The cripps in Hong Kong Hong Kong, Repulse Bay, Cripps, Crippo, Mark Cripps, Joss Cripps

Zai Jian 再見 (Hope to see you again soon)

A diary about our expedition to Hong Kong

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Monday, October 30, 2006

A lonely stranger in the strange land

Today was a Bank Holiday to celebrate the Chung Yeung Festival -- one of the days in the year when you're supposed to honour the dead (interesting it's so close to Halloween). I know in the UK we're searching for an excuse for an October public holiday (Trafalgar day on the 22nd being my personal politically-incorrect favourite) - but a day to honour the dead is a pretty good excuse too.

If we'd had relatives buried here, we should have visited their graves and given them (the graves not the corpses) a wash and brush up.

Many hong kong-ers take picnics along and feast on their relative's graves. I've also just read in wiki that they also should climb high mountains -- NO BLOODY WONDER we could not move for people when we went for a quick walk round the Peak this morning.

Note to self: read wiki before leaving the front door.

We told Billy about the graveyard bit and he asked if we could take a picnic to someone's grave when we got home to the UK. Can you imagine? Sitting on Fred Blogs' damp gravestone in late October guzzling pork pies and tizer? Can you still get Tizer?

Anyway, here's what wiki says about the festival:

The Chung Yeung Festival (or "Double Ninth Festival" because it's dated on the ninth day of the ninth month in Chinese calendar) is a traditional Chinese holiday, mentioned in writing since before the East Han period. (East Han is near West Han - a placed noted for its great football team).

According to the I Ching, nine is a yang number, ninth day of the ninth lunar month or double nine, has too much yang (a traditional Chinese spiritual concept) and is thus a potentially dangerous date. Hence, the day is also called "Double Yang Festival" (重陽節). To protect against the danger, it is customary to climb a high mountain, drink chrysanthemum wine, and wear a plant named zhuyu (茱萸), Cornus officinalis. (Both chrysanthemum and zhuyu are considered to have cleansing qualities and are used in other occasions to air out houses and cure illnesses.)

Double Ninth may have started out as a day to drive away danger, but, like the Chinese New Year, over time it became a day of celebration. In contemporary times it is an occasion for hiking and chrysanthemum appreciation. Stores sell rice cakes (糕 "gāo" a homonym for height 高) inserted with mini colorful flags to represent zhuyu. Most people drink chrysanthumum tea, a few strict traditionalists drink homemade chrysanthemum wine. Children in school learn poems about chrysanthemum, and many localities host a chrysanthmum exhibit.

Mountain climbing races are also popular; winners get to wear a wreath made of zhuyu.

This is an often-quoted poem about the holiday:

"Double Ninth, Missing My Shandong Brothers" - Wang Wei (Tang Dynasty)
Original:

《九(jiǔ)月(yuè)九(jiǔ)日(rì)憶(yì)山(shān)東(dōng)兄(xiōng)弟(dì)》
王維
獨(dú)在(zài)異(yì)鄉(xiāng)為(wèi)異(yì)客(kè),
每(měi)逢(féng)佳(jiā)節(jié)倍(bèi)思(sī)親(qīn)。
遙(yáo)知(zhī)兄(xiōng)弟(dì)登(dēng)高(gāo)處(chù),
遍(biàn)插(chā)茱(zhū)萸(yú)少(shǎo)一(yī)人(rén)

And for those of you who can't read Chinese -- here's the English version:

As a lonely stranger in the strange land,
Every holiday the homesickness amplifies.
Knowing that my brothers have reached the peak,
All but one is present at the planting of zhuyu.

Love it!

M

Sunday, October 29, 2006

Whilst we're talking about physical geography

On the evening of 14th September, I was putting the boys to bed and I heard some of the metal shelves rattling in the next room (playroom). I just thought something had fallen off the shelf. Went in to our room to change (to go to the gym would you believe?) and again I heard stuff banging against each other - thought nothing of it. THEN I (stupidly) went to the lift ... which, as usual, behaved erratically - but a bit more so. You, reader, can guess the plot - Mr Stupid here did not put the clues together. I bumped into a security guard -- sure enough, he asked me if I felt the earthquake.

