Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
5 interesting things I learnt about Hongkong
My family of four went to Hongkong last week and I had an enjoyable time picking up casual observances of the lifestyle of the residents there.
Here are 5 interesting things I learnt about Hongkong during my 5 day trip there:
1. The sitting areas in many Hongkong eateries are generally very cramped. I made this conclusion after visiting 3 different 茶餐厅 (Hongkong tea cafe) and a McDonalds and noticed the similar layout of the various eateries - adjacent tables were spaced just centimetres away from each other and the legspace at each table was barely enough for a 1.55m person like me, much less to say someone who is 1.7m or taller. I suspect this could be due to the expensive rental in the country - the shops had to maximize their space.
2. Environmental protection via law enforcement is much more pervasively practised in Hongkong than here. Under the environment levy imposed by the Hongkong government, we had to pay HKD5 twice for requesting for plastic bags from the 7-11 when we purchased some drinks. Another occasion we had to exchange five dollars for a plastic bag was when we purchased some groceries from the supermarket near our hotel. When we visited the supermarket for a second time, I made sure I brought my own recycled bag. So the lesson to learn is that one must bring at least two or three recycled bags if you visit Hongkong. On a more serious note, after this trip, I realise that it isn't really difficult to bring a recycle bag along with us sometimes and hmm, I have even decided that I would not ask for straws the next time I buy a drink and just drink straight from the bottle or can.
3. Something I really like about the hotel and shopping centre which I visited in Hongkong is that they have these sanitisers installed in the premises for visitors. For example, there is a sanitizer at the lift lobby of the Royal Plaza Hotel which we stayed at and a sanitizer outside the foodcourt at the Grand Century Palace shopping centre which we window-shopped and ate a couple of meals at. So far, I have never seen such installations in Singapore hotels or shopping centres.
4. Talking about the shopping centre makes me recall our first day at that place. We were exploring the shopping complex level by level, going up one escalator after another. The building was supposedly 7 storeys high, but we were really puzzled, how come after we explored Level 3 and proceeded to look for Level 4, we just could not find it. The escalator at Level 3 brought us to Level 5, not Level 4 as expected. At first I thought perhaps Level 4 should be accessed via another escalator or something, but after going through the entire Level 3 and not finding another escalator, my clever husband hit on the reason for this strage phenomenon. 4 is a forbidden number in this place! Mandarin speakers will straightaway know what I mean, but for those who are not, in case you encounter this peculiar occurrence as us in Hongkong and wonder why, it is because the number 4 rhymes with the word 'death' in Cantonese, and I guess, the guy who owns this building didn't think it was auspicious to have a fourth story there.
5. The final observation I would like to share is that I notice that they have really BIG dustbins in Hongkong. Most of the places I went, I saw really big and spacious rubbish bins. I think they should have big rubbish bins like these in Singapore. Most of the dustbins in Singapore are really too "slim" and often overflow after half a day.
Oh yeah, and one more thing to add, I love the BIG hotcakes at their Mac! twice the size of Singapore's hotcakes!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Here are 5 interesting things I learnt about Hongkong during my 5 day trip there:
1. The sitting areas in many Hongkong eateries are generally very cramped. I made this conclusion after visiting 3 different 茶餐厅 (Hongkong tea cafe) and a McDonalds and noticed the similar layout of the various eateries - adjacent tables were spaced just centimetres away from each other and the legspace at each table was barely enough for a 1.55m person like me, much less to say someone who is 1.7m or taller. I suspect this could be due to the expensive rental in the country - the shops had to maximize their space.
2. Environmental protection via law enforcement is much more pervasively practised in Hongkong than here. Under the environment levy imposed by the Hongkong government, we had to pay HKD5 twice for requesting for plastic bags from the 7-11 when we purchased some drinks. Another occasion we had to exchange five dollars for a plastic bag was when we purchased some groceries from the supermarket near our hotel. When we visited the supermarket for a second time, I made sure I brought my own recycled bag. So the lesson to learn is that one must bring at least two or three recycled bags if you visit Hongkong. On a more serious note, after this trip, I realise that it isn't really difficult to bring a recycle bag along with us sometimes and hmm, I have even decided that I would not ask for straws the next time I buy a drink and just drink straight from the bottle or can.
3. Something I really like about the hotel and shopping centre which I visited in Hongkong is that they have these sanitisers installed in the premises for visitors. For example, there is a sanitizer at the lift lobby of the Royal Plaza Hotel which we stayed at and a sanitizer outside the foodcourt at the Grand Century Palace shopping centre which we window-shopped and ate a couple of meals at. So far, I have never seen such installations in Singapore hotels or shopping centres.
4. Talking about the shopping centre makes me recall our first day at that place. We were exploring the shopping complex level by level, going up one escalator after another. The building was supposedly 7 storeys high, but we were really puzzled, how come after we explored Level 3 and proceeded to look for Level 4, we just could not find it. The escalator at Level 3 brought us to Level 5, not Level 4 as expected. At first I thought perhaps Level 4 should be accessed via another escalator or something, but after going through the entire Level 3 and not finding another escalator, my clever husband hit on the reason for this strage phenomenon. 4 is a forbidden number in this place! Mandarin speakers will straightaway know what I mean, but for those who are not, in case you encounter this peculiar occurrence as us in Hongkong and wonder why, it is because the number 4 rhymes with the word 'death' in Cantonese, and I guess, the guy who owns this building didn't think it was auspicious to have a fourth story there.
