Living. Fairytale

常常懷念去年去日本的時候，是最快樂的回憶之一，每一刻都很開心。每天吃早餐都想點什麼蛋，儲起漂亮的奶瓶子。晚上期待着酒店房裏為我們預備的生果。有一次滿懷希望的去開桌上兩個蘋果，怎料原來是兩個很甜的日本梨來的!出乎意料之外!
我喜歡輕井駅和自由x丘，夕陽的陽光下，在寧靜的街道上行走。還意外地遇到一間Studio Ghibli 店和Wachifield 店。

我喜歡在拉麵上加雙陪「青」，喜歡看魚生師傅片TORO!喜歡陪你吃蟹，那裏的大蟹標誌很大，還有人彈古箏。我們在六本木碰上大雨，我還看到黑雲湧來;在半島酒店的頂層吃晚餐，精心設計的幻燈感覺在北歐看極光。
在Yokohama吃午餐等了很久，外面太陽很猛，我們很喜歡雪糕店的人唱的歌，但我更喜歡之後吃飯時聽你說話。
我們說要再到台場玩ufo機，那裏高手比較少，你不斷的「夾」到很多東西呢，我把夾到的東西放在酒店地上拍照，Hedgy也來參與。
走過墳場與貓店後，我們也遇上大雨，躲在小路中，民居的車房下避雨，我最喜歡大雨，從屋簷像小瀑布的流到路上。
真希望可以快點見到你。

爆開的眼樹

北京的眼樹上的眼是因為樹枝生出來時，導致樹的表皮爆開，留下眼的形狀，樹枝被砍後，眼的瞳孔露出來。這是一個很local的爆裂，且是橫向的。
可是近日釣魚台國賓館外一段長達（十五分鐘車程）的路旁的眼樹卻出現直向爆裂，即由上至下的爆開，有的更整層表皮掉下來，眼的位置留出黃色及紅色的樹汁，情況嚇人，值得關注

今天記者路經此段，竟堵了三十分鐘車，兩旁不斷有警車經過，懷疑前面有乘客乍見眼樹後暈倒。

'Liberal'-Chinese-lover?

"A guy friend of mine has been in a stable relationship for a few years, but there's another girl who really liked him. People all adviced her not to do anything when he already has a stable girlfriend. But she thought if he loves her so much, than he won't be shook but her seduction. So later on, the guy did started getting really close with this girl, he decided to maintain both relationships.
A few days earlier, he posted a very long article on the internal-web of their uni (equivalent to facebook) - apologizing for what he did wrong. What made him changed all of a sudden - on her original girlfriend's fourth abortion, she realized that she couldn't get pregnant anymore. He felt sorry, and promised to marry her once they graduate"

Relationship-wise, I wonder if we are fossils.
Last night, I had another great cultural lesson on modern Chinese relationships. Many of those people involved in the stories are not fictional, not internet stories, not MK kids, but real friends of my friend, in one of the top universities in China.

"Another girl from a reowned school from Hong Kong, now studying University here, really liked a homosexual guy, she liked him so much that she made him drunk deliberately so he would have sex with her, and hoping that it could turn in a relationship. But the guy was too drunk and didn't know what happened the night before, so nothing happened following the event. Knowing that she couldn't win his heart, she thought having him physically is good enough."

Match-making is very common among my friends and C's friends here in the universities. It's alright to ditch a friend if a potential guy dates you for dinner, and it might happen like monthly or weekly.

There are internal websites, where people post their own pictures, searching for girl/boyfriends. One of C's pretty friend posted her pic, and got more than 1000 replies, INCLUDING a young professor. But that girl just got accepted by Harvard grad school, the professor suggested that he could apply to be a visiting lecturer there.

When Deborah was here, she pointed out how people are so CRAZY about getting married here in China, but it's not only in China, also in Hong Kong, people have very elaborate celebration for their weddings. Here, the biggest shops in shopping malls are those like "I DO"

PDA (Public Demonstration of Affection) is also serious, The other day i was on a bus- on the second floor, there were three couples, among them, two pairs were hugging very tightly, with the girl lying on the guys' legs throughout the bus ride, the remaining pair had the girl sitting on the guy's lap even there were SO MANY empty seats.....

According to both Miranda and my observation in our architecture firms in Shanghai and Beijing, almost all guys are married, and all young pretty girls ranging from e.g. 20 - 40 are single! How amazing. The girl next to me, looks like... 26? but she's actually 32, she's very eager to get a boyfriend, mostly cuz it's a norm, she's dating randomly, doesn't really like her boyfriend. But she felt scared cuz everyone in her University class are married - some even divorced already! hark.

