Wandering to a Serious Subject

Some people have asked me about the protests that are going on here- or rather, were going on here, as of about a week ago- and what exactly they are. Well, here's what I know…

First, I should mention that Hong Kong is technically part of China, but it is run differently- for instance, you're allowed to protest here (as evidenced by, well the protests) but not in China. Hong Kong is referred to a SAR, or Special Administrative Region. This basically means that it's halfway between China and independence.

Anyway, here's the lowdown: The protests that went on on here in Hong Kong (referred to as Occupy Central, the Umbrella Movement, or just "the protests") occurred because, despite the fact that this place's residents get their own government, they don't really have full voting rights. Instead of the U.S.'s system, in which candidates work their way up through several preliminaries, Hong Kong gets a system in which they pick between a few candidates that China selects beforehand. Worse still, the candidates selected are never pro-independence and will always support China- that's basically a selection criteria.

This issue by itself was not outstandingly threatening, but the question on the minds of the citizens was "What's next?" If they let China control their elections, will China's government step in even farther next time? Where would the citizens draw the line?

This whole mess prompted the Hong Kong citizens to set up camp in the middle of a busy street in an important area (the eponymous Central). They set up tents in a surprisingly organized fashion, with a check-in area and separate areas for entering and exiting to control human traffic. As we saw when we visited, there was a supplies tent, a medical tent, and even free rental tents for people who wanted to resist China but couldn't be there every day.

Unfortunately, the protesters were eventually forced to leave Central, so the protests failed… or did they? They spread awareness about an important issue, and had quite a spotlight for a while. In fact, they may even be influencing other places to stand up for themselves, since Macau just started a similar protest a day or two ago, and Taiwan's pro-China party just lost their election. Yay, inconvenient protests! Woohoo!

Thanks for reading!

Return of the Wanderer

Welcome back, blog followers! Wow, it's been a long time. I've been busy over here in Hong Kong- thanks to my teacher/mom- but I've managed to carve out time to go on a few trips… and to blog about them!

The highlight of our recent adventures was a one-day trip to Macau. During the first part of the trip, we toured the modernized portion of Macau. During the second part, we explored the old, colonial buildings. (What does it say about me that I enjoyed the first part more?)

Macau, Part One!

This part was arguably less interesting than the second, but we did have a few adventures. After we walked to lunch, we decided to locate the "Iceworld" exhibition that was advertised across the area. It took a long, confused walk across two floors of the building, but we eventually arrived.

Fun Fact:
Everything described above, from our hotel to the exhibition, was in the same gargantuan building. The building was so large that it created the impression of an entire city! There were even multiple hotels within the same structure.

Once we arrived at the expo, we noticed an area renting coats and winter gear just outside. We asked just how cold the exhibit actually was… and found out that it got down to -6 degrees celsius (about 21 degrees for all you fahrenheit users). Only then did we realize that there would actually be ice.

As it turns out, the entire exhibition was a collection of ice carvings centered around "Dreamworks" characters. Here's the "How to Train your Dragon" section.

"Kung Fu Panda". What looks like a temple staircase is actually an ice slide.

King Julian's throne,  courtesy of "Madagasacar".

The woman in the blue coat is not an ice sculpture. She is my aunt.

My aunt and me in an ice boat.

This is all just tinted ice. It's truly amazing what people can do with an otherwise dull material.

Macau, Part Two!

In this portion of the adventure, we experienced more of Macau's colonial side. Much of Macau is a Las Vegas-style casino-fest, but unlike in Hong Kong, many old buildings still remain intact in the old town.

 This wall is all that remains of the "other St. Paul's Cathedral". The rest of it was destroyed by a fire during a typhoon. That would actually be a pretty cool way to go if you were a building… very dramatic.

These gelatinous meat slabs were incredibly popular in the streets of Macau.

Here's an interesting blend of Portuguese and Mandarin. The sign clearly says "farmacia", which is a very Portuguese word, but it is followed by "Chun Cheong", a very Chinese name.

The pedestrian areas and town square still sport the unique Portuguese tile pattern of old.

Thanks for reading!

Adventurers of Hong Kong

Greetings, blog followers! We have had relatives visiting for the past week or so, so I was too busy to blog. But now, I present to you the activities that we did!

We had a few repeats- the Stanley Market and the Laser Light Show, for instance- but we also went on some new adventures. The first of these was the Dragon's Back trail, which is stage eight of the Hong Kong Trail*. There are a few ups and downs verging on mild insanity, but the view from the top is breathtaking.

*The Hong Kong Trail is a hiking trail stretching across the entire island of Hong Kong. You may know a bit of stage one from the post in which we encountered the giant golden orb spider.

