Hong Kong: 3

Damn you Blogger!

The site won't let me post four more photos. Here's the scoop for now:

On our last day in HK we checked out of our hotel and walked to nearby Kowloon Walled City Park. It was one of my favourite places we visited.


"The walls that enclose this beautiful park were once the perimeter of a notorious village that technically remained part of China throughout British rule, as it was never included in the 1898 lease of the New Territories. The enclave was known for its vice, prostitution, gambling and - yikes, Yanks! - illegal dentists. In 1984 the Hong Kong government acquired the area, rehoused the residents elsewhere and built pavilions and ponds filled with turtles and goldfish and planted exquisite trees and shrubs, including a long hedge coaxed into the form of a dragon. The park opened in 1996. Close to the Carpenter Rd entrance of the park is a renovated Yamen building, once an almshouse. It contains displays on the history of the walled city, with a scale model of the village in the mid-19th century. At the park's north side are the remnants of the original South and East gates."

The rain started to come down heavily, so park exploration was minimal. Part of the park was also sectioned off, so we wouldn't have been able to see all the grounds anyway.

We took a cab to an MTR station, then went to Tsim Sha Tsui. A lot of people just got off at the previous stop:


We looked for a place to eat breakfast but ended up not finding a suitable place. We did find the Hong Kong Museum of History though (it was on our list of desired places to visit).

A blurry shot of the Port of HK:

We checked out the permanent exhibit: Hong Kong Story. Folk culture, geography, the Opium Wars, Japanese occupation, birth of a region - what more could you ask for?

Post museum and breakfast-brunch-lunch we rode a double decker bus to the airport. It took nearly and hour, but we had great seats at the top and front of the bus. How perfect for someone, had they wanted to take a few pictures.


Then the rain came again.

Hong Kong International Airport:


A little duty-free shopping never hurt anyone. Well, maybe it has, but let's not talk about that.

We intended to get a drink because we were thirsty, but being people who like ice cream, ice cream thoughts popped into our heads. We all ordered a Hot Fudge Gay 90s (a real old timer). The rest of the menu names were normal, but this was hilarious. Pretty much had to order it.


The flight back took about and hour and a half. How incredibly short compared to a flight from Canada to Taiwan.

Entering Taiwan for the first time, I'd wanted to take a picture of this, but my camera wasn't handy. Now is the chance!

(p.s. Photos successfully posted.)

Hong Kong: 2

Here's a brief recap of my second day in Hong Kong:

We took a cab to the nearest MTR station and found breakfast at the food court of the nearby Hollywood Plaza. From there, we rode the MTR to Admiralty station (the public transport in HK is really great). We hopped on a bus which took us to the ticket centre for the Peak tram.

Up, upward we went!

That morning we'd found out that Typhoon Francisco was churning out there in the ocean, and possibly headed toward us. Throughout the trip I saw signs like the one below all over the place.


We made our way past the shops and across the multitude of escalators that are within the Peak Tower. At the very top, the view is quite something.


Inevitably we took the tram back down to city level.

Next, we caught a ride on a "topless bus" - as my coworker called it for lack of a better term. A minty refreshing ride, with the wind blowing and city unfolding.


Did we really take a bus to get to another bus station? I guess so. The second bus ride was over half an hour though, and it brought us to Stanley.

We ate lunch at a Thai restaurant in Murray House (an old colonial building that wasn't originally built here, but was dismantled and set-up again at it's current location). We visited the pier with fishers and tourists alike. We looked through the shops at Stanley Market.


The waterfront is lined with Western bars and restaurants. The majority of the customers were also Westerners. I was reminded of Harrison Hot Springs. Hong Kong is racially diverse in comparison with Taiwan, but this area didn't even feel like it was in Asia.

Another bus ride to get back to the city. We visited Hong Kong's Time Square. This is a mall nearby (though we didn't shop here) :
Outside, a Latin band was playing and people started to crowd around them.