Yes naturally, people all around the world seems to do things like this, we might be surprised because they are Chinese, I wonder... how are Chinese perceived, and how are they actually like?

Living in Art

Today I have found a close-to-perfect cafe, under nice sunlight, and stayed for a whole afternoon on the second floor on comfy chairs. With my drawing board, listening to stuff on laptop, soft pencils.. Cecilia even came visit me in the afternoon ! :)
Went to 北京美術用品街 yesterday, I love being surrounded by art tools and also books, I remember I really loved the smell of the art equipments room when I was back in St. Stephen's. Miss my seaside studio, creating art is such a therapeutic activity. 

Hatsune 隱泉

I am starving, but I guess I deserve it, I have less than RMB500 now, and had spent a few hundred on lunch today

Finally get around to trying some high-end jap food on the East side of Beijing today! Hatsune was repeatedly elected as the best Japanese food in town.

 

I must say that it's too good, the atmosphere is great, no door signs - look as if it's not opened yet from outside, after the stone door, it's an electrical water door, beyond are comfy sofas, abundant natural daylight, and fish installation in the double ceiling height space. 

I ordered a Hotate sushi and another dish withs hotate in, but later on the waitress said that the hotate is not fresh today, I told her that i really want it, but she said it's 真的不行.

So I had to change them to something else! Wishing for a surprise, and surprise surprise, it's really a surprise!!!!

ohohohohohohhohohohohohoh IT'S too good...................................

In search of a perfect cafe

You know how much time we spend in cafes. And of course in some periods of time in Edinburgh "when you can't find me in my room, I must be in a cafe"
But a good cafe is so difficult to find.
Ideally it should be above the street level, so you don't get people and cars roaming in front of you, and also allows more natural sunlight in.
E.g. Pacific Coffee Stanley and Starbucks Happy Valley
If not, it should be isolated from the streetE.g. Pacific Coffee Repulse Bay
They should also have a lot of comfy seats and is spacious. Mysteriously there are some that doesn't fit all the above criteria, but still won my heart,
E.g. Sift in Graham Street - probably because of it's unique atmosphere, the so squished steep street filled with old building and of course it's amazing food.
AND Aries!
It should also be quiet enough, of course, it's often difficult to get that, so one should always visit a cafe early in the morning, and avoid the time when school kids get off school (if it's near a school)
There are also some other with nice memory like Starbucks in Hysan Road, the old Starbucks of LKF...

In Beijing, I still haven't found one cafe that I always want to revisit.Sculpting in Time in Fragrant Hills is quite close, as it has good food, friendly waitress who know me already, free wireless, sunlight, and open view, and cats, but the sofa is not very comfortable, and as noon approaches, it gets crowded and you see disturbing scenes of people forcing cats to be near them!
The cafes I have tried in 798 either has good food but boring view, or no view and bad food.Nanluoguxiang's cafes are nice, especially if you watch from outside, but they have no sofa, and there will always be people admiring you (actually the cafe windows) in an arms length.Sanlitun is good for lunch and dinner, so those are not really cafes.The bookworm cafe is pretty but doesn't have nice seats.
Another problem is that they are all in a bit of a distance. Beijing is too big.

Of course there are also those cafes in shopping malls, which has no windows, those are not going to be considered.
et cetera....

I will continue to search for good cafes, some that I want to visit:
Cave Cafe 洞房咖啡 - 798 looks really nice, wanna go!! But far
Pacific Coffee - There are pacific coffees in Beijing, but no photos, i dun wanna travel half the city and be disappointed
Sugar Bar looks pretty but chairs dun look good
90% of the cafes in Beijing has wireless, but don't have good chairs, and no view, or are in crowded places, or have limited view because Hutongs have narrow roads. (ohhhh.....) But I still love Beijing, especially when I eventually find my favourite cafe here.


(Cafes I have visited so far in Beijing:
Nanluoguxiang: Guoke, NGLX, Sandglass
798: Art Cafe, The High Place, THe living experience place
Zhongguancun area: Starbucks, JC Cafe, Mima, Sculpting in Time
Sanlitun: that french cafe, Elements.... dun remember)

Picture was taken in a cafe in Denmark

S.A.T.C

"Later that day, I got to thinking about relationships"
Famous Carrie Bradshaw line from SATC
Men and women are naturally so different, so incompatible. Men always make mistakes in women's eyes, without knowing, then the women complains, without pointing out exactly what it is so problematic in the men. The men comforts, the women felt loved, problems unresolved, women complains again, men gets annoyed, then all of a sudden, it's no longer the men's fault (which sourced the problem from the beginning) it all became her fault - of being demanding, difficult to satisfy, inconsiderate. Mistakes continues, complains continues, problems unresolved, hatred increases. Relationships are difficult to comprehend.

