China - spontaneous association after 20 months

* drying laundry everywhere * loud chatter * mobile phones * bamboo scaffolding * people walking criss cross, bumping into each other * street hawkers * tiny temples/shrines on almost every street corner * sleeping people in all possible positions * water & air pollution * tropical rain storms * mahjongg * name cards * counterfeits * shopping lanes * latest electronic gadets * face business * lai see (red money packet for chinese NY) * hikers with umbrellas wrapped in multilayer clothing in 34 degrees * junks * gambling * fortune tellers * fung shui * panda bears * domestic helpers * modernization * materialism * congee (soup) * karaoke * squatting * spitting * Tai Chi * Calligraphy * Dim Sum * bribes & corruption * chopsticks * skyscrapers * demonstrations * tea * naked bellies since the shirts are rolled up to their armpits when it's hot

That about sums it up for me right now after 10 minutes of quick brainstorming - just wanted to write it down to not forget it....as you can tell, it must be raining cats & dogs outside and I am unable to leave the appartment and too lazy to read ;-)

In the latest issue of HK Magazine some famous people were asked what they love about HK - one particular answer expressed exactly how I am feeling too:

"Most Cities alienate, Hong Kong has a great sense of belonging"

Pink Dolphins in Hong Kong

This week I finally booked a tour to take a look at the famous pink dolphins of HK and I must tell you - it was well worth it. We boarded a junk from the Hong Kong Dolphinwatch Company in Tung Chung/Lantau Island and cruised the waters for about 45 minutes. Mostly these dolphins are seen north of Lantau and had been unknown to the world until the early 90s when they started building the new airport at Chek Lap Kok which put them into the spotlight. We were told that they are born dark grey, fade into a lighter shade of grey when they're about 8 months old and keep on changing their colour over the next couple of years, sometimes grey spots remain. The fellow below reminds me of my times as a competition swimmer when I used to swim backstroke.

Their average life span is about 40 years but the dolphins in HK won't survive much more than 20 years due to the deterioration of the environment, meaning
* a damaged ecosystem and seabed due to reclaiming many coastal areas for building new airports, shipping terminals, roads, etc.

* being caught in fishing nets and drowning

* having an ever shrinking home due to heavy sea traffic - large amounts of passenger and freight ships are crossing through that area which raises the danger of the dolphins getting hit and it also puts a lot of stress on them (loud noises from boat engines) which results in a weakend immune system followed by sickness such as ulcers or pneumonia

*polluted waters - HK flushes about 2 million tonnes of sewage into the sea daily from which approx. 400 million litres go directly into north Lantau where the dolphins are living. Much more sewage is coming down from the Pearl River, which drains 1/8 of China's population. This means even if sewage treatment will step up in HK, if it's not matched in the Mainland, the HK dolphins still face serious risks.

We were also told that about half of the dead dolphins each year are newborns. A first-born baby for example receives a decade of accumulated toxins from its mother via the milk and therfore becomes an easy victim of pollution. A dead dolphin in HK is declared "being toxic waste" - isn't this just plain awful? Just picture them nibbling on a plastic bag because they think it's a jelly fish....below I'll attach the picture of a completely dirty beach we came across while hiking on Cheung Chau, most of the waste being washed ashore from people throwing it overboard from their ships, arrrrrgggggggggghhhhhhh :-(





Despite these depressing facts we were very excited spotting them which is not an easy task since they don't tend to appear in packs. You really have to keep your eyes focussed on the water surface to not miss the second they'll stick their heads out. We were fortunate to even see a mother/baby duo which was super cute. I have to say that they were also much pinker than I expected them to be. Of course I can't take credit for having taken these pictures - no way I could have done this with my small camera. The photographer responsible for them accompanies the tours 3 times a week since years and sometimes gets lucky to catch the perfect shot - a lot of patience is needed though.....HEY, are you still with me or did you fall asleep trying to read through all that "stuff", I know from experience that the attention spans are low these days :-) Take care and I hope you'll recover!

Handover Festivities

...looks like we're having a busy weekend ahead of us - july 1st is the 10th anniversary of the handover of Hong Kong. There will be parades, parties and various events throughout the City. We're especially looking forward to the extended lightshow (=Symphony of Lights) on sunday where a total of 43 buildings will be featured with 23 on Hong Kong Island and 20 on Kowloon side. The show will be launched with rooftop pyrotechnic displays on both sides and followed by huge fireworks - keep your fingers crossed that we'll be out of the clouds by then! On sunday afternoon we'll be probabely having a field day with the soccer teams of 1.FC Bayern : Sao Paulo Football Club playing a match in Hong Kong Stadium - as you can see, Munich is just around the corner and I think I have to keep Michael from his usual brasilian chants during the match ;-)

Dragonboat Raceday Pictures

uff....finally - there are about a gazillion pictures to comb through and here are the funniest ones and of course, some of our team. Most pics are from the official website or from friends since I had no time to take care of it. Have fun......

PS.:

Hey there, I completely forgot to report, that Michael won one of the latest Nokia cell phones in stylish red (N 5700 XpressMusic) during a Raffle on raceday and guess who'll proudly carry it around :-) Who needs a boring cup these days anyway....?
...and another funny thing happened - our team was interviewed by a chinese journalist during practise a couple of weeks ago - today I finally hunted down a copy of it and there we were - in the midst of all chinese letter rows, not the slightest clue what they were writing about us - isn't this hysterical? Over 'n out.

