Advice from a Minibus in Hong Kong

A Cameo Appearance on Graham Street

A moment today in Central, Hong Kong

Trump's Tweets in the Hong Kong News

Tonight on the news as I waited for a ferry tonight in Hong Kong:

Just a basic point that is part of a larger picture: Trump's tweets receive close attention, even here.

Auspicious Construction in Hong Kong

A view from Lee Tung Avenue

An Unexpected Visit to the Sunshine Kowloon Bay Cargo Centre in Hong Kong

I hadn't expected to arrive in Prince Edwards, Hong Kong, at 11:30 a.m. yesterday.

Oh, the location was expected. But the time was not since I had departed Jiangmen only 3.5 hours before, and a similar recent trip from a closer location, Zhongshan, had taken longer. Arriving earlier than expected was grand though.

I had expected to stop by the Mongkok Computer Centre yesterday afternoon. I had also expected during this visit I wouldn't be able to fully resolve the problem which had brought me there. But I hadn't expected that after some assistance, I would head to Kowloon Bay.

And I hadn't expected that yesterday I would find myself at the Sunshine Kowloon Bay Cargo Centre.

Some readers must be wondering if the Sunshine Kowloon Bay Cargo Centre is a fine building. It is.

After entering the building, I hadn't expected that finding a way to the upper levels would be slightly tricky. Here is a later photo I took which which I believe captures somebody receiving friendly assistance to reach those levels:

After finding the elevator and exiting it on the 2nd floor (what would be labeled the 3rd floor in the U.S.), I hadn't expected to see no signs of my intended destination. So I picked a direction and found myself in a distribution centre for Circle K, a convenience store chain.

Soon a person who hadn't expected me to be in the Circle K distribution centre explained (hollered) that I shouldn't be there. Then an older man who presumably wasn't surprised to see yet another person in the wrong place immediately guessed my intended destination and directed me there.

Thank you, sir.

Shortly after that, I found my destination.

When I left Hong Kong during the Lunar New Year holiday I hadn't expected to return so soon. I also hadn't expected that I would have significant problems with an external hard drive I had bought there. I had expected that having discarded the box would make resolving the problem more challenging. It did, but I hadn't expected that things would go as smoothly as they did nonetheless.

In short, the external hard drive I had bought has been replaced. As soon as I feel reasonably confident all is OK with it, I will be heading out of Hong Kong once more. While I wish the drive I had bought before had lived a long life, at least the experience of replacing it afforded opportunities to open my eyes to new things.

More about some of those things and also the new travel options in and out of Hong Kong someday.

I expect.

A Gymnasium in Jiangmen

The other day during a long walk through the Baishuidai Scenic Area in Jiangmen I passed the Guangdong Nanfang Institute of Technology (广东南方职业学院). I see indications the school's English name used to be the Guangdong Nanfang (or Southern) Vocational School, which would be consistent with its Chinese name, but I will stick with what appears on their website. Whatever its English name, the architecture of one of its building particularly stood out.

On a page of photos of various buildings and locations at the campus, I discovered it was an indoor gymnasium. I don't expect to have much more to share about the school as I didn't stay around for long. But I do hope to share more about the scenic area another day. 

Shakespeare and Chinese Fashion: Wearing Your Heart On Your Sleeve in Jiangmen, Not in Venice

O, sir, content you;
I follow him to serve my turn upon him:
We cannot all be masters, nor all masters
Cannot be truly follow'd. You shall mark
Many a duteous and knee-crooking knave,
That, doting on his own obsequious bondage,
Wears out his time, much like his master's ass,
For nought but provender, and when he's old, cashier'd:
Whip me such honest knaves. Others there are
Who, trimm'd in forms and visages of duty,
Keep yet their hearts attending on themselves,
And, throwing but shows of service on their lords,
Do well thrive by them and when they have lined
their coats
Do themselves homage: these fellows have some soul;
And such a one do I profess myself. For, sir,
It is as sure as you are Roderigo,
Were I the Moor, I would not be Iago:
In following him, I follow but myself;
Heaven is my judge, not I for love and duty,
But seeming so, for my peculiar end:
or when my outward action doth demonstrate
The native act and figure of my heart
In compliment extern, 'tis not long after
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws to peck at: I am not what I am.

