Skydive in New Zealand

Nzone in Queenstown, New Zealand, provides skydive to visitors. A video-shooting team from a Taiwanese TV programme about tours experienced skydive over this southern city in South Island.

The sweet lady in black dress and the cameraman first signed papers and changed into proper uniforms, each accompanied by an experienced parachutist. They were to jump from a Cresco Turbine aircraft at a height of 15000 feet above the ground.

The jumps were successful ones. The two colourful parachutes, one pink and one purple, were in rectangular shapes. Two by two, they glided down and landed safely on the ground.

If I name my 16 photos here in order from left to right and top to bottom with numbers 1 to 16. What do you think is the order of the photos?

Earthquake near Christchurch Today

An earthquake with magnitude 7.1 occurred in the South Island, New Zealand at 04:35:44 AM local time (16:35:44 UTC), Saturday, September 4, 2010. The earthquake occurred at a depth of 16.1 kilometers (10.0 miles).

The epicenter was located 30 kilometers (20 miles) northwest of Christchurch. The earthquake was reported to have caused widespread damage and power outages. Several aftershocks were also reported. Christchurch residents were awaken by the heavy shakes of the earthquake and reported chimneys have fallen in through roofs, cracked ceilings and collapsed brick walls. Some of the cars were damaged by fallen bricks and debris.

Some of the water pipes were broken and thus flooded some of the streets. Articles of shops fell onto the floors when the earthquake struck. Some residents stayed outside the streets and some even drove to high grounds for fear of Tsunami.

Christchurch

Back to August 30, 2007, Ho Keung and Yin Ping reached Christchurch (基督城), the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand.The photos they took before the interesting houses looked as if they were in the city of Lilliput (小人國) in Gulliver travels. The houses were really beautiful. They also took a photo of Christ’s College (the one with a red tram) and at the Botanic Garden inside Hagley Park.

At the centre of Christ Church is Cathedral Square, surrounding the Anglican cathedral. There are chesses almost the sizes of people for play at the square. The area around this square and within the "four avenues" of Christchurch (Bealey Avenue, Fitzgerald Avenue, Moorhouse Avenue and Deans Avenue) is considered the central business district of the city. The central city also has a number of residential areas, including Inner City East, Inner City West, Avon Loop, Moa Neighbourhood & Victoria. Tourists could ride trams to tour round the city.

The Voice 2

I love watching “The Voice” ever since last year. At this moment, the “The Voice 2” has become red-hot because eight contestants will become six in the coming programme. Two will be disqualified. The last six contestants will compete and soon the winner will appear.

Last Sunday, an outstanding singer, Jeanie Lee(李幸倪), from Malaysia challenged one of the contestants in Hong Kong. I think her singing is up to perfection.

To me, I predict Mag Lam (林欣彤)will be the winner of this contest in the final. The runners-up will be among James Ng(吳業坤), Hubert Wu (胡鴻鈞) and Penny Chan(陳國峄). Let me see if I am right.

I enjoy watching and listen to the songs the contestants sing. Each time, I myself pretend to be one of judges. I am quite happy to find that the marks I give to each contestant are very close to those given by the judges.

In the photo, the top left is Mag Lam; on her right is Hubert Wu; the lady in red dress is Jeanie Lee, the Malaysian singer; the centre right is Penny Chan; the bottom right is James Ng.

Head-shaking Dolls

Without looking at TV advertisements, I would not have bought Happy Meals from McDonald to earn the head-shaking (up and Down movements) dolls for my grand-daughters.

Recently when buying a happy meal, one can get a doll for free. Yesterday, I bought one meal which included a Filet-O-Fish, small fries and a cup of Coke. It cost HK$23.7. I aimed at getting the Birdie (小飛飛) and I succeeded.

Today, we obtain the Ronald McDonald (麥當奴叔叔) when buying a morning Happy Meal which consists of hot-cakes, corn and a chocolate drink (HK$18 something).

Each of these dolls is made of plastic. The heads jump up and down when pressed. Through Skype, Abby chooses Ronald. There is no question that she will leave Birdie for her little sister, Elly.

We have not yet decided whether or not to buy the remaining two dolls, the Hamburglar (漢堡神偷) and Grimace (滑嘟嘟).

Mourning all over Hong Kong

Last Sunday, different political parties in Hong Kong raised a March to male condolences to our Hong Kong victims in Manila from Victoria Park to Chater Garden in Central. People, mostly in black or white clothes gathered at Victoria Park. Some children joined too because they understood what happened and would like to share the sorrow of the survivors who lost their loved ones in the incident. Some smaller children wondered if it was filming when they saw the horrible scene in TV. They asked their parents for the truth.

It was a march of silence. Everybody carried a heavy heart when he/she walked. Many cried because they could perceive the fear to be killed of the hostages , hated the ex-cop of the Philippine police who slaughtered our citizens and became angry at the slow and stupid rescue operation of the local police.

When the participants of the march reached Chater Garden, they tied the yellow ribbons provided onto the railings to express their sympathy towards the dead and the survivors. Some even brought along their flowers and placed them in the garden.

From recent news, the two wounded survivors at Prince of Wales Hospital are in good conditions after operations and speedy recovery is expected. Jason Leung, the young man who received a heavy injury at the head, had been taken back to Hong Kong by a medical plane and had part of his skull taken off to reduce the pressure to the brain in Tuen Mun Hospital. His fever disappears after medication and was put under an anaesthetic at the moment so that his brain can rest. We all hope that Jason can get out of the state of coma and recover as soon as possible.

Home again

It was August 25. After a short ceremony at the airport, Manila, a Cathay plane took the survivors, those corpses of victims, relatives of the victims, government officials, supporters such as psychiatrists, social workers, medical officers, even a few reporters back to Hong Kong. From TV, I saw a lady limp down the stairs and another man whose hands were seriously wounded by bullets walk to an ambulance which immediately took him to Hospital for further treatment.

After an almost two-hour flight, at around 8 p.m., the plane landed on our airport in Hong Kong. Our Chief Secretary, Henry Tang and Chinese Officials boarded the plane to meet and comfort the survivors.

Meanwhile, the coffins of the dead were lowered and drawn group by group, according to different families before the line of Government and Chinese officials and relatives of the dead in the tragic incident.

“The Amazing Grace” was played by two police bag-pipers. Wreaths were placed by Henry Tang and the relatives of the dead victims onto the top of each coffin. The most touching moments came when the mother of the responsible tourist guide from Hong Tai Travel Agency and Mrs. Fu, whose husband was killed, wept.

