趣緻的大紅花

趣緻的大紅花,
這朶嬌小的大紅花,
有鮮艷,柔軟紅色的花瓣,
細得像大頭針的黃色花粉嚢,
狀似金菇的紅色雌蕊球,
天然剪裁的花瓣邊,
獨自在晒太陽.

A Big map at Sai Kung

There is a large local map showing the Volcanic Rock Region of Sai Kung near its bus terminus.

From the map, we can spot out a number of small outlying islands around Sai Kung. They are namely:

[1] Shelter Island (牛尾洲)
[2] Sharp Island (橋咀洲)
[3] Yim Tin Tsai (鹽田梓)
[4] Kau Sai Chau (滘西洲)
[5] Jin Island (吊鐘洲)
[6] Bay Islet (匙洲)
[7] Tai Tau Chau (大頭洲)
[8] Buff Island (沙塘口山)
[9] Nine Pin Group (果洲群島)
[10] Ung Kong Group (甕缸群島)
[11] Balsalt Island (火石洲)
[12] Wang Chau (橫洲)
[13] Po Pin Chau (破邊洲)

The map suggests a study of the Geological features of Volcanic rocks around Sai Kung, usually in hexagonal prisms (六角柱體), by boats hired at Sai Kung Pier. The winter route is in orange and that of summer is red.

Paper Boat (紙船)

It was yesterday, April 27 that I found these paper boats on a pool of water near the bus terminus at Sai Kung. A wooden walkway let visitors walk out to the centre of the pool. Three bronze ducks were ready to dive into the water at the edges of the walkway.

To me, the paper boats seemed to be folded from big newspapers since the words were big and the arrangement of words and photos resembled that in ordinary newspapers. I believed the paper that made these boats should be thick, strong and waterproof so that it could last long under rain and wind. In actual practice, the boats were not floating in the water. Instead, they were uplifted a little by some supports.

The name “Paper Boat” reminds me of a poem from one of my Chinese text books. These paper boats can bring me back some memories in my school old days.

Breakwaters at High Island Reservoir

At Sai Kung, Hong Kong, the big breakwaters at High Island Reservoir (萬宜水庫) at the East (Main) Dam (東壩) near Po Pin Chau (破邊洲) are big and interesting. They are man-made. They looked like the Chinese letter, “工”, but one end is made perpendicular to the other. They are piled up and rest on the south-east shore to protect the inner main dam a certain distance away.

Some breakwaters are placed orderly further inland before the main dam for display to the public or they are reserved there for further use.

Let us study the work of these breakwaters from the information from Wikipedia:

Offshore breakwaters, also called bulkheads, reduce the intensity of wave action in inshore waters and thereby reduce coastal erosion. They are constructed some distance away from the coast or built with one end linked to the coast. The breakwaters may be small structures, placed one to three hundred feet offshore in relatively shallow water, designed to protect a gently sloping beach. Breakwaters may be either fixed or floating: the choice depends on normal water depth and tidal range. Breakwater construction is usually parallel or perpendicular to the coast to maintain tranquility condition in the port. Most of Breakwater construction depends upon wave approach and considering some other environmental parameters.

When oncoming waves hit these breakwaters, their erosive power is concentrated on these structures some distance away from the coast. In this way, there is an area of slack water behind the breakwaters. Deposition occurring in these waters and beaches can be built up or extended in these waters. However, nearby unprotected sections of the beaches do not receive fresh supplies of sediments and may gradually shrink due to erosion, namely longshore drift.

Breakwaters are subject to damage, and overtopping by big storms can lead to problems of drainage of water that gets behind them. The wall also serves to encourage erosion of beach deposits from the foot of the wall and can increase longshore sediment transport.

Rubble mound breakwaters use the voids in the structure to dissipate the wave energy. Rock or concrete armour units on the outside of the structure absorb most of the energy, while gravels or sands are used to prevent the wave energy continuing through the breakwater core. The slopes of the revetment are typically between 1:1 and 1:2, depending upon the materials used. In shallow water revetment breakwaters are usually relatively cheap, but as water depth increases, the material requirements, and hence costs, increase significantly.

The breakwaters were modelled, as it happens in the full size construction or in physical laboratory test, by overlapping three-dimensional elements and the numerical grid was thickened in such a way to have some computational nodes along the flow paths among the breakwater’s blocks.

In the last photo, the far side is the Main Dam (the brown wall) and the near side is a smaller dam with breakwaters lining outside to protect the Main Dam.

The beautiful Turkish girl

The beautiful little girl I have shown to you recently is Turkish. She went with their parents to the famous strange place called Cappadoncia (卡帕多奇亞) in Turkey.

