On several fronts...

School is starting again!
Ok it's not such a big deal (by right), and I am trying not to feel like it's a big deal too. I've been a good boy and I did my work, and now I just have to adjust myself to the waking/working routine again. I'm really looking forward to the short second semester! However much shit I take, it's only gonna be so long before I get my break!

I am still playing hard for polo, and actually kind of excited to play with my juniors for this year's national champs. It's hard work, but I should continue to push myself and not be a wimp. Am putting in more training into playboating these days too, because I might be performing at this year's Waterfest at Kallang! That'll be really cool, so long as performance anxiety doesn't sets in.

And we kind of decided we'll probably not go Nepal after all this year end; we are going through the process of getting our dream place now and renovations needs to be done during that period if we are to stay in it by next year. It's very exciting to think about how I can possible transform the place with a new look, and most likely very costly too...

Have only this much time to write, more later!

Hong Kong!

Arrival

It's a fairly quick flight to this place, and I watched 'Vantage Point' on the flight too. China has already decorated their plane with the Olympic theme, cute!

Taking a cab out, we went by several very modern bridges spanning across the islands. The terrain is really quite mountainous, and it is really fascinating to me that such a bustling metropolitan city can have so much hills around it such that a large part of the city is on slopes.

Near the bridges there are lots of tall skyscraper-like housing projects that looks like real nice condominiums, and they are all facing the water! Can you imagine living right up at the top, being buffeted by sea winds everyday and having a priceless view of the water?

Things get much less interesting once you reach the city. It's just shops and crowds, and I am pretty much stuck in it all these days. Ok, there are lots of nice and interesting things, but still, I long to go out into nature...

Food

Roast Pigeon! Always wanted to try that. It's nice and crispy on the outside, but the red meat is even more pungent than duck. Can be an acquired taste for some, especially the fried 'spare parts' that comes with it. Thankfully I take to good food fast.

We had dim sum at this restaurant today, and ordered an insane lot of food because we thought the portions will be smaller like how it is in Singapore. Even the waitresses were amazed by our appetite...in the end we only paid $10sgd for each person, so it's really like an all-you-can-eat buffet...worth it!

Buys

CDs - The Huang Mengla's one is $9sgd only! The rest are under $20sgd too. There's also a 'deep sea soloing' climbing DVD that I got at the Mammut shop.

Cute stuff - for my students and colleagues. Great gifts! Even I can 't resist them. Cartoon print band-aids!

The Mammut shop there is really amazing. I managed to find the Mammut climbing tile! Damn cool! Bought stickers for kicks too, and 2 chemically-activated handwarmers. And the salesperson gave me 3 cloth bags with its logo too, nice guy!

The climbing tile in detail. It's gonna take pride of place somewhere in my new place next year.

Other stuff - Chaco ZX2 at half price $65, wire carabiners at $10, cord, alpine utensil and sporks...

There's a shop selling so much Salomon shoes there, and it's real cheap! I bought the Salomon XA Pro Gore-tex version for $134, Black Diamond poles $41 each, Pocari drink packets, Platypus pushcaps, Map of North-East Hong Kong...

More to come! Hahah...

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We wanted to go for a walk at around this Plover Cove area (a reservoir), but was put off by the layers of rainclouds that morning. Also, apparently one day before we arrived Hong Kong had its heaviest rainfall in 128 years, which caused numerous landslides and flooding on major roads; there was thus the consideration that further rain can lead to more landslides too. So we slept the morning away, and eventually, the weather turned out sunny all day!

We had to substitute the trek with a visit to the Peak instead. The tram up is an experience in itself, and it starts from the basement floor of this tall building on the right! There are a few stops along the tram route, but only 1 person got up midway. Tourists are everywhere though. The ride is really steep! The gradient of the slope here can give you a picture...

Up there, we can see the night lighting of the city, and the water gap between Hong Kong Island and the 'mainland'. I just wanted a place with a nice view, but there's 2 shopping arcades there at the top, and the whole place is thoroughly commercialised.

You can see that the housing blocks are all skyscrapers in themselves, really amazing. Dwarfs almost any housing project we have here in terms of heights.

Back to the city for walks and more shopping. We meet pet dogs occasionally, and all of them seem exceptionally well-trained, and only one were seen with a leash. Here is an extremely cute one which stares up at people so attentively, and became an attraction itself with hordes of people crowding around it.

The last day - we still woke up late, had breakfast at a nice and cheap local porridge eatery, and bought a few cheap shirts before going back hotel to check out. We hit the streets again after that, rushing around for the last few buys of the trip. I went to scout around for the bus stop where the airport express bus will be, and went by this shao la stall by the road. This is probably the representative picture of Hong Kong for me - bright and delicious, lots of variety, value and full of local flavour.

OE Conference 2008

It was a great 3 days at the OE conference, which is a lot to be said for any conference generally. I am happy to see friends, meet new people in the community, and interact with the speakers from overseas. Their keynote speeches offers totally new perspectives to me, and it is a refreshing change from reading about OE topics in certain texts, because those speeches really inspires me to make changes to the way OE can go locally. There are many concurrent sessions offered there, presenting participants with some tough choices on which to go for, and the variety of topics discussed is really good!

It just gives me a warm feeling to be among like-minded people and talking with them passionately about the state of outdoor education in Singapore, and I think it makes us all feel that OE is really undergoing continual progress here. It is apparent that the OE unit in MOE has put in much work to make things happen and encourage the growth of the community, and it is really heartening.

In short, the conference reminded me again to aim to work there in the future, and to further the OE cause in schools. I only hope that I can still remember all these inspiring messages from the conference after school starts and the dreaded monotony of work sets in.

New on this Island!

Ok I have to say I'm pretty entertained by the Sunday Times today - the new Southern Ridge trail have a cover page mention, and it's good that it receives this publicity to get Singaporeans out of their house and appreciate the outdoors more. The National Parks website gives good direction for exploring the trail.

It's probably unfair to compare the natural walks on our island with other countries', but then again I think people elsewhere are much more passionate about walking than us generally. I'm taking a day of my Hong Kong trip for a day hike, and decided to try the Plover Cove walk after seeing the pictures of the scenery there. Look at the incredibly informative website that the walkers there created!

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In a separate article, apparently there will be an artificial surf site producing 3m waves at Siloso beach by next June! Surfing was really fun when I tried it in Perth last year, and to be able to do it locally in warm water will be great! Now I wonder if they can accomodate surf kayaks there hm...

And the paddling community is looking forward to the whitewater stadium at the new sports hub of the future. We'll have to wait and see if the public have full access to its facilities after it comes up. The paradox of paddling in Singapore is that water is all around but we got such limited access to it.