Blog Break

There will now be a big break in my blog, as Kyja and me go to Beijing and Mongolia.

But if you check in 4 weeks there should be photos. Unless we reconsider our attempts at higher education and decide to join a herd of nomadic yak herders. (May be better pay than social work.)

School Excursion!

I went on a class excursion. It was too a historical village in the New Territories. I woke up very excited, and packed a museli bar, and a small bottle of water.


This is my friend Jennifer Kwan. I think this is a very good name. We were trying on sunglasses to make us look like english ex-pats.

This is a village meeting hall.

This is incense inside a temple of the Tang family. Some dropped off and burnt my hand. Dan said it may have been the doing of his great great great great grandfather.

This is my classmate scaring a small child.

This is a garden. It is the first garden i have seen in Hong Kong. They have lots of aloe vera.

Here is some aloe vera jelly. It is very delicious.

Second best bubble tea

This is my second favourite bubble to in Hong Kong. It is from a shop in Mong Kok. The difference with this one is that it's green tea with milk. Strange concept, yes, and i was quite sceptical at first because it seems to go against both eastern and western concepts of tea consumption to add milk to green tea. But it's great! This one is quite sweet, with a subtle yet distinctive green tea teaste, and the pearls and have a really good texture.

For the 1198th time in Hong Kong....HOORAY FOR TEA!

Photo documentary of the glorious torch relay

Today the olympic torch relay passed through my little Special Administration Region.

First it went past Tsim Tsa Tsui, where apparently there were some tensions between Tibet protesters and the China supporters. This is the last leg of the torch relay where people can protest. Interestingly, the Hong Kong government didn't let some protesters enter Hong Kong during the time of the torch relay.

Actually, this morning i was sitting downstairs waiting for my friend Justin, wondering why all the hall residents were coming back dressed in red 'i love China' t-shirts and with huge China flags. I thought it was just some normal patriotism from the mainland students, before i realised it was in fact torch relay day.


But meanwhile, as the torch was running around Hong Kong in the morning, Justin and i were on Lion Rock.

You can't quite see in the photo, but his shirt is orange. We thought this might be problematic because on the way to the rock we saw another friend, who had been to the TST leg, and said torch relay spectators were colour coded - 'red is for pro china, orange is for freedom protesters, and blue is for samsung promotions people.' (it's Hong Kong, gotta put a product in there to balance all the idealism etc.) So we were a little worried Justin would get kicked in the kidneys by the cops for wearing orange accidentally.

So after hiking we went to Wan Chai to see the final leg of the relay, where it ends up at the convention centre with the giant bohinea (the flower on the hong kong flag) that was a gift to Hong Kong after the reunification with the mainland.

It's hard to tell the difference between Chinese flags and Coca Cola flags. 'Communism! Capitalism! ah...whatever.....' People are getting excited because the torch is almost here.......!

AND HERE IT IS!

The torch bearer is the one you can't see because he is behind the lamp post.... sorry.

How many people can we fit in the stair case?

I'd always heard the Hong Kong had alot of police presence, but this is just ridiculous. Look closely in the background and you'll see tonnes of them, just waiting for someone to put on a 'Free Tibet' t-shirt.