Cappadocia was once a tableland first built by volcanic eruptions. With the erosion of the Kizilirmak river and wind over ten thousands of years, chimney-like rocks were left. Together they form a wonder of nature.

Cappadocia was one of the most important pla ces in the spreading periods of the Christian religion. The first christians trying to escape from the Roman soldiers who wanted to avoid the spreading of the Christian religion have settled in the region of Cappadocia. The land features were suitable for hiding and so they were able to continue the spreading of their religion.

Nowadays, Cappadocia is one of the most important site for tourism in Turkey. Every year hundred thousands of tourists visit it from different parts of the world.

Rolls, Rolls, Rolls

Spring rolls, egg rolls and cake rolls are my favourites.

Spring rolls are crispy, but oily. The vegetables and meat inside the rolls are delicious.

Egg rolls are less oily. They are sweet and sandy if there are sugar particles inside. Sometimes if peanuts are added, the rolls will become crunchy.

Cake rolls are interesting to eat and see. As you can see here in the photo, the cake rolls are cut transversely so the cross-sections can be seen. The cream, fruit and cake together form simple and lovely pictures.

Other than rolls, Napoleon (in French, it is called mille-feuille, meaning "thousand leaf") is a kind of cream cake that I love too. It is composed of creamy and crispy layers. I usually find some walnuts in between. This kind of cakes is all-in-one, being chewy, creamy and sandwich-like.

Freshly-found Hibiscuses

I heard and learned about Hibiscus (大紅花) from my Biology teacher at school. According to my knowledge at that time, the flowers appeared to be red.

From the roadside flowers posted here, I suspect them to be hibiscuses in pink and yellow.




From the Internet, I learn that there are “pink” and “yellow” hibiscuses and many many others in different colours or even in multi-colours.

I came across the pink one, red at the base of the petals on March 4 and the yellow one, white at the base of the petals on April 12. I wonder if I have made a mistake in identification. Perhaps someone helps me identify them.

A Beautiful kid in Europe

What you can see here is a beautiful girl standing beside her mother in a European country. This little girl wears beautifully. The attractive red and white colours on her overcoat are exactly those of the national flag of her country.

Which country does this girl belong to?
Please Guess.

The options are:
[A] Austria (奧地利)
[B] Monaco (摩納哥)
[C] Poland (波蘭)
[D] Tunisia (突尼斯)
[E] Turkey (土耳其)

Please note that the national flags of the above five countries only bear two colours, red and white.

Crawling Elly

Elly began to extend her territory by crawling herself in the living room. The movement is slow at the moment, but she can do so. The motivation of her moves may come from a computer monitor or a key-board or a toy-phone or something new and interesting to her.

The joy of seeing Elly smile, chuckle, improve in her motor skills, her love of eating food (especially fruit) is really immense to everybody.

Abby loves Elly too. She usually places her face close to Elly and says, “Elly and I are good friends”. Such loving scenes of two sisters cheer us through Skype.

We hope that Elly can stand and walk soon. By that time, her parents will watch closely at her every minute and be her body-guards.

Recycled Clothing

Plastics bottles, those which hold soft drinks or drinking water, can be recycled and turned into synthetic fibres which are then woven into yarns and later after cutting and sewing, they are turned into clothes.


















the processes are briefly as:
[1] The plastics bottles are crushed into pieces.
[2] The paper and colours of the bottles are removed.
[3] The white particles are refined and turned into softer strips and broken up into something like wool.
[4] The material is transferred to another factory to be woven into yarns.
[5] Machines knit the materials into cloths[6] The cloths are cut by scissors and later sewed into clothes.
I can never imagine that some of our clothes are made from recycled plastic bottles. Ha, ha!

Pamukkale (棉花堡)

Pamukkale, Cotton Castle of Turkey, is considered by the Turkish people as the 8th World Wonder. It is a natural site in south-western Turkey in the Province of Denizli which attracts many tourists to come each year. My brother and sister-in-law visited this place in the year of 2005.

The television programme I watched today reminds me of the photos I got from my sister-in-law. They show the wide white patch of white land which is composed of calcium carbonate (碳酸鈣), i.e. 石灰.

Below is a full description of this piece of land from PamukkaleTurkey.com:

Pamukkale is located in Turkey's Inner Aegean region, in the River Menderes valley, which enjoys a temperate climate over the greater part of the year. The summers are hot and dry, and winters warm and rainy. Tourists travel from the coast of Antalya and the Aegean Sea to Pamukkale.