Mrs. Fu held her 4 to 5 year-old daughter and asked the latter to place a piece of paper on the coffin of her father. It seemed that there was something the daughter wanted to tell her father.

A seriously wounded lady tourist was taken home later of the night by a special plane which provides medical support. She was taken to QWH by mid-night.

Some residents in Manila, who came from Hong Kong, cried at the scene of tragedy. They did not believe that the Philippine police was so poor in the rescue operation and they shed their tears for the victims.

A Paper Dress

Graduated at University of Middlesex, London, Zoe Bradley becomes famous for her design in paper dress. She was inspired by the Fashion Designer called Alexander McQueen. Her talented creative craftsmanship has been praised and looked up to by different media.

Recently, Zoe makes a dress made of red paper roses and brings it to Hong Kong and has it displayed at New Town Plaza, Shatin. Through the display of this beautiful dress, she would like to pay tribute to the memory of Princess Diana and Alexander McQueen.

It was a large beautiful, but delicate dress. I believe that it is not suitable to be worn in the streets.

This Ruthless Cop kills

Not only this ruthless cop had killed some of the hostages, but the Philippines police was also responsible for killing other hostages during their invasion. Aimless bullets that flew from both sides during shooting could kill. The helpless hostages were nowhere to hide nor they could protect themselves at all.

The hijacker, or better say, the killer has made a bad mistake. If he finds no justice in the government, he should find other ways to appeal. He should not hurt or kill foreigners. He had already broken several Hong Kong families. Some lads had become orphans and a lady a widow having a wounded son and lost her daughters. This slaughter has broken the hearts of the victims and their families and most importantly to the people of Hong Kong. Never will our citizens of Hong Kong set foot on the Philippines because it is so unsafe to be in the country with kidnappers and dangerous and merciless men like the cop here.

The Police in the Philippines are to blame too. Their equipment is backward, just hammers and ropes. They do not have ladders. They are not well-trained and slow in rescue. They took more than an hour in the so called rescue operation. They did not have any tactics or rescue plans at all. Tear gas should be applied at the very beginning, but the police did not. The wrong information given by the escaped driver that all the hostages were killed made the police dare to shoot blindly at the bus. They longed to have missed several golden chances in shooting at the hijacker in the afternoon when the latter appeared at the door.

It was a nightmare to the victims and to us in Hong Kong.

A Tragedy

Yesterday morning a former cop of the Philippines, armed with an M16, hijacked a tourist bus operated by Hong Tai Travel Agency at Manila. In the afternoon he released a lady with her two sons, a young boy and an old couple. He kept the remaining tourists and a male guide, 6 males and 9 females, and a driver as hostages. He demanded to get back his job because he was accused of involvement in a certain criminal case ( he said he did not) and had been fired by the Police force. Negotiations were made all the afternoon and his younger brother (also a cop) joined in.

The hijacker became mad when he learned that police was closed in to take action. His brother was arrested for provoking his brother to start killing some of the sixteen hostages he held.

The police special force took a long time hammering at the windows, striking at the door as well as the windscreen at the front of the bus. The progress was very slow. It was quiet inside. At one time, the police wanted to break in through the emergency door at the back, but a few shots from inside held them back. Ten to fifteen shots was made by the hijackers to warn the Police. The driver was able to run away from the bus in the confusion. Tear gas bomb was thrown in and later it worked. The hijacker was shot dead when he went near the door. Soon the police broke in the bus to save those alive and carry the wounded and dead to hospitals.

In this hijack incident, 8 hostages were killed and the rest 7, some wounded, were still alive.

The lady guide who was earlier released told the press that she explained to the hijacker that her two sons had lost their father already and the hijacker agreed to let her, her two children and another young boy go.

Mrs. Leung was heart-breaking because she lost her brave husband and two daughters while her son was wounded.

A young girl was lucky to survive, but her parents and auntie were all killed in the incident.

Our Chief Executive, Donald Tsang, announced that the HKSAR flag would be lowered on August 24th to condole on the deaths of the victims in this tragedy.

One of young men in Hong Kong said to a TVB reporter that he could not sleep all through the night after seeing the direct broadcast of the horrible slaugter event.

This morning police investigation was made to determine what guns made the bullet holes on the windows of the bus. People wondered how many bullets came from the police side which killed the victims. The bullet heads in the corpses would tell the story.

Two bridges over the Willamette River

Today let us look at two interesting bridges that cross the Willamette River.

Marquam Bridge,1043 feet (318.2 metres) long, is a double deck cantilever bridge that carries Interstate 5 traffic across the Willamette River south of downtown Portland, Oregon. It is the busiest bridge in Oregon, carrying 135,900 vehicles a day as of 2008. The upper deck carries northbound traffic; the lower deck carries southbound traffic. (Look at the photos at Top Left and Bottom Left)

Hawthorn Bridge is the second-oldest bridge that crosses the Willamette River in Portland. Built in 1910, it is also the oldest vertical lift bridge in the entire country, allowing river vessels access up and down the waters . The colour of Hawthorne Bridge is forest green, with red railings and counterweights. Before it was repainted recently, it was beige. The original color of the bridge was black. (Look at the photos at Top Right and Bottom Right)

Hawthorne Bridge normally carries approximately 30,000 motorists across it daily. The bridge, due to its low clearance, must raise the drawbridge quite often, though lifts are not allowed during rush hour.

A Study of the Willamette River

To know more about the Geographical features of Oregon State, we must first learn about the Willamette River.

Wikipedia says:

"The Willamette River is a major tributary of the Columbia River. The river is 187 miles (301 km) long, lying entirely in northwestern Oregon in the United States. In 1997, the river was named as one of ten national American Heritage Rivers.

Flowing northward between the Oregon Coast Range and Cascade Range, the river and its tributaries form a basin called the Willamette Valley, in which live two-thirds of Oregon's population. Portland, Oregon’s largest city, sits along both sides of the Willamette near its mouth on the Columbia. The valley, fed by prolific rainfall on the western side of the Cascades, is one of the most fertile agriculture regions of North America.

It was the destination of many 19th-century immigrants along the Oregon Trail. The river was an important transportation route during the early history of the state. Part of the Willamette Floodplain was established as a National Natural Landmark in 1987.

