Woman from the Mao Ping Village
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Click here for Mao Ping Village Pictures
Click here for China Tour Pictures
This is a long description, but it was hard not to want to write all about our experience. If you are interested please read on, if not just scan the pictures above to get a sense of our trip to China.
How can I start to describe the week that we just spent in China? If I can portray even a portion of the intensity of the experience, you'll be touched in your spirit as we were. The background is that our school has a relation with a school in a remote village in southern China through an organization called the Zigen Foundation. The trip is designed to benefit children of both cultures and promote understanding between East and West. Let me set the scene - there are 15 of us - 4 teachers, 4 parents and 7 children aging from 4 - 9 years old. We leave the Hong Kong airport burdened with 16 boxes of supplies (paper, pencils, slates, chalk...) which have been purchased by the school children in a fundraising function, plus luggage, cameras, and 3 laptop computers. We arrive in the city of Guiyang and our Chinese speaking sponsors meet us as arranged, but our directions for the hotel are not correct and we spend an hour with minimal language communication trying to sort things out. This is our first indication that everything in China is slow and takes much discussion. We finally arrive at the hotel, everything is fine and we leave the next morning for the village of Mao Ping.
The countryside of this area of China is incredibly beautiful - it is all mountains with rice paddies and vegetable areas carved out on terraced hills.We travel up and down mountains and around curves intriqued with the views. Apparently no one in China can drive without a horn - EVERYTIME the driver goes to pass another vehicle or go around a curve he honks the horn, loud and long. Our 4 lane highway turns into a 2 lane road which turns into a dirt road. The next hiccup is a landslide on the dirt road, so we all get out and haul rocks off the road in order for the bus to be able to pass through. After 8 hours (1 hour at the airport retrieving a lost backpack and 1 hour for lunch) we arrive at the village. Until 2 years ago the people of this village had literally never seen a person from the West. In the past year there was a group from Australia and now our group who have visited the village. (This village is more accessible as the dirt road is traversable by a vehicle - many of the villages still have no roads - the only way to get there is to walk.)
As we arrive, the entire village is waiting - some children are playing drums, there are 4 men with huge (15 foot tall) bamboo flute-like musical instruments playing a traditional song, some young women are dressed up in traditional costume to perform a welcome dance for us, and the rest of the villagers are lining the path. Smiles and curious stares abound. We pass through the lines with the obligatory sips of rice wine (yikes! pure alcohol) from a buffalo horn as they welcome us.We were pre warned not to touch the horn - if you do, you have to drink the whole thing! The procession continues to the courtyard of the school house which is the main gathering place in the village where the welcomes and dances continue. The formal welcome is over and now our gifts of basketballs, soccer balls, and hoola-hoops enable our kids and their kids to play without the need of a common spoken language - just the language of kids and play. Again, there is a lengthy discussion about where people will stay for each night and a pairing up of a child partner for each of the kids in our group.Each family is eventually assigned a host family and our new friends accompany us to their homes.
This is an agricultural village - rice,vegies - where everything is done by hand. Wooden houses dot the hillsides - the houses are built so that the animals (pigs, water buffalo) inhabit the ground floor and the living quarters are above. There is no inside running water and outhouses are used for bathroom needs. A fire pit is used for cooking, but there is electricity and wouldn't you know it - some televisions. The diet is quite healthy with lots of vegetables, rice, eggs and a bit of meat. Billy, Sandra and I stayed at the school principal's house which had rough wood walls and floor, some glass windows, 2 living levels, 1 room that was full of potatoes, one room full of rice, a couple of bedrooms, winter kitchen, living room, and a beautiful open-air sitting room. At night the only noise was the nearby stream and when the few lights were out, it was very dark. Beds were raised wooden platforms on which were blankets and pillow. Furniture was a few wood small tables and a couple of falling apart couches and chairs.This home had a few old posters and calendars hung up, while many homes use newspaper on the walls like wallpaper because it lightens up the rooms by covering the dark wood. A swallows nest is in the living room with swallows free to fly in and out of the open window and is considered good luck. Dining tables are non-existent as all food is eaten family style where large bowls of food are placed on a low ring, everyone has their own individual bowl and chopsticks, and just takes from the community bowls while sitting on TINY stools. At our first dinner with our host family were Billy, Sandra, Ann and about a dozen members of the local family and luckily a translator from the Zigen foundation. It was great - the local dialect was spoken, one lady was able to translate that into Mandarin and then the Zigen person could translate the Mandarin into English so it was a real life game of round robin telephone. They killed 2 chickens for our dinner (very big deal as animals are usually only killed for Chinese New Year) and had made a chicken stew along with many other local dishes - dinner took about 3 hours to cook as they had to do everything from kill the chickens to make all the dishes - on one cook fire. Rice wine seems to accompany all festivities as well as some local beer and when I refused a refill I was told that in this village if you drink once, you have to drink twice! Women are up about 4:30 am to go out and gather greens for the pigs and some for people, then back to cook breakfast while both men and women work the fields. All work in the fields is done by hand with an occasional water buffalo to assist. Because this village has access to a town (about 2 hours by vehicle) there are some store bought commodities, but they are few and far between. Everywhere we go the children group around us, smiling, always curious to see what will happen next and the adults wave and smile as we go by - we wonder what they say to each other as we pass??? The children enjoy the digital cameras as we take their photos and show them the results they giggle and giggle.