DOH slap-to-forehead moment. Of course. I'd been in a small quake in San Francisco before -- but it just did not occur to me that they'd happen in HK. My Bro-in-Law warned me there are quakes in HK -- but I dismissed it.

This quake was 3.5 on the Richter Scale -- typically for me, this was the biggest quake in HK for 11 years. I say typically for me because stats like that are always happening to me e.g. when we moved to Crowthorne, we were worried about being so close to Broadmoor (the High Security Mental Institution) .... no one had escaped from there for over 12 years. Naturally enough, 3 people escaped in the first year we were living there (in Crowthorne, not Broadmoor).

Where was I? Oh yes, Quakes.

Found a great HK site (official Govt site -- they're pretty good at this kind of thing ... much clearer, or at least more accessible compared to the UK) which discusses quakes and Tsunamis and what is being done to a) monitor and b) protect against the likelihood. All very re-assuring.


RECORD OF TREMORS FELT IN HK

"Since 1874, a total of 6 tremors of Intensity V (5) or above have been felt in Hong Kong. The strongest of these occurred in 1918 arising from a Magnitude 7.3 earthquake at Shantou about 300 kilometres east-northeast of Hong Kong. The tremor caused only minor damages and cracks to buildings locally and its intensity was estimated to be VI to VII (6 to 7) on the Modified Mercalli Scale. From 1979 to present, a total of 52 locally felt tremors were reported, averaging two a year. Most of these tremors were of Intensity III to IV (3 to 4). There were five with Intensity II (2) and only one with a stronger Intensity V to VI (5 to 6).


Since 1979, there were altogether six locally felt tremors with epicentres located in Hong Kong, at Maipo (once in 1983) and near the east coast of Lantau Island (twice in 1982 and three times in 1995 respectively). All these tremors were below Intensities V (5)."

Tide tables

It's 08:00 Sunday morning and, already, it's a scorcher ... must be 30 degrees outside. We've got all of the windows open so we're getting a cooling breeze flowing through the apartment -- from the peaks behind us (where the dragon lives) -- down to the sea.

Anyway, we were woken by a series of airhorns ... there's some kind of ironman competition happening on the beach below us ... quite a spectacle from our vantage point as you don't really get to see the individuals participating ... just a collective mass of e.g. white water trails in the sea.

The sea ... currently it's @ maximum low tide. Watching the in & out of the sea everyday is very compelling -- fascinating watching the tides. My in-laws had amazing perspicacity in that they bought me a tide clock for my birthday (which archie dismantled and re-programmed but luckily I have got it all back together again).

The clock is unfailingly accurate. But I don't get it. According to the Hong Kong tide table site in HK, the tides oscillate a bit in frequency; duration and height. So how can an analogue clock - with no facility to set the day of the month etc, account for these variances? I don't know!

Have been trying to read up on how and why tides work .... but it remains a mystery. I'll persevere!

I'm feeling a bit stone age man about it all ... I'd not really considered how tides work before. I assumed full moon, or closeness of the moon = high tide ... allow for some local nuances. According to wiki, it's all a bit more complicated than that - e.g. high tide in the Southern Oceans occurs some two days before the North Sea. Fantastic.

I bet the nautical amongst you are thinking 'bloody idiot'. I remember once a mate of mine (Al Comrie) casually reciting next day's tide tables -- at the time I was immediately impressed, then realised he was making it up (a la Crocodile Dundee 'reading the time from the sun' scene), but in retrospect I have a sneaking suspicion that he actually knew what he was talking about (makes a change eh AL?).

M

example of the type of work i'm doing out here

Click on the BIG triangle below ..... fun eh?

And when you're done with that, check these out too!

Do me a favour -- send them to your mates!


m


Monday, October 23, 2006

Must not forget Lilo & Stitch

Archie's 3rd birthday






Archie's birthday weekend was great fun - mainly because it was my birthday too! And we'd arranged to go to HK Disneyland.

I've now clocked up every Disneyland in the world ... sad or what? There's a new one opening in Shanghai so a visit beckons.

HK Disneyland is much smaller than any of the others -- and lacks some of the most famous rides (and my favourite ones too) inc. Pirates of the caribbean; haunted house and runaway train. But fun none-the-less ... we could have bought a season ticket ... but would have had to visit the place x3 times in as many months ... a bit OTT in my book!

