First Athletic team emerges

This was how the first athletic team in the 2014 Winter Olympics entered the Fisht Stadium at Sochi. A circle first appeared on the floor of the field. When it was magnified, it was our globe. The globe spun round. We first saw India, next Saudi Arabia, then Turkey and soon it stopped over Greece in the Mediterranean.

A white oval ring and a stripe were shown. From the end of the sloping stripe, a line of athletes in blue suits were marching out . By looking at the flag, one was clear that it was the team of Greece. They waved their hands when walking in, each carrying a big smile. By tradition, Greece was the first team to enter because it was where Olympic Games first started, 

As the Russian National Flag raised ....

When spotlight shone at a stage in front of the main spectator stand, people at Fisht Olympic Stadium understood that it was the moment of hoisting the national flag of Russia. The huge flag of the country had been handed to the men-in-charge. A men's choir was ready to sing the national song of Russia.

In the centre of the field, lines of performers wearing coats that were lit with lights in colours of white, blue and red, those on a Russian national flag. It was wonderful indeed to see the "flag" waved in movement as the performers changed their positions accordingly. Everyone in the stadium including the guests of honour stood solemnly to watch the hoisting of the national flag of the hosting country of the 2014 Winter Olympics.

2014 Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony

The opening ceremony of the 2014 Winter Olympics took place at the Fisht Olympic Stadium in Sochi, Russia, on 7 February 2014. It began at 20:14 when the first fireworks were emitted. The ceremony touched upon various aspects of the Russian history, and included tributes to famous Russians.

The Games were officially opened by President Vladimir Putin. An audience of 40,000 attended at the stadium with an estimated 2,000 performers.

The ceremony, titled "Dreams of Russia", opened with an on-screen video showing 11-year-old Liza Temnikova playing a character named Lyubov (Russian for 'love') reciting the Russian alphabet. Each letter is associated with images of a famous Russian person or landmark. Lyubov then flew into the air as she dreamed of grabbing the tail of a kite and being lifted far off the stage. Nine different gigantic floats (hanging in mid-air), carrying Russian landscapes, passed beneath her as she slept.

Five large snowflakes descended into the stadium which expanded and joined to form the Olympic rings. The fifth ring did not expand owing to a technical error (the red one considered until 1951 to represent continent America).

2014 Winter Olympics Torch Relay

The 2014 Winter Olympics torch relay is being run from October 7, 2013, 123 days prior to the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics, until February 7, 2014, the day of the opening ceremony at Sochi. In Russia the relay travelled from Moscow to Sochi through 2,900 towns and villages across all 83 regions of Russia by foot, car, train, plane, and "troika" for over 65,000 km of journey. The event have become the longest relay in Winter Olympics history.

The lighting ceremony was held on September 29, 2013 at Olympia, Greece with Greek alpine skier Ioannis Antoniou as the first torchbearer. The first Russian torchbearer was NHL star Alex Ovechkin, who received the torch from Antoniou in Olympia.

The 2014 Olympic Torches were unveiled on January 14, 2013 in Moscow. The torch is stylish chrome with red detail, a traditional colour of Russian sports. It weighs nearly 1.8 kg.

It is memorable that on October 20, 2013, the torches reached the North Pole for first time via a nuclear-powered icebreaker 50 Let Pobedy. On November 6, 2013, the torch was flown into space by Soyuz rocket and brought back on November 11. The torches reached Europe's highest mountain, Mount Elbrus, and the depths of Siberia's Lake Baikal.

Sochi is a city in Krasnodar Krai, Russia, located on the Black Sea coast near the border between Georgia/Abkhazia and Russia. The Greater Sochi area sprawls for 145 kilometres along the shores of the Black Sea near the Caucasus Mountains. The area of the city proper is 176.77 square kilometres. According to the 2010 Census, the city had a permanent population of 343,334, making it Russia's largest resort city. It is one of the very few places in Russia with a subtropical climate, with warm to hot summers and mild winters.

馬年觀馬

今年馬年年初四我們一家有機會去上水雙魚河鄉村俱樂部食自助餐及觀賞馬匹。從沙田駕車走高速公路去上水只消半句鐘左右，但在尾段車要轉入彎曲的小路才可到達，的確有些走進鄉村的感覺。

在俱樂部二樓Arena Room享受了一頓豐富的自助餐之後，要幫助消化剛才吃進肚子的食物，最好是往四處走動一下。

這裏有大、小朋友的遊樂場，也有很大片草地給會員散步、玩耍和踏單車。遠望小山丘上有幾座兩層高白色的馬房。我們走上小路近距離見到馬伕牽引著馬匹走路。

所見到的馬有栗色、白色和灰色。牠們都非常馴服，沒有半點脾氣，很有紀律，又神色自若的隨著馬伕。

當我們走近馬房時，發現間中有馬糞留在地上，大家都要步步為營，以免踏上地雷。我們再向最近的馬房走。很開心見到一匹英俊的馬從窗口伸出牠的頭，好像和我們來一個見面禮。

我估計這裏的馬大部分巳退役，不再競跑，而轉作騎術方面。這次偶遇幾匹駿馬，我特別覺得開心，寄望著馬年行好運，事事如意！

Elly and Abby at The Arch

Today, February 2, 2014. Elly and Abby met their cousins at The Arch, a very tall building in Kowloon East because they were going to have lunch together on the third day of the Year of the Horse. They had a wonderful time. Besides eating, they ran about and played Hide-and-seek. For the first time, they sat together to have group photos taken. In one of the photos, Jasmine made herself look like a flower while Hayley, as usual, showed her signature smile.

Elly was attracted by two colourful lion-heads and big fans on a table when she got out of the lift at the restaurant on the 60th floor. I asked her to take up the cover of a golden nugget (actually made of plastic) and let me take a photo of her with the nugget and the lion heads. She smiled and made a pose for me. It was a very successful one. Where had her sister, Abby, gone? Well, she had run for long into the restaurant with her cousins.

One o’clock was not a good time to take photos of Hong Kong Island from the 62nd floor of The Arch because the screen on my camera told me that the glare of sunlight would spoil the qualities of my photos at such an hour. Instead, I preferred a cloudy day for photo-taking.