Pictures I'm tagged in

Saturday, Jul 5, 2008 1:01AM / 161 pictures

Stephen attacks Taipei

Sunday, Jun 22, 2008 11:39PM / Standard Album / Members only
14 pictures / 104 views / 10 comments

Two birthdays in Taipei for two people currently living in Hong Kong. This weekend was definitely "Hong Kong attacks Taipei"...

Spring trip in China: Wuyishan | 春天的旅行 - 武夷山

Friday, May 30, 2008 1:35AM / Standard Album / travel / Members only
40 pictures / 179 views / 14 comments

我很久没有改新我春天的旅行照片 -- 其实最有意思的两部分 （武夷山，厦门)我还没加了相册。这次可以给你们看 -- 我跟我妈妈和我厦门好朋友，晶晶，一起去武夷山旅游。因为我妈妈不太会爬山可是我要带她去看大陆的山水所以我带她去武夷山 -- 在上海到厦门的中间而我觉得比桂林漂亮和安静。我好朋友晶晶从厦门来了 -- 因为她是在附近的南平长大所以她比较认识武夷山。我两年前去了一次。

年开，成龙和李连杰来了武夷山拍电影 -- 所以有些风景你们可能会记得。

如果你喜欢爬山，自然的山水，我很推进你们去武夷山旅游。

It's been a really long time since I've updated my Spring Tour of China photos -- actually, the two most interesting segments of my journey (Wuyishan, Xiamen) are the ones which I haven't updated about. This time I'll update you guys about the beautiful trip to Wuyishan with my mom and my good friend Jingjing. My mom, because of age and because of our limited time, wasn't able to travel to more famous areas like Guilin or Jiuzhaigou for scenery, so I took her the the smaller and lesser known Mt. Wuyi. It's one of my favorite sightseeing places in China and I had the good fortune of having Jingjing, who grew up in nearby Nanping, fly up from Xiamen to accompany us on our trip.

I went to Wuyishan once two years ago and really enjoyed it -- this time was even more interesting because we caught it at the opening of spring and got to see the mountains in their full glory -- clouds, mist, sun... it was extra special.

I highly recommend everyone check out Mt. Wuyi!

Travelling through China Part 3: Hangzhou

Thursday, May 8, 2008 8:11PM / Standard Album / Members only
18 pictures / 230 views / 21 comments

我很久没有改信我的博客 -- 上次加了我的4月开的旅行相册可是没有加了我的杭州，武夷山，厦门的相册。
It's been a long time since I've updated my blog -- last time I updated with my early April China trip, I only added my first couple of days of the vacation, but didn't add the last half of the vacation in Hangzhou, Wuyishan, and Xiamen.

从小的时候平常听到我妈妈说她想去西湖 -- 很多她喜欢的故事，小说，等。。。她在台湾从小的时候看了很多在西湖的故事。结果，我开始准备我们的旅行比较辛苦安排我们杭州的一天。虽然杭州我去过很多次，每次我去出差，没有机会休息看风景所以我一月跟我一天上海本地朋友Jasmine去了杭州旅行。一天散步了西湖一圈而那天冷死了。可是这样子我比较认识西湖所以可以为导游帮我妈妈访问她特别想来的地方。
Jasmine: 如果来三藩市，华盛顿，我也可以帮你，为导游。。。哈哈。。。

Ever since I was a kid, I occaisionally heard my mom say that she would love to visit Hangzhou's West Lake, the setting for many of the stories and novels that she loved reading as a child growing up in Taiwan. As a result, from the very beginning of planning the trip, I took the most care in preparing our trip to Hangzhou. Although I've been to Hangzhou plenty of times on business trips in recent years, I never had the opportunity to actually relax and enjoy the West Lake scenery until last January when I asked my Shanghai friend al to help out play tourguide to me. Thankfully, as a Shanghai-native (one city over from Hangzhou), she's already played tourguide to plenty of friends -- kind of like the way I've taken countless people around San Francisco or Washington D.C.

我准备了一个很复杂的安排表去看很多地标，哪里吃饭，哪里休息 。。。其实，最后我们只有时间看一半的地方，没有时间去我定的地方吃晚饭。这次春天开到了 -- 天气太好，风景太漂亮，年轻对太多。。。哈哈。其实我妈妈喜欢的故事，小说家也是爱情的 -- 看我们的照片，有苏曼殊的墓碑；白蛇传的雷峰塔。err.. 也有西湖天地的星巴克。。。第一第二是旧的爱情事，第三是现在很多年轻对喜欢约的地方所以现在也是西湖爱情地标。
I prepared a really intricate schedule of places to visit in Hangzhou, where to eat, where to rest, etc.... Actually, we only had enough time to visit half of the places, and we never made it to where I booked dinner reservations. Nonetheless, this time we arrived at the beginning of spring: perfect weather, beautiful scenery, plentiful young (i.e. teenage) couples. Heh, actually my mom's oft-mentioned stories and novelists are all romances as well... Novelist-monk-slash-unrequited-lover Su Manshu's gravesite, Leifeng Pagoda from The White Snake Legend ... and Xihu's famous Starbucks. Okay, maybe the first two are romances, but the third landmark is now inhabited by dozens of young couples on dates so perhaps it's a modern day romantic's landmark.

