Weighing Machine with Tickets

This weighing machine is brought to life (to be displayed and used in the public) by this young gentleman, Mr. Wong. He is an extraordinary collector because he does not collect stamps or toys or antiques, but weighing machines.

It is incredible that Mr. Wong owns two such old weighing machines like these. He is so generous to keep and show to the people of Hong Kong these machines which once appeared in the front halls of cinemas or shopping centres.








To keep the weighing machines in good condition, Mr. Wong frequently oils the machines and replaces the worn-out parts from other machines or requests some technicians to reproduce them. Since the machines issue tickets and the tickets are the “souls” of the machine, Mr. Wong finds an owner of a small printing company to make them.








It is rare to see the weighing machines print one’s weight on small tickets made of card paper after someone has stepped on it, inserted a two-dollar coin and waited for the "striped" turning-wheel to become stable. A ticket is then issued. There is always a message on each ticket encouraging or cheering the ticket-holder.








Mr. Wong places his two weighing machines, one at Western Market (西港城) and the other before the fare-paying gates inside the Tsimshatsui Star Ferry Pier(尖沙咀天星碼頭).
Would you like to find out your weight from these machines?

Dome, Dome, Dome

This dome is very different from that of the United States Capitol at Washington DC and the one at Sacramento because it is specially decorated with Gold or something which looks like Gold.

No doubt it is a Government House, the San Francisco City Hall. My old colleague, Felix Ching, gives me the outside look of this solemn building while I got the interior look at the time my wife and I visited it in April 2006.














One may wondered why I did not take a photo of this building from a far distance. Well, my student, Roger Chan, drove us there and parked his car at the roadside near it. I did not bother to cross the road to take the photo of this building from a far distance. We just walked up a few footsteps and just got inside. Once inside every visitor had to pass a security check before he/she walked about the interior. I think on that day we entered the building from its back side. What Felix brings me from his photo is the front view of the building with a big square before it.

Here are the "United photos" of San Francisco City Hall from two teachers.

公仔也整容

信不信由你，世界上竟然有公仔整容師。為什麼呢?原本有人不滿意自己的公仔造型，或許他/她已經看厭了舊有的模樣，於是交公仔給這些公仔整容師作改造。
請細看改造的過程:
(1) 開腦
(2) 換眼睛
(3) 改嘴形
(4) 塗口紅
(5) 搽紅面頰
(6) 剪髮
(7) 洗髮(只用護髮素)
(8) 換上新潮服裝





























你願不願意花錢去把自己家裏的公仔去整容一番呢？

Flowers of papayas

Flowers of papayas that I find recently in Shatin appear milky white in colour and are shaped like stars.The five-petalled flowers look fleshy, waxy and slightly fragrant.

Here is the information I collected from Internet:

Female flowers are relatively large and rounded at the base. They have a stigma but lack stamens. Generally they must receive pollen in order to set fruit. Pollen can be carried by wind or by insects.

Male flowers are thin and tubular. They have perfect structure (i.e., they contain both male and female organs), but the small, vestigial ovary is nonfunctional. Male flowers are usually borne on a long flower stalk (peduncle).

Hermaphrodite flowers are intermediate between female and male flowers in size and shape. They are less bulbous than female flowers, but not as thin as male flowers. They have perfect structure with functional stigma and stamens and usually are self-pollinating.

Three types of plants are recognized based on flower type: female, hermaphrodite, and male.

Female plants always produce female flowers. If no male or hermaphrodite plants are nearby to provide pollen, female plants usually fail to set fruit. Unpollinated female plants occasionally set parthenocarpic fruits, lacking seeds.

Male plants are distinguished by their long flower stalks bearing many flowers. Usually they do not produce fruit, but on rare occasions there is female expression in the flowers, and they may set fruits .

Hermaphrodite plants may have male flowers, hermaphrodite flowers, or both, depending on environmental conditions and the time of year. Hot, dry weather may cause suppression of the ovary and the production of female-sterile (i.e., male) flowers. This accounts for occasional seasonal failure of hermaphrodite plants to set fruit. Male flowers on hermaphrodite plants are borne on short peduncles.

Hermaphrodite plants tend to produce self-pollinated seeds, which result in relatively uniform progenies. Seeds from hermaphrodite plants of 'Solo' varieties characteristically produce one-third female and two-thirds hermaphrodite plants, but no male plants are produced.

Abby’s short legs

This funny photo with Abby sitting on a modern tricycle for children reminds me of the film I saw many years ago called “Daddy-Long-Legs”.