It was incredibly windy at the top. All the bugs went away, but it was also hard to stand still.

One of the other places we visited was a combination zoo/park. We saw a variety of interesting creatures.

Wildlife Report:

Flamingos!

Ring-tailed lemurs. You may recognize them from Madagascar.

Blue heron. They regularly grow to be over a meter in height.

I forget the exact name for this primate… I just know that it has a cool beard.

Again, I don't know the name. I do know, however, that it is a giant blue pigeon with a shock of fuzz on its head.

A crane. This one was about as large as the herons.

 Videos

These are often unavailable on mobile devices.

I recommend turning the sound off for the full effect. OFF, not on.

A crane flapping its wings.

An ape doing three laps of swinging around its cage.

Thanks for reading!

Bonus: Laser Light Show!

As mentioned above, we headed out to see the laser light show again. If you need a memory refresher, the light show is a combination of lasers and buildings lighting up to the beat of some music.

Here's a picture of the event.

Wandering Aidan Miniseries, Episode 5

Greetings, readers, and welcome to the fifth and final episode of the Wandering Aidan Miniseries! I hope you've enjoyed the series, because I've run out of things to talk about. Today's theme is "Contrast and Halloween".

In every city, there are new bits and old bits, and Hong Kong is no exception. However, these parts are usually separated- and that is where Hong Kong differs from, well, most other places. Here, old and sketchy parts are mixed right in with new and clean areas.

Hong Kong Mixes:

1. The Whammy Ladies (the ones with the cursing shoes, remember?) are only about 100 feet away from a Lamborghini dealership.

2. The Wet Market, a large area selling all manner of dead things, is around the corner from a "Tiffany's" jewelry store.

3. Run-down buildings frequently transition into modern ones, and then transition back again.

4. These boats.

A sleek, expensive yacht and a run-down fishing boat mingle freely.

5. Here is a Porsche directly behind a pile of trash.

Halloween Special!

Happy Belated Halloween, everybody! Here are the pumpkins we carved this year.

From left to right: Dad's pumpkin (standard scary), my pumpkin (my own face), and Mom's pumpkin (a ghost saying "BOO!").

And here is what they looked like after twelve hours, no exaggeration. Hong Kong is ridiculously humid, and apparently that affects mold- positively. For the mold.

The eyebrows on Dad's pumpkin were actually filled in with mold. The pumpkin is also significantly shorter in this pic, having shriveled overnight.

There was one more pumpkin not pictured here. Even though we only bought three pumpkins, we got this fourth one as well. It's a cute little pumpkin sprout that we found growing out of one of the seeds! Aww…

Here is the sprout in front of my pumpkin (its mother, basically).

Thanks for reading!

The Great Wall! It Had to Happen Eventually...

Greetings, readers, and welcome to the fourth and final post of Wandering Aidan's China Series! This one has everything- hiking, dumplings, camping, piles of money… You name it. Oh, and there's some actual sightseeing in there as well. Enjoy!

Final Stop: Beijing!

After our action-packed day in Xi'an, we caught a train to Beijing.

Fun Fact: In terms of comfort, trains are vastly superior to airplanes, cars, boats, and pretty much every other method of transport. There are no seat belts on trains, making them feel less constrained, and they only travel in rigid, straight lines, which nearly eliminates motion sickness altogether.

The first adventure we embarked on during our time there was a trip to the Temple of Heaven. It was slightly dull apart from its excellent looks- at least compared to the other things in the blog that I'm sure you'll want to read more- so I'll spare you the waterfall of a life story that we were hit with during the tour.

I'll concede that this part was interesting. This area was called "Echo Wall". If one person stands facing the wall, and another person does the same, but in a spot much farther along, the two can hear each other easily. What startled me was the clarity; there was no echo effect or distortion. It simply sounded exactly like the other person was standing right next to me.

I should note that before the temple, we walked through a park (since the temple was in its heart). It was a refreshing, green space, and the simplicity was welcome after the complex structures and statues that we had toured previously. The reason I bring this up is this: like I mentioned in the previous blog post, parks are much more lively and interesting in China... So to give you an idea of the activities that go on here, I'd like to present this list.

Activities in the park:

-Cards.

-Choir.

-Hip-hop dancing (Maybe. I'm no expert.)

-Relaxing.

-Playing a strange instrument. It looked a bit like a thin castle, with turret-like pipes surrounding the main pole.

-Bird-keeping.

All this and more was on display. Also, further adding to the differences in U.S. and Chinese parks, many of these activities took place in a cozy, bench-lined, somewhat narrow walkway that lined the main greenery.

The walkway.

The odd instrument.