Shanghai and Suzhou: Trip to China with my mom

Tuesday, Apr 15, 2008 11:06PM / Standard Album / travel / Members only
21 pictures / 334 views / 23 comments

This is the second part of my multipart photo album of my recent trip playing tourguide to my mom in China. You can see the first part (Hong Kong) here.

Shanghai was the first stop of our trip into China. I've been to Shanghai many, many times at this point so I wasn't too concerned about finding interesting places to travel with my mom. I especially wanted to take her to nearby Hangzhou (tomorrow's photo album).

My largest concern about her coming to China wasn't that she wouldn't enjoy it or about playing tourguide. My largest concern was about her stomach -- 水土不服 -- or not used to the water and food. Everyone new to China will get sick at some point -- partially because of the hygiene differences and partially because of the impulse to eat all of the delicious street food. In this case, I decided on a strategy of taking her to the cleaner, more organized restaurants earlier in the trip and ease her stomach gradually to the farm-fresh food that we'd eventually be eating in Wuyishan and the seafood that we'd be eating in Xiamen.

I also decided to forego the tourguides and do most of the tourguiding myself -- especially in Shanghai, Hangzhou, and Xiamen where I've been plenty of times. Well, actually, it required a bit of preparation -- each time that I went to Shanghai or Hangzhou was always for some kind of business-related trip -- never for fun. Last January, in preparation for playing tourguide, I went back to Shanghai to meet up with my friend Jasmine who lived in Shanghai all her life until she moved to the UK a year ago. I basically spent two or three days finally doing the cheesy, touristy thing in Shanghai and Hangzhou and sucking up as much knowledge as I could before doing the same thing for my mom this time around. Thanks a million, Jasmine! I felt like an expert when showing my mom around!

Shanghai pretty much only has a limited number of places to visit for touristy stuff: The Bund, Xintiandi, Yu Yuan Laojie, Shanghai Museum...

Suzhou was interesting -- we met up with my friend Jason because he wanted to see the new I.M. Pei-designed Suzhou Museum. I had an extensive schedule planned where we'd visit two gardens, the museum, and the Tongli water town. In the end, we went to one garden, had an overly long hot pot lunch, and then found that everything (including the museum) was closed. Well, I'm not really a huge fan of gardens in Suzhou so it didn't feel like that much of a loss. Sorry Jason!!! He went all the way to Suzhou with us and didn't even get to get into the museum...

Oh, one recommendation in Shanghai: Thanks to Jasmine the find! Go to The Panorama Hotel (in 海湾大厦) near where Waibai Duqiao used to be (外白渡桥) and go to the top floor -- there's a coffeehouse with a huge bay window that overlooks both Puxi and Pudong... an amazing view -- photos in the album below. We waited there from 8pm to past 9pm for the lights in Puxi to turn on. These days, I think they only turn them on for five minutes during the weekdays so I took a quick snapshot...

Hong Kong: Travelling thorugh China with my mom

Tuesday, Apr 15, 2008 3:06AM / Standard Album / travel / Members only
10 pictures / 297 views / 23 comments

Okay -- I've seriously been missing-in-action, I KNOW! In case you don't know, my mother was visiting me in Hong Kong for the first time and I spent about two weeks travelling around China with her. It was a really memorable, really remarkable trip and pretty fulfilling for me personally because I was finally able to play tourguide to my mom.

Some of you who might know me only since I've moved to Asia might not be aware that I could barely speak any Chinese whatsoever before I set my heart on moving to China four years ago. Starting four years ago, I began preparing my way to move to China by teaching myself Chinese and visiting China for work/fun every three months. Finally, two years ago (2006) I finally moved to Xiamen (in Fujian, China) for a year and then finally to Hong Kong (now in month 16!).

I managed to do a fair amount of travel around China.

On the other hand, my mother -- born in Taiwan and immigrated to the United States in 1964 -- has never been to mainland China and was in Hong Kong in, well, 1964 -- on her way over to immigrating to the United States. As you can imagine, then, it's quite an experience for her to finally visit China for the first time and revisit Hong Kong 45 years later.


Over the next several days, I'm going to slowly release the dozens of photos that I took during the trip. It's not so much for your sake as it is for my family who was also concerned about her coming to China for the first time...

All in all, I think we both had a wonderful time.

