Hiking in Hong Kong during Chinese New Year :) (Photo-essay)

On the third day of Chinese New Year last year, I went hiking in southwest Lantau with two friends.  In light of how nice today's weather turned out to be (with the humidity levels having gone down and the gray mist and fog of the past two days having lifted by the afternoon), part of me wishes that I had gone hiking again on the third day of this Chinese New Year of the pig.

Still, it wasn't as though I didn't have a good time checking out my second Chinese New Year movie of 2019 this afternoon.  And I did also enjoy a good hike up in the Sai Kung Peninsula on the first day of Chinese New Year two days ago, which the following photo-essay (the first Hong Kong hiking photo-essay I'm putting up since last September!) commemorates:-
 

 This was not the first time I went on the Tai Tan Country Trail 

but the first time I saw this helpful handmade sign :)

I like this hiking trail a lot but it's not one I'll go on during 

the rainy season as sections on it probably would be 

water logged then, if not actually under water!

 

A noticeably hairy as well as beautiful butterfly

spotted nestling atop a clump of green leaves :)

The surrounding countryside remains mostly green but 

each time I return to the area, I do see more buildings at Tai Tan

 

  Something else noticeably different from the last time

I hiked along the trail was that a section of it had fallen 

into disrepair, probably a victim of Severe Typhoon Mangkhut :S

 

 Lots of tents spotted at one of the Wan Tsai Peninsula's 

two campgrounds this Chinese New Year!

Meanwhile, Hoi Ha village was quiet that day and

Hoi Ha Wan appeared positively serene!

The sight of cows lying on the road provide a good measure

of how quiet things were -- and the sight of a man stroking a calf

how placid and used to humans they appear to be! ;b

A special sighting involving a dancing unicorn on the first day of Chinese New Year :)

Sai Kung's Tin Hau Temple with festive decorations

on the first day of Chinese New Year

 

The sound of drums and this unusual sight 

caught my attention and drew me to the vicinity!

 

You know it's a special day when a unicorn

goes to pray at a temple ;b

 

Earlier today, I did what has come to be a personal ritual or tradition on the first day of Chinese New Year: i.e., I went for a hike in the Hong Kong countryside.  Like on two previous occasions already in 2019, I met up with friends in Sai Kung town before catching a green minibus that took us to our trail head up in the Sai Kung Peninsula.  But unlike on those two previous occasions, I arrived earlier in town than expected and consequently was able to take in some sights in Sai Kung town beforehand.

 

Since it's been some years since I paid a visit to the Tin Hau Temple in Sai Kung town, I thought it'd be worth doing so again this morning.  While walking towards it, I could see that there were festive decorations installed in its vicinity in the form of bright red banners and lanterns as well as colorful flags.  And I also could hear drums and gongs being beaten -- and upon getting near the site, got to realizing that they were being beaten for a dancing unicorn that was paying a visit to the temple!

 

I wasn't in time to see the dancing unicorn pay its respects to Tin Hau but I did get to witness it paying its respects to Kwan Ti (the god of war and righteousness who, like Tin Hau, was a real life historical figure) in the hall in the temple where a statue of him has pride of place.  Almost needless to say, I found this to be a pretty cool and special experience; one that most definitely doesn't take place every day -- but, then, the first day of Chinese New Year is a pretty special day in Hong Kong (and other parts of the world with a significant ethnic Chinese population)! :)

Flowers, foods, pigs and politics at the 2019 Chinese New Year flower market

Flowers galore at the Chinese New Year flower market...

 

 The abundance of pig plushies tells you what zodiac year's coming up!

 

And the topical political displays let you know what's on the mind of

many Hong Kongers even as the most festive time of the year approaches...

 

In just a few hours, it'll be Chinese New Year.  I've spent a good part of today cleaning up my apartment, and also spent some time today and yesterday shopping for food (even though I actually know that at least a couple of the supermarkets I shop at will be open every day of Chinese New Year this year).  And earlier still (on its opening day, in fact), I paid a visit to the Chinese New Year flower market in Victoria Park to check out what was on offer there this year.  

 

Entering from the Tin Hau side of Victoria Park, the first stalls I came across were those selling food and drinks.  Because it was so unseasonably warm when I went, I actually wasn't all that attracted to what I saw on sale -- a large percentage of which was "stick food", be it Hong Kong curry fish balls, Xinjiang lamb skewers or Japanese king crab sticks.  And it didn't help that there was a stall sending stinky tofu whose distinct -- and, to my mind, seriously smelly -- aroma could be detected several meters away!