Pirates of the South China Sea

High Noon under the mercyless blistering sun - boy did we have a HOT raceday. Blue skies, 34 degrees and even low humidity, we were really lucky. 208 teams and 4.000 paddlers were competing and a couple of thousand spectators were watching which was the hugest turnout in Stanley ever. The news reported that the International Stanley Dragonboat Race is the biggest one day dragonboat event worldwide which is quite impressive.

You can't even begin to imagine the noise level and the crowds, you simply will have to come here and and see for yourself. Each race consists of 9/10 boats and while one race begins the next paddlers are already sent on their way to row to their starting lane. The race course is surrounded by at least 100 junks with partying teams or spectators and from every junk you were bombarded with the hottest but deafening pop & rock tunes while you had to be focussing on the starting signal - difficult task - specially if you rather feel like singing than rowing ;-) I have to admit, I envied the people on the junks, they were really having a blast and that's hopefully where I will be next year, tell me where the party is, I ll be running....

18 Ladies teams were competing. We had to absolve 2 races which turned out to be pretty tough since our 1st race was at 10:30 in the morning and the 2nd one at 4:30 in the afternoon (same waiting periods for our competitors of course) - it's hard to stay motivated and pumped up when you have to wait it out for 6 hours sitting around in the heat and nowhere to go. The 1st heat was satisfying over all, the boat was moving effortless and we managed a place in the midfield. The 2nd one was already ill-fated right from the start since the race was interrupted for 25 minutes while we had to hold out at our starting position - by the time the announcer said "Ready" we were anything but - we were already dripping from sweat, some not focussed anymore and therefore we totally tanked it - we didn't end up last but anyone who is interested in the result of the Desperate Housewives will have to look it up at:

www.dragonboat.org.hk

This is also the Link for the official reports and event photos - everyone who is interested in further details can check it out, the race updates should be in the website by this weekend...my pics should be ready by then too.

Anyway, it was a great experience and although I failed to build up expected muscles like "The Hulk" I loved the physical exercise and can't wait to continue next year. The race will be on june 8th and this time I will captain the boat of the American Women's Association which didn't enter the competition for the last 2 years in lack of a coach. It'll be a huge time commitment (visitors be prepared, I won't have much time starting march 2008) but besides the organisation challenge I also will be having tons of fun.

Following, once again the official Event History:

AIA Stanley International Dragon Boat Championships
Stanley itself had long been an important settlement for fisher folk and dragon boat racing has always been a very popular way to celebrate the annual Tuen Ng Festival. As far back as the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) East and West seemed to mix well here.

In the late ‘60s the local races started to attract the interest of several expats living in the Stanley area and by the early ‘70s the expats were racing against the local Chinese. The Chinese teams always dominated the races so to make the races fairer for all in 1975 the organizers divided the races to allow the expats to compete in a category of their own. This was followed shortly after by the introduction of a Ladies' Competition.

The early races were originally held at Stanley Bay facing Tin Hau Temple and Murray House creating a strong community festival atmosphere. However, to accommodate the ever-increasing scale of the event, the Championships are now run from Stanley Main Beach.

The diverse nationalities of Expatriate Men's Teams remain a feature of the Stanley International Dragon Boat Championships. The event also holds the record for always having the highest competitor turnout as well as the highest company team turnout. Over its 40 year history Race Day has evolved into an amazing festival with competitors and spectators enjoying themselves in a wonderful party atmosphere.

Mr Wang, Mrs Li and Miss Zhang.....

...these are the surnames shared by about 85% of the chinese population, meaning about 291 million, I recently read in a newspaper article. If you happen to know the 100 most popular names in China you can already greet around 1.1 billion Chinese correctly - WOW, that's hard to digest - can you picture all the confusion and cases of mistaken identities?
You gain the impression that I am a bit bored for posting such highly important messages - well, you might be right. I am battling a nasty cold and try to do everything to get back on track until tuesday which is dragonboat raceday. The weather forecast announced 28-33 degrees with sunny skies and if I don't manage to get fit by then I can't row :-( Keep your fingers crossed...over n out

long time no hear

because there's not much worth reporting going on right now...dragonboat exercise, junking, salsacise, gatherings with friends and enjoying the sun doesn't make the computer my first priority these days. The highlight of this week was an AWA (American Women's Association) afternoon tea in honour of their volunteers which took place in the splendid mansion of the most influential indian family in HK. The Harilela family (6 brothers & 1 sister) first came to China in 1922 settling down in Canton before moving to Hong Kong. They mastered the development from hawkers to owning a global billion-dollar empire (hotels, real estate, banks) which is still a family run business. To this day around 70 family members spanning 4 generations plus 40 servants are sharing a 100.000 sq ft compound which consists of the main residence (6 apartments with 40 bedrooms) and an annex with further 30 bedrooms for other relatives - very impressive! As the oldest brother states: "As we were together in poverty we should not seperate in wealth" - maybe we all should take this into consideration for our own families....or maybe better not ;-) Anyway we had a very nice afternoon and it was truly a great experience. By the way AWA had the privilege of this invitation because many of the Harilela's are lifelong members of their organisation. I also heard that 20 AWA members have the chance to get a tour through the house once a year - guess who will be eager to sign up?!