M

More photos from Ocean Park




The first is Archie's reaction to the Cable car cresting over a mountain and going over the other side!

The second is a shot of one of the two pandas they have in captivity there.

And the third is a shot of the reef display ... you walk round and round and round and deeper and deeper into the ocean .... great fun.

We should get a season ticket!

Weird stuff I've eaten in Hong Kong

Chinese proverb -- "If its back is raised towards the sky, we'll eat it"

In no particular order!

1. Chicken feet dim sum .... yum slurping gelatinous 'meat' from webbed chicken-skinned toes
2. Turtle jelly ... the bit that holds the shells on to the meat ... meant to be good for you. Eaten cold as a dessert.
3. Braised fish maw ... erm ... jellied fish bloaty thing that helps the fish stay bouyant. Never again.
4. 100 year old egg ... egg preserved in horse pee ... tastes like 3 week old napies
5. Ducks' tongues ... look like ducks' tongues. Taste like them too by golly. Never again for these either.
6. Meat floss .. candy floss meats meet. Looks like someone's body hair you find in the bottom of the vacuum cleaner bag. Tastes like it too.
7. Cashew nut soup (warm) (dessert). Looks like sick.
8. Sea slug ... complete with prickles. Had to force it past my teeth. Had it today in fact ... hence this note. Don't like it AT all and I don't feel 100% right now.
9. Drunken crab ... right ... crab drowned in brandy and then eaten raw. Hmmm.
10. Dragon fruit .. pretty to look @ but tasteless.
11. Chinese soup ... cabbage leaf, meet some hot water. Hot water meet cabbage leaf. Sprinkle on some pepper. Hey presto = soup.


Stuff not yet tried:

1. Braised camel hump
2. Ovaries ... crab and frog = delicacy. Not for me it ain't.
3. Snake
4. Pig entrails
5. Shark fin & birds' nest soup

Sunday, October 15, 2006

Some photos from the Repulse Bay temple




Laughing buddah. Fisherman on turtle god etc

Some background relating to Repulse Bay


I think we chose well living in Repulse Bay - yes we're paying loads for it, but it's well worth it. The views; the space; the amenities; the easy route to work. It's all very convenient - but, yes, very Gweilo too.

More on Gweilo another day.

Repulse Bay feels like another part of Hong Kong entirely. You head South out of the crazy full-on-space that is Hong Kong Central (The Northern part of Hong Kong Island) ... go thru the Aberdeen tunnel and the BURST through into another world that's not skyscrapers on speed ... but greenery; South China shimmering sea and calm(ish).

Here's what Wiki has to say about the place:

In 1841 the bay was used as a base by pirates and caused serious concern to foreign merchant ships trading with China. The pirates were subsequently repulsed by the British Fleet; hence the name. Another theory holds that the bay was named after the HMS Repulse which was stationed at the bay at one point.

In the 1910s, Repulse Bay was developed into a beach, and the Repulse Bay Hotel was built in 1920. To attract swimmers, a bus route from Central to Repulse Bay was created, and now stands as one of Hong Kong's oldest bus routes. During the Battle of Hong Kong in World War II, Repulse Bay was an important strategic location.

We recently went to the excellent Hong Kong Coastal Defence Museum .... a must visit - more later.

The former Repulse Bay Hotel was refurnished to become a shopping mall in 1982, providing fast food, shops and restaurants. The hotel's colonial architecture was retained. Aside from the attraction of the beach, Repulse Bay is also a popular place for family or friends to gather because of its barbecue sites have looked for these -- can't find them!.

On the beach there are large statues of two goddesses, Kwun Yum and Tin Hau. Also overlooking Repulse Bay, although from higher up, is the famous "building with a hole".

The building with a hole is built that way to allow the mountain dragons access to the beach (bad Feng Shui otherwise).

Saturday, October 14, 2006

Review of the last few weeks in UK & the first few weeks in HK


Pressure was mounting hourly ....