The Zigen foundation has built a 'Women's Center' in the village to provide a place for women to gather and to provide education in areas of health, economics and more. One of the primary questions of the village is how to make money. They are fairly self-sufficient as they are able to grow and raise most of their own food, but there is always the need for other things such as window glass or hardware or clothing and so on. The principal's wife has been teaching some of the other women in the village to sew and embroider as a way to market products and make money. They had an exhibition and sale for us and our group purchased many of their wares. Billy and I were fortunate to purchase an incredibly beautiful skirt - started 3 years ago - which we plan to use as a wall hanging. The cost of the skirt was equal to the profit from one pig, so if the sewing takes off some of the women may be able to put more time into the sewing and less into taking care of pigs.
All children here attend primary school - there is a fee of about $25 USD and the Zigen foundation makes sure that all children who can't afford the fee are sponsored. There is a middle school in another village or in the nearest town but attendance necessitates living at the school as it is much too far to do a daily commute. Mostly boys attend the middle school as families who have to choose between a son or daughter attending will always choose the son. Again the Zigen foundation sponsors some girls for attendance at the middle school and also the senior high in the town. The school is a rough cement building built by the government with desks and stools for the children. Each desk had a set of very old used books for each child and instruction is very traditional. Some bits of technology are already sneaking in - there was a distance learning room with a tv, dvd player and satellite hookup. It seems so incongruous to see technology is such a primitive setting.
The village hosted the best barbeque that we have ever been to. We hiked to the river where we swam while the villagers prepared a wood fire, washed the pork meat in the stream, cut it off the bones, and stripped bamboo to make skewers. Yams and potatoes roasted in the coals while the pork cooked on the fire. Rice always accompanies everything as well as chili sauce. There was not a paper plate or utensil to be seen - just great food, lots of smiles, kids and adults swimming and having fun.
There was a simple PA system to host an evening performance at which the villagers performed traditional villages and songs around a huge bonfire. Our group did a short play, sang some songs and the villagers laughed and laughed at us doing the Macarena.
On Monday we had lessons scheduled for the local children with an art/math focus. Billy and I had the children use the drawing tools on the computer and build a clay animation movie. Although none of the children had ever touched a computer some of took to the mouse quite readily. More surprising was that none of the children had ever used clay before. The other teachers did various art/math activities with the children. All of the activities were a success to some degree and the local teachers got to see some alternative ways of instructing students. Even the fact of having desks out of straight rows and children working together were novel concepts.
As we leave, the whole village again gathers to see us off and tears are in the eyes of many of the villagers and ourselves as well. In our minds the questions are many as we leave - how can the village continue to survive? If you open up the doors will the young people want to return to the village? What will happen if tourists come to the village? Should the village be preserved? Is modernization always a good thing?
Back to the city to stay the night and then the rest of the group goes back to Hong Kong while Billy and I hitch up with two wonderful girls who had helped with the translating in the village. Both girls live in China, did graduate work at Columbia Univ in NYC and are fluent in both Mandarin and English. What great guides - we were able to go places and see things that we never could have done without someone to speak the language. You can get around Hong Kong fine with no Chinese but not at all in the parts of China where we were.The girls arranged a 3 day tour - lodging, meals, van, driver, guide - underground cave, waterfall, park, lake, ancient village, shopping - a wonderful experience and 2 new friends. We learned so much about China - politics, religion, economics by talking with the girls.
So, we are back in Hong Kong now and getting ready to leave for the states. It has been such an incredible transition from remote village of Mao Ping, to poor town of Leishan, to small city of Guiyang, to East/West huge city of Hong Kong, and now to the US. What a diverse world we live in!
