eggs and other cool things. Not surprisingly, Hong Kong is in the centre of a bunch of now-defunct volcanoes and a lot of it is silt rock. But there was a lot more. Wetland, marshes - and at one point it was even a desert. And of course the most recent ice age carved some valleys too. The museum also dealt very well with all of the ecosystems of Hong Kong...different types of forest...freshwater...saltwater...all very interesting. Then there was a lot on the different people who have lived in Hong Kong. Different clans with different trades and lifestyles. There were whole floors of that museum that I didn't even see because I got tired. There was a small section dedicated to the sophisticated way people would crystallize salt from the sea and then use it to make shrimp paste.
I walked around for a while and walked down the Avenue of Stars and snapped a picture of Jet Li and Bruce Lee's stars. I couldn't help myself. I also shot a short video of two birds sharing a piece of bread or maybe a cookie. One of them keeps following the other and chirping to be fed. Watch the feathers!
Thoroughly wet and ready to go home by this point, I took a bus and sat in the top floor first seat through the rush hour traffic and tried not to doze too much as I went back to the hotel. Tonight I've just been watching the Olympics. China beat Poland in women's volleyball and it was a great match. It could have gone either way. I also watched a bit of synchronized men's 10 metre platform. Who could ask for more.
Tomorrow's weather is supposed to be nicer so I hope it's a good day for Stanley and the flower market.
Thanks for visiting.
Leslie

Typhoon Lagoon 8

I woke up early on Wednesday morning because I knew our field trip to the Lions Nature Centre in Sai Kung would be canceled if there was a tropical cyclone warning level of 3. So I found the web page for the Hong Kong SAR Observatory and saw the number 8 with winds from the southeast. I thought to myself "Gee, doesn't that mean that school is canceled"? And of course it was. People kept calling me to make sure that I knew. I felt sorry for the credit teachers because it's the last week of summer school and they really can't afford to lose a day. But as for me I stayed in bed all morning reading a book, had an extended lunch in the cafeteria, and then worked during the afternoon on lesson plans. I realised that the poor night staff, who are on from 8:30 pm or so, were also stuck there all day because no one was coming into work. Poor William and Moon. I've been here so long that I know all the night staff and they all know me. I will miss them.
There were very few things going on outside. The wind was roaring and there were periods of pretty serious rain. Sometimes the rain went sideways. There was also hail and, I swear it because I'm from Ottawa and I would know, snow. Little bits of flying white water that fell more slowly than rain. Very, very interesting. By the evening the typhoon has been downgraded to a tropical storm and we went to the shopping mall for dinner. Classy. I think the eye hit landfall around 180 km away from Hong Kong. We found out that street signs has been blown over uprooting the stones from the sidewalks and scaffolding had fallen off a building just down the street from us.

Typhoon Lagoon T1

Hong Kong has a number and symbol system for warning of incoming hurricanes. Since last night we have been under a T1 warning which means just wait-and-see. The air felt unsteady for the past day or so and the clouds just rolled over from the mountains this afternoon. Now Hong Kong is misty and damp. Apparently it's going to be like this for the next few days. If the warning gets upgraded to T3 then my little field trip to Sai Kung's Lions Nature Centre gets cancelled tomorrow and I will have to somehow add another day of curriculum. No problem.
After school yesterday I hopped on the MTR and went a couple of stops to Diamond Hill to see the Chi Lin nunnery. On the way there I passed by the Nan Lian Garden and decided to go inside. It is another classical sculpted garden in the style from the Tang Dynasty inside the city with different kinds of trees, rocks, ponds and some buildings. It has a circular pattern and you can only walk in one way and walk out another way! I was struck at how few people there were inside the garden. Visitors were outnumbered by the number of security people. I felt really conspicuous. I don't know why more people don't use it just to hang out or relax. It's not very big, and I don't think it's as nice as the Walled City Park in Kowloon.
Afterwards I went on to the Chi Lin Nunnery and admired the Lotus Pond with lily pads and dragonflies. The nunnery is Buddhist and the part open to visitors was really the main courtyard where you could walk around and peer into the various chambers but could not go inside. I saw some beautiful woodwork and some fantastically scary representations of Buddha's guardians and companions. There was burning incense and piped chanting coming from all around, and offerings of fruits on little glass dishes. A very nice experience.