It was pouring out by now. Glad I brought my raincoat with me. From Time Square we took a tram (double-decker and narrow) and wound up at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre.

Then we walked to the Star Ferry terminal and took the ferry to Tsim Sha Tsui (from a day of Hong Kong Island). Night had arrived.

There were some great neon views to be seen, but I wasn't able to capture a single good shot. This is the best one I have:


The Hong Kong Cultural Centre was behind us, and a Lantern display was lit up in front of it. The flowers are the best part:


Afterward, we took a KCR train (we sampled quite a bit of HK transportation) to a MTR station/shopping centre. We looked around, but none of us bought anything besides dinner. A long day, and so we took the MTR and a taxi back to our hotel.

Hong Kong: 1

We arrived at the airport in Taiwan in the afternoon for our flight several hours later. While we were sitting having a drink there was a small earthquake. I didn't actually feel it though, because my legs were propped up off the ground.

Our flight was late leaving by about half an hour. In itself, the flight was fine. It took less than two hours to get to Hong Kong.
We had a local tour guide to pick us up from the airport and show us around Saturday and Sunday. Our first stop was a viewing point of the bridge that we'd just crossed. The Tsing Ma Bridge is one of the world's longest suspension bridges.


From there we went to a hotel. Too bad it wasn't ours.

There was a name mix-up, and we ended up going to a hotel with a similar name in an area 30 minutes away from our hotel. Once realized, we found out the correct address for our already booked hotel.

Instead of going to the hotel first as planned, we went to the Ladies' Night Market in Kowloon. Food stalls, clothing, various kinds of junk, and loads of real designer goods. After that we headed to the nearby Temple Street Night Market. Less crowded, and less food stalls. More about goods, and there were quite a few fortune teller booths.

We must have stayed out till 11pm or so, and we were all tired. We then drove to our hotel in Kowloon City. It's an affordable hotel area, and low-rent neighborhood. It's near Kowloon Walled City Park, and by the old Kai Tak International Airport.

*more details to come*

Take me there

I'm flying to Hong Kong today. In fact, I leave for the airport in a little while. For whatever reason, I left packing till this morning. Less than three days of travel doesn't require a lot of luggage though.

Packing is like being the mayor of a small town. One has to make crucial decisions on the basis of what people need to stay alive. Clothes, gum, camera, tissues - all necessities for survival.

What's your blood type?

In some areas of the world blood type and personality are linked. Sort of like the Western version of horoscopes - discounted by scientists, but propelled by the public.

Kicking myself

That's what I'm doing right now.

I just found out that a DJ whose set I've enjoyed in Vancouver had a show in Taiwan ten days ago. I could have gone to that! *kick* *kick* *kick*

The moldy hat

Yuck. I found out that my hat has mold growing on it.

It was bound to happen...

Floating apples and grassy patches

The bathrooms at Breeze Centre:


I did get the day off work today. I surprised myself that I slept in till 10am.

In the afternoon I went outside amidst the wind and downpour, and I noticed that a road near my neighbourhood was partly shut off. A large tent was set up for some sort of gathering. There was food and a KTV trailer, but few people. Typhoon must have been to blame for that.

A day off

The typhoon has brought me a day off work tomorrow. A day off is a good thing, but you won't see me dancing in the streets out of joy. That's not only because rain and wind from the typhoon don't make for great dancing-in-the-street-weather, but also because I'm now going to have to shuffle my lesson plan around, and condense the material. Bleh.

Wipha

Another typhoon approaches. It's going to be rainy all week.


I finally got a few mosquito bites, and I was able to try out my new bug bite stick. It works amazingly well.

Leading up to the goodbye: A/C

Soon I should be able to leave my air conditioner off permanently. It's still hot out, but I find that I'm needing my A/C less and less. I still turn it on from time to time though, seeing as it helps clear the air in this small space.

