What Coins areThe Worth These Days

A silver coin from the Republic of China era 

My paternal grandmother gave a bunch of old coins dating back to the Qing dynasty and Republic of China to my dad a long time ago. There was one silver coin from the Republican era, and several bunches of copper coins wrapped in light beige paper, denoting their circulation during different Qing emperors.

Now that my dad is getting on, he has been downsizing a bit, and wondered if those coins were worth anything. We took pictures of them and sent them to relatives in Hong Kong to show a coin buyer to see what they thought.

The other side of the silver coin

The verdict? Can't really tell from the photos so bring them here so we can see them in person.

So I packed them in my suitcase and after we arrived in Hong Kong, I met up with my relatives at Century Plaza, a small shopping mall in Mong Kok, Kowloon.

But we weren't going in there -- they led us to an old multi-storey building behind the mall, but we could quickly see on the ground floor that there were small stalls filled with coins and bank notes from various countries.

My relatives didn't know a particular seller, but since there were three floors, we thought we'd work our way down from the top.

As soon as the elevator doors opened on the third floor we went to a stall that was open in front of us. The seller, a guy in his late 40s, early 50s seemed decent enough. 

Once I revealed the silver coin, I could see his interest right away. The coin was secured in between two pieces of cardboard with circles in the middle covered with cellophane and stapled together.

The seller carefully took the coin out and pronounced it legit and would give us HK$700 for it. 

As for the copper coins, he wasn't interested.

"You can give these to your friends if you want," he said.

But when I explained I'd rather just get rid of them, he said he'd give me HK$50 for the lot.

He opened the paper-wrapped coins and saw some were dark-coloured, while others looked shiny.

"Never ever try to clean the coins because they will immediately lost at least half their value," he warned. 

We didn't know what happened to these copper coins, as they were pretty much untouched for decades.

When we asked about bank notes people collected over the years, he said they weren't worth much unless the serial numbers were good ones, or in a sequence. The other problem is keeping them relatively pristine in Hong Kong's humid climate.

As for stamps, they are hardly worth anything at all, again for the same reasons.

However, if you have something like share certificates in excellent condition, like this one from The Kwongtung Tramway Co, Limited, then you could hit the jackpot.

In any case, seems like coins are the best bet. "If you have anymore of these silver coins, bring them back," the seller said.

Picture of the Day: Hong Kong Street Art

A nice surprise to see this piece of street art!

When I was walking around in Hong Kong, I was surprised to come across one or two beautiful manhole covers like this one!

Turns out the Drainage Services Department held a design contest in 2019 and did it again last year to celebrate its 35th anniversary. The entries were shortlisted by a panel of judges before the public could vote on the ones they liked best.

There are some 200 decorated manhole covers across the city with different ones reflecting the places they are in. For example, the one in Tai Wai features an egret, and the one in Tsuen Wan has the design of a bird called the red-whiskered bulbul and a squirrel.

At the Central Ferry Pier, the manhole cover has the Star Ferry, Victoria Harbour and Victoria Peak. 

This one I stumbled upon in Central turns out to be the runner-up winner in 2024 and it encapsulates the energy and vibrancy of the city. 

Shenzhen: Hanging Out in the Mall

MixC is a massive retail development in Shenzhen Bay

During our stay in Hong Kong, we also did a day trip to Shenzhen. We had heard a lot about how the city had changed in the last few years, how people and families go there on the weekends to shop, eat, and have massages with really good ambience and service at a fraction of the cost in Hong Kong.

And it's easy to see why seniors love going across the border, because with a JoyYou card, they can travel to the border for just HK$2. That's even cheaper than regular fare going one stop on the MTR line.

The mall looks sleek, but hardly any shoppers

We took the longer route of taking the MTR from Admiralty to LoWu, and the border control on the Hong Kong side hasn't changed much.

Then we crossed the bridge to the Chinese side where at first foreign passport holders were expected to fill out an arrival card online. There were technical difficulties and the officers gave up and handed out paper forms instead.

I downloaded the app Didi ahead of time and ordered a car -- but as we didn't know the Shenzhen train station well we got lost trying to find the meeting spot! The driver called us and we saw the Shangri-La Shenzhen ahead of us and rushed over there to meet him. Thankfully he was very patient despite only making 36 kuai from us!

He drove us about 30 minutes to a new shopping mall that friends had recommended we check out. It's called MixC and it's been around since 2017, but we went to a new location near Shenzhen Bay, which opened in October, which might explain why it was pretty empty? Or is it a sign of China's slow economy? 

Vietnamese lunch of vermicelli with pork

The mall is sleek and modern-looking, filled with luxury brands from Louis Vuitton to Christian Dior, Gucci Kids (I couldn't even afford a child's handbag), an upscale supermarket called Ole, and a movie theatre.

In the supermarket one could buy a giant king crab, or palm-sized hairy crab, blueberries the size of 5-cent coins, and even Nicholas Tse "low-temperature processed black pork luncheon meat".

For lunch we ate at a Vietnamese restaurant in a kind of food court in the basement, which was busy. We ate pho with beef and sausage, and warm vermicelli with spring roll and pork slices, and a plate of young water spinach that was delicious. We went to another kiosk for gelato that other people were lining up for.