The water (35 degrees Celsius) which is flowing down the cliff of Pamukkale has turned the area into as white as cotton color, and carved this fantastic formation of stalactites and basins. Pamukkale is a very popular destination for a short visit, the stunning white calcium pools, which cling to the side of a ridge, have been long one of the most famous picture postal card views of Turkey. It is the largest and finest example of elaborate calcium formation in the world, which dominates the landscape miles around. Pamukkale was formed when a spring with a high content of dissolved calcium bicarbonate cascaded over the edge of the cliff, which cooled and hardened leaving calcium deposits. This formed into great natural pools, shelves and ridges, which tourists could plunge and splash in the hot water. According to ancient tradition, the waters within the pools are said to be advantageous in treating maladies and attracting people from all over the world. The calceous waters rise from the ground at a temperature of 35 degrees Celsius. In this white wonderland is an abundance of hot warm springs which are recommended for the treatment of high blood pressure, heart diseases, rheumatism, circulatory problems, nervous disorders, digestive maladies, nervous and physical exhaustion, eye & skin diseases and nutritional disorders.

Hotels were springing up from the 1970s to cater for the large influx of tourists, and shortly afterwards UNESCO declared it a World Heritage Site. But by the 1990s, this took its toll on the state of the calcium pools and restrictions were placed on these travertine terraces. Many hotels were knocked down, visitors are only allowed on major paths around the sites, and must remove footwear to stand on the calcium deposits. This seems to have been a successful move, as the water supply is now used for preservation and some of the damaged calcium deposits have been strengthened.

As you approach the site of Pamukkale / Hierapolis from Denizli, a long white smudge along the hills to the north suggests a landslide or open cast mine. Getting closer, this resolves into the edge of a plateau, more than 100m higher than the level of the river valley and absolutely smothered in white travertine terraces. Some are shaped like water lilies, other like shell - bathtubs with stalagmite feet, with simplest ones resembling bleached rice terraces out of an oriental engraving.

In and Out

Felix Ching, my old colleague, and his wife, Audrey, accompanied us to Fisherman’s wharf, San Francisco on April 22nd, 2006.

To me, “In and Out” was an interesting name given to a fast-food shop when my wife and I went into it with Felix and Audrey.

This time, Audrey was the boss. She would decide for us what food to eat. I was particularly pleased to taste burgers other than Mc Donald’s in the States.

The burgers came fresh with tomatoes, lettuce and onion in the American way. The meat in between was nice to eat. Another big piece of news came to me. I could refill my cup of coke for free.

We sat at the seats close to the down-to-floor glass window near the pavement.










Attraction came from outside because an old magician was playing his tricks right before us. This moustached gentleman was dressed in his old “50’s” costume. He called himself “Mr. Magic”. Beside him were placed boxes of different sizes which I believed he would store his magic aids. I never stopped looking at him because I wondered what magic he would play. The truth was that he played with rings, the old fashioned trick we saw many years ago. He had a small table with him. Most probably he would play tricks with cards using it. This old gentleman could have brought old memories to the elderly passing by.

It was really “double delight”. While I was gobbling at my American burger, Mr. Magic was performing “in and out” rings of the “50s”.

荃灣川龍點心

在三月五日當天那一輯So Good裏面，蘇絲黃帶大家去荃灣川龍(村)吃中式點心。去川龍要走一小段荃錦公路(荃灣段)右轉直上斜路便到。這裡吃的是自助點心，但並不是任食那一種。

當天阿蘇吃的點心，其中有幾款在現今普通酒樓是吃不到的：
[1]雞球大包─以前佔去整個蒸籠的龐然大包，吃一個已經飽了一半。
[2]鵪鶉蛋燒賣─很久以前是茶樓常見到的點心之一。








[3]臘腸卷─是以前很滋味的點心。
[4]芝麻卷─用黑芝麻生磨成槳所做成的卷，顏色與形狀像快要失傳照相用的塑膠菲林卷。
其實，我兒時見過吃過的有黑色芝麻腸粉，也有黃糖做的啡黃色腸粉。









[5]魚茸豆腐─近年少見。
[6]咖喱魷魚─在街邊小食檔可見，但在茶樓，已經很少見了。








[7]鹹肉粽和鹼水粽─除非在端午節附近，否則酒樓是少提供的。

Everywhere are Maple leaves

In Canada, red Maple leaves can be found everywhere, on trees, on the ground when they fall and in gardens, on flags, ships, planes, souvenirs and stamps.

The above left photo shows the leaf that I picked up from the ground. The colour of this leaf is beautiful. The veins are in lighter orange and the red colour varies towards the tips.










The rest of the Maples leaves are from a Skyride Cable car, a roadside garden, on silvery coins, a flag and Air Canada planes.