Farewell Summer

I've been really ill. I had a fever, blocked nose and sore throat. I spent the last two weeks sleeping my life away. Today is my third last day in Hong Kong and I'm not ready to leave yet. Funny because I used to always leave home for a few months.

Sometimes, I think about the food in Korea:

O'sulloc I love you

Really good noodles in Jeju

I still think about this

Ewha isn't food but I want to squeeze this photo in

O'sulloc froyo *_*

Then I think about the real-world responsibilities ahead of me:
School work
Exams, exams and exams
A job
......
...
:(

I apologise if this post seems depressing and I sound like the exact opposite of what an outgoing exchange student should be... Apparently I should be "happy" and "excited to see the world"? Well, truth to be told, I'm excited about living in a new city and exploring what it has to offer. But the preparation is a lot of work, plus I don't think I'll have energy to go around. I was excited about tiff and my 5k race. But the tickets to screenings I wanted to go sold out within the first hour! And I haven't run in a month... I better stop here before this post gets even sadder. I'll update when I've arrived in Toronto. Ttyl!

"Where Has My Summer Gone?"

For the past week, the question I have been asking my friends --- “where has my summer gone?”

A: DOWN THE DRAIN!

Still remember in May after my exams, I was slightly worried about the length of my summer holiday. 3.5 months! Will it be boring? What activities/productive things can I do? But I should have known better... This summer is just like any other summers, I did nothing apart from wasting my life away.

PHOTO SPAM TIME (warning: image heavy!)
click to enlarge

27 May 2013 The first official day of my long hot summer vacay. We went sing karaoke, duh. High school kids were still in school then, so the place was pretty empty. We were given a massive party room. By massive I mean MASSIVE. There was even a Xbox Kinect in our room. (We continued with Kinect in the waiting area... who knew you would get extremely sore arms and legs from Kinect?)

29 May 2013 I visited the giant Rubber Duck (which wasn't very big). This is so out of my character, I know I know... but I'm from Hong Kong, what do you expect? (To be quite honest with you I didn't want to go...) For lunch/tea we had Butao Ramen, it was Yoyo's first time and my n-th time. I could only say the quality was deteriorating.

31 May 2013 The Great Gatsby movie date avec ma belle amie Theodora. We were let down by the movie but not by the food we ate afterwards. We had Shun Hing 順興車仔麵茶餐廳 in Tai Hang and our all-time favourite Kasho Chaya (which we chose over Lab Made because "if I want to eat custard buns, why don't I eat an actual custard bun?". But I was a hypocrite as I had Lab Made for the second time in July... and I really did have custard bun ice-cream).

(This is getting a bit long... from now on I'm only going to list really interesting things)

8 June 2013 Tracy, an exchange student from Toronto who is super awesome, took me to the Peak with her friends! I hadn't been there for almost 10 years. It was my first time hiking up to the Peak. The view from Lugard Road was mesmerising!

12 - 17 June 2013 KOREA TRIP. Annyeong haseyo! Before the trip I was disappointed we weren't going to England this summer (my "busy" mother had to work)... but it turned out Korea was GREAT! It was a 6-day trip so I had spent quite a bit of time planning -- looking at maps, organising various things... A tricky thing was that maps in Korea are in Korean (as opposed to HK maps which can be searched in both English and Chinese), but we had GPS in Jeju and I made use of Konest when in Seoul. I'm still happy that my family loved the places and the food that I had included in the trip :) (more and better photos were taken with my DSLR, but I still haven't imported them to my computer...)

Our car in Jeju

Ugly me but I want to show you readers that Koreans love to wrap their meat in sesame leaves

"Is this the boarding pass?"

I love this graphic but it's outside a smoking room... Thought that was weird

very cute logo of Jeju Air

My sister and me have dirty minds... when we were younger we heard there was correlation between the size of one's nose and the size of one's _____, so when we saw the logo that was the first thing that came to mind

First thing that greeted me in Seoul, reminded me of Mei Tu Xiu Xiu 美圖秀秀

From some building in Myeongdong

Gyeongbokgung Palace

Mukshidonna, one of the best meals in Korea

Also one of the best meals in Korea - Sinseon Seolnongtang, it's a chain restaurant but it's so good

Definitely visiting Seoul again soon!


29 June 2013 Went to the Peak again, this time with high school buddies!

July was spent having fun with my buddies, seeing old friends and building friendships... and ahem, working.


4 July 2013 Music Rocks the Valley! Had lots of beer and fun. Got lots of freebies. Awesome night.

6 July 2013 Eason's Life concert. I like Eason Chan's songs but is never a big fan of him... after the concert I understand why he's the King of Pop. Man, he's SO good live.

9 July 2013 First day of work! Visited the Poho area finally... even the air there was artsy~ (mainly because it was quiet I guess, or "tranquil" as pretentious people would say)

14 July 2013 This summer I've gotten into hiking... Thank god I have friends who are already into hiking or enjoy being healthy in general. Laetitia, Simmy, Yoyo and me went to Dragon's Back. Gloomy weather, but still a good hike nonetheless!