Apparently it gets cold in Taiwan during the winter. My place doesn't have a central heating system, so I'm most likely going to need to buy a warmer blanket for later.

Breezing through

The Breeze Center in Taipei:
It's a department store with high end stores that I certainly didn't enter. It was like walking into through a Vogue magazine. I saw several stores that I'd heard about, but never before seen, such as DSQUARED and rebecca taylor.

I visited the Dean and Deluca on the lowest level. The fifth floor has a really cool book store. It's cool because it has a lot of books in English. There was a great selection of travel books, and I had to pry myself away because I knew I'd be able to spend a lot of time flipping through the guides. One book on Taiwan was translated into French, so I read a bit about Taiwan in French.

The English literature section was also noteworthy. I'd like to read some classic Chinese novels - translated in English of course!

The mall has a HeySong Pavilion, and I so went there. It's like a mini-museum devoted to HeySong - the Coca Cola of Taiwan. According to wikipedia, it's root beer though. When HeySong was first available, it was the only beverage company in Taiwan. The monopoly could only last so long...
The Pavilion, along with signs detailing HeySong's history, includes displays of casual scenes from life in Taiwan in years past. Someone be jammin'.
Then, a walk about the city. Due to the Car Free Festival (not free car festival), a section of the street was barricaded and Taiwanese traffic shut out. People roamed the streets, mostly without the fear of being run down by the bold drivers here.
You can see Taipei 101 in the upper left hand corner of the photo. This picture is about kites though.

The weekend is here!

Hooray!

This past week has been another hectic one. I'm getting more and more settled into my new work routine though. I have new duties, like preparing CCs - Communication Corner reports. CCs are given approximately every two weeks.

I also give quizzes and more formal homework. Before, it felt strange not giving quizzes or tests. I'm also marking much more. We'll see how long it takes for me to tire of that.

Delay

I keep delaying my blog posts. "I'll post something later." Suuuure.

This has got to stop. It's the same story for my journal. Must! keep! things! up! to! date!

Hooked on phonics

One of my classes doesn't have a cd with the words from the weekly word list, so guess who had to record her voice. I haven't yet decided on an album title, but I already have a few sketches for the cover art. I've got to be careful to include everyone in my "Thanks" section too.

Problematic guidelines

One of my lesson plan guidelines includes questions to ask the students about a story in our textbook. The story is about a cat and dog, and the dog is hiding in a pile of leaves. The cat is looking for the dog, and the dog jumps from the leaf pile - only the position of the animals in the picture is slightly suggestive. A student noticed and commented on such. Luckily, the other students didn't hear her and we were able to move on. "What did the cat want to do?" The suggested questions would only have egged her on.

I bought a Burt's Bees bug bite relief stick today. Every night when I'm finishing my marking, I get bitten by the resident mosquitoes. None of my bites are itching at the moment so I can't test the ointment out yet. It has the scent of lemongrass, thyme, lavender, and orange, which makes me want to test it out anyway.

Sogo see the shoes

This is probably about 1/200,000th of Sogo's shoe department. Okay, maybe I exaggerate a little. There is a large selection of shoes there though.

Clearly

That's Glinter for ya.


I took the train to Taipei this afternoon, and met with a few people for a language exchange. It's a slow process.

National Central University

I went for a stroll around NCU today. It's a fifteen minute bus ride away. Hey look, hockey in Taiwan!
NCU is responsible for Taiwan's satellite in space. My picture makes this satellite look like a bird death ray.
Jhong-da Lake on campus:

Here a turtle basks in the sun, perfecting the tan:
The male and female dorms are separate. There are 11 male dorms, and 5 female. Of faculty dorms, there are three male, and 1 female. There are also 4 ambiguous "Faculty Residence" buildings.

My face got sunburned today. Up until this point I've just been tanning. I think I'm going to start using the sunscreen I bought.

Life is exhausting. Sleepy puppies:

Cooling down

Summer warmth seems to be fading away slowly. It's not over yet, but I did wear a cardigan over a t-shirt yesterday. That's when you know something is up.

