Even the best laid plans...

Last night's sunset was pretty impressive. The color of the sky was nothing special but it had been windy for most of the day so all the smog was gone by day's end. The red yellow sun went down in a very clear sky. I saw it while I was jogging and decided to go back again today and take some sunset photos.

I left work on time, managed to catch the exact right bus, got home, picked all my gear and saw…a smoggy sky. The sun was an awesome red but the horizon was smeared by so much haze that I could just barely make out the mountains in the distance. Just goes to show that you can plan all you want, but at the end of the day it all boils down to plain old luck.

Happy?

People keep telling me that I never upload any photos of myself, so here's one that I took while shopping this weekend. I was waiting outside a shop and saw myself reflected in a big metallic pillar, and voila:

BTW, the striped shirt that I'm wearing is by FCUK (no real reason for mentioning this aside from the fact that I love the sound of this brand).

Mutant Noodles

Sunday being the crusp of a grocery week, I had nothing but leftovers in the fridge for lunch. I decided to make some noodles with dumplings and red cabbage. This is what I ended up with:


Normally, I stir fry the red cabbage and it releases a nice reddish purple color. Somehow, prolonged boiling with the noodles resulted in the colors breaking down further to a bluish turquoise.

Ooo, so pretty...I sincerely hope that these were naturally occuring dyes...

"Freedom" of the press

There was a big Falun Gong parade in Causeway Bay today. I know this because I was stuck in a bus for over an hour due to the traffic jam caused by the parade. And yet, there was absolutely no mention of this on any of the news programs tonight.

Now, because of the sensitive nature of Falun Gong, it's hard not to think that all the local news stations chose not to mention this event to avoid provocation with the government. Which lead me to think, does "Freedom of the Press" refer to the freedom to disclose the news, or simply the freedom to release infomation at their discretion?

Personally, I've always believed that the press should report objectively and allow me to draw my own conclusions, although this obviously - and sadly - is becoming less and less the case.

At any rate, I would have liked to have known about the parade today so that I could have avoided going to Causeway Bay. It's bad enough to be delayed, but to be delayed by mindless fanatics like the 廢 "lun" 功 is extremely vexing...

After the storm

As expected, after last night's freak storm, today's weather was especially beautiful. That insane amount of rain and wind really cleaned out the skies. I can't remember the last time Victoria Harbor looked this colorful:

Went back after work for some Magic Hour shots. Some cloud formations would have made for more interesting shots, but I'm not complaining:

One last shot of the AIA Ferris Wheel before the Carnival ends this weekend:

Respect

Flipped on the TV after coming home late from dinner last night and saw the last hour of the Hong Kong Film Awards. One word: crap. Make that 2: total crap.

I know, I know...what did I expect? It's only the HK Film Awards, not the Oscars. That's the response that you hear most often, which when you think about it is rather sad. The main defense people have for the show is one of lowered expectations (along the lines of "Of course Billy can't run 100m in 10 seconds; he's just a kid, what do you expect?"). It's an issue of Respect, or lack thereof. Not only lack of respect from us, but lack of respect from themselves.

The problem is that they just don't care. I've been saying for years (even wrote the HKFAA several times) about how half-assed the nominations clips are. The clips are supposed to represent the reason why the person being nominated deserves to win, yet clip after clip, year after year we just get a random splice of some scene from the movie, with little relevence to the subject matter. I remember last year during the 10 second clip for an actress nominated for the Best Supporting role, about 8 seconds were used showing someone else! I mean, there has to be a reason why this person was nominated, right? How hard is it to find the one scene in the movie that gives us the audience proof that they deserve to win? By just spewing out some random scene, it's hard to avoid the feeling that the people in charge just wanted to get the task over with.

Another issue of respect: look at the ordering of the awards. Traditionally, the Big 5 are Film, Director, Actor, Actress and Screenplay (usually in that order). Now let's look at last night's ordering. Screenplay was issued before I tuned in, but the final 4 were Actress, Director, Actor and Film. So what can we infer from this? Movie > Actor > Director > Actress. Quite a slap in the face for Actresses and Directors.

Now let's look at the awards presenters. Could they be any more unprepared? Basic etiquette of being an awards presenter: know the names of the nominees in your category. It takes like, 2 minutes backstage to ask someone how to pronounce all the names on your list. You can't even take 2 minutes to learn 5 names? I guess they were all too busy making sure they hair, make-up and wardrobe were set.