The Willamette rises in three separate forks in the mountains south and southeast of Eugene, at the southern end of the Willamette Valley. Formed by the confluence of its Middle and Coast forks near Springfield, the main stem meanders generally north for 187 miles (301 km) to the Columbia. The river's two most significant course deviations occur at Newberg, where it turns sharply east, and about 18 miles (29 km) downriver from Newberg, where it turns north again. Near its mouth north of downtown Portland the river splits into two channels that flow around Sauvie Island. The main channel enters the Columbia about 101 miles (163 km) from the larger stream's mouth on the Pacific Ocean, and the smaller Multnomah Channel, a distributary, enters the Columbia about 14.5 miles (23.3 km) further downstream near St. Helens in Columbia County."

Loch Ness

On June 23, 2009, the documentary TV programme, “Britain From Above” briefly mentioned Loch Ness. Double-click to see better photos.

Wikipedia supplies us the following information about the lake:

The Loch Ness (尼斯湖) is a large, deep, freshwater loch in the Scottish Highlands ( 57°18′N 4°27′W / 57.3°N 4.45°W) extending for approximately 37 km (23 mi) southwest of Inverness. Its surface is 15.8 m (52 ft) above sea level. Loch Ness is best known for the alleged sightings of the legendary Loch Ness Monster, also known as "Nessie". Loch Ness is over twenty miles long and hundreds of feet deep in places. The loch is notorious for its murkiness, as the water is filled with slime, peat, and mud. Some people think caverns under the loch connect to the ocean, but such connections have not been proven.

It is connected at the southern end by the River Oich and a section of the Caledonian Canal to Loch Oich. At the northern end there is the Bona Narrows which opens out into Loch Dochfour, which feeds the River Ness and a further section of canal to Inverness. It is one of a series of interconnected, murky bodies of water in Scotland; its water visibility is exceptionally low due to a high peat content in the surrounding soil.

Loch Ness is the second largest Scottish loch by surface area at 56.4 km2 (21.8 sq mi) after Loch Lomond, but due to its great depth it is the largest by volume. Its deepest point is 230 m (755 ft), deeper than the height of London's BT Tower at 189 m (620 ft) and deeper than any other loch with the exception of Loch Morar. It contains more fresh water than all lakes in England and Wales combined, and is the largest body of water on the Great Glen Fault (大格倫斷層) which runs from Inverness in the north to Fort William in the south.

The Loch Ness Monster (Cartoon Version)

The cartoon-like figure in the photo is supposed to be the monster at Loch Ness, a famous lake in Scotland. It looks very much like a dragon or prehistoric dinosaur that lives in that lake. It was my daughter who bought it to me when she was travelling in Britain. I remember there was a comprehension passage about Loch Ness monster in Form One English text books which our CCSC students were using.

The following materials come from Wikipedia and I have modified them a bit:

The Loch Ness Monster (尼斯水怪) is believed to inhabit in Loch Ness 尼斯湖 (“Loch” means "Lake") in the Scottish Highlands. The creature is most frequently described as“ a line of long-surviving plesiosaurs”. It is similar to other supposed lake monsters in Scotland and elsewhere.

It was first brought to the world's attention in 1933. Evidence of its existence came from much-disputed photographic material and sonar readings. The scientific community regards the Loch Ness Monster as a modern-day myth. People called this legendary monster by the nickname Nessie since the 1950s.

On 2 May 1933, Alex Campbell, the water bailiff for Loch Ness and a part-time journalist, reported seeing the "monster" in the Inverness Courier. On 4 August in the same year, the Courier published as a full news item the claim of a London man, George Spicer, that a few weeks earlier while motoring around the Loch, he and his wife had seen "the nearest approach to a dragon or pre-historic animal that I have ever seen in my life", moving awkwardly across the road toward the Loch carrying "an animal" in its mouth. There were other claims of land or water sightings. These stories soon reached the national press, which talked of a "monster fish", "sea serpent", or "dragon", eventually giving it the name, "Loch Ness Monster". On 6 December 1933 the first photograph of the monster, taken by Hugh Gray, was published. Shortly afterwards, the Secretary of State for Scotland ordered the police to prevent any attacks on it. In 1934, interest was aroused by The Surgeon's Photograph. In the same year R. T. Gould published a book of personal investigation and collected record of additional reports pre-dating the summer of 1933. Other authors have claimed that sightings of the monster go as far back as the 6th century.

Flowers that cluster like Tails

Recently my classmate, Daisy Mak, told me that she has grown plants called Love-Lies-Bleeding Amaranth in her garden in Texas. What a strange name it is to me! I found interests in the way these deep-red flowers cluster like tails of animals.

The seeds of the plants are sown directly in the ground when it is thoroughly warm in spring. They take 10 to 15 days to germinate. The plants, which must be spaced out 1 to 2 feet apart, will grow up to 4 to 5 feet. The Amaranth plants are easy to grow, need full sunshine and usually take 60 to 70 days to maturity.

For many centuries, the leaves and seeds of Amaranthus species have been sources of food for native people from North and South America to Asia, India, Africa, the Pacific Islands, the Caribbean region, and Eurasia.

The seeds of Amaranth are one of the most nutritious foods grown. Not only they are richer in protein than the major cereals, but the amino acid balance of their protein comes closer to nutritional perfection for the human diet than that in normal cereal grains. Amaranth may be very useful as a food source for the world’s future.

A Cross

Yesterday I was a little unhappy when I saw the “cross” given to me by the chef of my salmon fillet. The skin of my part of salmon had been peeled off and was put on top of the meat. The feeling was no good. I don’t like “crosses” because they often mean negatively as, “wrong”, “poor’, “bad” or “fail”.

I can’t remember or have never counted the number of “crosses” I have given to my students on their homework books, test papers and examination papers. To me, “Ticks” are only given to those perfect answers. “Crosses” are given to “Definitely wrong” answers. What about those wrong-to-a-certain-extent answers? I usually give a “tick” with a “stroke” across to make it look like a “partly right and partly wrong” signal.

At one time, in some questionnaires, people are asked to draw a “cross” to those boxes where you think it is “right”. How absurd it is to do this kind of thing. I think the designers of the questionnaires have something wrong in their minds.

Back to the dishes of food my wife and I ate yesterday, my wife ordered a meat soup and for myself, a shrimp salad as appetizers. The former was delicious because it tasted like “Lo For Tong” (老火湯).

The shrimps in the latter appetizer reached the “tasteless” level. The salad below was composed of vegetable leaves (western style), rich in olive oil. I felt the vegetables a bit bitter to taste. The piece of salmon, with an extra ten-dollar charge, was not bad to taste. The spaghetti beside the fish are slender, Without the white cheese sauce, they would be too “plain” to taste.