It had been building up for 4 months, and stress had got to crazy levels .... leaving my work in the UK; finding work in HK; tidying the house up to put it on the rental market (with everything emotional that entails); sorting out a home for the Lotus (sorting out bodywork repairs for the Lotus in fact ... idiot next door crashed into it couple of weeks before we were scheduled to leave the UK); sorting out somewhere to live in HK; telling everyone we were leaving ... our parents; our friends; my cousin "you're ****ing not!!?!"; our great friends who we nanny-shared with; neighbours ... one of the worst was having to tell kirsty, our wonderful new nanny - she'd given up a good job to work with us. i did not particularly enjoy that conversation at all

Then joss was in HK on her own for a few weeks - was hard for her living out here on her own in an empty flat ... hard for us in the UK too ... loads of things to sort out in the UK. but we filled the weekends by seeing friends etc.

The two days immediately prior to leaving were difficult .... despite being reasonably organised, there was a tremendous amount of work to do -- stupidly, I agreed to do a couple of days freelancing which was a mistake in retrospect (but money was nice)!

The day of departure started @ c. 05:00 ... after 4 hours sleep ... removal men had been there the day before, so the bulk of the packing was done, but still loads to do. And, as usual when we move, record breaking temperatures. Vicky & Kevin (sister & bro-in-law) were stars and helped out.

About 16:00, I put the BBQ on for the last time ... we had to leave the house @ 18:30 to check in on time ... though we'd have plenty of time to spare. Also @ 16:00 we popped round to the garage to handover the Citroen. Naively, I thought this would take about 20 mins ... paperwork; sunny-summer-weekend Friday afternoon Chiswick traffic and 1.25 hours later we got home. £25 worth of Farmer Tim's beef joint had yet to be put on the BBQ. Aaaaaagh. Needs 1.5 hours to cook - thought we'd just squeek it. Joss took the boys to the neighbours' houses to say goodbye. Meanwhile I popped next door (knackered; tired and sweaty - me not them, well not all of them) to drop some keys off.

Need-less-to-say I ended up there with a beer in hand -- knowing I had to shower; pack (for 2 years!!!); finish cleaning the house; change; and do BBQ/supper ... all in <40 mins. Nutz.

Crazy ... I tell you @ that stage, I nearly stayed in the UK!!!!

GOD that was a knackering few days .... I really don't want to go thru that again in a hurry .... overall, it was a much harder experience than moving out totally ... having to decide what stays; what gets thrown; what gets shipped and what gets stored & selling the car on the last day & packing for the 13 hour flight. Also knowing what we'd need in the 6 weeks between arriving in HK and the time a majority of our possesions would arrive (78 boxes!!!).

GAWD just how did we get thru that?

So time had finally come to leave Chiswick. It was great that loads of our neighbours turned out to say goodbye .... John & Julie came over with a bottle of Cloudy Bay & four glasses which went down v. well. I gave my uneaten joint of beef to John next door. Forgot to give the BBQ to Mark across the road as I promised.

In taxi & waved goodbye to all.

Joss shed a few tears on the way to the airport. And Billy needed a wee of course. So there we were having said goodbye ... belting down the M4 & Billy announces he's about to wet himself - we're hard pushed for time so Billy pees into an empty lucozade bottle (which we left in the taxi - hope the driver did not mind too much!).

Flight check in was a mare initially .... seemed like half of bloody nairobi was checking in @ the virgin desk with us .... joss pushed in .... my those nigerian ladies are BIG ... BIG I say ... would not want to mess with them ... i pulled the
"embarrassed husband" act and walked off ... i managed to sweet talk the first class blonde bird (aren't they all on virgin atlantic?) check in desk to check us in there and went a bit sweeter after that.

Flight was fine .... archie slept all the way apart from last 3 hours.

Billy was kept amused by some entry-level war movie in-flight. he did however manage to tip his cold scrambled egg breakfast all down my lap/legs/in between my un-shoed/socked toes YUK

Stepped out of HK airport (HKIA = BEST airport in the world BTW) to be met with a wall of 40 degree/90% humidity heat ... never thought i'd be able to live in that heat. Amazing how one acclimatises though ... some days in the summer temp climbed to late 30's degrees .. and i went in to work wearing moleskin trousers and walking shoes ... the air con is FANTASTIC everywhere including the tube; buses; some pavements even have AC coming up the vents and overhead in the pedestrianised walkways (mid level escalators http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central-Mid-levels_escalator .. more about that another time). London could learn a thing or two.