Abby is still small. When sitting on this strange-looking tricycle with one big wheel at front and two small wheels at the back, her legs are hanging down, but still cannot reach the pedals. I guess she enjoys the moment of mounting on this lovely pink little tricycle for a while although she cannot drive it an inch forward.




With a little imagination of driving and her hands on the handle, Abby ought to have a-minute satisfaction. What will happen if her legs are long enough to reach the pedals? There is no doubt she will step on the pedals and drive the tricycle madly over the grass lawn at fast speed. When can she do this? Perhaps in two years’ time.

Cruising on Zodiacs

Zodiacs are not mainly used as landing-crafts on Antarctica, but also as cruisers across icy waters. They carry hot explorers and photographers from different cities of the world. They go near floating ice pieces where sea animals such as sea lions are resting so that the curious passengers on board the big passenger ships to Antarctica can have a close encounter with these animals and study their behavior at the spot. I wonder if these sea animals like this idea of being watched and disturbed by human beings. It is not fun at all if they plunge into the water and sink any of the zodiacs.

There are dangerous spots though exciting to reach at Antarctica. They are caves and cracks of ice close to the coastline. It is likely that the ice there will fall any time while melting. The force of fallen ice will certainly smash the zodiacs and drag them down to the depths of the sea.

Sometimes zodiacs are trapped among small ice pieces because the latter may float and close up the entrance where the former come from. At this moment other zodiacs without passengers will come forward to rescue. They will together push the loose ice pieces apart and let go the zodiacs that are in captivity.

To conclude: In this ice world of Antarctica, people show their faces to the sea animals as strangers and on the other hand the latter are lovely animals that entertain the human on board the zodiacs.

巧遇雞冠花

今晨在快餐店吃過早餐，路過第一城，忽然發現在行人路上盆栽式的花叢中長出紅色的雞冠花。在網上搜尋資料給我一大驚喜，原本雞冠花的形態不只是雞冠那般簡單，有三種。花的顏色簡直是靚到不得了。

請細看以下我找回來的資料及圖片：
雞冠花學名Celosia argentea， 英名Cockscomb，為莧科一年生草本植物。原產於亞洲南部，並在熱帶美洲及非洲歸化野生。由於雞冠花的花部構造為雞冠形或塔形的肉質花序，頂端為生長點，真正的小花於生長點分化後生於花序的側面，整個花序形成後顏色及形狀能夠保持長久，使得雞冠花普遍應用在點綴花卉上。

雞冠花依花序形狀可分為三種：
(1) 頭狀雞冠(C.argentea var. cristata)，亦即俗稱的雞冠型雞冠，整個花序呈花椰菜形、雞冠形或扇形，邊緣旋繞皺摺，顏色有不同程度的紅、黃、粉紅、橙色及雜斑雙色的品種。



(2) 羽狀雞冠(C.argentea var. plumosus)，又稱火焰雞冠，花序形狀為尖塔形，農民通稱為鳳尾，花色以紅色為主，尚有黃色及橙色的品種。







(3) 麥穗雞冠(C.argentea var. spicata)， 花序呈長槍狀，在台灣各地野化自生的青箱就是屬於這種花型，顏色以深洋紅為主，少數為略帶淡粉的白色，由於麥穗雞冠花形較單薄，顏色也不若另外兩型雞冠亮麗，較少做切花，可於農田休耕期撒播當野花觀賞或摘取嫩枝做為野菜食用。




















雞冠花依葉色可分為紅葉種及綠葉種。葉色和花色有絕對關聯，紅葉種的花色均為紅色，綠葉種則有各色系的花，包括紅色在內。

Prices of Grapes

Regularly, lists of promotion articles of Coles and Woolworths are inserted into the postboxes of the houses in the neighbourhood of these two supermarkets in Sydney, Australia.

On one of the recent lists of articles promoted by Coles, I found grapes grown in Australia, namely Crimson Seedless Grapes and Black Seeded Grapes. They were sold at A$3.75 per kg (HK$6x3.75/2.2 per pound= HK$10.2/lb).



Recently (24/5/09) on a newspaper in Hong Kong, the red grapes produced in Australia was sold at HK$9.9/lb by our Park-in Supermarkets, a little cheaper than those sold on mainland, Australia. Unfortunately, we did not buy any on that special day.

Today, we found red grapes at the same price (the place of origin was unknown) from Park-in shops. My wife picked one pack which was sold at HK$15.6 for 1.575 lb.

My conclusion is that we, people of Hong Kong, can share at times the same taste of grapes with Australians at more or less the same price.

請你寫故事

今次請你看完最近在香港電視出現一個有趣的廣告片段之後，試用自己的文字串成整個故事。