Portland Saturday Market

Portland Saturday Market does not only open on Saturday, but also on Sundays. It is located at SW Ankeny Street and Naito Parkway.
The Market provides opportunities for customers to meet the artist and their art pieces at the artist’s booth. Over 250 small businesses and individual artists from across the NW region gather each week for the Saturday/Sunday event with live music and a wide variety of foods that will satisfy the visitors.
There are beautiful glass hanging-decorations, beautiful pictures of Art, African crafts and drums, interesting human figure-heads made of ceramic and artistic lanterns made of fine pottery and many others.

One of the food stalls in the market sells Chowmein and fried rice at around US$5 to 6, a variety of chicken and spring rolls or salad rolls. Another sells drinks of strawberry, honey dew, peach, mango, red beans, coconut and taro. The third, Mandarin House, sells Chinese food advertised as healthy at around 5 to 6 U.S. dollars. The fourth sells sandwiches of vegetables, tomato, onion and meat-like bean-curd product, all wrapped up like Mexican “tarcos”.

Happy to see a flower of Strelitzia

Strelitzia (天堂鳥), as far as I know, is a perennial plant, native to South Africa. Some thirty or so such plants have been growing healthily in an oval-shaped flower bed in our public garden below. Each of its flowers resemble the look of a bird of paradise. In South Africa, it is commonly known as a crane flower. Today I spotted one fully-grown flower standing rigidly out of the big leaves.

The orange and purple “feathers” spread spirally over the “bird’s" head. The green head is recognizable, but not conspicuous. To me, I welcome such plants so close at hand. They look very much like birds resting on some shrubs.

Wikipedia describes the leaves and flowers in detail as follows:

“The leaves of Strelitzia are large, 30–200 cm long and 10–80 cm broad, similar to a banana leaf in appearance but with a longer petiole, and arranged strictly in two ranks to form a fan-like crown of evergreen foliage. The flowers are produced in a horizontal inflorescence emerging from a stout spathe. They are pollinated by sunbirds, which use the spathe as a perch when visiting the flowers; the weight of the bird on the spathe opens it to release the pollen onto the bird's feet, which is then deposited on the next flower it visits.“

Portland International Rose Test Garden

Inside Washington Park in Portland, Oregon, United States, there is a rose garden called The International Rose Test Garden. There are over 7,000 rose plants of around 550 varieties. The roses bloom from April through October at their peak in June, depending on the weather. From many parts of the world, new rose cultivars are continually sent to the garden and are tested for color, fragrance, disease resistance and other attributes. It is the oldest existing public rose test garden in the United States. Portland thus wins the nickname of the City of Roses.

The International Rose Test Garden covers 4.5 acres (18,000 m2) in several tiers facing downtown Portland, the Willamette River and East Portland. On clear days there are views ofthe Cascade Mountains, with prominently Mount Hood.

There is an amphitheater which hosts many events throughout the year, for example, classical music concerts. During good weather the amphitheater is popular with picnickers and people throwing the disc around. It is interesting to find is a brick walkway at the side of the garden called The Queens Walk with a bronze star honoring each Rose Festival queen since 1907.

To mention here, in particular, the Royal Rosarian Garden has paid tribute since 1924 to the goodwill ambassadors and official greeters who serve in the many Rose Festival events. As each rosarian is knighted, they adopt a rose variety as their namesake. A rose is planted in this garden for each of the highest ranking Rosarian Prime Ministers. This garden-within-a-garden contains many roses which are no longer available in the market.

The central photo shows a small brick house with rest-rooms surrounded by fragrance of roses. Do you like it?

Father-in-law’s Birthday Dinner

One, two, three, four, five, six dishes of food were served on the table on Father-in-law’s birthday this year.

The dishes are as follows:
[1] 苦瓜菜脯蛋角
[2] 青瓜炒牛仔粒
[3] 酸甜咕嚕肉
[4] 雜菇炒白菜仔
[5] 欖角肉鬆炒肉豆
[6] 西芹腰果肉丁

In addition, we ordered a dish of noodles. The dishes of food fed seven of us full to the neck. At last, we were given red bean congee as dessert, free of charge.

Lok Fu Plaza

The old Lok Fu Shopping Centre has been renovated phase by phase into a new one called Lok Fu Plaza (樂富廣場). Please double-click to see better pictures.

Shops, no matter big or small, banks and eateries are shuffled during these few years. It is a big surprise to find that the Park-in and Wellcome supermarkets disappear; the long-life "Jusco" vanishes and is replaced by a new UNY; banks such as Chartered Bank and Bank of China, Heng Sang Bank accumulate round the shuttle-bus (to and from Kowloon Tong and Broadcast Drive), taxi and minibus terminus. The branches of Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank and Bank of East Asia are located in better sites in the shopping centre.

After renovation, the shopping centre, in my opinion, looks newer, cleaner, better organized, fresher and modernized. This will mean that rents will go up and customers have to pay more when they buy and eat here.

Let us look at the nine photos here:
[1] Top left – the red plate showing “Lok Fu Plaza” on one of its walls is relatively too small. It is partly hidden by the tall trees in front of it.
[2] Top centre – UNY occupies the second floor and third floor while new restaurants and fast food shops line on the ground floor facing the large courtyard.
[3] Top right – the hanging coloured plates seem to hide the monotonous look of the walls
[4] Middle left – A few decorative squares of lights have been added to the large roof cover of the courtyard.
[5] Middle centre – The fruit store has been replaced by a fast food shop and its top formerly the Bank of East Asia (Lok Fu Branch) now becomes "Fortress".
[6] Middle right – The tiles of the courtyard have been replaced. The courtyard will still be used for activities and exhibitions.
[7] Bottom left – The McDonald is still there, but has been modernized and provides twenty-four hour service.
[8] Bottom centre – A corner of the former “Dry” market is now “Tai Hing” (太興) Restaurant.
[9] Bottom right – Here we can glimpse of the floors of UNY Department Store and eateries with all-weathered escalators wrapped up by glass towers.

Elly making a Phone call

To make a phone call, Elly picks up the TV remote control and speaks into it. Who is on the other line, we never know. Perhaps she uses the phone to talk with the one she is looking at. In one of the photos, she looks into her mother’s face. I believe she has a lot to tell her mother from the bottom of her heart.

With one eye hidden by her long hair at her forehead, she plays games of her age. Besides making phone calls, Elly is able to turn round and descend safely by herself down the sofa, pushes and walks with the “Baby-walker” training unit with a handle, toys and wheels. Crawling is another choice. Well, she wriggles fast like a worm room to room. Eyes should be on her closely, otherwise she may bump into her obstacles on her track.

