Chinese Halloween?! (Day 18)

Day 18 (31/10): halloween in HK -- there are actually entire streets that sell halloween costumes... and there were late-night parties going on the last 2 days... it's pretty freaky to see bloodied limbs lying around as window "decoration" in coffee joints...


On a more normal note, Ping had a nice lunch at the Jap restaurant just outside her place... this restaurant is just next to the porridge shop where lunch was taken yesterday (and liked immensely)... think will miss all the food at Central after the move...

More magic: a new world slowly opens... (Days 16-17)

Day 16 (29/10): Ping is slowly but surely settling into HK...

Playing around with the iPhone 4, a nifty device that keeps Ping connected to the rest of the world, and provides entertainment while dining alone...

1st non-official lunch with a colleague that Ping doesn't already know before going to HK; lunch at a cha chan teng, HK-style bun with condensed milk... tastes good, and Ping thought that it was almost symbolic -- "the world is my oyster!" :-)

Ping enjoyed the company but wonders at the instant noodles culture in HK...

Playing with the iPhone photo settings (Mobile Monet); this is the lunch place: a bubble tea shop from the outside, leading into the cha chan teng inside (see: left side of picture)... it's quaint how the 2 ladies are perched on stools on a raised platform directly in front of the shop, which is on Gage Street...

Day 17 (30/10):

Furniture hunting: Ping's new house is gonna have a white colour scheme... and this tv rack, seen at North Point, is on the shortlist... :-)

Remembering her mother's wise words, Ping dutifully went to buy vegetables... cooked with oyster sauce, crab stick, golden mushrooms and egg... with the phone hotline help of Leeli... :-)

A little magic (Day 15)

Day 15 (28/10) -- Playing around with iPhone apps + trying to replicate Grandma's classic chicken wings, both a little magical in their own ways... it's interesting to have a clean slate and so much time...

Keeping it fresh (Days 12-14)

Day 12 (25/10) -- chilled milk tea, seen at cha chan teng where an ex-seminar mate, now colleague treated Ping to lunch... it works like beer: no ice in the drink itself, so one gets to appreciate every drop of the contents of the bottle... talk about doing the same things differently!

p.s: managed to get an iPhone cover! :-)

Day 13 (26/10) -- worked in the office till 10+pm... no photo for the day... sigh... at least work got completed... oh, there was a mini-adventure though... was locked in the office for a while as Ping's temp staff card was programmed to deactivate by 9pm... 2nd day this is happening...


Day 14 (27/10) -- Ping's 3 well-liked foods in the same pan... cooking is more than about food, it's about individuality and self-expression too...

On the road with Jesus (Days 10-11)

Day 10 (23/10) -- timely reminder at Causeway Bay (where Ping was watching a movie checking out the furniture at Ikea) that Jesus is Lord, and that on the Road of Life, better keep remembering this... and living life with this fundamental centering principle...



Day 11 (24/10) -- Committed the whole settling-into-a-routine process to God.

Visited The Vine (Church) at Central.

Dinner (a microwaved beef rice set, with a great book and in front of the computer) was good, after the microwave oven stopped mid-way at the right point when Ping was busy with other stuff, thereby ensuring an unburnt meal. And inspiration for a non-airline style meal came: dried mango pieces were cut up and mixed into the rice together with a half-boiled egg.. it was yummy! :-)

Ping still can't open the aloe vera jar though... after many days of trying... this is more difficult than trying to find a decent (and reasonably priced) iPhone cover...

Friendly Family (Day 9)

Day 9 (22/10) -- Ok. this is not the best-taken photo around... but lunch was pretty good, with a friendly, funny family... A colleague Rina (who gave the thermal pot) came to HK with her family and brought Ping to eat nice local food... :-)

of typhoons and raisins (Day 8)

Day 8 (21/10) -- Ping is in a place with typhoon warnings for the first time in her life... but it felt entirely normal, maybe only slightly windy in some parts of the city...

Oh, and are raisins healthy? Cos these are free in the office pantry, and have become a favourite snack... :-)

(p.s: the box used to be full, as recently as Monday, 4 days ago)

Mickey Mao and the usual house hunting (Day 7)

Day 7 (20/10/2010) --

Nice date, right?

Housing agent called today and showed Ping this place in North Point:

Then the agent bought dinner! Of fishballs kway teow, dried fish skin and veg + drinks (coke light with lemon)... this agent has an infectious enthusiasm, quite cool! :-)

And here's another cool thing: Mickey Mao in HK...

