Last night, from our club pool. By our backyard. As every night. Used to be actual live bursting fireworks. Drones is better, don’t you think?
There were plenty more animals and cutesy drone-thingies in the sky. But I’ll leave it at that one octopus. As with actual fireworks, “enough” is pretty quickly enough! Don’t you think?
Happy "Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Establishment Day". A Hong Kong holiday.
28 29 years ago that Hong Kong was handed over to the Chinese government, by the UK government.
In Chinese it's 回归, Hui Gui, which is much simpler and much more descriptive. It means "the return of Hong Kong to our beloved motherland".
28 29 years ago, last night, Jing and I sat in a Wanchai Bar, watching the proceedings. All the Chinese army waiting on the Shenzhen side, to cross over into Hong Kong on the stroke of midnight.
It was a very wet, rainy night. Prince Charles was here for the handover, and famously described the Chinese bureaucrats at the ceremony as "appalling old wax works". It would be good if he was as honest today about Islam in Britain as he was then about those appallling Chinese apparatchiks.
Jing was pregnant with John, who was born two weeks later.
The Chinese largely kept out of Hong Kong politics, until forced to do so by the riots of 2019. But even then, I think it's fair to say, they handled that with a light hand, given what they could have done and many people, including people here in Hong Kong, were calling for them to do.
One simple thing to note: unlike most post-colonial places, Beijing has not demanded the change of a single name of a single street or building in Hong Kong. It's still Victoria Harbour, Victoria Park, Queen Elizabeth street, Pottinger St, Des Voeux road, and so on. I'd guess there's been more renaming in Australia than here in Hong Kong.
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| Byron in the park next to our house in Discovery Bay Mountains in the back: the Tiger Head range |
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| Far left: ICC Centre, 108 floors. IFC Two Tower. The Peak |
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| Stanley Beach, south Hong Kong Island |
Good exercise too! Fun for the littlies...
Our version, here in Discovery Bay, Lantau Island, Hong Kong:
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| Tai Pak Beach, Discovery Bay |
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| Our Byron. In Siena Park |
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| Our Byron, contemplates three tennis balls. On our local Siena Park. “Why is nobody throwing them for me? Gerrr…” |
In the background is Discovery College, a private school of the English Schools Foundation on International Baccalaureate curriculum. Our son attended.
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| Gabrielle was the sidekick of Xena |
This is the little wooden boat I built in our backyard in 2013. She was at the Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club in Wanchai, for some mast and keel work. Then we towed her back home to Discovery Bay. See my blog about the build here.
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| Hotel Auberge, North Plaza, Discovery Bay, at left Central Hong Kong, in the middle far distance |
