Hong Kong isn't Supposed to be Quiet

Greetings, blog followers! We just went into the city to get Hong Kong I.D.s, and our travels took us close to the "Occupy Central" protests. If you've never heard of them, here's a quick summary:

Hong Kong is a SAR, or special administrative region, which means it has some freedom while still being part of China. Part of the former is their ability to vote- however this is hindered by part of the latter, a policy that dictates that the candidates must be provided by China first. Since China's government is known for rewarding mostly the people who are friends with important people and not hard work- further compounded by communism- the citizens of Hong Kong are naturally resisting governmental intervention from them.

Phew. So, with all that in mind, we set out to the city and noticed a few things that had changed from being on the outskirts of a protest. Here's a handy list, because I like lists.

-We noticed someone wearing a backpack with safety goggles attached, presumably to protect against pepper spray.

-Because of the blockade set up for the protest, there were no cars around, making the area peacefully quiet.

-7-11 was nearly sold out of water, likely from protests needing fuel to stand in Hong Kong's uncomfortable sun.

-The area seemed to be less crowded than most Hong Kong areas. That, in conjunction with the quiet, made the place unusually serene for the city.

The car-free streets.

Thanks for reading!

Electron Microscopes and the Moon

Greetings, blog followers! I have more material than I expected for this post, as the iMax movie that I mentioned in the last post was fascinating! But first, a brief overview of our adventures.

We headed out into the city and ate dinner at "Life Cafe", a vegetarian restaurant centered around healthy food- in other words, my dream restaurant. Afterwards, we took the Star Ferry to the mainland side of Hong Kong, Kowloon, to catch the evening iMax show, "Mysteries of the Unseen World", at the Space Museum. We had to go when we did because the movie was only in English on Saturday and Sunday night. We've had to be more flexible here in Hong Kong than in Denver.

It was a colorful journey, since the buildings in Hong Kong turn in to light shows at night, with fantastic patterns climbing up walls everywhere. Many buildings even have animated patterns. In any case, we got to the Space Museum. We were early, so we tried out the moonwalk exhibit, which straps you into a harness to simulate walking on the moon. According to a video that was playing at the exhibit, the most effective form of movement on the moon is the kangaroo hop.

Now for the iMax. It was a long video that is hard to summarize, so I'll just provide a few facts that I found interesting.

-Not only can we see individual atoms with microscopes, we can also use the tips of these microscopes to move atoms around, creating whatever kind of structure we like.

-Speaking of atomic structures, we have created the world's thinnest substance. It is made of carbon, and it is only one carbon atom thick. The substance is as tough as diamond, and almost as flexible as rubber. When curled up into tubes, this substance forms carbon nanotubes, a possible building material of the future.

-A butterfly's wings may seem flat, but each wing is made of many, many tiny scales, and if you zoom in even farther, you can see the tiny ridges on these scales that are cells. One type of butterfly has magnificent blue wings, and this is because those tiny cells reflect only the purest blue light.

-An electron microscope is more precise than a light microscope simply because light is too big.

-A dragonfly is the world's best flyer- it can fly in place, backwards, and even upside down. This is because it is capable of moving each of its four wings independently at the same time.

Thanks for reading!

Next up: An undetermined outing! At least there is an outing.

Hong Kong High Jinks

Welcome once more to virtual Hong Kong, the Wandering Aidan blog! We're back in business. We haven't gone spiraling off on any crazy adventures yet (somewhat surprisingly), so instead I'll update you on what we've done so far.

The first point of interest was getting here. Here's the lowdown of all the bad things that happened, from the minute we set foot outside our house into the world of annoyingly annoying annoyances.

1. Car service is twenty minutes late. We call many times without receiving a response.

2. Car service is now thirty minutes late, so we call a taxi, which arrives in two minutes.

3. Our flight out of Denver is delayed twice, by a total of 2.5 hours.

4. United Airlines can't make up their mind about whether or not to switch our flight. Different people give us different information, until it is finally decided that we are staying on our delayed flight. We are reassured many times that we will have enough time to get on the next flight, and even if we don't, they will wait for us.

5. The doors to our next flight close. They don't wait for us.

6. We wait at a help desk for 45 minutes. In response to the large line of people, the desk closes early at 4:00 in the afternoon.

7. We learn that there was an empty help desk 5 minutes away that nobody mentioned.

8. We call my dad (who is already in Hong Kong) to alert him that we will be late, waking him up from a dream in which we had finally arrived and a joyful reunion had occurred.

9. We go switch our baggage to our new flight. We are directed to a United Airlines counter, where we wait for an hour to finally make some progress with our tickets.

10. We are then sent off again to an American Airlines counter, who we are told can help us. They can't. They tell us that, despite the fact that our ticket says "American Airlines", we are flying Cathay Pacific.

11. Cathay Pacific refuses to give us a boarding pass until four hours later, when the handouts officially start.

12. After twelve wonderful hours in the airport, we finally get on the flight at 1:30am!




So, that was… interesting.


Now for some background on what we're up to in Hong Kong. We're giving home-schooling a shot, and it's going surprisingly well, with only a few hitches- like the fact that my mom doesn't know Spanish. As for activities, we're going into the city this Saturday to see a science-related iMax film, but other than that, not much interesting is happening this week. I might find something to post, but don't expect much.