More food! (Days3-6)

Day 3 (16/10) -- More house-hunting followed by more good food! Premium Jap dinner at Oedo Japanese Restaurant at North Point... :-)

Day 4 (17/10) -- HK dim sum place (Cui Hua in Central) which has food Ping likes: Grandma-type chicken wings, lotus root soup and milk tea; the Yunnan bear serving a dual purpose as a key-holder

Day 5 (18/10) -- Skype-ing the family after 1st day at work, over microwaved grandma-style chicken wings... :-)

Day 6 (19/10) -- Supermarket therapy translating into Ping's first real home-cooked meal in HK... it's a mish-mash of udon, golden mushroom, pork ribs, eggs and crab sticks... :-)

Working in Hong Kong

And so Ping gets what she has wanted for a long time -- working overseas.

In Hong Kong, no less. The land of eating, shopping and hiking.

Working, unfortunately doesn't always allow the luxury of long posts, but Ping figures she could do a Project 365, that's posting a picture a day (not necessarily on the same day) for a year.

Here goes:

Day 0 (13/10) -- Packers working on getting Ping's 70kg air shipment allowance all packed and shipped (post-script: as at today 19/10, all these haven't arrived yet!)

Day 1 (14/10) -- Queuing up for the airport bus, saving HKD60 in the process! It was quite a feat lugging 32kg of stuff around town.

Day 2 (15/10) -- Walking through the happening Central market, house-hunting (see the really small spaces in the 2nd photo) and eating non-stop... thank God for Peck Chee who translated everything from Cantonese! :-)

Bye from Zurich

We are at the breakfast area of our Zurich hotel. In a few hours, our flight to Singapore takes off, ending our 11-day travels through France/ Switzerland.

Yesterday was fun enough: ping tried paragliding and Wen took nice photos of that. Paragliding was really cool -- it's safe and at the same time offers superb views of the interlaken, where we were. The most interesting part was the take-off where the paraglider had to run off a slope, trusting that the equipment and the pilot would do their job. Wen wants to come back to interlaken to try this...

We also did a quick city tour of Luzern on foot in the afternoon. Luzern was both scenic (think lake plus imposing mountains in the background) and historical at the same time.

Then we went to Zurich for an adventure with our hotel. It turned out all for good as we eventually got checked into a nice upgraded deluxe room with free wifi.

It's shopping for feragamo's now before heading to the airport! See you soon... :-)

Heading off to Interlaken and Jungfrau

As usual, our plans remain flexible... We had a good rest on our REALLY comfortable bed last night! Decided that 7am was too early to depart so we slept in. :)

We just finished a hearty breakfast at the hotel and targetting to take the 1035 train to Interlaken. This is suppose to be the highlight of Wen's trip cos she's been reading how nice and breathtaking the scenery is!! :) Then again, Wen also thought Paris was also going to be really nice but was a little disappointed with the actual experience - it was too huge a city for her (too overwhelming!).

We like Bern and decided that we will pop by the city on the way back to Zurich tomorrow. Wen is also hoping to cover Luzern too... Well, that's the plan for now! :) Love you daddy and mummy! Wish the both of you were with us... Then again, we may pull each other's hair apart with our travelling habits... :)

Bern

Bern is cool!

Wen likes this as much as she likes Strasbourg. Which is saying alot.

Wen now reckons that she is a 'small city' kid... meaning that, while touring, she likes places that are small enough to be easy to navigate, has nice architecture and has shopping places, preferably those with shops that stay open after 8pm.

Wen is also getting more savvy and intelligent. She is now fully capable of figuring out a new city or town all by herself, and can tell when Ping is 'smoking' her with generalities that may or may not be accurate... haha... travelling provides a real education indeed... this is fun!

Tomorrow, we shall attempt to visit some Paul Klee place and the house Einsten stayed in. Then we move on to Interlaken, where we have a B&B booked for tomorrow night.

Switzerland's greatest accomplishment is to give Wen so much comfort and such a sense of security that she has made the landmark decision to NOT pre-book accomodation for our last night of the trip... wow! :-)

Back in Switzerland

We are back in Switzerland, blogging from a nice train that we don't have to pay an exorbitant 3 euros reservation fee for.

The French TGV train we crossed the french border in not only required a reservation but also did not have space for us to sit. It was surreal... People were sitting on the floors of the 1st class cabin we were in.

Tonight, thanks to Huifang, we get to enter Bern with the comfort of having a nice hotel pre-booked... It's great to have nice and helpful friends who are still awake at midnight and right next to their computers with Internet connection... :-)

We like travelling by trains cos they bring us through beautiful scenery and also afford time to chill and think -- a luxury in our hectic schedules. we enjoyed ourselves with ping's mp3 player too. Wen likes some of the music.

The great escape

France is going on strike tomorrow. We are scheduled to leave France today, which is a real blessing cos our travel plans will not be disrupted.

Only thing is the trains out of France seem to be quite full. We're off to the train station now to find any train at all that will help us leave. Preferably a train to Geneva.

What an adventure! :-)