What a Good Beginning of Today!

I was not aware of the streets below which had been wetted until my wife called out to me. There was no trace of rain on the windows. I guessed it was drizzle that made the streets wet for a few minutes.

Looking up, I spotted in the distance the first rainbow I saw this year. It is rare to see a rainbow because a thin film of rain, sunshine at the right angle and the right time to build are necessary.

The rainbow was not conspicuous nor complete this time, but I could figure it out. How light-hearted I was to see a “welcoming” morning rainbow at seven twenty-one!

Lovely Flowers at Sai Kung

It was May when I set my feet on the roof-top garden of a café at Sai Kung near its bus terminus.

Lovely flowering plants were grown along the edges of this narrow U-shaped garden. I was stunned to see the peach-coloured hibiscus for the first time in my life. The yellow flowers were equally attractive. Their centres were dotted as if they were sprayed with red paint.

Full of life, the flowers stood high above the leaves. Some lined up along the straight edges of a quadrant of a circular grass lawn.

Working under the same roof in the 70’s

Here are some of my old colleagues of CCSC who worked together in teaching some of our younger generation of Hong Kong. Most of our students have grown older, married, have children and have become people of importance working successfully in different parts of the world, serving the communities they are in. Please Double click to see larger pictures.

Yesterday WE met in a restaurant in North Point. Sitting face to face, chatting, we found ourselves still energetic, somehow humorous and still remembered the old days that we were in CCSC.

In those days of the old, besides teaching our students during week days, we took part in many outdoor activities such as picnicking, barbecues, swimming, playing ball games of football or basketball. Afternoon tea was one of our after-school activities During summer time, we sometimes took coffee or tea after lunch at those Tai Pei Dong (大牌檔) at Tai Hang.

Since I was sitting at the back of the Male Staff Room, I could see all the backs of my colleagues and their activities. Although I was always correcting Mathematics exercise books, my eyes could spot out every moment of my colleagues. Some of them read newspapers. Some were sipping coca-cola. A few took a nap on the table when they were really tired. Sometimes jokes and laughter broke the silence of the room. We never found ourselves like teachers in our room because we have no boundaries among us. Games were played secretly inside the staff room, but obviously I shall not talk about them here.

Days passed so quickly that all of us at lunch yesterday have left CCSC. Some of us have retired. Some are still working because they are still young. What we are proud of was our little contribution in educating some of the youngsters of Hong Kong in the years of 70’s, 80’s, and for me 90’s and into the Millennium until September 2005.

ICC

Nowadays, 112 buildings in Hong Kong stand taller than 180 metres (591 ft).

The tallest is the 108-storey International Commerce Centre (ICC 環球貿易廣場), which was completed in 2010. It stands as the 4th-tallest building in the world having 118 storeys, being 484 m (1,588 ft) tall and 2nd-tallest building in the People's Republic of China. The tallest building in the world at the moment is Burj Khalifa at Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE).


The second-tallest building in the city is the International Finance Centre (IFC 國際金融中心) at 88 storeys. It is the fourth-tallest building in the Greater China region and the eighth-tallest office building in the world, based on structural heights.

The 78-storey Central Plaza (中環廣場), which is in Wanchai, instead of in Central, contains the Hong Kong City Church, the highest church in the world located inside a skyscraper.

The fourth-tallest building in the city is the 70-storey Bank of China Tower(中銀大廈), which is 367 m (1,204 ft) high and was designed by famous architect I. M. Pei. The skyscraper has the distinction of being the first skyscraper outside the United States to exceed 305 m (1,000 ft) in height.

Harbour Views

Through the lens of Tony’s camera, the harbour views of Central and Wanchai from the Arch are superb. Please click the photo to get a larger view of the shore of Central.

First, looking at Central, the two “sharp-looking” buildings are IFC (International Financial Centre 國際金融中心) and The Center (中環中心).

IFC stands like a “cob” of maize with visible “grains”. Its top looks like the head of an electric razor.

The Center looks like a colourful pencil especially when its colour-changing lights are on at night. Its top is more or less like a pyramid.

The bank buildings are attractive to our eyes in Central. First the chisel-like Bank of China Tower (中銀大廈) is always the centre of interest in Central because of its “sharp” faces.

The “robot-like” Headquarter-building of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation wins a lot of admiration and fame in all these years.

Jardine House(怡和大廈), formerly called Connaught Centre (康樂大廈), was completed in 1973. It has 52 storeys (178,5 metres tall). At that time, it was the first skyscraper in Hong Kong and the tallest in South-east Asia. Its outlook is nothing special except the big round windows. Its height was quickly beaten by other tall modern buildings.

It is interesting to see eight piers lined evenly at the coastline of Central. Looking at them from left to right (east to west) from Kowloon are:

Pier 8: for Star ferries to Hung Hum
Pier 7: for Star ferries to Tsimshatsui
Pier 6: for ferries to Silver Mine Bay and Peng Chau
Pier 5: for ferries to Cheung Chau
Pier 4: for ferries to Lamma Island
Pier 3: for ferries to Discovery Bay
Pier 2: for ferries to Park Island
Pier 1: for government use

Looking up at Victoria Peak, The Peak Tower (凌霄閣), the cresent-like building is the terminus of Peak Tram at 396 metres. Tourists can overlook at the roof of the tower (at 428 metres) the scenery of the two shores of Victoria Harbour.

The Campus at University of Oregon

This is University of Oregon.It is a coeducational research university (founded in 1876) in Eugene, Oregon, United States. UO is the second oldest public university in the state.

The campus is spread over 295 acres (1.19 square km) and holds sixty major buildings, as well as providing a home for more than 500 varieties of trees. Eugene is located near many outstanding geographic features such as the Willamette River, Cascade Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. Portland is within a two-hour drive. Many of the University's buildings are built around several major quadrangles, many of which interact with the famous pedestrian 13th Street.

Gifts of Craftsmanship

My wife received two wedding banquet gifts from a friend. They were supposed to be the gifts or souvenirs to the guests at the banquet.

Two pieces of small Chinese cakes were wrapped and put inside a cubical red paper box. It was so designed that the letters of double delights (雙喜) appeared on its four lateral faces, while the base closed like the shutter leaves in a single-lens reflex camera. The top of the box closed in, crossed and knotted together perfectly. The most interesting part was that one could see butterflies at its very top.

What a wonderful design and craftsmanship the designer has created!

Oregon

It is interesting to see colourful hot-air balloons flying at low altitude when driving along a road through Oregon, a state between California and Washington. The snow-capped mountains in a distance give a visual cooling effect to the driver and passengers on board a car on a highway.

