2009-10的香港深圳雙城展的香港部份於二月底完滿結束，閉幕前我才匆匆趕去看。今次地點沒有2007-08的舊中央警局那麼方便，因為是在荒蕪的西九龍填海區。戶外有的是空間，但空間太大和分散，加上經過一個多月的風雨洗禮後，部份展品也“走了”樣。 I literally dashed to see the closing of the Hong Kong portion of the 2009-10 Hong Kong-Shenzhen Biennale. The exhibition site this time is the open air, still very much barren and yet-to-be West Kowloon Cultural District, reclaimed land from sea in the past decade or so. One of the exhibit was a model of those cage-home style flats in the former Kowloon Walled City. 其中一個“模型”是已經拆掉的九龍城寨，這樣的龍屋在深水埗等區還有的。This type of housing still exist to this date, in areas like Sham Shui Po. The challenge for the government is do help improve the extremely crammed living environment of residents in these buildings and yet avoiding the preying eyes of various real estate developers which have been contributing so much to the gentrification of this city.
Call it avoiding the misfortune, or welcoming your wealth, floors in highrises in China could go missing in action. Take the one photographed above or 39 Conduit Road in Hong Kong. In the latter, floors "jump" from 12 to 15, 23 to 25, 33 to 35, 39 to 60, 63 to 66 to 68 to 88. Can it be more confusing than that? Don't joke about it should fire broke out, whether the firefigthers can locate the right floors could be a real challenge!
By the way, can you guess what city is the building photographed located, given the missing floors?
The food was mediocre, more like those huge, coarsely presented buns and dim sums in New York Chinatown restaurants, or perhaps that's what the 1960s looked like? Lung Mun closed its doors in its 60th year of operation. The decor looked dated, but was quite refine when it started running and up til the 1980s. Afterall, that was the first dim sum restaurant to be air-conditioned. In the spirit of the ever developing Hong Kong, some real estate developer offered HKD400 million to the own for the plot of land on Johnston Road in Wanchai. Rumors have the restaurant owner looking for a place to reopen, let's keep our fingers crossed.
Ngau Tau Kok Lower Eastate, une des HLM plus ancienne à Kowloon, a été mis en fin en novembre 2009, après preque 40 ans de service. Dans une ville où quatre édifices au siege social de la banque HSBC ont été démolies et reconstruites sur le même site pendant moins de 150 ans à cause de manque d'espace, ce point de fermature n'étonne pas les piétons qui passent par là en route à la station MTR. Néanmoins, pour les enfants qui ont grandi là-bas, pour les réfugiés et nouveaux arrivants de la Chine continentale dans les années 60s ou 70s, c'était où ils ont développé et bati 'chez eux'. Le plan de redéveloppement vise à reconstruire des tours plus grandes et plus modernes. Côté des organisateurs communautaires, ils ont commencé leur campagine de sauver les bâtisses nos. 13 et 14, et les convertir au centre communautaire / multi-fonnctionels au lieu d'un grand batîment cher. À noter que ces structures complétés dans les 1960s sont simples et probablement plus écologique que les gratte-ciels neufs! On n'utilisait pas de climatiseur 24 sur 24 au passé modeste! J'espère que le gouvernement les écoute, comme des bureaucrates qui habitent pas dans le quartier connaissent moins que des citoyens.
最後一天營業，人們拍照留念。 on prend des photos dans la dernière journée de l'opération. un des restos qui dure tout le long de 40 ans
Ngau Tau Kok Lower Estate, 1969 - 2009. One of the trailbazers of Hong Kong Housing Authority's developments in the ever rapidly changing Hong Kong was sealed off officially on 25 November 2009. The last remaining towers would be torn town for eventual rebirth, taller and better equipped with amenities. Goodbye was sad though, as the local buzzwords "collective memory" resurfaced again as much of our memory was again erased as a result. Community residents are mobilising to save Blocks 13 and 14, which are joined together like the letter T. Their rationale? It will better serve as a memory of the 1960s style of housing as well as providing space for recreation and cultural purposes, instead of building from the ground up again a new, cross district (Kwun Tong-Ngau Tau Kok) cultrual centre. My two cents? I will side with the average citizens advocating this idea as the various government departments handling urban redevelopment and housing projects do not have a throuough understanding of the areas they are trying to 'revitalise'.