We walked off the calories by wandering the mall. Seeing there was a roof garden, we checked it out and were impressed by the design of the space -- global firm CallisonRTKL, which my architect cousin says is only interested in massive projects like these, with lots of space to design.

The mall is spread over several city blocks

The concept is "city crossing", where we would wander through one part of the mall, emerge outside and see a bridge to the other side, cross it, and enter another part of the mall, and it would continue like this for several city blocks. 

The stores were pretty much empty except for the staff inside them, and the restaurant calibre looked impressive. There was DaDong Roast Duck from Beijing, a Shanghainese restaurant that had a nice decor and menus that were large books filled with big pictures. 

MixC is next to a bullet-shaped tower that had no obvious signage, but it is a China Resources building, as the entire development is owned by the state-owned enterprise. And next to this futuristic building is a nice open space, with water features, and a Monet-like sculpture with figures dancing in a circle.

We ended up having dinner in a vegetarian chain restaurant called Qing Chun Perma, which gives of a zen-like vibe with its minimalist decor. Diners walk into the open kitchen, seeing staff preparing dumplings, stir-frying or making desserts wearing white chef jackets and gray fedora hats.

Mushroom xiaolongbao at Qing Chun Perma

Each table is set in a booth-like atmosphere and shielded with bamboo screens so that you can't see the people sitting at the next table, but you can hear them.

The menu has a mix of Chinese and Western dishes: The mushroom xiaolongbao were big, generous dumplings with thin wrappers, and lots of flavour in the fillings. We also had an asparagus and morel mushroom warm salad, a pumpkin soup with coconut milk, braised tofu with morels, and stir-fried pea shoots.

For dessert, a bowl of glutinous rice dumplings in sweet rice wine, and mango sago cream with pomelo.

At times it was hard to flag down the servers -- all women -- but they were friendly and helpful. When we finally got a hold of someone asking for the bill, she told us to scan the QR code at our table and pay that way. No need to tip. Just pay electronically and then you can leave.

Then we made our way back to Hong Kong, getting a car to drive us back to LoWu, and then after going through Chinese immigration, we took the train back, very tired!

Review: Fantasia

The Sorcerer's Apprentice is just one of eight segments

Each month VIFF in Vancouver has its Pantheon series, featuring what they think are the greatest movies of all time. In addition to the showing is a film expert who gives some comments beforehand and there's some feedback afterwards from the audience.

Yesterday was the showing of Walt Disney's Fantasia. I watched it so long ago that I can't remember when, and thought it would be neat to watch it on the big screen. So did over 150 other people! The show was practically sold out on a rainy Sunday late morning.

Before the screening, Alla Gadassic, associate professor in Media History and Theory at Emily Carr gave a talk on the history of Fantasia, and explained how Disney poured a lot of money into the film and how it was such a risk for the studio, which lost money when it was first released in 1940.

The dancing Chinese mushrooms

She said nowadays we live in a very visual world, more than other senses, like sound. But in the 1910s and 20s people were thinking about how to represent sound visually. Gadassic showed a painting by the abstract Russian painter Wassily Kandinsky, who is believed to have synesthesia, where people associate music with colours, or certain letters or numbers with colours. 

Around this time film was believed to be a way to represent sound visually and there were many experimental films at this time, showing sound waves, or shapes representing sounds. People like animator Oskar Fishinger believed that since music or sound didn't have historical or cultural context, neither should the visual representation of it, which is why simple shapes were believed to be a good way of doing this.

Disney probably saw Fishinger's work, and recruited him to work on Fantasia. However, they later had a falling out, as Fishinger felt his work was possibly too abstract for mass audiences and left the studio; he was never credited for his work on the first of eight segments of Fantasia, Toccata and Fugue in D Minor.

There are eight in total, each different from the others, which is why Gadassic suggests looking at Fantasia as an anthology. Disney himself chose the music, while different teams of animators worked on the segments and Gadassic says it was a group effort, where everyone collaborated. One theory is that Mickey Mouse was included because his popularity was flagging.

When a hippo and an alligator dance together

The eight segments are:

Toccata and Fugue in D Minor: Live action of the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Leopold Stokowski gradually fades into abstract patterns determined by the music.

The Nutcracker Suite: Various pieces were chosen, such as the Asian-looking mushrooms dancing in "Chinese Dance", beautiful fish frolicking in the sea in "Arabian Dance", and flowers and leaves blown by the wind in "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies".

The Sorcerer's Apprentice: Mickey Mouse is is an apprentice told by the sorcerer to gather water to put in the cauldron, and tries to use magic to make his life easier...

The Rite of Spring: How life began on earth from protozoa to eventually dinosaurs and how they became extinct.

Intermission/Meet the Soundtrack: The master of ceremonies announces there's a 15-minute intermission to which we snicker. The film cuts back to the orchestra members returning to their seats and have an impromptu jazz jam session.

A giant devil in Night on Bald Mountain

The Pastoral Symphony: A romantic scene of centaurs and "centaurettes" complete with cupids and fauns. Interestingly the female centaurs don't have their breasts defined which somehow escaped the censors, though they do wear revealing organic tops, covering their chests with leaves and flowers. Bacchus is super drunk, and they are all caught in a big thunderstorm created by Zeus above.