Thanks for reading!


Bonus: The Detention Balcony!

Here I am, in detention for attempting to take seven consecutive bathroom breaks during math. Due to the extreme heat and humidity, this would actually make a fitting punishment for any ne'er-do-wells.

Up next: Not much!

There's No Place like (What used to be) Home.....

Welcome to England, blog readers! Our 4-continent journey comes to a stop here. We've cooled down by shopping and relaxing in Windsor and London. We haven't gone on any big expeditions, but here are some highlights.

The "Long Walk" in Windsor is about 2.6 miles long. We all jogged down it together, leaving me quite tired.

Another view.

We rented some bikes in London to explore the parks.

This is the palace where Prince William lives.

As our tradition demands, we visited this sandy playground. My vessel seems to be the victim of a mutiny.

This is humiliating.

It's dangerous to let me get bored.

After a few more days in London, our continental saga will come to a close. I hope you all enjoyed my blog. Thanks for reading!

Next up: More London!

Ich Bin Ein Berliner

Hello - guest blogger Lisa here.  We have spent the past two days in Berlin.  History is not Aidan's favorite subject.  We dragged him all over the city, and he was a good sport, but it certainly has not been his favorite part of vacation.  I think if he has to learn anything else about WWII or the Cold War, his head might explode.

Yesterday we wanted a shorter walk (only two hours instead of half the day like today) so we intentionally avoided the war places and went to some older buildings.  Of course, there is not a lot of old architecture left in Berlin compared to other European cities.

The Reichstag, built in 1894, currently houses the Parliament.  The old dome was destroyed and this new modern glass dome was added.

Brandenburg Gate, 1791, former city gate.

Berliner Dom (church) located on Museum Island.

Today we moved on to the WWII and Cold War sights.  We wanted to walk around the city but didn't want to be stuck with a guided tour group,  so we tried a walking tour app.  It mostly worked but it wasn't 100% current- I think because Berlin is constantly changing, constantly under construction.  We started at an exhibit called the Black Box which gave detailed information about the war and gave us a better understanding of the sights we were about to explore.

This is a replica of Checkpoint Charlie, one of the crossing points from East to West Berlin.

Checkpoint Charlie

Conveniently, a Starbucks was down the street when we needed to escape the rain. 

The longest continuous stretch of the Berlin Wall remaining.

The same stretch of wall with an exhibit in front called the Topography of Terror explaining Poland and the war.

The Berliner Mauer is the Berlin Mile, markers that denote the past location of the Berlin Wall.  In this particular spot, the wall coincided with the old town wall, marked by the brick cobblestones.

Under this parking lot was Hitler's bunker, where he committed suicide.  The government buildings and the bunkers were destroyed, either by bombing or demolished by the Soviets after the war.

After our walk and dinner, we found a small playground, possibly too small for Aidan.

Much of Berlin was bombed during the war and buildings were demolished afterwards.  This is one of few examples where they saved part of a building.  This was the Grand Hotel Esplanade.  They saved the lower floors with ballrooms and other lavish rooms then added a new building on top.  Because the old building could not hold the weight of the new building, they built supports around it so that the new, upper part does not actually rest on the old, lower part.

We have a brief few hours in the morning to visit the park before we fly to London.  I like Berlin - it is pretty, clean, safe, and interesting.  We could easily have spent more time in Berlin seeing other areas of the city, although Aidan might disagree.  

Back to Aidan for Windsor and London next.

Making Praugueress

Greetings, loyal blog readers! I bring tidings of a beautiful city- Prague, in the Czech Republic. We explored the city and the countryside on bike, segway, and e-bike (bikes that cycle for you).

The city is an amazing mix of old and new. Here's a modern building right next to an old one, for instance. Even the cable cars have drastic age differences, and they run side-by-side.

Czech countryside.

A swan with some ducks. The swan didn't seem to enjoy the ducks' company.

Karlstejn castle, just outside of Prague.

The e-bikes.

The city, from a distance, can look like a simple, charming one, but if you venture in you will discover that you can find many modern stores and gadgets. Prague is not an old-fashioned city by any means, but it's not all shiny skyscrapers either.

A row of bridges lined up.

It's not often you get to see a beautiful city with a double rainbow in the background.

The TV tower in Prague has been deemed the second ugliest building in the world, so they decided to decorate it with babies like these ones.

                                             

The tower. This photo was found online, not taken by us.

The famous Charles bridge. I shouldn't have let Dad try the "panorama" function on the phone's camera.

The gateway to Charles bridge. Many people set up small stands there, offering items from caricatures to trinkets.

More Czech countryside, seen from the train out.

Even the amazing pictures that I have here cannot begin to describe how sprawling, fantastic, and diverse the city of Prague is. The roads are cobblestone, and half of the sidewalks have patterns on them. The whole city is nothing short of spectacular. There's always something new around the corner- like a monastery that brews their own beer, supposedly some of the best in the world and only available there.

We could have spent many days exploring, but we left after only two. This morning, we caught a train to Berlin, where we are now. We'll walk around the city tomorrow, and I will report our findings. Thanks for reading!

Next up: Touring Berlin!