Hey, you're always asking me where I find stuff...
Sunday, August 27, 2006
Little Link List 19
Crikey - that's a big burger! - interesting article about the new super-sized burgers in the US, and some good stuff about food psychology;
The only jazz I like - The Necks;
Eel used to be a delicacy, now it's available in fast food places like Yoshinoya - goodbye eels.
The only jazz I like - The Necks;
Eel used to be a delicacy, now it's available in fast food places like Yoshinoya - goodbye eels.
Labels: eel, food, psychology, thenecks
Sunday, August 20, 2006
The Future
The future is happening. I’m looking out from the top of No.1 Peking Rd, looking north, towards China. Sulphurous light renders the roofs and towers of the New Territories ominous and silent. They stretch in front of me for miles. The future is definitely happening.
The moment of reflection is lost. I head back upstairs to the bar, where a fifty-something expatriate makes a fool of himself, passionately embracing a young Cantonese woman he’s sharing a seat with. The past happens at the same time as the future.
Later the rain starts again, splattering the tilted windows. Rain, rain. In the taxi on the way home I can’t get the skyline image of the New Territories out of my mind. I know what the New Territories are like. Old houses, old people, poor people, decrepit buildings, public housing. The small factories that turned out anything you can imagine have all gone across the border. Soon the people that worked in those factories will follow them across the border as well. But the image seems more real than my knowledge.
The future is still happening. I’m standing in the middle of the Convention and Exhibition Centre. Thousands of people, children, teenagers, parents are excitedly chasing down the objects of their obsessions. Online games that require special printed cards to be bought so as to open up new areas of the game. Foot-high metal statuettes of Japanese robot-suited action heroes. Young women dressed as lecherous maids. Comics. And, incongruously, a series of DVD’s detailing how to perform such prosaic skills as card tricks and making a coin appear out of someone’s ear.
Life is lived online – games are more real than daily life. These obsessions will last all their lives. I can sense how something is changing. I wonder what a happy grandfather makes of it all as he leads his grandson through the crowd. He talks in Mandarin – he must be from the mainland. From the Cultural Revolution to this. The future is happening.
tags: china | hongkong
The moment of reflection is lost. I head back upstairs to the bar, where a fifty-something expatriate makes a fool of himself, passionately embracing a young Cantonese woman he’s sharing a seat with. The past happens at the same time as the future.
Later the rain starts again, splattering the tilted windows. Rain, rain. In the taxi on the way home I can’t get the skyline image of the New Territories out of my mind. I know what the New Territories are like. Old houses, old people, poor people, decrepit buildings, public housing. The small factories that turned out anything you can imagine have all gone across the border. Soon the people that worked in those factories will follow them across the border as well. But the image seems more real than my knowledge.
The future is still happening. I’m standing in the middle of the Convention and Exhibition Centre. Thousands of people, children, teenagers, parents are excitedly chasing down the objects of their obsessions. Online games that require special printed cards to be bought so as to open up new areas of the game. Foot-high metal statuettes of Japanese robot-suited action heroes. Young women dressed as lecherous maids. Comics. And, incongruously, a series of DVD’s detailing how to perform such prosaic skills as card tricks and making a coin appear out of someone’s ear.
Life is lived online – games are more real than daily life. These obsessions will last all their lives. I can sense how something is changing. I wonder what a happy grandfather makes of it all as he leads his grandson through the crowd. He talks in Mandarin – he must be from the mainland. From the Cultural Revolution to this. The future is happening.
tags: china | hongkong
Labels: china, future, hongkong
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
It goes away and you forget
The sky has been relatively clear for the last month or so in Hong Kong. But today the dull grey haze is as thick as anything I've ever seen. As I sit here typing this out my eyes are stinging and I can't see the harbour at all. I'd sort of forgotten how bad the air can get. Coincidentally last night was the occasion of an attempt to raise the awareness of the public will in Hong Kong to get something done to clean up the skies. At 8pm last night, we were all asked to turn off our lights by a group called "Lights Out Hong Kong", so as to demonstrate the need to save power and thus prevent excess greenhouse emissions.
I forgot to turn off my lights - actually I completely forgot about the whole thing otherwise I would have least had a look out the window. But it was all a bit of a damp squib apparently. Most of the big buildings on Hong Kong island didn't bother, restaurants and other public places couldn't because of public safety reasons, and the power company reported a negligible change in power output for the duration of the protest.
I think really they should have asked everyone to turn off their airconditioners - every airconditioner is left on all day. Cars owners don't turn off their engines while they are waiting because they don't want to turn off the aircon. And each aircon is set to about 15-17 degrees. That's cold. We walk past shop doorways here and get blasted by freezing cold air.
But no-one in Hong Kong wants to stop the aircon. So we're stuck with pollution for a while I think, until the government starts forcing people and organisations to make changes.
tags: hongkong | pollution | lightsout
I forgot to turn off my lights - actually I completely forgot about the whole thing otherwise I would have least had a look out the window. But it was all a bit of a damp squib apparently. Most of the big buildings on Hong Kong island didn't bother, restaurants and other public places couldn't because of public safety reasons, and the power company reported a negligible change in power output for the duration of the protest.
I think really they should have asked everyone to turn off their airconditioners - every airconditioner is left on all day. Cars owners don't turn off their engines while they are waiting because they don't want to turn off the aircon. And each aircon is set to about 15-17 degrees. That's cold. We walk past shop doorways here and get blasted by freezing cold air.
But no-one in Hong Kong wants to stop the aircon. So we're stuck with pollution for a while I think, until the government starts forcing people and organisations to make changes.
tags: hongkong | pollution | lightsout
Thursday, August 03, 2006
T3
Hong Kong Weather Forecast:
Today - Light Showers Rain
Friday - Thunderstorms
Saturday - Chance of storms
Sunday - Thunderstorms
Courtesy of Typhoon Prapiroon. Whahey!
Today - Light Showers Rain
Friday - Thunderstorms
Saturday - Chance of storms
Sunday - Thunderstorms
Courtesy of Typhoon Prapiroon. Whahey!
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