 

Actually, one of my abiding memories of this year's Chinese New Year flower market may well be the strong aromas that wafted about the place; with there actually be two stalls hawking durian -- yes, really! -- and at least one selling kimchi located not in the designated food stall area but among those hawking pig plushies, pig-shaped balloons and the like!  And for the record: despite my actually loving to eat (Malaysian) durian quite a bit, I declined the opportunity to do so in Victoria Park; this not least because I have a feeling that the prices being asked (t)here for the king of fruits would be on the princely side!

 

While I walked quickly by the durian and kimchi stalls, I did linger in the section of the Chinese New Year flower market set aside for the sale of the titular blooms.  And while it's true enough that I never do buy any flowers at this festive fair (or, for that matter, the Hong Kong Flower Show that's also held each year in Victoria Park), I do like the sight of the many beautiful and colorful flowers set in row upon row next to one another or similarly auspicious plants that are particularly sought after at this time of the year, such as the "lucky bamboo" and orange trees. 

 

What I did come away from my visit to this year's Chinese New Year flower market with were a pair of Totoro-themed bedroom slippers and, as has become a customary practice for me since the Umbrella Movement came into being in late 2014, an item purchased at a stall operated by a political party that's part of the pan-democracy camp.  

 

While we're on the subject: this time last year, I got the sense that many people sought to steer clear of the overtly political-themed booths but this year, support for those associated with the Umbrella Movement looks to be up again.  At the very least, I personally observed a matronly woman walk up to the Demosisto stall and drop a HK$500 note into a donation box without anyone approaching her to do so.  And that action makes up one of my abiding memories of this year's Chinese New Year flower market -- along with the strong afternoon heat and strong smell of stinky tofu encountered in Victoria Park that day!

The 2019 Chinese New Year movie season opens with I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change! (film review)

Chinese New Year movie goodies for 2019! ;b

I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change! (Hong Kong, 2019)

- Wong Cho Lam, director and co-scriptwriter (along with Joey Leung Cho Yiu)

- Starring: Wong Cho Lam, Teresa Mo, Ivana Wong, Eric Tsang

I love you, you're perfect, now change.  That sentence sounds pretty weird, yet was used as the title for what went on to become a very successful musical play which had its premiere in the USA but has gone on to be performed in a number of diverse territories.  And now that theatrical work has been adapted into a Hong Kong movie whose English title has an exclamation mark at the end and six character Chinese title is several syllables shorter.  

Back in 2005, the Windmill Grass Theatre staged a local adaptation of the musical theatre production featuring Cantonese language lyrics by one Wong Cho Lam.  Fourteen years on, the entertainer is the director, co-scriptwriter and one of the main stars of I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change!, a HK$20 million movie whose cast's eagerness to please along with its large size and multi-generational nature is entirely characteristic of Hong Kong movies released to entertain cinema-goers over Chinese New Year.

Still, it's not unlikely that, at one or more points during your viewing of the film, you might want to ask "What the hell am I watching?"  For rather than have a fairly conventional Chinese New Year story involving such as a multi-generational family along the lines of those found in the classic All's Well, Ends Well (1992), I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change! actually comprises a series of vignettes that all have to do with love together with romantic or sexual dissatisfaction in one way or another but otherwise aren't all that obviously related to one another.    

Early on in this movie that's filled with familiar and welcome faces, there's a hilarious segment set in a cinema and featuring Alex Fong Lik Sun and Ivana Wong playing a couple on a movie date.  Soon afterwards, the scene changes to Tai Po Waterfront Park, where another couple -- this one played by Wong Cho Lam and Joey Yung -- have just finished playing a bout of tennis which left one of them with a black eye.  Later vignettes include ones that take place in settings as disparate as a restaurant, a church, something that's a cross between a prison and the underworld, and a funeral parlor -- and adding to the craziness of it all is that Ivana Wong, Wong Cho Lam, Eric Tsang and Teresa Mo play multiple unconnected characters in the film!   

       

In view of its scatty as well as sketchy structure, it probably was inevitable that I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change! would be uneven in quality; with some segments falling flat and leaving the audience stone-faced even while others (including that which has Sammi Cheng stealing the show for the second Chinese New Year movie season in a row) were super successful in getting a number of us laughing loudly and a lot.  At the same time, the movie actually would have benefited from being less unvaryingly loud in tone and volume.  As it was, the scene in this offering that most resonated -- featuring an extremely sincere performance by Teresa Mo -- was the one that was the most low-key as well as dramatic.  