– Iago in William Shakespeare's Othello, Act 1, Scene 1*

For sale at Diwang Plaza in Jiangmen, China

* See here or here for translations into modern English of this scene where Iago explains he hides his negative feelings toward his master in order to better take advantage of him.

Passing Up the One-Night Stand in Jiangmen: Creative Names and a Taste of Demolition of Cheese River Powder at Yes Cuisine

Yes Cuisine at Diwang Plaza in Jiangmen

So many questions . . .

Should I leap at the opportunity?
Would I regret doing so the next morning?

In the end, I decided to take a pass on the pan-fried one-night stand at the Hong Kong-style restaurant Yes Cuisine (YES茶餐厅), and narrowed the options to two recommended dishes.

Choosing between demolition of cheese river power and bizarre was not easy, but I finally settled on the former. So I raised my hand to get the attention of a restaurant worker. He smiled warmly at me, waved, and then went on his merry way.

Something important was missing.

After recovering from the unexpected yet entertaining response and becoming convinced nothing further was going to result from it, I tried again with another worker. She wasn't as cheerful, but she immediately recognized I was ready to order. Excellent.

Everything was efficient after that, and I soon had a hot plate of demolition of cheese river powder.

Today's noodly lunch

If by "demolition" they meant at a molecular level then they were spot on. Either there was very little cheese to begin with or most of it had decomposed into something not very cheesy. I have had similar experiences with cheese in China before. I'm not sure all of it was really cheese. In any case, if this dish had been topped with more or better quality cheese, I might be a fan.

But at least the taste was passably pleasant, and I finished most of the dish. I only left some of the noodles due to being full enough. For what it is worth, a misguided literal character by character translation of the Chinese word for a wide type of noodles — "河粉" — gives rise to "river powder".

As far as the fish dish, I'd say "pan-fried one-night stand" is actually a good translation of the Chinese — "香煎一夜情". According to recipes for similar dishes, the witty name comes from the fact that the fish is marinated for one night.

For the translation of "比翼脆雙飛" into "bizarre", I am not sure what happened there. It is worth noting that this translation is the first result provided by Google Translate. Baidu Translate's result of "flying brittle with two wings" strikes me as closer to the mark. I will leave it up to the professionals to decide what would work best here.

More than noodle dishes or cheese, I would say the thing to take away from this restaurant is that, yes, there are plenty examples of translation gone wrong on menus in China, even including fried enemas. But that perplexing or entertaining name you see might be a good translation of a name that is creative in Chinese as well.

So don't let an unusual name alone scare you away from a one-night stand, whether pan-fried or steamed.

A Little Red App, Li Rui's Death, Lots of Debt, and Forced Pork: Four China-Themed Tweets With Links

Here are four tweet with links to pieces very much worth checking out if you haven't already:

they used to read the little red book. Now the little red book reads them: https://t.co/adJNYhQmtc

— jamie k (@jkbloodtreasure) February 14, 2019

“He saw himself as a conscience of the revolution & the party . . . But he had grave doubts about the system he spent his life serving.” Extraordinary obit for Li Rui, once Mao's personal secretary, by @iandenisjohnson: https://t.co/irtjHtkPpB

— Julian Gewirtz (@JulianGewirtz) February 16, 2019

"Of the 22.9 trillion yuan ($3.4 trillion) of outstanding mortgage debt held by Chinese people as of the end of 2017, 47.1% of that is tied up in residences that now stand empty"https://t.co/MHkUUh8U0y

— Matthew C. Klein (@M_C_Klein) February 14, 2019

"Many Uyghurs...fear that the 'pig' in the year of the pig will be all too literal: that this will be the year when Uyghurs in their homeland will be forced to eat pork as yet another way to perform Han-ness." by @dtbyler https://t.co/skFY4fJLRo

— Amy Qin (@amyyqin) February 7, 2019

Three Hearts in Jiangmen

Some more love in Jiangmen:

At The Dong Hu Park

Two Valentine's Day Sellers in Jiangmen

I believe it is February 14, which in parts of the world is Valentine's Day.