27 July 2013 Mahjong with my buddies. Hadn't played actual mahjong in almost two years? That day was a perfect example of how good people in life could always lift your mood and spirits.

28 July 2013 Went hiking again. Hong Kong Trail Part 5... the endless flights of stairs and the heights! It wasn't so positive that the weather would be good that day, but that morning I woke up -- I knew that God wanted me to be healthy and hike! Haha :P

6 August 2013 Dragon's Back on a good day! It was even more beautiful than the photoshopped photos on the Hong Kong Tourism Board website.

Photo courtesy of Elsie

9 August 2013 Went to the Peak again with two fun/cool/inspiring people. I know I always go to the Peak, but I would never get bored of the views!

Hiking is a great activity because it's a fun exercise, unlike going to the cinema it allows for quality chatting times and the views are always great (well, the air is always fresher)! Once I've gone to enough new places I'll write a separate post on hiking,

Seems that this summer isn't so bad after all. Less than three weeks left!

[低質post]一日一件事

悠長暑假很頹，現錄下每天memorable的事，迫自己productive些少。


六月一日
在Deli and Wine排隊買下午茶發生了一個很Celeste & Jesse Forever的事情。 那時大約有六七個人在排隊。當我排到隊頭時，有一位剛剛買完茶餐的女士拿着錢包，問我「可以比我加單買點東西嗎？」，其實可以說是打尖。不過這麼突然的問我，我當然說沒有問題。之後我就想起：

之後收銀員叫那位女士重新排隊，她卻很生氣離開。 哈哈，難道收銀員也看過Celeste & Jesse Forever？ 雖然只是很trivial的事然而，但我覺得很memorable。

六月二日
自從我家附近的租碟店結業後，便沒有機會看新推出的電影DVD（窮學生沒錢），所以一直很想找一間離家不太遠的alternative。之前在黃頁（！！還有人用這東西的！？）發現了一間在家方圓十里內的租碟店， 今天終於有機會到訪! 現今的租碟店都很勁，竟有自己的面書專頁！依據面書專頁提供的地址，在google map找到店的確實位置後，我便出門了！整件事很有以前獨自在倫敦探險的感覺！

六月三日
上了人生第一堂的Les Mills RPM！感覺有少少像跑完Standard Chartered 10k的I DID IT！其實想上RPM很久，但經常覺得自己很unfit，跟一些很fit的陌生人一同踏健身單車會很awkward。而且gym的spinning bikes有限，上RPM/spinning要首先sign up，一直很put off by這點，我是個很spontaneous的人嗎！ 我是班中的其中一個newbie，還有另一位，不過我不知她/他是誰… 其他的RPM-ers是已經成群結隊很pro的regulars。初時我亦有點尷尬，我不懂該如何set up 那單車（對不起現在也不懂），warm up踏單車亦踏得很慢（不明白為甚麼那些pro regulars可以把resistance調得很高但仍可以摩打腳）。之後我開始投入，我想差少少便可以跟regulars們比下去呢！我是個高水平的newbie :)
Edited: Would I do it again? Probably. I am surprised that RPM hasn't killed my legs. Of course soreness is inevitable, but I can still speed-walk and climb up flights of stairs the next day… I've expected it to hurt a lot more, as I remember that during the class, I thought I was gonna die of dehydration!

六月四日
一壽司料理是個伏。只有froyo可取。

六月五日
很想quote The Great Gatsby： “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” ― F. Scott Fitzgerald

六月六日
七點睡，十點半起床，去gym跑步。真是水皮了很多，跑了兩公里就要停… 之後cool down十年體溫才回復正常。真的真的要多練跑噢！ Toronto 5k here I come!

放假啦啦啦啦啦啦

博客你好，我們很久沒見了。

身為一個勤奮學生，學業是我的priority。所以我的讀者們，請接受我衷心的一句 – duibuqi！現在考完試了，吃了2046篤大便（duibuqi again），我終可以跟我的悠長頹廢暑假講聲哈囉。

大家知道revision week最好做甚麼？當然不是溫習啦，而是計劃考試後一系列的活動。我發夢發過天天去游泳跑步看電影看書放狗，還有學好français。我曾經可以用法文寫一篇幾百字coherent的文章，but merde happens，只好重新學過。幾時？下世啦。

今天看了The Great Gatsby 《大亨小傳》。雖然古語有云：沒有希望就沒有失望，我進場前沒有任何期望，但看罷電影後還是有點失望。我一直很欣賞創新-ness，但是那soundtrack？格格不入！一大敗筆。很多的場景亦沒有我想像的美。現在不寫那麼多，要留下墨水，詳細評論請留意魚與蝌蚪Fish & Tadpole！

這一個鏡頭笑死了我和Theo。

<無恥> 寫blog是試後活動的其中一環。所以大家可把florsflor.blogspot.com加進我的最愛， 說不定隔幾天再訪，一篇新post會等著你呢！</無恥>

On Life of Pi

I wrote a part of this post four weeks ago... Note to self: don't leave unfinished writing lying around Desktop!