Which brings me to another point: is it really that hard to just wear proper attire? A simple tux for the gents and nice evening wear for the ladies; just to show that you respect this formal occasion. What is which all the casual jeans and tacky bizarre dresses?

Oh, one last thing. Please get over the whole Even Hollywood is Borrowing From Us routine. Yes, "Infernal Affairs" was the basis of last year's Oscar hit "The Departed" and yes, it's encouraging that a screenplay from HK made it big in Hollywood. But lets put things in perspective; that's one screenplay that someone borrowed from HK out of the hundreds of movies that HK copied from others. It's good to be encouraged, but don't let it go to your head.

The film industry is always complaining that it doesn't get enough respect. Newsflash: respect is earned, not given away.

Top of the World

Today turned out to be another sunny Sunday. I didn't really have anywhere to go but I didn't want to waste the great weather, so I went for a quick stroll around the Peak.

You know, I've passed this huge Banyan tree countless times, but I never photographed it before. I wonder how old it is?



It never ceases to amaze me the way people use pets as a vanity project. The perfect grooming aside, look at those little red booties.

Despite the great weather, the smog situation was still pretty severe. Look at the view from today:

compared to the view from 2005:

And the sad thing is knowing that things will only get worse for a long time before they get better (if they get better).

Woah, sometimes I still find it hard to believe the density of the buildings in HK:

Here are 2 photos that rank under the category of "Making the Best of a Situation." As many of you know, I'm a stair freak. Love to shoot 'em, even when they aren't that interesting. So when I saw the escalators in the Peak Galleria, I just had to shoot them. But the lighting was a bit too low and I had issues with camera-shake blur. So I made the best of the situation and did some zoom blur shots.

Here's a more conventional shot. Actually, I'm trying to figure out whether this version or the cropped version is more effective. Which do you prefer?

It figures...

4 days of crappy weather and on the last day of the long weekend, when it's too late to plan anything, we get weather like this:


What was the weather like on Thursday, when I planned on going to Ngong Ping 360 *? Cloudy with rain. Friday, when I went to Shing Mun? Cloudy with rain. Sunday, when I went to Cheung Chau? Cloudy with rain. Then suddenly on Monday afternoon, we get blue skies and white clouds. Mother Nature can be one fickle beeyotch (I expect to get struck by lightning any moment now).

* Of course, I guess I should be grateful that the weather wasn't good enough to visit Ngong Ping 360, considering it broke down tonight for the umpteenth time. Who wrote that pathetic control program anyways? I mean come on; it's just a cable car system. It's not rocket science. The cable cars at Ocean Park have been in use for 30 years without half as many failures as NP360 has had in the last year. Someone needs to lose their job big time.

Anyways, took advantage of the late afternoon change of weather and went for a nice jog (wanted to go swimming but it was too late and the outdoor pool was closed for the day). Great weather for it, sunny and cool. Saw that old ship docked in Deep Water bay again. I'll have to ask Ginger if she can get me on that thing. It'd make a great backdrop for a photo shoot.

Oh, and here's a random pic. Ebony and Ivory, live together in perfect, harmony...

Been a long time...

I went on a hike with some family in Shing Mun Reservoir Park yesterday. Although it was cumbersome, I brought my D80 and tripod with me because it'd been nearly 2 years since my last photo visit to the area. The sky was overcast and a boring gray, but at least it made for a comfortable hike.

The water levels were already beginning to rise and despite the gray skies, the waters were a nice dark green (made even deeper because I used a circular polarizer):




I found a secluded little spot in the northern part of the reservoir. The lighting was pretty flat so I decided to experiment with the shot to make it look more like it was shot with IR film (the original can be seen here):



I think this spot would probably look better during the wet season when the water levels flood the park.

Anyways, it was probably stupid of me to do this ('coz I was alone at this point and I had zero phone reception), but I hiked upstream to see if I could get closer to the source of the water. I am SO glad that I wore my trusty Timberland hiking shoes because it was a slippery trail (I had about $10,000 worth of non-waterproof gear with me so any slip would have been costly...). But in the end, I think it was worth it because I finally reached this area:

More photos of Shing Mun (both Wet and Dry seasons) here.