Tonight on Shengli Road in Jiangmen, I passed two nearby places where people could buy last minute flowers.

The second photo captures intense bargaining. Perhaps some people would prefer their love to pay whatever it takes to get some flowers. In this case, tag team action between the couple sought a better price.

Well played.

40 Photos Taken With a New Camera and Lens in Hong Kong

I had not originally planned to spend time in Hong Kong so early this year, but an urgent need for a new camera and lens changed things. Both in terms of options and prices, purchasing a camera in Hong Kong was a far better option than doing so in mainland China, especially given what I was seeking and that I was relatively close to Hong Kong. My previous camera and lens had both been in far-from-ideal states for some time. Although I found workarounds for some problems such as malfunctioning dials, dust buried deep in the sensor, and problematic autofocusing, their state certainly had affected how and what I photographed for a period of time. So there was some good that matters had reached a state where I was forced to upgrade (repairs weren't sensible given what they would cost).

I only stayed in Hong Kong long enough to purchase the camera & lens and to feel reasonably confident all was well with them. So below are 40 photos presented in the order they were taken with the theme "photos I took while testing my new camera and lens for a few days in Hong Kong", although I hope in the process to share yet a little more about Hong Kong. I won't get into technical details, but I'll share that all of the photos are unaltered "as is" from the jpeg files the camera produced, except reduced in size.

Scenes and locations were motivated by a variety of factors, including simply testing the camera under certain conditions and other pragmatic matters. I would have set the camera differently if I took some of these photos now or if I had known all of those pigeons were going to suddenly take off in my direction. I covered far fewer locations than typical for a Hong Kong stay. Still, I managed to capture scenes in areas such as Wan Chai, Causeway Bay, Central, Tsim Sha Tsui, Mong Kok, and Kowloon City.

Anyway, the photos are what they are. And of course, more will come.

Red lanterns at Lee Tung Avenue

Photographic moment at Lee Tung Avenue

Birds at . . .

Kwan Kee Birds & Small Animals

Tram and Five Guys

Vendor in Wan Chai

Arsenal Street tram stop on Hennessy Road

Playing in the fountain at Hong Kong Park

Playing in the sand at Hong Kong Park

Running at the Hong Kong Zoological and Botanical Garden

De Brazza's monkey spotting a human at the Hong Kong Zoological and Botanical Garden

Below the Glenealy Flyover

The Glenealy Flyover

Above the Glenealy Flyover (and a change of light)

Looking up from the parade ground at Tai Kwun

A local Young Master IPA at HK Brew Craft

Fruit loops cones at Emack & Bolio's

Topman and Topshop

The Lunar Fantasy with Ancient Auspicious Animals at Times Square

Sea of flowers at the Lunar Fantasy with Ancient Auspicious Animals

Advertising in front of Times Square

Multistory escalator in Hysan Place

View of Ma Tau Wai Road from the upper level of a Hong Kong double-decker bus

Herbal tea stand in Kowloon City

Art at the Cattle Depot Artist Village

Ma Tau Kok Road

Footbridge on a Sunday in Mong Kok

Fish for sale at the Fa Yuen Street Market

Junk in Victoria Harbour

Lunar New Year pig sculpture at Harbour City

Photographing the Symphony of Lights from a Star Ferry boat

Pedestrian subway in Tsim Sha Tsui

Looking down at the ground floor of the Chungking Mansions

Top of the The Masterpiece skyscraper seen through the Victoria Dockside

Photographic opportunity with the pig cartoon character McDull at the Avenue of the Stars

Pigeons taking flight at Kowloon Park

Miss 13 Dots at the Hong Kong Avenue of Comic Stars

Looking down at a multistory escalator in Langham Place

Fa Yuen Market

Minibus and crowd in Mong Kok