恐怖的事

今天分享一些具恐怖的東西。北京四周都是眼樹，每天上班都要受十五分鐘看眼樹之苦。北方人自小看慣，不以為然，但所有香港朋友都覺得很freaky。眼睛是樹枝被砍後留下的疤痕，像平滑的樹皮上爆出一隻隻木無表情的3D 眼。

但香港有更恐怖的：行山時, 不知道還以為是一棵樹, 其實是滿佈了毛蟲, 請大家看看。(可能引起不安)
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e6/icyconnie/0705/DSC09155-1.jpg
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e6/icyconnie/0705/DSC09159.jpg
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e6/icyconnie/0705/DSC09165.jpg

辦公室的同事分分雀躍地分享自己小時候「玩昆蟲」的經歷：哈爾濱春天掉得滿地是蟲，她總喜歡騎單車踏過它們;他小學時，春天的牆和樹身都滿佈蟲，他們會用樹枝把蟲括下來…….
我只能conclude我們香港人是來自石屎森林的。

離別２

今天媽媽告訴我，我們家中的鳥兒死了。雖然我不是常常看着他，但已很習慣他在家中，很喜歡跟他談話。他的聲音很大，在貝沙灣的巴士站等車也會聽到。他的一雙眼睛很純真，有摸彷不同人說話的能力，最喜歡聽鋼琴聲。我們養了他差不多有八年了，是妹妹的生日禮物，爸爸媽媽也很喜歡他，常聽到媽說有關改善家中鳥的生活的事情。其實他的生活已很不錯，有一個大得可以在裏面自由飛行的籠，四周環境尚算寧靜，每天有鮮果吃。Even though it feels great to say "he must be in a better place now" But I am not sure if I do believe in an afterlife, nevertheless, I'm sure he enjoyed this life.
其實事情還有一段（不小）插曲，但我也不想多說了。

另外，又跟Jaci在skype談話，她在香港機場丟失了「阿花」。
載颸不特別喜愛毛公仔，家中就只有阿花一隻「小雞」毛毛玩偶。她很喜歡讀有關地震和火山的書，阿花便是她從汶川地震後「收養回來的女兒」。每與載颸聊天，話題都圍繞阿花﹣例如阿花不見了媽媽、發高燒進醫院等，所以大家聽見阿花不見了，都有點緊張，因為它不只是一件普通的玩具，而是一個小朋友生活中的一大部份。

他們在機鐵上已發現阿花不見了，立刻致電機場有關部門，說明丟失的exact厠所格，但只得到十分官方的reply，亦拒絕找人去看看是不是還在那裹................

離別

人生實在太多離別要面對了，尤其是交通發達的年代。爸媽來之前還挺不期待他們來，感覺已經很習慣一個人的生活。但現在卻習慣了早上有煮好了的早餐，晚上可以坐的士去吃飯的美好生活。剛在想要適應他們的離開，卻驚訝地聽到我在公司裏最要好的朋友都將要離開了，而且兩天後便是最後一天上班﹗
战致平 15:03:27: 我要走了，下周一就不来了
袁明珊 15:03:38 為什麼呢﹖!!!
战致平 15:03:53 我有更想做的事
實在太驚訝了，雖然我們都習慣離別，又為她追求夢想而感到很勇敢，但仍然覺得有點傷心的。
战致平 15:06:30呵呵，我5月不在BJ，不過五月末回來，所以你走之前還能看到豬狗MAC哈哈哈哈哈，我有個小本本給你
她就是也看小人書的女孩，與兩個畫家一起養了一隻husky及三隻貓呢。她還常到尼泊爾、緬甸等國家旅遊呢。
我一直想問她的星座，因為她性格很特別，星座真準,她是人馬座的。

Beijing Roast Duck - Dadong

It's so good that I wanna go again!!! We tried making reservations three times before, and finally succeeded on Monday night.

Nestled in the Nanxincang complex, a thoughtfully restored Ming dynasty imperial granary, is not one of Beijing’s famous centuries old Peking Duck eateries, but it was made famous by serving one of the best ducks in town.