Driving long distances needs stop and rest after two to three hours or so, especially when one feels hungry. Finding suitable restaurants with cheap and tasty food to fill the stomach is a piece of art. It always takes some time in a car circulating round the streets, which are supposed, filled with restaurantsor simply walking about the streets, door by door, looking at the menus or photos on the windows and most important of all the prices and kinds of food, if none, one has to estimate the prices by the look of the restaurants they stand at.

McDonalds are attractions everywhere, but their burgers are not cheap at all in the States. We experienced the cheapest hamburgers at midway to La Vegas. We bought them at one U.S. dollar each. In Canada and Australia, if there is no promotion, the prices of similar burgers are twice or thrice those in Hong Kong.

One particular thing about the trolley-buses in Oregon, they are modern and beautiful, unlike those old ones that run in the old town of San Francisco. The bus-stops are specially designed here with large wing-like shades for passengers to hide from the hot sun.

Some modern buildings made of glass and metal appear in Oregon. They are "assembled" like "Legos", which takes much shorter time.

Double-click if you want larger photos.

An Interesting Dish

Yesterday at JC, my wife and I ordered an appetizer, soup, two main courses and two slices of cakes. It is always our tactics to share different kinds of food between us. “More taste, more enjoyment”.

The appetizer, Mango and Scallop Salad, came before us in a strange white dish which made me chuckle. The salad was buried in a circular hole at the centre. I wondered why the dish should be so big and thick, but contained a small hole to hold the food. With respect to area, the hole is one ninth of that of the whole dish. Such a dish made me feel that the salad is relatively small in amount. I could only say it was “a big dish of tiny salad”.

The chicken soup with sea coconut was tasty, but it seemed to me that the coconut had slipped out of the soup or perhaps the cook had forgotten to put it inside.

The Smoked Pork Loin and Roasted New potatoes suited me because the taste of pork was quite close to ham and the small lovely potatoes are tasty under Port Wine sauce.

My favourite Fish cutlets came fresh and hot. The steakhouse fries, as they were called here, were tasty, a thousand times better than those match-stick like fries at a McDonald.

The two dessert cakes we shared were completely different in styles. One was home-made. I believed it meant that the cake could be easily made at any home. The other was a thick cheese cake which I guessed it could only be prepared at a kitchen like that at JC. We all agreed that the latter, was the “king” among the cakes displayed behind the show-windows.

Baggy Soap bubbles

It was July 17th, 2010. Little Hayley, a few days before two years old, was filled with curiosity when she first saw her grand uncle illustrate how soap bubbles were created by a circular plastic loop. She observed and learned fast.

Next she picked the loop up, dipped it in soapy water, waved it and soon mastered the skill of creating soap bubbles. No doubt she enjoyed those minutes of creating large baggy bubbles by herself and watching them disappear instantly.

Please double-click to get larger pictures.

My Collection of Coca-cola bottles

Among the five Coca-cola bottles I collected, one glows and changes colours.

As described by the manufacturer, it is a plastic plant-bottle, up to 30% plant-based and 100% recycled. In the limited edition (50,000 in all), this bottle ranks 34,103th. Great fun comes when it is turned on at the base. Its colour changes from red to purple to orange and to green. It is so produced as to arouse the interests of the people at Vancouver and elsewhere in Canada about the Winter Olympics in February. It is naturally enough that no coke is stored inside, but merely a light-changing toy-coke instead.

The other four 250 ml bottles are stylish, made of light, but hard metal, two of which were sold during Winter Olympics, one was made in Slovakia and one in Toronto. They all arrived at my home several months ago or earlier and together they give me a strong spirit of Coke.

Leaves stitched with laces

The photos above show leaves in two different parts of the world stitched with laces:

[A] The leaves on the left-hand side grow in summer Hong Kong at a temperature of around an average of 30 degrees Celcius. The colours are mainly purplish red, but yellowish green near the stalk and fringing the tooth-like edges.

[B] The leaves on the right-hand side grew in winter Vancouver at a temperature around 0 degree Celcius. The colour of the leaves are green, but stitched with a lace of an overnight frost.

Eco Terrace

Eco Terrace (都市梯田) is located at podium at Lok Fu Plaza(樂富中心). Some 10000 plants of seven organic vegetables are planted in boxes placed on the floor of the podium and on the steps leading to the road below. It is a project-based activity which will end in July, 2010. Obviously it is rare to see terraces in the midst of our concrete city.

The seven vegetables that are planted here are:
[1] Red Amaranth (莧菜)
[2] Eggplant (茄子)
[3] Mini tomato (蕃茄仔)
[4] Chinese Cabbage (上海青白菜)
[5] Wheat grass (小麥草)
[6] Water Spinach(通菜)
[7] Malabar Spinach (潺菜)

Have you eaten all of them before?
See if you can find them from the photos here.

Pineapple-bun breakfast

A pineapple-bun is shaped like pineapple, but does not contain any pineapple at all. It recently becomes the "star" of breakfasts of Café de Coral. Customer can’t resist its attraction.

To our disappointment, the bun is small, cold, hard like a shell and stale like yesterday's made. I think the pineapple buns sold in some of our local small restaurants are much bigger, better in taste and served fresh from their ovens. I don’t believe these buns are made by the fast food restaurants themselves, but simply they are ordered from a certain bakery.

Sooner or later, these buns will fade out and never appear in the breakfasts because they are not up to standard.

Scenery around the Lookout of The Arch

The Lookout (瞭望層) of The Arch (凱旋門) is located on its 62nd floor. It provides a 270-degree view of the northern shore of Hong Kong Island and most of Kowloon, except West Kowloon which has been blocked by neighbouring tall buildings.

It is so interesting to be there to observe and take photos of the panorama view of the busiest parts of Hong Kong and Kowloon.

The Arch itself is easily recognizable by its door-like shape from Central and Tsimshatsui. It really looks like L’ Arc de Triomphe (巴黎凱旋門) in Paris, France. Few people know that the clubhouse (with a restaurant and a swimming pool) is launched in mid-air, right at the top of the arch.

Please double-click to get a larger picture.

Chanthu

Chanthu (燦都) is the name given to the recent typhoon that affects the coast of Guangdong. This typhoon does not hit Hong Kong, but brings much rain to us. Yesterday it was fine without rain and strong winds. The typhoon signal Number 3 was put up for quite a number of hours.

Today, the Observatory changes the typhoon signal from 3 to 1 because the typhoon no longer threats Hong Kong.