A measure of how consistently and over-the-top noisy this movie is should be evident by it literally giving me a headache that got me popping ibuprofen after the screening. Nonetheless, I do not regret having checked out I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change!  This might say something about my masochism but may well speak more to my feeling that this festive cinematic fare does have enough entertaining bits to please its audience, especially those all ready to have a good time when the Chinese New Year of the Pig comes along!

My rating for the film: 6.0 

10 highlights of my 2018 year

An image that brings back fond memories 

of my favorite hike of 2018

Puppet Ponyo posing in front of a temple in

my favorite town or city visited this past year

The proverbial "they" say that time flies when you're having fun.  If so, I must have had a lot of fun in 2018 -- and in the similarly fast passing first month of 2019!  So it really would be a crime to not note down 10 highlights of the past year for the record to add to my previous posts for 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007 and 2006 (the last of which was the year that I began this now over 12 year old blog) -- and preferably before the second month of 2019 comes long!  So, without further ado...

Best book: It's been decades since I last set foot at my beloved undergraduate college but, as a recent blog entry shows, I still find myself fondly recalling my experiences there from time to time.  Perhaps for this reason, I still enjoy reading stories that take place, even if only partly, in college settings.  So when I saw a copy of J. Courtney Sullivan's Commencement for sale at the local Salvation Army thrift store for HK$25 (~US$3.18), I bought it despite being unfamiliar with the author or book title.  Post reading this 2009 novel, I now realize what a bargain I got -- since this gem of a book is one that I can easily foresee myself re-reading again more than once in the future! :)    

Best concert: I went to a number of classical music concerts in 2018 that I thoroughly enjoyed, including yet another Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra concert which had my favorite classical musician, Ning Feng, as the featured artiste, and a Hong Kong Sinfonietta concert with a movie-themed program.  However, none of them got me beaming from ear to ear all evening that the Hong Kong leg of Charamel's Splash Tour did!  There's no two ways about it: my favorite pear fairy and its band really rock, and are super entertaining and fun to watch as well as listen to! :)   

Best decorated building (complex): I visited many buildings in 2018 whose decorated interiors as well as exteriors had me gasping at their sheer beauty, and filled with awe at the mastery of the artists and artesans whose creations remain amazing centuries after they were made.  This was particularly the case in Spain, a country whose past glories have left it with a number of really incredible works of art, including architecture.  In Segovia, I was so busy admiring the buildings seemingly everywhere around me that I literally fell down in the street.  In Sevilla, I was bowled over by Christian cathedrals along with Mudéjar artistry.  But it was Granada's Alhambra, particularly its Palacios Nazaries, which I found truly heavenly -- and I count myself very blessed to have been able to see its beauty up close and with my own eyes.   

Best exhibition: After visiting in Hiroshima in October 2017 and discovering that the area's oyster season hadn't begun yet, I vowed to return there soon to feast on fresh and raw Hiroshima oysters.  Upon doing so early last year, I not only was able to do that but I also got to check out a special exhibition of works by the great ukiyo-e artist, Hiroshige, at the Hiroshima Museum of Art which ran there for less than two months.  Although the art history classes that I took at college in Wisconsin focused by and large on Western art, this former art history and anthropology double major (and museum studies minor) still is able to appreciate masterworks from the Land of the Rising Sun which may use different aesthetics but depict scenes that I increasingly find familiar rather than super foreign, and feel an emotional as well as intellectual connection to.

Best hike: For a number of reasons, I didn't hike as much in 2018 as in previous years.  At the same time though, I was able to get in a number of hikes outside as well as in Hong Kong -- sometimes on my own but also often in the company of friends; with my favorite being a hike in southwest Lantau on the third day of Chinese New Year in the company of two good buddies who I've done a lot of hiking with over the years and are always fun to be around both on a trail and off it.  On that particular excursion, we got to see lots of great views (and Chinese New Year flowers) and also get to talking about a wide range of subjects -- the kind of ingredients enjoyed by people who go for the kind of "non-competitive hiking" that we all like to do! ;b 

Best meal: The category with the most candidates by far; something which should come as no surprise considering how much of a foodie I am and that the territories I visited in 2018 include Japan, Penang, Spain and Jeju!  This past year, I also dined at a couple of three Michelin-starred restaurants (8 1/2 Otto e Mezzo and Lung King Heen) here in Hong Kong.  The more I think about it though, the more I return to my most recent meal at zero Michelin star Godenya -- which I actually am a bit shocked to realize that I didn't blog about.  Many months later, I still can almost taste the incredible kabogani (female snow crab) risotto, the inspired combination of sweet potto, beets and century egg, the rich-tasting abalone and shirako combo dish, and the amazingly delicious pistachio and sake dessert -- and their memory is getting me thinking that another visit to that sake-food pairing specialist is overdue! 