Love to all our friends and family.
Click here to see April pictures (New format).
Here it is Spring time already and plants and flowers here are blossoming - bougainvillea , pansies, nasturtiums, orchids, azelas, and many more. Our rainy season has started with lots of cloudy days and some rain, although not the torrential rains which have 3 labels and levels of warnings such as "Amber Rain", "Red Rain" and "Black Rain." We have yet to experience any of these!
Monday, April 5th was the "Ching Ming Festival". A day when people visit graves of their ancestors to bring food, good wishes, offerings and to clean the gravesites. To our Western eyes, the leaving of thousands of slips of paper (fake money, good wishes) around the graves looks like a mess, but it is part of the culture here. In addition to the graves, throughout the city people place offerings of food (fruit, tea, rice, vegies) and lighted incense-like sticks in small piles on the side of streets. One morning while waiting for the bus, I placed a carry bag in front of a small offering on the street and a very upset man spoke a lot of Chinese and I guess I had inadvertently insulted some tradition. So now, I'm more careful where I set things down.
Mike returned to Hong Kong from Australia with some incredible diving pictures and stories of his adventures there. He spent a week here before returning to the states. We spent a day at "Ocean Park" which is an amusement park with the traditional rides and games as well as the most incredible walk-thru aquarium and shark tank that any of us had ever seen. The aquarium housed an enormous 3 story tank with hundreds of fish from large manta rays to huge eels to fish of all shape and size. One could spend a whole day there just watching the sea creatures. In addition there were the panda bears, a dinosaur exhibit, beautiful butterfly walk-thru, sea lion pool, dolphin show and more. It was a terrific day - the weather was fine, the crowds were minimal and we had a great time. We ended the busy day at a nearby Thai restaurant where Mike really enjoyed the spicy roast beef salad.
We were fortunate to visit Thailand for a 4 day educational conference. This small taste of Thailand has whetted our appetites for more exploration some time in the future. The conference was held in Bangkok which is a huge, sprawling city, totally polluted sky, with more traffic jams than anyone should have. The 3 lane freeway, was 4 or 5 'creative' lanes, people just driving as they choose, no emergency lane anywhere, it's being used for main traffic. What a mess! It has vibrancy however in the middle of this mess. We enjoyed the people, smiles, the weather was kind of hot and humid - like Phoenix in the summer time. We visited a 'night market' with many traditional Thai crafts and bargains galore for the shopper and took a ride in a 'tuk tuk' which is an open-air taxi where the driver weaves in among the cars at a high rate of speed! Bangkok is called the "Venice of the East" because of its location along the Chao Phraya river and the system of canals that run through the city. Many years ago the canals were the primary mode of transportation and today along the canals is an assortment of 5 star hotels and newer homes, along with traditional shanties on stilts, as well as many temples. We took a 1 1/2 hour tour through the canals to see a slice of Thai life. All along the journey people smiled and waved, especially the children. The children swim in the canals and rivers along with the pollution and 7 foot komodo dragons!
Now, talk about luxury! We went to see a movie last week and had a great surprise - imagine a small theater (40 seats - 2 seats, isle, 2 seats, isle, 2 seats isle), where each seat was an enormous lounge chair with buttons to make the seat backs and leg rests go up and down. There were small throw blankets if you were chilly. In between each pair of seats was a wooden table for your snack goodies and a button for service where you could order your popcorn. It was crazy - but very comfy and the cost was no more than a regular movie ticket (about $7 US.)
Biking in Hong Hong is very limited - actually on Hong Kong island it is purely suicidal. However, we had heard that out in the New Territories there were bikeable places so we took a journey by bus, subway, and train, rented some bikes and did a bit of biking. Our big mistake was going on a public holiday where we shared the bike path with too many other bikers. Many of the bikers acted as if they rode bikes very infrequently - weaving about, stopping right in the middle of the lane, not paying attention at all to where they were going, yikes! The path was along a lovely river so the scenery was great, and we chalk it up to an experience... but we think we'll stick to hiking around here.
We've been having fun working on developing a "Claymation" class for the kids at school. Remember the TV show 'Gumby and Pokey' or the 'California Raisins'? It's making clay figures and animating them by taking digital pictures and putting them into a movie making software. We had a group of teachers over for a Mexican luncheon and clay-play - and we all got to play like kids.