Next day we spent on the beach in front of our flat ... it was sunday & gets very busy, but boys had fun .... water was OK
(warm) ..... about as clean as the Solent .... but I had the runs something AWFUL 3 days later ... for about a week ... been nervous about going into the sea since!

The first week ... spent time finding furniture; schools; live-in helper; ID card etc ... but also took a day out to a theme park
(Ocean Park) which the boys loved .... real pandas ... massive cable car etc

Customer service here is the exact opposite of the UK ... took 20 mins to open a bank account ... nothing is too much trouble ... restaurant service is outstanding

And it's very reasonable to eat/drink out .... transport is v.v.v.v cheap ... i get an airconditioned bus from outside the flat to work every morning ... 12 mins door to door .... 36pence .... taxi home costs £3.60 .... brilliant.

As I've said before, the boys have settled in really well ... they spend all day outside in the pool ... billy's swimming really well. we put sun protection factor 13000 + on them - despite that, they have both got brown faces/arms and archie has
developed loads or freckles. archie, he confesses, has made LOADS of girlfriends ... 1/2 a dozen girls follow him everywhere in the pool answering to his every beck & call. (apart from the time he had a number two accident poolside with me on parent duty -- i was not amused i can tell you!).

We took archie to disneyland HK for his 3rd birthday.

Nearly everyone who lives in HK thinks disneyland is rubbish/beneath them (just like the parisians) .... (whereas i love disneylands!) .... disneyland HK is stuffed FULL of mainland chinese folk who arrive after sitting in an eastern european coach for 24 hours ... a few days earlier they were tending the fields ... people who for the most part have not seen a westerner
before ... let alone blonde westerners ... let alone two small blue eyed sun-bleached blonde westerners with brown faces so their hair looks EVEN whiter. blonde hair is meant to be lucky (they're v. superstitious) ... meant to bring good financial fortune as blonde = GOLD in their eyes ... consequently, the boys get their hair ruffled continuously. anyway, every few steps in disneyland, people were asking to have their photos taken with the boys .... amusing @ first but wears off after an hour/10 photos.

Right it's Saturday night and a curry beckons ... more later.

M x

Friday, October 13, 2006

Choosing lunch

Archie at Disneyland with his princess!

10 fun things we have done in HK

1. Mark has eaten turtle jelly (the bit that stops the chaffing between the shell and the flesh) - well he said it was fun
2. Trip to Macau - spent the princely sum of £20 on the slot machines in the (now) biggest gambling centre of the world). But in Las Vegas you get Celine Dion and Elton John, In Macau you get some hopeless blondes who think they are Banararama
3. HK Disneyland with the boys - Archie was kissed by snow white - how he blushed
4. Climbed to the top of HK's tallest building (the one where I work). The lady in front of me was 82...
5. Took a junk out on the harbour and then Billy and Archie ate scallops at local sea food restaurant
6. Mid Autumn moon festival celebrations on the beach in front of our flat
7. Catching crabs and fish in the rock pools at Big Wave bay
8. Dinner at The China Club - David 'Shanghai' Tang's private members club
9. Evening races at Happy Valley
10. Hiking in Tai Tam country park

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

Stoopid photoshop thing ... but i think it's fun


Really captures the essence of Archie somehow

Let's go back in time




We've been living in Hong Kong for 3 months now and it's been a pretty intense experience -- feels like we've been here years. The first week, I thought, would be relaxing & settling ... no work ... BUT no of course not. We had 1000 admin things to sort out ... bank accounts; phone; water; leccy; gas; ID cards; furniture etc etc

On top of all this, we had to settle the boys in OK.

And on top of all THAT, we stupidly decided to go for a swim in polluted water and need-less-to-say I had beijing belly for a couple of weeks.

More about the flight over and the first few weeks in HK later ... meanwhile, here are a few pics of the bay where we live.

M

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

(Yet another) Trip to Ocean Park


Ocean Park is Hong Kong's very own playpark and an area where, it seems, half of mainland China want to descend to on the very day we decide to go.

The boys think it's fun anyway!

We're rubbish @ keeping this up to date

But promise from now on we will!

Mark x