Best museum: Last year, I achieved a dream I've long had of visiting Spain's Museo Nacional del Prado.  But as it turned out, my favorite of the museums I visited in 2018 actually was another Madrid museum: the, to my mind, better designed and curated Museo Arqueológico Nacional which came across as well as innovative as well as interesting and informative, filled with lots of impressive artefacts and also possibly the best multimedia displays that I've ever seen in a museological institution ever!

Best sunrise: Being far more of a night owl than early bird by inclination, it's extremely rare for me be awake at sunrise, never mind wake up to hike up to a high vantage point from which to watch the sun rise.  Thank goodness that the views from the top of Jeju's Seongsan Ilchulbong were absolutely worth it -- and the sunrise I viewed there may well be the most beautiful sunrise I've ever seen, never mind for the year 2018, which is saying something since the previous year, I had seen the sunrise from atop Indonesia's Borobudur!  

Best tour: If I could only choose one alcoholic beverage to drink, it'd be sake (yes, rather than beer!).  And if I could only drink one brand of sake, the Asahi Shuzo Company's Dassai sake would be it.  With this in mind, I hope you can get a sense of how much of a thrill it was for me to be accorded a personalized tour of the Asahi Shuzo Company's brewery: one which included visits to a rice milling factory and various rooms in the main building including one where the koji was being sprinkled onto the rice along with my third meeting with company president Kazuhiro Sakurai (and the first in his home country) and complimentary glasses of the three sakes at the top of the Dassai range.  In addition, so amazing was the hospitality that I will feel forever in the Sakurai-san's debt -- one which I guess I can only repay by making sure to imbibe a lot of Dassai sake in the years to come! 

Best town/city visited: There are many towns and cities in Japan, my favorite country to visit, that I've been charmed by over the years -- places where I've seen beautiful sights, tasted good food and had great encounters with local folks.  Nonetheless, Takayama, which I visited for the first time this past year -- and certainly want to return for another visit at some point -- really did feel especially wonderful.  In just a few days there, I got to see a seriously gorgeous sunset, had daily encounters with super friendly people, enjoyed a lot of good food and loved the sights found in its streets so much that I spent many hours doing nothing more than strolling around the town that I would go so far as to say that I fell in love with... :)           

An enjoyable, even if physically demanding, day out in the Sai Kung Peninsula

I don't want to know how many uphill steps

I went up this afternoon... ;( 

 

These Chinese New Year flowers signal that

Chinese New Year really is not far away!

 

Beautiful day for a hike in the Sai Kung Peninsula :)

  

I spent a good part of last weekend indoors in urban sections of Hong Kong, doing such as having dim sum lunches two days in a row, attending a seasonal sake event at Sake Bar Ginn and attending a screening of a beautifully restored version of Yazujiro Ozu's Floating Weeds (1959).  In contrast, a good part of this weekend's daylight hours have seen me outdoors in the less built up sections of "Asia's World City": on Cheung Chau taking part in one more beach clean-up yesterday; and out hiking in the Sai Kung Peninsula this afternoon.

 

And just like it's not at all usual for me to have dim sum for two days running, I don't usually go hiking two days in a row -- but ended up doing so this weekend!  Granted that the journey to and from Tung Wan Tsai (aka Coral Beach), where the beach clean-ups regularly take place, from Cheung Chau's ferry pier (which I take a ferry to from Central) are not more than one hour long each way -- but they still count as hikes, even if short ones, to me.  At the same time though, I don't think anyone is going to dispute that a trek along the Maclehose Trail's Stage 3 is not a proper hike; and this even if we take detour midway along it to the Lady Maclehose Holiday Village rather than continue up and then down Kai Kung Shan to entirely follow the official route!

 

One reason for this is that this route involves one pretty physically demanding uphill stretch very early on in the hike.  For another, unlike Stages 1 and 2 of the Maclehose Trail, Stage 3 is one of those increasingly rare sections of major Hong Kong trails that's entirely unpaved.  Furthermore, even with the detour, I easily took over 10,000 steps -- and many of them uphill ones too! -- on today's hike (and had over 14,700 steps recorded on my pedometer when I got home this evening).

 

I think one of the three people in my hiking party today was not completely prepared for how tough today's hike would be.  But after seeing the splendid views and other cool sights frequently on offer over the course of today's Hong Kong country park excursion, I trust that she is agreement with everyone else in the group that today's was a really enjoyable hike.