Leung Sing Bo and Lydia Sum were icons in Hong Kong movies and television for decades, and were the pillars of EYT, a programme that aired five nights a week, like an intense version of SNL. My visits to two exhibitions paying tibute to them brought back memories from my childhood. The influence of TVB in Hong Kong was more omnipresent than the TV-fixated Americans as described by Neil Postman in Amusing Ourselves to Death.
No, i am not talking about the bus route, but the bus company in Guangzhou (or Canton). It was refreshing, though in a mischievous kinda way that I was happy to note that the bus company used 巴士 "bashi" instead of 公交 "gongjiao" because that was evidently a nod to the anglicism infiltrated into the local Cantonese dialect. One might wonder why I want to see "bad" Chinese usage of ba shi, buit I can tell you if that's the public concensus which shaped this expression, why not? It also enriches the Chinese vocabulary.
Après les allemands ce sont les indiens cette fois-ci. Alors pour 2009 l'Inde est invitée d'honneur pour la fête nationale française. Bien que je ne sois pas un fanatique des affaires militaires, le défilé est intéressant comme un téléspectacle sur TV5monde diffusé en direct par France2.
French culture carries NOT a very masculin image, given people think about French cuisine, fashion or perfume when they fantasize France. However, their Fête nationale is always a parade of various regiments of the military. This year, India is their guest of honnour so you would have seen the Indian military marching on the Champs-Élysées, carried live on TV5monde and France2.
What a good attitude towards life： If you see something that you like, take it home; otherwise, stop by just to have a cup of tea. So reads motto from this boutique in a village within the juridiction of Guangzhou. The clumsiness of the translation should motivate one to learn foreign languages, for no two languages could seamlessly translate back and forth, are there?
Kongming Lantern, named after Zhuge Liang, ancient strategist in the Shu Kingdom, the area of the modern day Sichuan. One can understand why many people floated these Lantern of "wishes", as I saw the wrapping as people unfold the lanterns from the package, light up the candle inside each lantern, wait for the warm air to "inflat" and then release the lantern into the clear night sky. In Hong Kong many years ago, huts and hillsides caught fire at times when the deflated lanterns fell from the sky. They were since then banned from the territory. Needless to say, it was an extremely present surprise for me since I havn't seen this "ritual" for over twenty as these lanterns were banned when I was a kid in Hong Kong.
C'est la période à construire des hôtels de glace, au Québec, peut-être ailleurs aussi comme les pays scandinaves. Pékin, je pense qu'elle est assez froide, sauf que l'on est extrêmement sec ici. Là-bas, par contre, a reçu plein de neige. Les ouvriers préparent les dernières installations pour que l'hôtel soit prêt le 4 jan 2009. Pour des renseignements plus détaillés, lire un reportage sur le journal Le Jacques-Cartier. J'espère que le réchauffement planétaire ne dégèle pas la saison. Je me souviens un an le Canal Rideau avait des problèmes d'être gelé comme il fallait, ou plus dans un endroit un demi-monde à part à HongKong quand j'ai vécu en octobre 2008, le plus tiède dès les statistiques météorologiques sont disponibles! (photo crédit: robinhd on Flickr )
中國人 Chinese 香港人 Montrealer montréalais HongKonger 華裔加拿大人 canadien.
but principal: être flotteur extraordinaire avec beaucoup d'argent hahaha!
I am NOT proud to say I've finally signed up on Facebook, one of the time wasting social media blackholes. My share of social networking accounts: flickr, youtube, meetup, delicio.us bla bla bla. They bring you people "de quatre coins du monde"... parfois étrange hahaha!
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