Dance of the Hours: A strange scenario of dancing ostriches, hippos and alligators.

Night on Bald Mountain/Ave Maria: A giant devil summons spirits and ghosts to dance for him (and there are brief shots of bared breasts) until dawn breaks and robed monks are carrying lights through the forest as Ave Maria is sung.

Gassadic also explained that a large number of women worked on Fantasia. They not only painted all the cells by hand, but a handful of them were the lead designers of some of the segments. She said Disney was a good manager, they didn't just work on Fantasia, but also Dumbo and Pinocchio, hence the dancing elephants and pastoral scenes, having already experimented with drawing and painting them in Fantasia.

Fascinating to get the context of the film before watching it to have a greater appreciation and understanding of the anthology. No wonder it felt so disparate before!

We Didn't Jump on the Tai Bo Cafe Bandwagon

Steamed pork patty at Sang Kee in Wan Chai

After I came back from Hong Kong, a Vancouver friend told me about Tai Bo Cafe in Yuen Long, which has become a viral hit. Someone on social media raved about the cafe's pork patty rice, and now there are 2-hour queues for it.

Seriously? 

Legit prawn toasts covered in sesame seeds

Apparently it started back in March when someone asked for a restaurant recommendation and one of the comments replied, Tai Bo Bing Sutt.

Then a few months later, that same commenter would mention the cafe when others posted about things not even related to food, from complaining about academic stress, asking for job vacancies, or raving about their favourite music artist.

People saw Tai Bo Bing Sutt mentioned so many times that they had to check it out themselves, hence the super long queues.

Apparently the person suggesting the bing sutt is a friend of the owner's daughter.

True or not, it has helped this eatery become super popular with the term "tastebud nuke", where the flavour of the patties explode in your mouth, overwhelming your oral senses.

Lovely steamed threadfin fish with chicken oil

I obviously didn't go to this place as I hadn't heard of it until I returned home.

But I did have a pretty good steamed pork patty at Sang Kee, a restaurant known for Hong Kong specialties. Opened in 1976, the place is now located in a non-descript office building on Lockhart Road in Wan Chai.

On the third floor you can hear the hustle and bustle of the place, the small dining room packed with mostly large tables. The one next to us was celebrating a birthday, and there was even a table filled with Europeans enjoying the food with red wine.

Not long after we ordered the food arrived fast and furious. We started with braised duck tongues, nicely balanced, not too salty, and we munched on those until our plate of prawn toasts came. 

Cold starter of braised duck tongues

These beauties were perfectly deep-fried and generously covered in sesame seeds. Another dish was a half portion of a roast piglet, the skin was very crispy, and a thin layer of tender meat underneath. 

Then came our steamed pork meat patty. It was a large portion for the five of us, drizzled with diluted soy sauce and spring onions. You could easily tell it had been hand chopped from the mouthfeel having a bit of a bite to it. 

Another outstanding dish was the steamed threadfin seasoned with chicken oil and Chinese ham. The fish looked so plain, but its taste was so flavourful -- we couldn't stop eating the tender delicate white meat that was perfectly seasoned until we were left with a plate of bones.

The pork patty would have been good with white rice, but we had ordered congee with meatballs and a fish called mottled spinefoot. The congee had been simmering for hours, the grains totally broken down and had chunks of the fish and meatballs.

Simple steamed rice cakes for dessert

Finally for dessert, steamed rice cakes that weren't too sweet, and had a honeycomb-like texture.

The dining experience was not "tastebud nuke", but definitely memorable! 

Sang Kee

3/F, Sunshine Plaza

353 Lockhart Road

Wan Chai

+852 2575 2239

Delightful Dance Twist on a Christmas Classic

Students put on a fun, re-imagined Nutcracker show

This evening we went to see "Mixed Nuts", a performance put on by the dance students at Arts Umbrella at the Vancouver Playhouse. Instead of the traditional take on the Christmas classic The Nutcracker, this one is reimagined and features not only ballet, but also modern dance and some contemporary elements like hockey and snowboarding!

The students range in age from teens to early 20s, with the latter taking on most of the dances, mostly ballet in the second half. The story has Clara and a "godfather" Drosselmeyer character, but it's actually a cross-dressing male dancer, dressed in a frilly blouse and black coat and strutting in high heels. After the intermission he becomes like a fairy godmother in a white dress, again in those white heels.

Male and female parts are danced by both the young men and women in the corps -- the girls have their hair pinned up and wear trousers and shirts, or in some parts the boys don a skirt with leggings underneath. There's even a sugar plum fairy dance -- and there's a male fairy complete with wings and a tiara like the others.

This dance was inspired by peppermint swirls

The theme is candy, so dances are inspired by peppermint swirls, Hershey's Kisses, cupcakes, gingerbread men and black licorice.

The gender-bending playful show is fantastic, normalising the opportunity for young men and women to dance each others' roles. That said, the line stops at the classical ballet dances, where they dance their traditional parts.

One dance featured the can-can, and the audience couldn't help but clap along, while they laughed as two (female) dancers pretended to be hockey players comically fighting each other. 

We sat at the third last row (the row behind us was empty, and the last row were the instructors and a video and cameraman). As the show progressed, the teachers were unabashed in praising their students out loud, while the audience, mostly made of parents and relatives of the performers clapped or hollered.