 

Among today's hike highlights: feral cow spottings (including right by the trail head!); seeing a paraglider in glorious flight; and the sight of clump upon clump of beautiful Chinese New Year flowers!  And, of course, there were the views of land, water and sky -- with far more hills than buildings visible for the great bulk of our hike and sections of cloud-filled skies whose sight I enjoyed so much that I ended up gazing skywards more frequently than I regularly do on a hike, never mind while strolling in the more urban parts of the Big Lychee... :)

Memories of riding (pillion) on a motorbike in Malaysia, Zanzibar, and Beloit

Car and motorbike show in Central this past Sunday

Biker types hanging out near their dream machines

My choice for the most beautiful vehicle at the show ;b

After having my second dim sum lunch in two days last Sunday, I decided to go for a stroll that took me from Sheung Wan (where the eatery I had been at with my friend is located) to Central and beyond.  Near the IFC (International Finance Centre), I came across a car and motorbike show featuring some pretty eye-catching vehicles, including a number of big bikes along with sports cars and antique automobiles. 

I get the feeling that most of the people present were particularly impressed by certain of the cars (including Lotuses, Ferraris, Maseratis, Porsches and such) on show.  By my reckoning though, the most aesthetically pleasing machines on display were the large motorbikes -- all of them Harley Davidsons that were so shiny and well looked-after that I have to admit to wondering if they spend much time being ridden on actual roads!

Although I am a big advocate of public transportation (and have voluntarily gone through all but two years of my life -- when I lived in Kuala Lumpur, whose public transportation system leaves a lot to be desired -- without owning any motorized vehicles), it's also true enough that I have fond memories of riding (pillion) on a motorbike.  Of these, the earliest involved going on joy rides on the backseat of a bike belonging to a then 20-something-year-old aunt who regularly rode around town on a machine that may seem pedestrian in type and light on power but still seemed cooler to my preteen mind than those of her siblings who drove about in cars instead!

Then, when I lived in Zanzibar, I had a motorcycle-riding Italian doctor friend known to all and sundry as Dr Mario with whom I shared a common love for the beers produced by Malawi's Carlsberg brewery.  Whenever he managed to get a few bottles of their brew, he'd send word to me to drop by his clinic after work and after his own work day ended, I'd get on the back of his motorbike and he'd take me back to his place to enjoy a few beers and a feast that invariably included items -- such as salami and other preserved meats -- from care packages that his mother would send him from Italy along with fresh bread from a local bakery! 

Later in the evening (yes, after he and I had imbibed quite a bit of alcohol), he'd take me back into town.  I think in part because traffic tended to be on the light side and in part because I had got quite a bit of Dutch courage, I never feared that we'd come a cropper on those late night motorbike rides.  Instead, I thoroughly enjoyed the rides back into town as much as the rides to his place, the brewskis, the food, and viewing one of the only two video tapes he owned: the more frequently watched of  which was The Beatles' Yellow Submarine; the other of which was a documentary about giant whales!    

Probably my best memories involving riding on (the back of) a motorcycle though are those involving a beloved college professor and his beloved motorbike.  Although Dan Shea was born, went to school, taught and lived pretty much all his life in the state where the Harley-Davidson Motor Company was founded, his choice of vehicle was a British Norton bike that, after we had become friends, he'd take me on joy rides along beautifully long and lonely Wisconsin roads that went through farm land on which cows roamed or wheat grew in abundance.

I remember once telling Dan he should take prospective students on these bike roads as I figured it'd get them deciding they'd want to attend Beloit for sure, whereupon he laughed and pointed out that if he had an accident while doing so, he'd have the pants sued off him!  Since I wasn't thinking at all like a college administrator, I replied that I figured that it'd be worth the risk -- because, in all honesty, I think the experience showed how, at Beloit, professors and students didn't just interact in classrooms and actually could become friends who could have fun times (as well as seriously educational ones) together!

On June 19th, 2012, Dan Shea died of accidental causes while in Chile conducting archaeology field school.  A friend who's a fellow Beloit alum and friend plus fan of Dan broke the news to me a few days later.  I think I was so shocked by it and in denial that he was no longer of this Earth for so long that I couldn't write about his passing until now.  At the same time as I still feel sadness about his passing, I have got to realizing how many good and fond memories I have of the man that remain unsullied by his death and also still very strong, and how such as the sight of a beautiful motorbike parked in a central part of Hong Kong can get me thinking of him.