A PILE OF SPOILERS AHEAD


Surely HALLUCINATING should be 100%? source

I had struggled for a long time on whether I should watch Life of Pi. In the end, as I've said in my last post, I "manned up" and saw it in 3D. Now I want to see it again in IMAX.

My internal debate started because 1. I love animals, 2. apparently Life of Pi is SO good that one has to see it in theatres in 3D no matter what. I really wanted to see it through my 3D glasses, but then I feared the death of so many animals would make the situation difficult. So I got a friend and into the cinema we went.

This isn't going to be a thorough review because I don't have many opinions on the film itself. I was too carried away by my own emotions to pay attention to the details of the film. Yet, there are still something I would like to comment on:

1. Not particular a fan of the guy who plays the Canadian writer. God, is he awkward! Unless you've been living under a rock, you should know the main story of Life of Pi is a metaphor. After the adult Pi finishes telling the second story, the writer tries saying what means what flatly. That's totally unnecessary! Perhaps they're trying to explain the second story to the younger members in the audience, but that ruins the whole thing for me. I understand the writer and Pi have just met, and they shouldn't act like they've been buddies for life and etc... but the guy who plays the Canadian writer, Rafe Spall, seems so uncomfortable! On the other hand, Irrfan Khan, who plays the adult Pi, is so natural. The contrast's quite obvious and this makes the very last part of the film hard to watch... it literally ruins THE WHOLE THING, for it's a disappointing ending, and endings always account for 50% of films.

2. In Hong Kong, the film is given a I rating, i.e. according to the Television and Entertainment Licensing Authority, Life of Pi is "Suitable For All Ages". I read many reviews which said something along the line that adults and children could get different things from the film. Adults may get from it a great moral lesson, whereas children could see it as a big adventure of a boy and a tiger. I beg to hold a different opinion - the film's not for kids. At my screening there were lots of weeping children, weeping because of their fear for Richard Parker, the tiger. They cried and screamed at the scene in which Richard Parker first appeared, and were silent later on... Younger siblings of my friends didn't enjoy the film, as they didn't "get it". What a waste of a great film! Personally I've wasted too many good movies by seeing them too early in life, but Life of Pi shouldn't be wasted like this!!! A child-friendly rating doesn't imply a film for kids.

3. Amazing visuals. Especially love the scene that Pi looked into the ocean with Richard Parker and various images flew out.

4. It seems very childish of me, but I actually was let down by the fact that the tiger's not actually a tiger! When I saw Pi taming Richard Parker, and them eventually growing closer, I thought of my dog and me, and other human beings with animals as companions. Then WHAM BAM, Richard Parker is Pi's alter-ego... Another disappointment of mine that doesn't make sense - WHY THEY NEVER BECOME BFFs LIKE ME AND HANHAN LI? This disappointment doesn't make sense because it's already established at the beginning of the film that tigers and humans can never be friends (that was also when the goat magically passed through the gate, if you know what I mean... that still bothers me)...

5. Pi's a really religious man. Life of Pi is a very religious movie. The whole journey's possible pretty much because of God. What I like about the film is that it never preaches (at least not till the very end). Religious themes are obvious, but as someone who holds negative views towards religious elements in films, I never said "It must be God again!?". Even at times I felt that Pi is too religious, you'd accept that's the way he is, I didn't feel annoyed like I was watching The Tree of Life. Yes, I never run out of Tree of Life jokes.

PERSONAL: Sometimes I'm quite jealous of people who are religious. I was quite religious a few years ago, then I woke up one day and I didn't believe at all. At the end of the film, Pi asked "which story do you prefer?" Anyone with a heart would choose the first story, and Pi said "so it goes with God". That might well be preachy, and it reminded me of Religious Studies at school. I saw Jesus's miracles merely as stories back then, not proof that God exists. Choosing the first story means believing in it and thus committing to God? That's not right!

But still I envy those who have a God, or in Pi's case, Gods, to fall back on. When these people feel helpless, they pray and they feel better. That doesn't work for me. Perhaps I'm too scientific/mathematical/logical. Does God exist? Have you got the proof? I wish I could have faith, that might make me a happier person, and if I ever end up in a shipwreck, I might survive, just like Pi.

-------------------------

同場加映：
所有想看 ∩ (上映了 ∪ 將會上映的電影)（應該沒有時間 :( ）：

CURRENTLY IN CINEMAS:
ARGO
WARM BODIES
HITCHCOCK
MOVIE 43 (for Naomi Watts, obvs)

FEB 21:
BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD

FEB 28:
SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK
STOKER

MAR 7:
AMOUR

MAR 14:
THE MASTER

APR 11:
I GIVE IT A YEAR