====

Hong Kong:
My mom is not really the heavy shopping-type so I limited our time in Hong Kong to just two full days. On Saturday, I took her to Causeway Bay where she did a brief amount of shopping while I met with the rest of the AnD boys. After that, we headed over to have dinner with the alivenotdead.com team and then to the Chanel Mobile Art Exhibition where Galleri Magazine was having an event. What fortuitous timing -- what women wouldn't want to go to an art exhibition centered around Chanel handbags? It was a pretty snazzy event and something different and distinctively Hong Kong for my mom. After the Chanel event, I took her to Victoria Peak were we were blessed with really beautiful, clear weather and a the best looking night I've seen in Hong Kong.

Sunday was more relaxed: We headed out to Shek O for lunch and a walk on the beach. We then headed over to Tsim Sha Tsui where I walked with her from the Avenue of the Stars down to Harbor City where we grabbed a meal. Finally, I brought her back to Hong Kong via the Star Ferry which she rode 45 years ago while visiting Hong Kong.

My mom was pleasantly surprised by Hong Kong: her impression in 1964 wasn't overly positive -- dirty and dangerous compared to the nicer parts of Taipei at the time. Her viewpoint has definitely changed.

Next album: Shanghai!

Niseko Fun

Wednesday, Feb 20, 2008 1:12PM / Standard Album / Members only
5 pictures / 402 views / 6 comments

January 2008 Photos

Wednesday, Jan 16, 2008 2:53AM / Standard Album / Members only
19 pictures / 945 views / 0 comments

January 2008 starts off with even more fun events
- HK Live 2nd Anniversary at Fringe Club with DP, Hardpack and a special appearance by Soler
- Jan from So What?'s birthday party
- Michael Wong Big Band show TVB Live taping along with Audiotraffic

2007 Holiday Photos

Thursday, Jan 3, 2008 1:48AM / Standard Album / Members only
46 pictures / 1075 views / 11 comments

I can't believe how fun and tiring this holiday season was this year. Our house played host to one Xmas Eve potluck, three guy friends on the sleeping couch, five female friends sleeping on the couch, Wii night, etc... Basically, my house became a hostel for lots of my friends during the holiday season visiting Hong Kong for fun.

I had  a great time showing around my friends from outside of Hong Kong around town -- it's only been one year since I moved here and it feels like it's come full circle with me playing tourguide to all of my friends now.

Here is some of the craziness from this photo album:
- [alive not dead]'s First DJ Showcase at the new club Cliq. Big shoutout to the awesome DJs: DJ TKO, DJ Beware, and Kid Fresh. Also a HUGE shoutout to Alaric for helping us book the club on a busy Friday night. The BEST DJ night I've ever been to, hands-down.

- CityU Bands at HITEC Park featuring Hardpack, Ryan Hui, Shepherds the Weak, King Lychee, and Soler. The sound and lighting sucked ass, but the bands kept up a good mood had a goo time.

- Going with the cast/crew of "Fog" (directed by Kit Hui, starring Terence and Eugenia) on their last day of shooting. We crossed the border into Shenzhen to visit the Aquatic Park there.

- New Year's Eve dinner at Zuma where Janelle invited all of her friends for a MOST AWESOME dinner -- one of the best meals I've ever had. THANKS JANELLE and THANKS DAN!!!

- After Zuma, we all headed over to Cliq again to see DJ Beware and Kid Fresh do ANOTHER set. Everyone from the previous Zuma dinner showed up so we had about 30-40 friends all celebrating together. GREAT

I love holidays spent with friends. Let's do it again!

A very Brady un-Xmas

Friday, Dec 28, 2007 6:12PM / Standard Album / Members only
8 pictures / 540 views / 10 comments

It's my first Christmas in Hong Kong and, without family or a holiday dinner to go to, we decided to make our own Xmas Eve tradition here in Hong Kong and invited all [alive not dead] team and "Fog" (the movie that Kit and Terence are working on) over to Patrick and my place for a big ol' potluck dinner. The following day was followed up by ANOTHER potluck by the OTHER Patrick Li, followed by a night clubbing Hong Kong style.

Welcome to our many friends visiting from abroad for Xmas: Kit, Renee, Jasmine, Jesskah, Eddy, and more..

Dec. 2007 miscellaneous photos | 12月07年 七七八八的照片

Sunday, Dec 23, 2007 11:04PM / Standard Album / Members only
40 pictures / 763 views / 14 comments

Wow, December was quite a month and there were tons of great photos from different fun events.
- Conroy's birthday party at Sweet Jane's
- Watching Warlords at Jet's charity screening event
- Jin performing at Wanchai Convention Center
- Hardpack and Little Fat Pig at Little Fat Pig's album release party at Yo Park
- Jin performing AGAIN at Pi -- with his grandfather in attendance!
- Rozy and Race work super hard with Wing Shya to debut the JC Photography Exhibition
- MGM Grand Macau opening night -- seems like half of the Hong Kong [alive not dead] artists were there!
- Managed to catch the LAST Song of Michael Wong's Big Band event

Lots of great photos -- be sure to check them out!