Yesterday was a really long day. We left the hotel at 10am and rode out to the edge of town and then caught a bus to the Tai O fishing village. It amazing...downright astonishing that a village like that exists so close to the ultra-modern Hong Kong. When we got off the local bus we found a little tour outfit that for about $3 CAD drove us on a twenty minute boat ride through the town and out into the sea. The town is built around the little baylets that feed the sea and because of the tides coming in and out, a lot of houses are on wooden stilts. Having helped to install our dock this season, I had to wonder how they kept the wood from rotting. We were so close we could look into people living rooms. In fact, the whole town is like that. People sometimes leave their doors wide open. Once we got out into the sea our driver started looking for dolphins because there is a region around there where there are these famous pink-white dolphins. Too bad for us but we were not lucky that day. We did run into tourists later on who had seen them. Too bad. Maybe next year.
We wandered around the village for about an hour. We had lunch at the local noodle shop and then wandered some more. People bring in their catch and then hang the fish out to dry. On the main street there was shop after shop selling bushels and bushels of dried fish slices and other things I didn't want to look at too closely. A lot of them also seem to string pearls and bottle their own bean milks and there is a dark red berry juice that appears to be everywhere. I wasn't feeling brave enough to try it since I'm not sure they know the meaning of the word pasteurization. But it sure was interesting.
We stopped off at one of the new malls that just opened up and meandered for a while. That mall had a lot of upscale stores and it had a very curious layout. It was zoned into "Wood Zone", "Water Zone" and so on. I just didn't have the mental energy to try to figure out where the Ecco store was even though I was curious. I barely made it past the H&M. There was some kind of music festival going on in the mall so I watched a bit of a Capoeira show and wondered how they dared do some of the stuff they do on the extremely hard marble floor.
After our stop at the mall we went on to Victoria Peak. This is a must-see in Hong Kong. We caught a bus that snaked it's way up the mountain. The mountain is so high and steep, and the condo buildings downtown are so tall, that we could practically see into the windows of the people who lived on the 40th floor. The ride was great. There is also a tram but the wait was too long. At the top we found the lookout point and watched a bit of the famous Hong Kong lights show. Every night the buildings are all lit up with moving and flickering LEDs and it's really something to see. I'd like to see it again from the Kowloon harbour side some time this week. There are only a few places to eat up there and we ended up at...Burger King...(I know I can't believe it happened either...and I tell you...NEVER AGAIN). But then we found the Pacific Coffee and I had a fantastic latte (although they called it a cappuccino) and we relaxed a bit while overlooking the city lights.
We snaked down the peak again but this time in a taxi and then took the Star Ferry across to the harbour on the other side before taking the bus back to the hotel. A lot of walking and a lot of feasting for the eyes.
Today was a lazy start and we headed out to Stanley market for an afternoon of bargain and stuff hunting. This is another must-do because the ride to the south side of the island is gorgeous. I am figuring out all of the buses for these things. I talked for a bit with a locals heading to one of the beaches for a barbeque and birthday celebration. I saw those BBQs on the way home. They are these concrete fire pits with grills on top. Imagine having access to such a stunning day trip using fast public transit that costs less than a latte. The only drawback is that the water around the HK harbours are kind of dirty and if you (non-locals) want to swim you should go out to one of the outlying islands.
Stanley market is a large permanent series of shops stuffed with everything you can imagine. handmade cheap cloths, knock off purses (I tried to find a decent Coach copy wallet and could only find ones with nasty vinyl inside-disappointing-but I will not buy a copy purse for myself-I don't wear the real thing - what's the point), silk kimonos, mass produced oil paintings - real art galleries with original oil and water colours...I stayed in one of those for a long time admiring a painting. Only $1000 CAD. The art galleries are nestled among so much junk and crap that it's hard to believe it's serious business. There are also lots of places to buy jewelery of various grades of quality. We got a lesson in jade from a really nice man who sometimes spends his weekends at Stanley but other times teaches gemology here and there. Got his card but could not figure it out. He put my the bracelet I bought in Shenzhen under a UV light and put a piece of A jadeitte next to it. He let me know that I did not overpay for my bangle and it's always nice to hear that. In fact I got a pretty good price. Apparently there are two types of Jade. Jadeitte is a generally more desirable and come from only certain parts of the world. When you shine a light on it and look at it through a special filter, you can see different colours to gauge the grade and type. Jade comes in different colours and even in the "green" family there are so many different types. The rarest colour is this "ice white" and it kind of looks like surface of the Rideau Canal frozen over but maybe with a hint of green. The purple jade is expensive because women like that colour. The dark green jade that we see as BC jade is valuable because it has a very desirable meaning (although after seeing a lot of jade lately I think it might be the other kind of jade from BC). Very interesting. And all this just for the joy of sharing knowledge. He didn't even try to sell me anything.
Barb and I went back into downtown and returned to that noodle place for another shrimp wanton bowl of noodle soup.
All in all another good day and an excellent weekend.
Thanks for visiting.
Leslie