Most of the dancers looked like they enjoyed themselves on stage. One pas de deux featuring an Asian girl was fantastic and she smiled as she nailed all her moves. That dance reminded me of what made me love about ballet when I was a child, but also all the hard work that goes into being able to dance like that!

Partway through the show, I couldn't help thinking, these kids are going to be alright. They demonstrated how hard they had worked on the show; they apparently know all the parts and are assigned which ones they will dance just before the performance starts. 

Amazing.

Picture of the Day: A Big Catch

Giant eel on the pavement that tried to eat the fish (underneath)

During our trip to Hong Kong we stayed in a hotel in North Point, near the harbourfront.

We managed to get in a few walks along there, soak in some Vitamin D from the sun and burn off a few calories before lunch.

I really enjoy walking along here, as part of the path is underneath the overpass, making good use of the space while offering stunning views of Central and Kowloon. 

You can see the newest landmark, the Kai Tak Sports Park in its purple hue, and nearby the Kai Tai Cruise Terminal where there were one or two cruise ships docked there.

Along the harbourfront there are a few anglers trying their luck to catch some fish for the day. 

When I used to live in Hong Kong, most people caught tiny fish about the size of a man's hand or smaller. Probably enough food for a cat, but not a human!

But one day as we walked by on this visit, one man happened to catch a giant eel!

It was khaki green in colour with dark spots, about a metre long,  and writhed on the pavement with a hook stuck on its mouth.

Someone had a big feast that day!

A Trip Down Memory Lane with Noodles

This shop apparently has better quality noodles

My mom's formative years were spent on a farm in Kam Tin in the New Territories. She has told me many times how after school she and her siblings had to help inoculate lots of baby chicks before dinner and then do her homework.

On the weekends, a big treat was being able to go into town -- in this case Yuen Long -- and watch a movie, and then have a bowl of noodles at Ho To Tai.

Plump wontons with egg noodles in soup

The noodle shop was opened in 1946, and still retains its old school look, with the menu of 16 items written outside the shop complete with a phone number with five digits! Today there are eight.

The interior still has a lot of tiles on the walls, uncomfortable tables and chairs, and glass Coke bottles for drinks. Customers can also buy boxes of dried noodles to make at home.

When we came back this time, our relatives told us the Ho To Tai business had split up between two families, one taking the Yuen Long shop, the other set up the next station over in Long Ping, and the latter's noodles were supposedly better.

So we made a pilgrimage to that place, a quiet district that didn't have a giant shiny imposing shopping mall like Yoho Mall in Yuen Long.

Less than a 10-minute walk from the station we found Ho To Tai and it wasn't busy.

Tender beef brisket with radish

The menu is pretty straight forward and the three of us, my aunt, mom and I ordered several things to share: wonton noodles, noodles with dried shrimp roe generously sprinkled on top, beef brisket with radish, a plate of vegetables, and deep-fried dace fish balls with a briny sauce.

The noodles weren't extra thin and springy like those at Mak's Noodles, but they were comforting to eat, simple and delicious. The beef brisket was very tender, and the dace fish balls were bouncy and flavourful.

It was a simple dinner, and while my aunt and mom ate, they began reminiscing about their childhoods; they are nine years apart in age, so their experiences growing up were different. But it was fun listening to them talk about commuting to school, going to the wet market to buy food for their elder brother to cook, or boarding at school with five other girls in a room.

They had much tougher childhoods than me, though they seemed to find joy in their experiences, or grateful for the discipline drilled into them, or just accepted that this was the way life was back then.

Deep-fried dace fish balls with a briny sauce

After we finished eating, we paid the bill at the cashier, where the were yellow and orangey-red boxes piled high. The yellow ones were shrimp noodles at HK$70, but the latter were more expensive at HK$98! When we asked why, the staff explained it was because they were totally covered in shrimp roe compared to the former.

We only wanted to give the best to my uncle so the HK$98 box it was!

It took us about an hour to get to Long Ping and another to get back, but it was a nostalgic trip worth spending the time.

Ho To Tai

G/F, Fook On Building

67 Yuen Long On Ning Road, Yuen Long (Long Ping MTR station)

The other noodle shop is at

G/F, 67 Fau Tsoi Street, Yuen Long (Yuen Long MTR station)

Listening to the Wickedly Funny Margaret Atwood

A lively conversation with Atwood (left) and Off on stage

This evening we had the opportunity to listen to the one and only Margaret Atwood speak at the Orpheum Theatre in Vancouver, the last event of the year as part of the Vancouver Writers Festival.

The Orpheum was almost completely full, save for a few seats here and there, and as my friend remarked, a lot of white people... 

In a way it's a bit surprising, as we all read her dystopian novel, The Handmaid's Tale in high school in the mid to late 1980s, and has since become a highly rated TV series. 

Atwood, 86, is arguably the biggest Canadian writer, with over 50 novels, graphic novels, short stories, poems, children's books, the winner of the Booker Prize twice, the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the Governor General's Award, and the Frank Kafka Award among others, and a champion of Can Lit, but also writers around the world, and co-founded PEN Canada.

Some of her books include Cat's Eye, The Edible Woman, Alias Grace, Oryx and Crake, and children's books like Princess Prunella and the Purple Peanut, Rude Ramsay and the Roaring Radishes, and Up in the Tree. 