The skin of the duck is crispy and the meat is tasty, and each roast duck is served with an array of sauces, including sweet wheaten sauce, granulated sugar, crushed garlic, thin slivers of scallions, red turnips and cucumber.

Your molasses-coloured duck is presented at your table, carved table-side, and then several duck-filled pancakes are assembled for you until your waitress thinks you’ve got the knack yourself.

It proves that you don't have to be a "Lao zi hao" to do it great!

Present. History.

During lunch, they had intense discussion about 6.4. Again very extreme views, which is interesting. We kept saying that we shouldn't really discuss this in public, as the police could arrest us, but they were too into the discussions. Two of them were in primary 3 or 4 in 1989, they were told to go home after lunch at that time.
Only one of the girl said that she would stand on the army side. And they said 小戰,你腦袋有問題. 這不是中國人的本質，是你受了二十多年黨教育失去了自己的思想。And they also talked about their views on the Communist Party.
I always find their political/historical discussion really interesting and annoying. They are all quite cool people, with strong personality and beliefs.

Magic Potion

辦公室內，喬健愛喝檸檬甘草，下午沒事做，偷了一片甘草，磨成粉末(個多小時)加一點點水，一朵菊花，數片苿莉花片,收在高身透明瓶內。
他們說：你不用做建築了，去幫人練仙吧。
練仙神藥, 你要嗎﹖

Morning Memoir of Summerbridge

This morning, I "accidentally" re-read my posts during Summerbridge period, it's one of those places, like LPC - hard for outsiders to truly understand unless experienced. And a place that even upon re-reading the memories, makes your heartbeats and totally drew you into the sentiments.
It's one of those places where love is so close and real, and a place where you see miracles.
I love pondering on the importance of "letting-go", I felt like it's important for our generation, when we are always moving around, experiencing new things and meeting new people. But maybe I deliberately let go too soon, without a proper bridging period, instead of feeling plain, my heart actually beats upon those memories.

I miss the close relationship and trust developed between the staffs and students, and also the feeling of support, tolerance and the chance to empower others. Perhaps it's also because I don't know how or whether (frankly) we should maintain the friendship with the students after SB, and how long could it last? Very sophisticated matter, relationship with these young people, each of them distinctly different - some with a weaker mind but loving hearts; some that are caring and funny; some with big ambition; some are lost about their life; some are naughty but cute............ Oh I miss them a lot. However, I think I just couldn't do it for another year, it's good to have a break from it after two summers.. two exhausting summers.If I were doing SB now, I must have left home already, writing letters on the bus, I would not have been eating Jap food last night, probably having dept dinner or met up with Holing cuz we are soooo behind in lesson planning! 
SB is too intense, seeing the pictures are too intense.
It's really enjoyable working with people, especially young people, small like Jaci or teenagers like SBers, I love interpreting their thoughts, and tricking them into abandoning their wicked motives, I love to support them and let them realize their potentials
Previous posts- http://maoshan.blogspot.com/search/label/Summerbridge

茶

近日午飯後,常開車到宣武區一茶莊喝（他們買）茶。
一開始覺得有點無聊的,尤其如養茶壺那類活動 - 很多買了貴茶壺的客人把它留在茶莊裏養，讓茶味滲入紫砂壺中。
近幾次都是試普洱茶，普洱也有很多不同的，有生有熟，也有年份之分。
大多茶都是雲南來的呀，茶馬古道就是以前雲南普洱茶外運的路綫，「三道六綫」，就是指北道至北京，西道至西藏，及南道四綫到南洋或世界各地的。
我認為生普洱比熟普洱好喝，但我還未遇到一種真正喜歡的茶，我近來特別期待那一天的來臨，我知道是會有的呀。
很久以前我也喝過玉蝴蝶，它是雲南少數民族的一種民間茶，茶形很美，在熱水中泡像蝴蝶翩翩起舞般。
另外，現在紫砂茶壺設計很diverse，不只有傳統那些呀．（有牛形呀，鳥形呀，南瓜形，鳥巢－（北京那個）形都有！）今天我看到一個很喜歡，但他們都說有點貴，我打算下次再去，如果還喜歡的話便買下來。
他們喝茶都計好溫度，不喝第一泡，用茶洗杯等，真好玩的。辦公室內很多人都喝茶呀。好喝的茶跟不好喝的差太遠了，有些「茶」樓確的茶像喝怪物般。