Random November photos

Thursday, Dec 13, 2007 3:37AM / Standard Album / Members only
26 pictures / 873 views / 5 comments

Lots of November randomness:
- The biiiiig impromptu [alive not dead] karaoke bash at CEO
- Macau Grand Prix with Raffi
- BIRTHDAY!!!
- Quick Underworld concert photos from Japan

An Audiotraffic jam

Sunday, Dec 9, 2007 2:23AM / Event / Members only
26 pictures / 592 views / 6 comments

Okay, is it me or has Hong Kong indie band Audiotraffic been on a tear with the number of concerts they've been playing recently? It seems like every weekend is a new Audiotraffic gig. I'm not complaining, but it just means that I have big backlog of photos from Audiotraffic concerts recently that I want to share with you.

- Audiotraffic closes the 2007 Hong Kong Battle of the Bands (as an invited guest since they won in 2004) at The Cavern

- Audiotraffic headlines at the Ellen Li Breast Cancer Charity Event at the IFC.

- Audiotraffic plays a small gig at Harvest Moon. My good friend 小K/Kelly came along...

Late photos from the November [alive not dead]/Diesel event

Thursday, Dec 6, 2007 11:40PM / Event / Members only
16 pictures / 386 views / 11 comments

Yes, I know I'm probably the last person to post up my overdue photos from [alive not dead] and Diesel's ROCKING event at the end of November. I've been a bit busy -- you know, with this web site... Heheh... in any case, the server fire is extinguished (*fingers crossed*) So now you can check out the AMAZINGLY FUN event: Terry Richardson's eye-raising exhibition, the MOST AMAZINGLY AWESOME rock concert with My Love Puzzle, Hardpack, and Qiu Hong, and the afterparty at Racks.

November 2007

Tuesday, Nov 6, 2007 12:28AM / Standard Album / Members only
15 pictures / 635 views / 11 comments

Photos from November events

A trip to back to Xiamen for Boon's birthday | 回去厦门过Boon的生日

Tuesday, Oct 30, 2007 5:23PM / Standard Album / Members only
12 pictures / 753 views / 16777215 comments

In September, we brought Boon back to Xiamen, China with us -- his first time in Xiamen AND his first trip to REAL China (not the tourist-packaged crap). We spent a couple of days in Xiamen visiting old friends, going to A BUNCH of places at night (seven bars/clubs in three nights), and stuffing ourselves with lots of food... I really want to go back soon to my second-home ...

我们9月份带boon去厦门 - 他的第一次去了,而他的第一次真的有真中国的旅行 (以前去的时候座老外的旅游团). 几天在厦门再看了很多旧朋友, 去很多地方玩, 洗头/足浴, 泡温泉, 吃了很多很多东西... 我真的要快回去我的第二家...

BBQ party at Uncle Ray's house

Tuesday, Oct 30, 2007 5:00PM / Standard Album / Members only
12 pictures / 174 views

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Hawaii Nightlife | 夏威夷夜生活

Sunday, Oct 28, 2007 8:51AM / Standard Album / Members only
27 pictures / 634 views / 10 comments

It's the Alive Not Dead trip to the Hawaii Film Festival for a week of fun and hanging out with the cast/crew of The Heavenly Kings and Finishing the Game.

- The Heavenly Kings screening
- The afterparty for The Heavenly Kings and Finishing the Game at the W Hotel
- Farewell/Connie's birthday dinner at Tanaka of Tokyo
- Karaoke time after the Finishing the Game screening

Hawaii Days | 夏威夷白天

Sunday, Oct 28, 2007 8:38AM / Standard Album / Members only
24 pictures / 656 views / 5 comments

It's the Alive Not Dead trip to the Hawaii Film Festival for a week of fun and hanging out with the cast/crew of The Heavenly Kings and Finishing the Game.

This album includes:
- The trip to the airport
- Arriving in Honolulu at 5:30 in the morning!
- Hitting Hanauma Bay for snorkeling
- A catamaran boat trip for more snorketling
 - Hitting Waikiki beach with Connie

Ya Sei Mei! 24 Herbs MV "Respect Tou Pok Gai" music video shoot | 24 Herbs的MV

Saturday, Sep 15, 2007 11:59PM / Event / Members only
19 pictures / 887 views / 3 comments

Alive Not Dead boat trip | Alive Not Dead 的船行

Saturday, Sep 15, 2007 12:16AM / Event / Members only
17 pictures / 707 views / 6 comments