Sending love to all,
Ann and Billy
Wow, how the time flies by! Happy New Year to everyone and warmest wishes for 2004. On the right are the accompanying links to the sights and sounds that are related to this January 3rd Update. Enjoy. |
Video Clip of Monkeys at Kam Sham Country Park (long download) |
The outward aspects of the Christmas celebration have extended even to the Asian part of the world with colored lights, decorated trees, gifts, and Santa hats everywhere. Inside the big malls with elaborate decorations everywhere, you would think that you were in the US. One of our Indian friends explained this phenomenon as a "sparkly, happy" celebration. The skyscrapers around the harbor decorate their harbor-facing sides with huge pictures composed of millions of colored lights so that no matter what side of the harbor you are on, you get quite a show, not to mention the boats that take you around the harbor for the full view. After the first of the year, the decorations will go down and the ones for Chinese New Year will go up.
We spent Christmas day with some fellow teachers and families at the beach. Our weather has been cool (jeans and sweatshirt) with warmer days here and there, but Christmas day came through absolutely gorgeous - warm and sunny. The 9 of us hired a sampan to take us over to a nearby island where we had a beach picnic, laid in the sun, climbed the rocks and had a wonderful, leisurely day.
Chinese New Year starts with the New Moon on the first day of the new year and ends on the full moon 15 days later. We are currently learning about the traditions of past and present associated with this time. The Chinese New Year's Day is celebrated as a family time of reunion and thanksgiving, traditionally with a ceremony honoring Heaven and Earth, the gods of the household, and the family ancestors. Households have live blooming plants to symbolize rebirth and new growth while oranges, tangerines and specific candies each represent some kind of good fortune. Many taboos and superstitions come from past days. Here are a few things to ensure that the new year will be a good one: make sure your house is clean before New Year's Day for sweeping on that day may sweep all your good fortune away, on the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve have all your doors and windows open to allow the old year to go out, pay all your debts by the New Year, refrain from using foul language, bad, or unlucky words (the word "four" - Ssu - which sounds like 'death' is not to be uttered), don't wash you hair on New Year's Day as you may wash away all your good luck for the New Year, wear red clothing as it is sure to bring the wearer a sunny and bright future, the first person one meets and the first words heard are significant as to what the fortune would be for the entire year, do not use knives or scissors on New Year's Day as this may cut off fortune... We'll be celebrating with some special activities at school and then school will be closed for part of this time (as will all schools here as well as many businesses).
So, what else has been going on? Ann's son Mike stopped by Hong Kong for a week before heading to Australia in November and we had the pleasure of introducing another family member to the wonders of HK. We toured the city, hiked the peak, explored an island, visited a museum and Mike gave HK a definite 'thumbs up.' We've already got activities planned for his return in February. In the meantime he is backpacking along the Eastern Coast of Australia for the next several months. It seems that Australia is totally geared up for thousands of these young travelers: hostels, bus discounts, lots of places to see and do. He should have many stories to tell.
We conbined a business and pleasure trip to Australia at the end of November. A 4 day technology conference was what drew us there and it miraculously coincided with the marriage ceremony of Ann's nephew. It was a very busy time and much travel for a short visit but was wonderful to get a glimpse into AU. The conference in Wollongong, just south of Sydney, kept us busy for 4 very long days. We decided that Australians like to party - there were social activities until late every night but then up for early morning conference workshops everyday. After the conference we headed north to Byron Bay and talk about beaches - these were the most beautiful we have ever seen - mile after mile of white beachs and clear, turquoise water. We could have relaxed into staying here for another week! Byron Bay must be the youth capital of the country - so many young people - many doing the backpacking hostel thing - and it's easy to see what attracts them - surfing, swimming, kayaking, hang gliding, hiking, mountain biking, scuba diving, snorkeling.. Ann's nephew, David, and his wife, Jane, chose the lighthouse at Byron Bay as the location for their marriage ceremony. Here's the scene: the sky was brilliant blue, sun strong, a light breeze, the lighthouse solid and strong, a string ensemble accompanied the waves, guests in bright attire, a circle of flowers and David and Jane surrounded with love.
We are finishing up a working/resting vacation here in Hong Kong and among other things have done a fair share of hiking. The pollution that blows in from China this time of year has been distressing - apparently China still uses a lot of low grade coal in its industry and the predominantly northern winds of this time of year blow the stuff our way. In our mountain top hikes, we keep imagining the spectacular views that one would have without the "haze" in the sky. Take a look at the pics of our latest adventures and you'll see some of the yucky stuff.