On our next day, we paid a visit to the Ming Tombs. The emperors of the Ming Dynasty are resting there, and one emperor's tomb is even accessible to visitors. We were visitors, so we accessed it. Here are a few photos:

Yes, that is a pile of money. Apparently, throwing money onto the tombs grants people good luck. So much money piles up, in fact, that the tomb's caretakers occasionally have to come through and collect all of it. How convenient for them… I bet this tradition was started by the tombs' marketing department.

More of the tomb, with Devil Aidan in the foreground. This is not a particularly flattering photo.

Later that day, we set our on the trip you've all been waiting for… *switches to dramatic announcer voice* the Great Wall of China! *switches back* We started with a brief hike around a small area before returning for a delicious Chinese dinner.

An unusual part of the wall: an open courtyard, restored to its original glory through repairs. Note the intricate carving on the wall in the background.

We arrived just in time to see an event called the Golden Hill, in which the beautiful sunset light catches on the top of this hill and fills it with a beautiful glow.

After dinner, we set out on the real hike- a trek through a nature trail and up to the wall… In total darkness.

Once we climbed up the wall, we noticed a miniature fortress on our left. This was to be our camping spot for the night. Yep, we camped on the Great Wall! The wind loudly buffeted the tent all night, but it was a memorable experience.

Fun Fact:

Our guide claimed that he couldn't sleep in the cacophony of the wind, but his loud snores overpowered the gale more than once.

This was our fort for the night. You can't tell in this picture, but it's about the size of a quite small room in a house. It was bigger than a bathroom and smaller than a living room.

An adorable dog named Toto accompanied us on the way back (he belonged to the woman who came to collect our tents). As we hiked back the way we came, this cute puppy would frequently plunge into the bushes for a shortcut, only to burst back out at a later point. He was always a step ahead of us!

After we had breakfast, the real real hike began. We set out on a journey across a vast portion of the Great Wall, culminating in a mountainous section akin to a roller coaster designed by a psychopath.

The hike was tricky enough that we brought along walking sticks.

The vantage point of the Wall provided beautiful views.

The Wall is in various states of disrepair. Some areas are pristine, having been restored recently, and some areas are a bit more on the rubble side of the scale. Oddly, many areas seem to lack walls on the sides, no matter what their condition is, which makes the area… less than safe.

Good stairs, good wall

Awful stairs, good wall

Good stairs, awful wall

Going from relatively good (the floor, at least) to rubble

This is that roller coaster bit.

We returned to the hotel room afterwards, and treated ourselves to a day of rest.

The following day, we toured the Forbidden City, which is actually an expansive palace built by a former ruler. Or at least, that's what I would be blogging about if it weren't, well, forbidden. It turns out that it had been closed because of an economic conference (the APEC, if you've ever heard of it). The connection between these two things is beyond me.

So instead, we went to a park right next to the forbidden city, with a view of the city at the top of a miniature mountain.

We can now add "water calligraphy" to the list of park activities. It is common for people to use an oversized brush to paint water onto the ground in the shape of Chinese characters.

The forbidden city, as seen from the peak.

After that, we visited yet another temple, this one Buddhist. This was mostly filler- since we had time between two activities- so it's not particularly interesting or significant. The buildings and statues were impressive, however.

Finally, we took a rickshaw tour of a small neighborhood. Oddly, though, the tour only had one stop, and it was just some people's houses. Our guide simply showed us the houses and the small (yet quite pleasant) courtyard between them, led us inside, and told us we could look through their scrapbooks. It was weird, but apparently it wasn't the first time people wad visited their houses.

Our final activity was dumpling-making, a relaxing activity to conclude our epic journey. My dumplings looked like wounded birds, but it was still an enjoyable experience.

The one in the front is Dad's, not mine. Even I, with my awful dumplings, don't want credit for that one.

Thanks for reading!

Bonus: Aidan's Mandarin Lessons, Episode 3!

Today's topic is dates- part 1! In this, you'll learn numbers, which will be followed up with dates in the next episode.

One: yī

Two: èr (pronounced "arr")

Three: sān

Four: sì (pronounced "sǝ") (That's a schwa, by the way. It makes a sound like a u. You might want to look it up if you want to know for sure what it is, since I'm not particularly reliable.)

Five: wǔ

Six: liù

Seven: chī

Eight: bā

Nine: jiǔ

Ten: shí (pronounced "shǝ")

When making numbers above ten and below twenty, simply say ten, then a number. For instance, "eleven" would be "ten one" or "shí yī". When making numbers twenty and above, simply say a number, then ten, then a number. For example, "twenty" would be "two ten" or "èr shí", and "twenty-three" would be "two ten three" or "èr shí sān".