Joining her on stage was Carol Off, the former CBC host of the current affairs radio show, As It Happens, as they talked about Atwood's latest work, Book of Lives: A Memoir of Sorts.

The pair seem to be good friends already as they shared barbs with each other. At one point Atwood talked about how she and her friend were underpaid when they did puppet shows for children's birthday parties and demonstrated with her shawl how she manipulated the fabric to make into a character.

Off put her hand under her velvet blazer and talked in character, to which Atwood quipped it looked like a "talking tit" to great hilarity in the audience.

While Off tried to get Atwood to expand more on her answers, it was obvious the author would rather people buy her big thick tome than reveal too much, from how she grew up a lot in nature as a child because her father was an entomologist studying insects, to remembering that she wore a white crochet dress with wooden buttons when she met the love of her life William Gibson, and how they lived on a farm with a peacock that was desperate to mate...

Over an hour later time was up and Atwood got a standing ovation from the audience, some of whom clutched copies of her book after the event.

Quick Day Trip to Zhongshan via Macau

At the Hengqin border inspection building looking at Zhuhai

After we finished lunch in Macau, we headed to Zhongshan via the Hengqin border check point.

Hengqin is actually an island near Macau's Taipa and Coloane districts, where many of the massive casino resorts are, such as Londoner, The Venetian, City of Dreams, Galaxy, and Studio City.

Hengqin is a special economic zone 

We passed by these expansive properties with dazzling architecture, in particular the Zaha Hadid-designed Morpheus with its exo-skeleton construction so that there are no internal pillars inside the 40-storey building.

What's interesting about Hengqin is that while it is technically Chinese land, the Macau Special Administrative Region has governance over this area, which is a special economic zone, much like what Shenzhen was over 45 years ago. 

After about a 25-minute ride we arrived at the Hengqin Border Inspection Building. Once inside we had to fill out the China arrival form and then the actual passport control process is straight forward: you step up to the first counter and it's a Macau border officer with a perspex gate. 

He had to wait because the counter right after is the China officer, who was still processing the person before us; once that person was completed, the gates opened and we were allowed to move to the China officer who took a while to process our passports.

Zhuhai has some very modern buildings

Those holding wui heung jing, or "return home permits" were very quickly processed, while others with passports take a while as they scan the passport, take pictures and scan fingerprints too. 

Once that we done we were basically in Chinese territory, specifically Zhuhai. A driver picked us up in an electric car called Aion Y Plus by GAC Aion from Guangzhou. I asked the driver about the mileage on electric cars, and he said it was around 400km on a full charge.

He explained there were many places to charge, and even after 20 minutes it's good to go for a couple of hours. While they are efficient, he said the battery will wear out after about five years, much like a smartphone battery, and by that point there is no point in replacing it -- it would be better to buy a new car.

It didn't seem very environmentally friendly... were there solutions in place for recycling and such?

The drive to Zhongshan took about 40 minutes, to a suburb area that has a gated community. 

A quiet gated community with a large garden

A lot of Hongkongers have bought property in Zhongshan for retirement, as real estate is much less expensive than Hong Kong. An unfinished flat around 1,000 sq ft costs around 2 million yuan (US$282,852), and about 60,000 yuan in renovations will make it ready for moving in. 

At one point prices for apartments doubled from speculation, but now the values have fallen back to the original prices, perhaps a reflection of the property sector in the doldrums these last few years.

The gated community we checked out is very quiet, mostly because many of the flats are not inhabited full time. There's a large beautiful garden in the middle, and has a very big swimming pool that is only open in the summer.

After a hearty dinner in a nearby restaurant, we took a car to get back via the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau bridge. The 40-minute ride took us to the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge Zhuhai Port, where we bought bus tickets and then again went through passport control to exit China.

At the Zhuhai border to catch the bus back to HK

Then we got on the next bus available which took us about 40 minutes to get to Hong Kong. We went on the bus at night so there wasn't much to see outside, or in the tunnel, which seemed to go on forever. We arrived at the Hong Kong border checkpoint, and individually passed through immigration and then waited for our bus. We were near the airport because we could see planes taking off nearby every other minute.

Of the whole trip, waiting for our bus was the longest holdup -- about 15 minutes -- before it arrived, picked us up and drove to Hong Kong Island, and then to North Point.

What an adventure -- Hong Kong-Macau-Zhuhai-Zhongshan-Zhuhai-Hong Kong in one day!

Lunch at the Macau Military Club

The dining room looks the same, with ceiling fans

We did a quick side trip to Macau with the intention of having lunch there and then hanging out, but then my uncle suggested we go to Zhongshan after.

Our lunch was booked at Clube Militar de Macau or the Macau Military Club, an old colonial building adjacent to the Grand Lisboa, a giant shiny bulbous tower with lotus petals sprouting up from it. 

The foyer looks elegant with antique furniture

In the morning we took TurboJet from Shun Tak Centre in Sheung Wan. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the aging building FINALLY got a refresh and looks so much better now.

For decades it was so tired-looking and considering so many people commute to Macau from here, one would think they would budget some money to renovating it, which they did a few years ago.