Our next holiday is April 2-19 - weather should be in the 70's - humidity high - some rain - pollution levels should be low - sounds like a lovely time for visitors - any takers??
Billy just got back from the market with fruits and vegetables - the markets are fabulous here with delicious fresh fruits, eggs, juices, and vegetables at ridiculously low prices. Let's see what we have today - eggs, cherries, pineapple, papaya, bananas, spinach, eggplant, broccoli, tomatoes, potatoes - yum! Not to mention the incredible bakeries which lure you off the street with their wonderful smells.
Much love to all,
Ann and Billy
Richard, Ann's oldest brother, has been our first official visitor to Hong Kong from the States and we were able to feel somewhat like 'locals' showing him some of the sites here.
We ferried over to Lamma Island and walked around through lush tropical foliage on a lovely, quiet island where there are only walking paths, no cars and no noisy busses! It reminds us of Mexico - very simple homes, friendly people, nothing upscale here. We joined the rest of the tourists for a harbor-side dinner, had a great moonlit walk up to the only other village on the island only to find out that the last ferry home had already left. Not to worry, there was still a ferry to the main district of HK and a bus to get home.
We took a day trip to Macau, a peninsula off the China mainland which until 1999 was a Portuguese protectorate and then, like Hong Kong, reverted back to Chinese rule. You take a one hour high speed ferry to get there - either a turbojet or hydrofoil. It's actually a separate entity like HK, so you have to go through customs with passport, etc. There is still some Portuguese influence and we were able to decipher many of the signs since the language is similar to Spanish. A very fun. knowledgeable and personable tour guide "Sam" took us for a couple of hour tour around the place - old fort, old catholic church, Buddhist temple, great Portuguese lunch, Pearle River with China across the river. (Sam Leong of Lotus Travel Agency) This town has more motorcycles and scooters than one can imagine - like bumble bees buzzing in and out and all around the city - and Sam told us that we hadn't even seen the height of rush hour! Here is a great, animated Macau website: Information about Macau
One day we actually got to ride in a car, (unusual for us here) and went with a friend and her son to the Kowloon side of HK to a country hiking park where we were hoping to see monkeys. We brought binoculars hoping to catch a glimpse of one or two of them and were thrilled when we saw one close to the road - THEN - there were more and more and more - right out in the country alongside the paths and walkways all hoping for something to eat. As we were hiking we had to cross a reservoir walkway that was lined with about 20 or so monkeys - we had no worries until about 3/4 of the way across one male decided that he didn't like us there and he got a couple of his cronies to start making noise and hustle us across. So we got across in a bit of a hurry with one monkey grabbing at Ann's shirt. It was great fun to watch their interactions, grooming of each other, the definite prominence of the big male, the babies holding on to their mothers as they ran, jumped, swam. It was quite amazing - and just 20 minutes outside of HK.
A Junk trip over to Lantau island was great fun. We found out that a Junk is a boat with a flat bottom and Richard discerned that they use no navigational systems - no GSP, no Loran, no radar. Oh well, they got us to and from where we wanted to go, even at night amongst the rocks. The taxi driver there appeared to be an ex-Nascar driver as he roared along a twisty mountain road. We had a great dinner with real homemade bread, escalloped potatoes, great barbeque - you can tell what we're missing here - it's really hard to find good bread in this rice nation. On the trip over to Lantau we got some good views of the huge container ships that travel from all over the world to unload and load cargo in the HK harbor. They load/unload all from barges that travel out to the ships to get everything from McDonald's supplies to cars to concrete to steel beams, to who knows what. Remember, everything has to come from somewhere.
We played tourist and went to the Stanley Market and lubricated the local economy and bought our fair share of fun stuff. Richard left his old "one way ticket" tennis shoes here and bought a new pair of shoes - better to buy them here as they are all manufactured in China anyway. We continued with a trip out to the surfing beach via high mountain twisty roads and beautiful views. While LI is in a cold snap we were on the beach and each day of Richard's visit has been warm and sunny although hazy.
Richard, the night owl that he is, has checked out the HK nightlife finding everything from people calmly fishing after midnight to the noise and beat of the Western (gwylo) area of town. He has told us when the restaurants and escalators and busses close as we are not ever out at the time of the early morning. But, he managed to get home every night - not always an easy feat with figuring out busses, and taxi drivers who don't speak English.