To our surprise, in an hour’s time in the afternoon between four thirty and five thirty, the sky turns dark. Heavy rain pours down and thunder roars with lightning. The amber, red and black rain warning signals are issued one after another. The northern district suffers flooding because most rain falls there. Under the black rain signal, office workers can go home, so the streets and traffic become busy towards evening.

Singapore Flyer

Recently I was fascinated by the TV programme called “Planet Food”, not only by the food it introduces, but also by the beautiful scenery.

This time, the programme was about Singapore and its local food. It seems as if I were back to this small island at the tip of the Malaysian peninsula. I first visited it in January, 2007.

At the start of the programme, the scene of a team of men rowing a dragon boat showed up. I just wondered where the dragon boat was heading. The camera man then zoomed out and I saw the new landmark of Singapore, the Singapore Flyer, in a distance.

The Singapore Flyer is considered the tallest observation wheel on Earth, rising 165 metres into the sky. It can carry 1,260 passengers around hourly to see a stunning 45-kilometre panorama view of Indonesian Island of Batan and Bintan as well as Johore, Malaysia. The wheel stands twice the height of the Statue of Liberty. The observation whee,l which looks like a bicycle whee, rotates 28 large capsules through the sky, each carrying 28 passengers. By construction, the wheel stands firmly against monsoon rains, thunderstorms and dangerous Sumatra winds.

Happy Birthday, Hayley!

Today is Hayley’s Birthday.

How old is Hayley? Two years old or three years old? In one of the photos, Hayley raised three figures while her parents did two each.

It was so nice to pre-celebrate Hayley and Jasmine’s birthday last Saturday at “the Arch” clubhouse restaurant.

We supposed that the two cousins would celebrate their birthdays together. The birthday cake was first placed on a square table. Hayley was brought up onto the sofa and she sat there. It was natural that Jasmine was the next girl to join in. To our amazement, Jasmine did not want to come close to the birthday cake, but turned away from it. Later we learned that she was afraid of the flames of the two little candles on the cake. Several photos were taken with Hayley alone with the cake. She showed her smiling face in some of the photos.

Soon Hayley was to blow the candles with the help of her mother, Daisy. The candles were next re-lit because group photos had to be taken . Hayley’s family members flocked together at the table. They included Hayley’s parents, grandparents and Uncle Lit. Then grand-uncles and grand aunts joined in for photo-taking with Hayley.

Next the birthday fruit-cake was cut and shared around us at the long table.

Two cousins playing Hula Hoop

Last Saturday, Hayley eyed on one of the plastic hula hoops at Grand uncle and aunt’s home and soon she picked it up from the heap of toys with the help of Grandma Au Yeung.

Normally, Hula hoops for children generally measure approximately 28 inches in diameter, and those for adults around 40 inches. Hayley picked the right one.

Hayley must have seen hula hoops before, otherwise she would not choose it to play. She knew very well that she had to put the hoop over her head and held it at the waist. We saw that her pose of holding the hoop was correct. She began to twirl the hoop around her waist, but the hoop fell down. She might be too young to master the skill of swinging the hoop round the waist and twisting the latter at all times. Anyway, she had a nice try.

A moment later, Jasmine came out after taking her bath. She did not miss her chance of playing the hoop. As expected, she was willing to try, like Hayley she failed to turn the hoop at her waist. Perhaps, these two little cousins could play well in a few years’ time.

An Extraordinary Benz

At Elements, an extraordinary Benz is displayed. This Benz sparkles when light shines on it. From a distance away, it looks as if it were coated with beads of jewels. The badge of Benz can easily be seen at its front. Lower down, the registration plate bears the name of the shopping centre, “ELEMENTS”. Its headlights and wheels are stylish. Following the recent trend, the side-mirrors also serve as blinker-lights to show to other cars the intention of the drivers to turn left or right.

The twin seaters do not look as high-class and comfortable as I expect because they are thin and the red colour does not match with the white colour of the car.

Since it is so different from other Benzes, it will certainly attract people’s attention in the streets. I don’t know how much it costs. Maybe it is a “Concept” car (概念車) which is priceless and will not be sold to the public.

Playing Soap Bubbles

From my observation yesterday, Jasmine and Hayley, love playing soap bubbles. Jasmine held her soap bubble gun, pressed the trigger and soap bubbles oozed out continuously. It was funny to hear the gun make interesting sounds when it was “fired”.

Grandma Sung said that the soap-bubble gun was very cheap, some ten to twenty dollars. To reload the “gun”, it should be dipped into the bottle of soapy water. For many times, Hayley wanted to catch the soap bubbles with her hands, but failed. The bubbles disappeared shortly before her.

Seeing bigger soap bubbles created from bigger nets of a “star” and a circular "loop", Hayley began to learn how to create such bubbles by herself. Her father, Dik, was able to catch a photo or two of Hayley’s success in creating a big wavy bag-like bubble. Surely enough Hayley must have enjoyed herself in the soap-bubble play, same to Jasmine.

Mocha Choco Pies

We chance to see Mocha Choco Pies (巧克力Q餅) from EDO recently. We wonder if they are new products, but we are eager to try.

They come in two flavours, peanut and sesame. Out of their packets, they look flat and small pies. I better say they are like glutinous rice (nuomi) dumplings (糯米湯丸) beaten flat. In the past, we often boil dumplings in these two flavours in sugar solution. Now we can eat these dumplings chewy-dry instead.

Two Cousins met yesterday

Hayley and Jasmine met yesterday at the Arch (凱旋門), not in Paris, but near Kowloon Station. Hayley is a little bit taller than Jasmine. It maybe that Hayley is three weeks older than Jasmine which makes that difference in height.

Last winter the two cousins met once and yesterday it should be the second time. Since they live in different parts of the world, seldom meet and are too young, at the beginning, they did not get together to converse or to find out who the other is.

After lunch, the two cousins left the dining table and involved in their exploration of different parts of the restaurant. They walked separately and were chased by their parents and photographers (I was one). We, photographers, would like to catch the moments when they came together or perhaps hand in hand (but, to our disappointment, they did not hold each other’s hands). We well understood they had not yet learned to make friends in any social circle like school.

A Glimpse at Tsimshatsui

Yesterday I had a bus ride to Tsimshatsui. Since it was quite difficult to take photos from a moving bus, I grasped the time when the bus stopped at traffic lights or bus-stops.

The new bus-stop poles on Nathan Road in Tsimshatsui look different nowadays in three folds:

On each of these poles,

[1] the bus routes are coated inside a square transparent acrylic sheet unlike those old round metal plates.