Taking the ferry during the week was not too bad, and we even caught an earlier boat and it's a good thing we did. By the way, gone are the stickers with seat numbers -- all seats are printed on separate tickets, which seems counter-intuitive in terms of using more paper...

After an hour we arrived in Macau (the old part), we swiftly went through immigration and then I thought we would go through the underpass to get on a hotel shuttle bus to Grand Lisboa, but none were to be found.

An old photo of the club from decades past

Instead we had to follow a series of arrows taking us on a very long walkway to get to the hotel shuttle buses. This was new! It took us a good 15 minutes to walk to the Jai Alai Oceanus station, apparently a temporary measure until December 15.

When we finally got to the shuttle stop, there was a long line of people already waiting. 

And there aren't numerous shuttles ready to whisk people off to the casino resort -- instead we had to wait for the next shuttle, which took passengers to several different stops before finally arriving at Grand Lisboa (stop number four).

From there we crossed the street to the Clube Militar and arrived just on time at 12.30pm.

The last time I was here was in the early 2000s, and its old school atmosphere is like seeing an old friend again.

The downstairs hallway to restrooms

The European-style building was originally built in 1870 as a private military club for Portuguese military and their guests. Some notable ones include Dr Sun Yat-sen, who lived in Macau for a period of time. Another was poet Camilo Pessanha, who gave a presentation on the pleasures of learning Chinese language and culture in 1915.

In 1953, Clube Militar was opened to civilians, and then in 1995 the building was restored and reopened as a restaurant to the public and still retains its club. This year Clube Militar celebrates its 155th anniversary.

The club has over 700 members, most of them non-Portuguese, after the handover of Macau back to China in 1999. 

It seems the dining room is very popular for lunch, and soon after we arrived, the tables filled up quickly with Chinese and Portuguese guests alike. We opted for for the buffet spread, which included salads, soup, braised eel, beef, seafood salad and fried rice.

The desserts were impressive, in particular the flan that was a smooth egg custard, poached pear, traditional rice pudding, and chocolate cake. 

One of the large paintings in the foyer

If you order a la carte, signature dishes include bacalhau or codfish, African chicken, and arroz de marisco (seafood rice)

975 Avenida da Praia Grande, Macau

+853 2871 4004

 

Sombre Hong Kong Election Day

Do these ballot box mascots entice people to vote today?

Today over 4 million Hongkongers can vote in the Legislative Council elections. One would have to be living under a rock not to know this, as there have been posters all over the city featuring three cartoon ballot boxes, and if you happen to walk along the harbourfront in North Point, those ballot box mascots are in statue form, as if voting is a kids' exercise.

There are 161 candidates vying for 90 seats, and what's interesting about this year's election is 12 lawmakers have declined to run again because they are over the age of 70. They include big names like the convenor of the Executive Council, Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee, council president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen, and Michael Tien Puk-sun.  

Tommy Cheung Yu-yan isn't running again for the Catering functional constituency -- perhaps there will finally be someone who will be more passionate about advocating for the restaurant industry that is being depleted because of people going to Shenzhen regularly.

With so many retiring, is there enough new blood to get people's vote? One candidate people are watching is Vivian Kong Man-wai, former gold Olympic fencer who is looking for a seat in the Tourism functional constituency (one of the 12 functional constituencies that allow those with foreign passports to run), even though she is renouncing her Canadian passport.

However, the bigger question is, how many people will show up to exercise their right to vote?

In the previous election four years ago, there was a record low turnout of 30.2 percent of the over 4 million eligible voters who cast their ballots, despite the government spending HK$1.28 billion on advertising an increase of 50 percent.

That's because this is the second "patriot-only" election after the electoral system was completely revamped where only pro-Beijing candidates are allowed to run; the vast majority of pro-democracy politicians were banned from even running.

After the Wang Fuk Court fire that erupted on November 26 and has sadly claimed 159 lives, many Hong Kong residents are probably not in the mood to vote, despite the government claiming the election must take place today.

Five days ago Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu said it was important to vote in new lawmakers to help launch reforms and to hold the government accountable with relief work following the devastating fire.

"The partners I need most importantly are lawmakers," Lee said on December 2. "To hold the election as scheduled is to respect the constitutional order and rule of law ... it is also to safeguard social stability as it serves as a strong support to the post-fire work."

Nevertheless, John P Burns, emeritus professor and Chinese politics expert at the University of Hong Kong expects voter turnout to be low, partly because of the Tai Po fire.

While those in the pro-establishment camp may be impressed by how quickly the authorities have re-housed victims and provided financial aid, Burns says others "may stay away from the polls" as they are "disappointed, even angry, by the governance problems the fire as exposed." 

In that vein it is possible the election results could be interpreted as a referendum on the government's handling of the Tai Po fire...

Picture of the Day: Sweet and Sour Pork on Ice

Tsui Hang Village's sweet and sour pork on ice with pineapple

We've all eaten sweet and sour pork in different variations, but how about this one?

At Tsui Hang Village in Tsim Sha Tsui, the restaurant's version is called "Sweet and Sour Pork on Ice" for HK$208 US$26.70).

When it arrived, the bite-sized pieces of the pork were served in a bowl made of ice and next to it slices of fresh pineapple. It was presented deconstructed, but had an added dimension.