Week 3

Last Sunday I did go to the Big Buddha as I had hoped. We took the MTR out to Lantau Island and then stood in line for an hour waiting for the Ngong Ping cable car. It's a novelty in Hong Kong so there were a lot of locals and families also out for a day by the Buddha. Spectacular views. I tried to capture it on my camera but of course couldn't do it justice. There is a little village that has been created at the top that reeks of tourist trap. But it was clean and with lots of things to see. And I tell you that after snaking the Disneyland-style lineup for the cable car, the Starbucks iced mocha tasted really good. We then went into the Nature centre and talked to a couple of nice kids who worked there. There weren't any English tours so the nice kid, who wanted us to call him "Stone" told us to join his Cantonese tour and he would do his best to translate into English for us. And thus we ended up on a nature tour of flora and fauna around the mountain for about an hour. Saw lots of butterflies the size of birds and plants. Don't ask me to repeat what they were because I have zero talent for that sort of thing. But it was beautiful. In Hong Kong it is so incredibly easy to get away into the countryside. Much much easier than Toronto - oh wait, there is no countryside within an hour of Toronto. I climbed the 188 steps to the Buddha and walked through the exhibit section. They worship a bone relic there and the relic was held inside of a tiny glass urn surrounded in a large altar built for it.
We toured the Temple a bit but decided to come back because there was a sudden change in the weather and it started to rain. In fact, cable car service was suspended for about half an hour. All of the people decided to go home at the same time and we waited another hour for the trip home. But all in all it was a great day.
Tuesday has become a regular social meet-up day in Lan Kwai Fong at Al's Diner for happy hour. I had gone to Causeway Bay beforehand to try and get some cloths because people tell me the shopping is good there. This was the same place I had tried my first weekend here. I definitely went the wrong way the first time because this time, when I had people who knew where to go, I found the outdoor markets and the giant shopping mall. I have decided that a lot of the fashions here are u-g-l-y. Overly drab or overly vibrant colours and cuts that generally are not suited to me. And I am so tall that the "dresses" look like tunics and I can't quite decide what to do about that. But the pants, shorts and shoes are good. I picked up a couple of shorts at the end of seasons sale. Nothing crazy. After happy hour, a few of us went to a noodle shop that was recommended to us by the owner of the restaurant we went to on Monday. For 2 dollars CAD I had a bowl of soup with noodles and the freshest shrimp wantons I've ever had. I'm turning into my father when it comes to food but I suppose there are worse things that could happen.
Wednesday after school a few of us went out to visit a new mall in the suburbs. There is a free shuttle bus from the MTR station and since there were a couple hundred people waiting, we thought the mall must be pretty good. That was until we saw all of these people returning from the mall without shopping bags. I did find a cute pair of shoes suitable for going out so I don't have to wear my Naot with skirts anymore. But all in all not so great.
On Thursday, almost all of us went to a Moroccan restaurant in Soho called Sahara. It is on one of the little side streets and you might find it if you meandered but I know that I probably would have never gone in there. We had a private room on the second floor with cushions and candles. We were celebrating two birthdays and Dan had negotiated a special menu and price for us. Delicious lamb and chicken, and some kind of fish.
Last night I visited the Jade Market. It is a giant permanent set-up with dozens of merchants all selling you the same thing. The tinkle of glass was everywhere. And they all have lighters to try to demonstrate to you that their jade is the real thing. I bought a couple of glass beaded necklaces, and then some silver and pearl necklaces from a woman who makes jewelery. But after that I was pretty much done with that place and went on to Canton Road. That road is full of little shops that sell the authentic stones and metals. The prices reflect it but it was great to just wander and ask what all of those stones are. I had some jewelery made for me and bought a gift here and there. I love shiny things and bright colours so the allure of Canton road might bring me back. If anyone wants freshwater pearls in any colour you can imagine, or any other strong of stones, now is the time to place your orders.
We then wandered on to Temple St. and at dinner in one of those popular places by the night market. On the advice of an American who had lived here for seven years, we ordered a crab dish that was seasoned with something mysterious and delicious. Of course, it takes more calories and brain power to find the meat than you can physically extract from the crab so to make up the deficit we had some garlic scallops and singapore noodles. After that we walked the gauntlet of the night market. We got lured into a back alley where a merchant had all of his fakes and would have bought some gucci wallets if there had not been a bunch of other tourists there with their wallets open. They were easy targets and Barb negotiates like a pro so we came away from that one empty-handed. The same thing happened with a different vendor about 10 minutes later. She had a goal. I decided I had the same goal, and went along for the ride. But I did get a couple of watches for cheap. If you want a watch, let me know.
We ended the night by finding a juice bar on Nathan Road and for $2 CAD I had a little woman prepare me a fresh mix of cucumber and strawberry juice. I highly recommend that. Very, very highly recommend that.
Thanks for visiting. Send me shopping orders. I can't believe I'm going home in a week.
Leslie