We are constantly amazed at the mass transit system here - Richard used his Octopus card (mass transit card) for the Airport Express train, many busses, MTR (subway), the water taxi, the Trolley, Tram up to the Peak, and ferry - we think we hit them all. We have walked and walked both city and country hiking - I don't know if we'll ever hike all the trails around here as the hills are full of them.Our last day ended with a hike up to the highest peak on HK island with incredible 360 degree views.
Cheers to all - love from Ann and Billy
September 28th: 3 days before Chinese "National Day" celebration. The locals say to expect lots of fireworks.
It seems amazing that our last update was almost a month ago. September has flown by with each week going faster than the previous. Well, let's see... Ann has her official "Hong Kong ID Card" and is truly a resident of HK while Billy's remains tied up in paperwork. The school technology is slowly sorting itself out; we now have a true e-mail system, working library system, software is getting installed, operating systems updated, decisions for using iBooks are being made, and a lot more that doesn't sound like much but takes tremendous amounts of time and mental energy.
The weather is slowly turning to fall with less humidity and hints of coolness. Earlier this month we experienced our first "Signal 9" typhoon where the city literally comes to a halt and all businesses and schools close, and the streets are jammed as everyone tries to get home before it hits. Luckily the typhoon veered north at the last minute and we were spared the brunt of its force.
We continue to learn our way around the city, and the busses, trams, and subways are not quite as confusing now. We've even taken a "water taxi" which crosses the small harbor near our apartment.
HK is truly a city of international foods - we've experienced a Morrocan restaurant which took us to another corner of the world, a small but good quality Mexican restaurant, found an Italian supermarket, a South African food store, and an American health food store, while Thai, Vietnam, and Indian restaurants abound.
We continue to enjoy exploring the hiking trail systems around here and marvel at the infrastructure of dams, resevoirs, slope maintenance, canals, and trail work that we see on our walks. Every slope here is registered for maintenance, as a tremendous amount of work has to go into keeping the hillsides from eroding and making sure that they are draining properly. At least once a week we hike home over the local mountain and down the other side - about 1.5 hours, sometimes ending up at KFC at the bottom of the mountain. Sometimes the walks end up in the dark, but with even far off city lights, it is very walkable. Billy is having "star withdrawal" symptoms - there is just too much ambient light to see many stars.
There was a beach picnic recently with families from our school and because it took place on a very hot day, lots of people (expecially the kids) enjoyed the swimming. The beachs are surprisingly uncrowded here and it's not because of the holes in the shark nets!! Our director of school says that only a couple of people a year get eaten... not really. There were water skiiers outside and didn't seem to worry about sharks or maybe it makes for really good skiiers as they are afraid to fall down.
The busses and streets are filled with school children in the morning with every color and style of uniform. All children wear uniforms to their public or private schools. The public school are even open on Sat. with some children attending and the teachers are required to be in attendance but cannot teach any new content..It seems to be almost a babysitting service provided for the many parents who work 6 days a week. The majority of people work a standard 6 day work week - no overtime!
We met up with an interesting cultural phenonmenon. Many people from the Phillipines live and work here because of economic hardships and lack of jobs in their country. Quite a few of them are servants/helpers for the local population. They live in with the families, sometimes in minimal space, and cook, clean, take care of children, etc. On holidays and Sundays the families don't want them around the house so they are literally put out onto the streets for the day. They congregate in huge crowds all over the city - sitting in parks, hallways, public areas - and sit with friends, play cards, sleep. HK is embarassed by the situation, but doesn't know what to do about it.
Night life exists here as in any major city. There are some young and adventurous (single) teachers we work with who like the late, loud, crowded street and bar scene. We unknowingly accompanied 3 such energetic people to dinner last Friday and got a glimpse of another side of HK. Talking about crowds, there is an area of town called Causeway Bay that has been dubbed the "World's Busiest Intersection". How can I describe this experience?? You literally move with a crowd across intersections and down streets - like one bee in a swarm of thousands - streets are blocked off to traffic - stores are so crowded sometimes people wait outside to enter. We are constantly amazed at the "vertical shopping" - stores on the 10th and 20th floors of buildings.
Billy has lost his hair again, but this time to a good cause. "Locks of Love" is an organization that collects hair of at least 9 inches in length and uses it to make wigs for children who have a physical defect in their ability to grow hair. Ann says it looks great!
Thanks for "tuning in". We're excited that a couple of family members from the states are making plans to visit. Yea Richard and Michael! We would love to see any and all of you.
Here are some pictures for September.