[2] advertisements are posted below the bus-routes.

[3] details of the bus routes and fares are listed on a rotatable rectangular column.

The scene on Salisbury Road near New World Renaissance Hotel looks more or less the same for years.

The dome of Hong Kong Space Museum (香港太空館) has a better look after renovation with a smooth lustrous coating material.

The Hong Kong Cultural Centre (香港文化中心) looks as it was.

The China Hong Kong City (中港城) stood like a few pieces of Gold in Tsimshatsui. It is famous because from there we can take hovercrafts to Macau or to different ports of the Zhujiang Delta (珠江三角洲).

The new Austin MTR Station stood lonely at the moment. I think it is the quietest station at the moment. With the completion of the Guangzhou-Shenzhen - Hong Kong Express Rail Link (廣深港高速鐵路， 又稱廣深港客運專線) in the future, trains from Guangzhou and Shezhen will stop here. There will be a big change in terms of flow and visits of passengers to Hong Kong and the development around Kowloon Station, Austin Station as well as Express Rail Terminal.

Flowers on Lamp-posts

Yesterday a visit at Shun Lee gave us a new impression of this estate. We discovered that twin-potted flowers were hanging on every lamp post along Lee On Road.

These flowers were in light orange and pinkish red. Leaves of a few long creepers were hanging down from the pots making the whole display look beautiful and elegant. I loved the colours and lay-out of the flowers and leaves whether the plants were real or not. The swaying of the creepers under light winds looked cute and lively as if young girls were swinging their pigtails.

The potted flowers have added life to this old residential area though they may be made of silk. We wonder how they are watered for their being hung so high up on the lamp-post if they were real. I suppose these flowers cannot last long because some or all of them may soon become grey or black when flying dust and dirt cover them.

Mosaic Wall Pictures at Ngau Tau Kok

When I got off from an 89X bus at Ngau Tau Kok this Monday, I turned my way towards Ngau Tau Kok MTR Station. Looking up, I was astonished to see two large mosaic pictures on two walls of a pillar supporting a pedestrian footbridge near the station.

I marvelled at the pictures because it is difficult to make them so detailed. The artist(s) who make(s) them must have drawn the pictures beforehand. The finished pictures should have been divided into smaller squares by grid lines so that the correct coloured tiles are carefully selected. The tiles will be numbered according to the grid and stuck to the walls, square by square. It is painful and careful work to put the designated tiles at their right places.

Both pictures show the real street scenes at Ngau Tau Kok. The bottom left one shows the passers-by in heavy clothes. Some of them are talking. One man was kneeling down to tighten his shoes. Some are walking up a pedestrian footbridge. We can see some buildings in this area. The bottom right shows people visiting the old stalls here. The woman on the left is a typical housewife buying things home. The man in blue shirt and trousers is looking at the things in one of the stalls. Most probably the stalls are selling roasted meat, small electric appliances and so on. Someone is selling preserved plums or similar fruit. The tall buildings behind are those of a public housing estate in the area.

The pictures can definitely show the life-styles of the residents in Ngau Tau Kok. They record a glimpse of harmony and comfort of living here.

The two top-left small photos show the two faces of the pillar.

Always with us

On July 11, 2010, during the 2010 FIFA World Cup Final, Andrés Iniesta (恩尼斯達) celebrated his 116th minute world cup winning goal (the only goal of the game) by removing his jersey to reveal an undershirt with the sentence "DANI JARQUE : SIEMPRE CON NOSOTROS" which means "Dani Jarque, always with us".

Andrés Iniesta never forgets his close friend, Daniel Jarque González ,a Spanish footballer. Jarque played his entire career with RCD Espanyol (愛斯賓奴球隊), as a central defender. He was named team captain one month before his death from a heart attack, at the age of 26.

Born in Barcelona, Spain, , Jarque made his way up through through local RCD Espanyol's youth system starting from October 20, 2002, and after 15 appearances in two seasons, went on to become a defensive mainstay for a side that won the 2006 Spanish Cup.

In 2006–07, after renewing his contract until 2009, Jarque appeared in 14 UEFA Cup contests, as Espanyol reached the final, lost on penalties to Sevilla FC. In the previous league season, he contributed with four league goals, as Espanyol finished 15th.

At the start of 2009–10, Jarque relieved Raúl Tamudo of his captain duties.

According to several online Spanish newspapers, Jarque was found dead during Espanyol's pre-season, done in Coverciano, Florence, Italy. He was on the phone with his girlfriend in the team hotel when he suffered a heart attack.

Incidentally after that final match of World Cup, two other Spanish players, Sergio Ramos [15] and Jesús Navas [22], wore T- shirts with a similar tribute to another deceased Spanish player, Antonio Puerta, who passed away at the age of 23, due to a cardiac arrest he suffered during a match in August, 2007. Indeed it was the same message as the one of Iniesta: Always with us.

If Iniesta had not scored the goal by himself, he would not have shown this message to the World. I admire Iniesta because he is passionate and treasures his friendship with Jarque in Spain U17, U19, U20 and U21 National team.

Those 120 minutes

The World Cup Final 2010 was held on July 11th at Soccer City Stadium at Johannesburg. It was a tough match between Netherlands and Spain.

Netherlands missed several chances to score because the Goal-keeper also Captain of the Spanish team, Casillas (卡斯拿斯) [1] saved the ball several times from its getting into the net. Robben (洛賓) [11] of the Netherlands, a fast runne,r pushed much pressure on the defenders on the Spanish side. On the Spanish side, Villa (韋拿)[7], Xavi (沙維) [8] and Iniesta (恩尼斯達) [6] were active players.

Both sides played very cautiously because they did not want to lose the game. There were 5 yellow cards and 1 red card given to the Netherlands, 2 to 3 yellow cards to Spain, which meant that the players tended to use these tactics to stop immediate threats of invasions from their opponents.

It was still a tie when the whistle blown at the official finishing time (90 minutes from the start). Additional time of thirty minutes were given to the two teams to compete. As the spectators and TV watchers all over the world expected to see the Penalty Goals, the climax came when Fabbegas (法比加斯) [10] of Spain, being substituted in at 86 minutes, passed the ball to Iniesta (恩尼斯達) [6] who stood at a very good position to strike. With his right leg, Iniesta struck the ball to the far corner of the goal. There he scored the goal for the team. The match was soon over and Spain won the Championship of this year’s World Cup Final. Those 120 minutes of watch in front of television was worthy to me and to millions of people all over the World.

Please Double-click the photo to see bigger pictures.