First week of regular teaching is now over. It doesn't feel like it's the first week though. Maybe it's really the second or third week of school.


In Taiwan, at birth you are considered to be one year old. In the West when you turn one, you're two in Taiwan.

Earth be quaking

I've been on an island while there was an earthquake. I can now add that to my list of experiences, even though I didn't actually feel it. ;)

Crazy Woman

This plant is called 'Crazy Woman' because the seeds stick to the clothing of passerby.

Lao su

The kids in my lower level class have little experience with English, and my goal is to expand upon that. It's interesting to say the least, because many of them talk to me in Mandarin, and call me lao su (teacher).

Hairdresser

... working on the street.

First September

Today marks the first day of my teaching semester for the regular school year. It was a little hectic trying to organize everything, but it all went smoothly. I still have a few posters to finish for my classroom decorations. The new rooms look neat and professional.

My first two classes are beginner or new beginner students, so all the material is quite simple. My last class is several levels higher, and comparatively I felt like I was teaching university students. Almost. Their English comprehension skills are good, but they still have a lot to learn.

Keelung

I took the train to Keelung this morning. Keelung is a small port town in the north. The town is filled with many reminders of the past when the Japanese occupied the island. Bus to the Fairy Caves. I didn't spot any fairies in the cave, but I did visit a temple within a sea-eroded cave. There are two rooms where the general public is permitted, and at one point I was close to being on my hands and knees to get into the second room.
Is there light at the end of the tunnel?



After the Fairy Caves, we walked uphill for what seemed like a very long time. It was hot out, and we hadn't much protection from the sun's rays, so that didn't help. We finally made it to the top, and the view was well worth the trek. We had reached Baimiwang Fort; an excellent location for defending the island against approaching intruders.
You can see Keelung Island from here, and a whole lot of Pacific Ocean. The breeze up here was refreshing, especially after the climb.

A locked bunker:
Blue Chinese character spray paint graffiti decorates the walls inside. Where the roof and ground meet, there's an opening for people or firearms to peek out. Nearby there's also a machine gun station.

Bus back to the bustling streets of Keelung's city. I was told that Keelung is sometimes called "Little Hong Kong."

We visited a temple, even though it was under construction. I accidentally walked into the lion's mouth.
From there we took the bus again. We arrived in another area where we hiked on a road uphill to our destination. A lot of the houses there look like the ones in the following picture. I also saw several remains of large concrete buildings. Everything is built into the mountain.


We walked along a river rich in iron.

All the walking took us to Golden Waterfall. The story is that nine families used to live here, and since the grocery store was far away, they'd take turns going in for supplies, and they'd buy nine times the amount as usual. The mountain is also known for having had a lot of gold in it.
Our continued walk took us to Gold Ecological Park. There are many Japanese-style houses in the area, and we also saw the Prince's house. Apparently a lot of Japanese people visit the area so that they can learn more about their peoples' history.
Watching over his mountain:
The road took us to an ocean lookout point, as well as this wooden walkway. More stairs.
The sun was starting to set, so we caught another bus and left. In summer, the area is prone to afternoon thunderstorms. Next stop: Jiufen. We went to the night market, whose stalls and attendees are squished into the narrow streets. It's a popular location, and it was quite busy. It's a good spot for viewing the night lights spread across the landscape.
We took the bus again, and it was a crazy ride. It was dark, the road winding, and the bus crammed full of mostly standing people.

When we got back into the city, we walked to a lit up temple. A Martyr Temple, I think. It was almost like an amusement park. There was music, vendors, families, and animatronic Chinese opera performers. BTW, there were a lot of stairs.
A several minute walk led us to a massive statue of Kwan Yin.
We walked a lot today. I hope my legs don't fall off. It was definitely a full day, and after this last stop, we walked to the train station. I then rode for over an hour and a half to get back to Zhongli.