Not only was there a sweet and sour taste going on, but also hot and cold! 

A Happy Mistake

A very quiet airport at 3am, walking all the way to Gate 36

I made a happy mistake when I booked my hotel accommodation. I didn't look too carefully at my flight departure time of 1am December 1, and instead had the room reserved until noon that day.

After a whirlwind trip of two weeks that packed in not only Hong Kong, but also side trips to Shenzhen, Macau, Zhongshan and my mother's hometown of Mui Yuen, just over 470km north east of Hong Kong, we were tired and ready to go home.

On November 30, we had dinner and then packed the rest of our items in our luggage and were ready to vacate our hotel room around 9pm.

We arrived at a cavernous, empty airport

But at 8.38pm we received a text message that our Cathay Pacific flight was delayed and would not depart until 4.30am December 1!

Apparently it was a maintenance issue of the aircraft. Surely CX had another plane on hand -- in its home base -- that we could use instead? But no.

So... we took a nap (well whatever shuteye we could get) and left the hotel at 1.45am to get to Hong Kong International Airport by Uber.

Our ride took just over half an hour and we entered a cavernous, empty airport.

When we checked in, the ground staff explained as compensation for the flight delay we would get HK$200 in food after we went through security. All we had to do was present our boarding pass.

"What kind of food options are there at this hour?" I asked.

"Probably McDonald's," was the reply.

How delightful...

We went through security and the immigration -- no one was even manning the booths, let alone the automated immigration clearance or e-channel.

Dumplings with noodles, soup and choy sum

All the duty-free shops had shut long ago, passed by a Labubu statue where he too had a boarding pass in his pocket, and we wandered to where there was a food court.

Thankfully there was more than just McDonald's open!

There was ramen at Bari-Uma, sandwiches and salads at Gordon Ramsay Plane Food to Go, Fujianese dishes at Putien, and finally Tasty Congee & Noodle Wantun Shop.

We went to the latter and ordered dumplings with noodles. The man at the counter encouraged us to order more food to reach HK$200, so I also had choy sum and two bottles of water.

Other than us, there were only ground staff hanging out, who either were aircraft engineers or moved luggage and cargo around.

When we finished eating, it was about time to reach our gate, Gate 36 -- down at the far end. 

Really? We had the last flight out before 7am and we had to walk all the way down to the end of the airport to board the plane.

By the time we got to the gate, we saw people already in line anxious to get on the plane, but we were kept waiting because the pilots hadn't boarded yet, nor the flight crew.

Labubu looking perky at this hour 

Passengers were exhausted and when we finally boarded, there were some terse exchanges because people didn't want to patiently wait and just wanted to get into their seats and start flying.

While the pilot apologised again, stating it was a maintenance issue of the aircraft and that it was safe to fly, many of us had already fallen asleep in our seats.

We didn't actually take off until 5am, and landed in Vancouver International Airport at just after midnight December 1.

It's a good thing I made the mistake in the hotel booking otherwise we would have been very miserable and tired hanging out in the airport for hours!

Where do Tai Po Fire Survivors Go from Here?

Wang Chi House residents grabbed items from their flats

If you were only given 90 minutes to fetch things from your home, with no reassurances you could return to live there, which items would you get?

That's what happened to the residents of Wang Chi House, the only building that was untouched in the devastating Tai Po fire last week.

On Wednesday and Thursday from 9am to 9pm, two members from each household were allowed to go into their flats for 90 minutes.

Many people went back to fill suitcases full of clothes, important documents, and treasured photographs, while others even managed to extract their washing machines. One man surnamed Suen told RTHK he went back to get some household goods as well as his game console. Everyone has different priorities...

Despite some of these Wang Chi House residents reporting their homes smelled of smoke, many interviewed in the media expect or hope to move back into the building soon.

Thousands of paper cranes memorialise victims

However, their homes may be too carcinogenic for them to return to, and there is talk that the seven burned out buildings will probably have to be demolished because they may be structurally unsafe, while those who believe in restless spirits may not want to live there again.

In the meantime many of the victims of the fire are worrying about where to live next, as they can only stay in hotels paid for by the government for two weeks and other temporary housing are already full. 

According to the Hong Kong government, 1,152 residents have accommodation in youth hostels, camps or hotel rooms, and another 1, 765 residents in transitional housing units. Others are staying at the Tai Po Community Centre or the Tung Cheong Street Community Hall. One can imagine these shelters aren't exactly comfortable and cooler temperatures are settling in for the next few months.

What is the long-term plan for these residents who may have lost loved ones, lost their homes, and lost all their possessions? They not only need financial help but also psychological counselling and support. 

It will take weeks if not months for the authorities to complete their investigations and identify all the deceased, some of them found as ash. There are also concerns that charging the 21 people arrested so far with alleged manslaughter may be hard to prove with the complexity of construction law and building regulations.

In other words it's not a cut and dried case. 

Meanwhile, despite the government trying to clear the area of grassroots volunteers and their resources, mourners continue to come to Tai Po to pay their respects with flowers, handwritten notes, and paper cranes.

It shows Hongkongers continue to be shaken by the horrific man-made disaster and demand accountability. 

Going through flats to recover victim remains

Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu will be under a lot of pressure to find out how the fire started, and to punish those involved in causing the fire to spread to seven buildings, killing at least 159 people.