5. The final observation I would like to share is that I notice that they have really BIG dustbins in Hongkong. Most of the places I went, I saw really big and spacious rubbish bins. I think they should have big rubbish bins like these in Singapore. Most of the dustbins in Singapore are really too "slim" and often overflow after half a day.
Oh yeah, and one more thing to add, I love the BIG hotcakes at their Mac! twice the size of Singapore's hotcakes!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Saturday, June 4, 2011
First day of Hong Kong trip - Part 1
Last night, I set my iPhone alarm to 5.20 am to ensure we woke up in time to leave the house by 6.15 am, but turned out that I was so excited about the trip that I somehow "automatically" woke up much earlier at 4.45 am already.
Decided to slack a while more in bed, and I somehow fell asleep again despite my excitedness, so it was lucky my iPhone did duly ring at 5.20 am as planned. Well, the reason I said that is because we all know those infamous incidents where the iPhone alarm did not work as it should.
Talking about iPhone, I love my iPhone despite its little imperfections because on occasions like this, this little device just shows how tuned-in it is to the common needs of people. What occasion? For example, when we need to get a taxi to the airport in 5 mins time at wee hours of 6 am like today. iPhone makes this task seem so easy - just call up the Taxi Booking cab from ComfortDelgro, press the "Book" button and in less than 3 minutes, I received a SMS to inform me that a Toyota Crown taxi 1257 would be at my lift lobby waiting for me.
I guess we are really fortunate to be staying in Singapore, everything was so hassle-free, we managed to reach the airport via ECP in about 20 mins at a cost of $20 which included the $2.50 taxi booking fee.
I love my iPhone too because it allows me to blog on the fly like this. And I do mean literally "on the fly" - because I am now typing this post at an altitude of 9753 metres above ground onboard a cruising SIA 860 jet. Two hours away from my destination, this is a good way to spend this otherwise much wasted time. :)
And I relish recording the sights and sounds I can take in through the corner of my eyes even as I tap on the onscreen keyboard of my iPhone. A baby fussing, a cute little girl toddler chatting away, the footsteps of the crew as they push the trolleys storing the inflight meals across the plane, the flipping of the newspapers two rows away and most of all, the droning sound of the plane engines as the pilot navigates us towards our destination.
Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Decided to slack a while more in bed, and I somehow fell asleep again despite my excitedness, so it was lucky my iPhone did duly ring at 5.20 am as planned. Well, the reason I said that is because we all know those infamous incidents where the iPhone alarm did not work as it should.
Talking about iPhone, I love my iPhone despite its little imperfections because on occasions like this, this little device just shows how tuned-in it is to the common needs of people. What occasion? For example, when we need to get a taxi to the airport in 5 mins time at wee hours of 6 am like today. iPhone makes this task seem so easy - just call up the Taxi Booking cab from ComfortDelgro, press the "Book" button and in less than 3 minutes, I received a SMS to inform me that a Toyota Crown taxi 1257 would be at my lift lobby waiting for me.
I guess we are really fortunate to be staying in Singapore, everything was so hassle-free, we managed to reach the airport via ECP in about 20 mins at a cost of $20 which included the $2.50 taxi booking fee.
I love my iPhone too because it allows me to blog on the fly like this. And I do mean literally "on the fly" - because I am now typing this post at an altitude of 9753 metres above ground onboard a cruising SIA 860 jet. Two hours away from my destination, this is a good way to spend this otherwise much wasted time. :)
And I relish recording the sights and sounds I can take in through the corner of my eyes even as I tap on the onscreen keyboard of my iPhone. A baby fussing, a cute little girl toddler chatting away, the footsteps of the crew as they push the trolleys storing the inflight meals across the plane, the flipping of the newspapers two rows away and most of all, the droning sound of the plane engines as the pilot navigates us towards our destination.
Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Friday, March 25, 2011
The Last Lap
Just 10 days away from completing my last module in my Master's course in NUS.
加油! ^.^
Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
加油! ^.^
Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Planning for our one day trip to JB tomorrow!
Haha, going to JB again tomorrow.
The main objective of our trip this time is to experience a train ride before the Tanjong Pagar KTM station is demolished in July 2011.
We are planning to take a bus to JB Sentral first, shop around JB until afternoon, detour to Danga City Mall in the afternoon to take the train back to Singapore.
Some links that I googled for this plan ;)
This link good to get the train timings
WikiJB - train schedule here
Danga City Mall
We took train from tp
From Singapore to Johor Bahru
NEW BUS SERVICE - S1 SHOPPING SHUTTLE (KSL CITY <-> JB SENTRAL)
Express Rakyat
Long distance travel to Malaysia
The main objective of our trip this time is to experience a train ride before the Tanjong Pagar KTM station is demolished in July 2011.
We are planning to take a bus to JB Sentral first, shop around JB until afternoon, detour to Danga City Mall in the afternoon to take the train back to Singapore.
Some links that I googled for this plan ;)
This link good to get the train timings
WikiJB - train schedule here
Danga City Mall
We took train from tp
From Singapore to Johor Bahru
NEW BUS SERVICE - S1 SHOPPING SHUTTLE (KSL CITY <-> JB SENTRAL)
Express Rakyat
Long distance travel to Malaysia
Monday, February 21, 2011
Felder & Soloman: Learning Styles and Strategies
http://www4.ncsu.edu/unity/lockers/users/f/felder/public/ILSdir/styles.htm
Attended this workshop conducted by Dr Edna Chan this morning. Nice.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)