While accending the Mid-Levels Escalator after visiting the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Museum I was extremely lucky to come upon the following phenomena ... men without safety belts erecting bamboo scaffolding. One side of the apartment building is being covered so that maintenance can be carried out. One tenant was out on his balcony watching the process thru his small jardin. The bamboo rods are tied together with black plastic lengths. These hang from the waists of the men giving the appearance of huge horse tails. There are two views, one side view from the footbridge and then further along after a sharp turn on the footbridge a view straight on. Also took six minutes of video but apparently travelblog.org is not supporting videos at themoment. Will publish as soon as possible. It was a bit scary ... read more

Day two in HK. Walked down to the pier and took Star Ferry across Victoria Harbour. Rush hour was over and very few people were on the boat. On the water was a small boat and on the boat was a man with a net at the end of a long pole. He was scooping up debris from the water. What an idea! I know of a few bodies of water that could make use of this simple method of ridding quais of stinking garbage! Once on the Kowloon side I went to the happy room at the golden arches. I must call these people. Usually the happy rooms at the arches are always very clean. Breakfast became an egg mcmuffin and coffee. The most important goal for today was to secure a ticket for the ... read more

HongKong Central is where all the money is. People are dressed to the nines; men in suits and ties with wrinkle free white shirts sporting real shoes, women in tailored outfits with matching pumps, handbags, hairdoos and makeup, all traipsing past Gucci, Paiget, Lalique, Cartier, Bulgari /Bulgravi, Mont Blanc and all those other names too. And amognst this jungle of designer wear and high finance housed in ever higher reaching glass spindles n the sky who comes along but Barbara in her MEC pants, beat up hiking boots and raspberry red backpack. I am wearing a Ralph Lauren shirt knockoff with polo rider and altered made-to-fit-the-length-of my-arm-sleeves. And I did buy comfy black and yellow sandals at the Stanley Street Market. I trudged up Ice House Road to number 38 and found the MiniCentral Hotel ... ... read more

Because the email is forever "connecting"and then becomes timed out Mingnon this is youalthough I do not know when easy access will be available again. I have stopped wasting the time to be disappointed. For all who are trying to make contact I promise to read the messages during this trip and at this time apologize to those who have sent kind words and not heard a reply ... one from 2010 ... embarassing... After that short message on to... The Summer Palace It was a 08:30 beginning to the day. We visited the Summer Palace first then took a trip to Olympic site and then went for rickshaw ride. In between had good lunch and even better dinner. Two full meals a day are starting be too much and it is only day four of ... read more

My whole rant about Pearson has been lost in the ether. Everyone has heard it all before anyway. Just want to mention that I missed the Collevile Exhibit at the AGO. Also want to give my thanks to my bestest friend of two, who drove me to the airport in time to report back for lunch duty at school. Hainan Air, even though in the last corner of Terminal 3, was efficient up to the point of the movies not functioning. Did not get the seat I requested so moved. The gluten free meal was delish... looked much better than the other trays that were distributed. Did not eat the dry rice cake. Two dinners were served; one at Canada afternoon time and one at Beijing afternoon time. There was fish with two ping pong ball ... read more