The authorities tried to clamp down on protests when 24-year-old student Miles Kwan was arrested and then later released without charge. He had started an online petition and passed out fliers outlining "four demands", which included guaranteed support for the victims and accountability for those at fault, including any government officials.

He was detained and charged for "seditious intention" for speaking out what many had been thinking.

In the meantime it is heartbreaking hearing Superintendent Cheng Ka-chun, the officer in charge of the Disaster Victim Identification describe the grim task of how he and his team have gone floor by floor to find victim remains.

"Our colleagues, in a bid to keep the bodies more intact for their return to their families, chose to dig for the bodies using their hands, touching sand, mud and polluted water," he said, when explaining why they chose to recover corpses by hand instead of using equipment.

"Their only goal was to preserve the integrity of the bodies."

This demonstrates how they are doing their utmost to respect the victims and their loved ones, taking time and care to preserve the remains the best they can.

Hongkongers looking after Hongkongers. This is the Lion Rock Spirit.

Hongkongers Search for Answers After Inferno

At least 156 people have died from the fire. Credit Getty Images

I have just returned from a two-week trip to Hong Kong and China, and like everyone else, am devastated by the Tai Po inferno that killed at least 156 people. As the authorities comb through the wreckage of the seven buildings, the number of dead will only continue to rise.

In the afternoon of November 26, my relatives and I had finished lunch in Macau, and then went to the Hengqin border where we were driven to Zhongshan to see my uncle's apartment.

Periodically I began getting news updates about a fire in Tai Po and it became very shocking when I started seeing the video footage of the flames engulfing the mesh that covered the bamboo scaffolding.

As the number of casualties began to rise I wondered what was going on. Did residents think fires didn't happen in concrete buildings?

Later it was revealed the buildings were undergoing an extensive renovation of the exterior, costing around HK$160,000 (US$20,546) per flat. Their windows were sealed with styrofoam material to prevent debris from damaging the glass, and much of the green mesh covering the scaffolding were not fire-resistant.

Stories subsequently came out from survivors who told of being completely unaware their building was on fire until their loved ones called them. Even the firefighters could not reach them because the scaffolding was in the way and the fire temperature was so hot.

There were reports the government wanted to phase out bamboo scaffolding in favour of metal -- this was quickly dismissed by passionate Hongkongers who made videos trying to set bamboo sticks alight, or explaining to people outside of the city that bamboo is a building material that has been used for over 100 years.

After having experienced a relatively small fire in my neighbourhood in August last year, when a six-storey wood-construction condo building was on fire. The cause is still unknown. The two fire chiefs at the scene recently told us residents that the fire was so hot, they didn't even imagine that the construction crane would melt and collapse the way it did.

So to say that metal would be safer is very hard to say; it would probably make the fire even hotter.

It took over two days for firefighters to have the flames of the Tai Po fire under control.

Meanwhile grassroots groups saw the news and began coming together with water, blankets and food for the affected residents and firefighters. They just setup near the area and gave victims whatever they needed. It was so heartening to see them rally behind these residents who have lost their homes, or worse their loved ones. Some lost their pets, unable to get inside, as firefighters and police stopped them because it was so dangerous with the falling debris and the heat.

But after extensive media coverage of how these NGOs and local groups had mobilised so quickly, donating clothes, food, water, even their electric cars for people to charge their phones, the Hong Kong government cleared everyone out; perhaps the scenes are too reminiscent of what happened over six years ago, or even 11 years ago, when protesters were on the streets...

Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu has pledged a judge will lead a committee to investigate the cause of the fire; perhaps his administration, particularly the Labour Department should have listened to residents' concerns about the green mesh not being fire resistant and witnessing the construction workers smoking on site. While warnings were issued by the Labour Department, it seems punishment was not enforced.

Some survivors have raged about being forced to pay HK$160,000 in renovation fees, only to have their homes go up in smoke. 

As a friend said to me, governments are not prepared for disasters, but it is how they deal with them is what matters. 

Two days ago actor Chow Yun-fat opened the MAMA Awards by speaking in Cantonese, Mandarin and English, asking the audience to stand up for a moment of silence to pay tribute to the victims of the Tai Po fire. He was genuinely upset and felt this was an important gesture for Hong Kong.

The government declared three days of mourning from Friday to Sunday. Thousands of mourners descended on Tai Po, creating a 2km line, patiently waiting to walk closer to the makeshift alter near the fire-ravaged buildings where they left flowers, handwritten notes and toys. 

Hongkongers will never forget this horrific tragedy, nor will they stop finding out who should be accountable.

A mainlander, Jiang Yaling, who writes the Follow the Yuan on Substack, commented how the Hong Kong authorities deal with victims very differently from in China. Typically if a disaster happens, the victims and families are immediately shuffled into hotel rooms and forbidden from speaking to the media; she was very surprised to see how Hongkongers were able to speak freely with emotion...

For now a lot of fundraising has been done, over HK$1.3 billion raised. But where exactly will all this aid go? Will victims get the money directly? Or will it be given to charity groups? Where are people going to live now? They can't live in hotel rooms for weeks on end. And what kind of compensation will they get? 

All eyes are on the Hong Kong authorities. Will they step up and serve the people as they have promised?