On Thunderstorms, Grumpy Cat Faces and Other Things

Hello again everyone!

Rewind a bit to a few weeks ago when our school put on an outdoor jazz concert.  My office is directly below the podium (the commons area outside where people eat and hang out and the elementary students have recess).  The whole thing is tiled.  When the set up crew was rolling big heavy boxes across the podium it sounded just like thunder in my office.  I got so excited to see a thunderstorm I ran outside only to find a bright sunny day and the realization of what was actually making the noise.

I LOVE thunderstorms   Not the scary tornado ones or the ones with crazy winds and torrential rains, but the ones that make a lot of noise and have enough rain so that you can hear it tap lightly on the windows.  I think I started getting really excited about thunderstorms after my family moved to Minnesota because when a thunderstorm happened, it meant that the snow was going to melt and that spring was right around the corner!  Even though it has been warm and humid here (in the 70-80F range) for the past few weeks, we have not had any "Spring signaling" rains that I am used to from back home.

This week we had our very first thunderstorm of 2013 in Hong Kong.  I heard the distant rumble as soon as I got home and threw open the curtains to discover that it was not another event getting set up on the podium - it was a genuine storm cloud (either a nimbostratus or stratocumulus or both - I was too excited to remember it exactly)!!!  The cloud got closer and the rumblings got louder and then there was lightning!! And rain!!! Sweet rain to clear the air! :)  It was fantastic :)

I was so wrapped up gazing out the window I forgot to take a pic.  Something that I noticed later on was that a good number of my Hong Kong friends updated their facebook statuses with something about the storm :)

Ok, now that I have gushed about the thunderstorm (haha), I'll go over some things that we did the past few weeks.

Slow burning incense

Art at Che Kung Temple

Che Kung Temple from the outside

The church that we go to is on a hill above the Che Kung Temple MTR stop.  We realized a few weeks ago that we had not been to the Temple or the Hong Kong Heritage Museum at that stop so we decided to change that.  The temple was quite busy.  There were lots of people there worshiping and offering incense bundles.  There were also drums that you could hit.  I think it had something to do with the end of the Chinese New Year celebrations.

Burning incense 

Inside the temple

One funny anecdote from Chinese New Year - they sell these spinny, jingly, pinwheel things (with bells on them) near the temples.  I think they are supposed to keep spirits away (Please don't hold me to that - I could have misheard when I asked someone).  There are small ones, medium sized ones and super gigantic ones.  I don't think you were supposed to bring the super gigantic ones onto the trains, but some people did.  Most of the people that had them on the train held them close so they would not spin or make a noise.  There was one guy on a fairly busy train who was at the middle of the car that did not.

The Spinny Jingly Things!!!

When the trains move, air generally blows straight down the middle of the cars.  It is quite refreshing compared to the trains in Sydney where the air was stagnant and uncomfortable.  This one guy looked just like Grumpy Cat.  He had a sour face and his arms were crossed just like a little kid who was not getting his way.  The only difference is that he had a gigantic spinny thing in one of his hands.  When the train started moving, you heard this whirring and jingling sound and when you turned to look, Grumpy Cat Guy was holding the spinny, jingly thing and the pinwheels were going crazy and he kept his Grumpy Cat face.

A close up of the spinny jingly things :)

Normally people on the MTR keep to themselves.  There isn't a lot of talking and almost everyone is on their phone.  On THAT train, EVERYONE turned to look to see what was making the noise and then EVERYONE made eye contact with each other and smiled a small smile while Grumpy Cat Guy kept holding his Grumpy Cat face while holding the spinny, jingly thing high in the air.  We all shared a moment and as soon as Tim and I got off that train we burst into laughter.

A whole bunch of them!!!

It was FANTASTIC.  I hope that Grumpy Cat Guy realized how much joy he was creating in that car.  :)

Ok back to exploring, when we were done at Che Kung Temple, we headed to the Hong Kong Heritage Museum to see what was there.  It was super cheap to get in compared to museums of similar quality in the US and was fantastic!  My high school teachers in Minnesota that did History Day would have a field day with all of the display ideas that were there.  It was for sure on par with the Science Museum of Minnesota.

The Hong Kong Heritage Museum

The Cantonese Opera Exhibit

Their special exhibit was on the Faberge family from Russia, and they had four of the famous Easter Eggs on display.  I took photos of two of them before being told by one of the museum people that no photos were allowed (in my defense, the sign was about the size of my hand and blended in with the extravagant background at the entrance of the exhibit).  The eggs (and everything else there) was so small and had amazing detailing.  It was hard to believe that someone was capable of making things that small soooo beautiful.

Faberge Eggs!

:)

Some other highlights of the past few weeks:

Hiking the Dragon's Back (Famous trail in HK)

Heading up the Dragon's Back

The Dragon's Back

The view down the other side

At the top!

Chaperoning/Coaching Badminton (that was an experience!)

:)

Hiking from Discovery Bay to Mui Wo Pier via the Trappist Monastery and ending at Silvermine Beach

Discovery Bay (Looks more European than HK)

Leaving the Monastery

The Trappist Monastery which was home to a dairy for a long time

The trail down to Silvermine Bay

At Silvermine Beach

We got some Trappist Chocolate Milk to celebrate finishing the hike!

Tim took a choir to festival and he felt like they did well.  He also went to McDonalds earlier that day at 5:30am and got a free Egg McMuffin. :)

The line went around the store by the time he left!

Another update to come about this weekend - student led conferences, yoga, the Rugby Sevens and the Shatin Methodist 15th Anniversary Celebration!!!

Thankful to have you read this :)

It's my turn to write the blog post, and quite frankly, I am drawing a huge blank as to what I can share with everyone.  Life here in Hong Kong has been fairly normal and has comfortably followed the ebb and flow of the life of two 27 year olds.  But, knowing that friends and family love to see the photos, it is good to keep these posts a-coming.  I guess in many ways it is also healthy for me too to hit pause on my brain and look back at what has been happening in the past few weeks.  So here are a few photos for the sharing.  Please enjoy!!!

Orchids in the Hong Kong Arboretum.

A close up of an orchid.  They are really popular here!!

Tim dressed as the Cookie Monster for Book Character Day at school.

Tim got sick and had to wear the "mask of shame."

Growing old and growing up are two different things :)
Christine with her two giant googly-eyes!

We have been doing a bit of hiking on some of the many Hong Kong urban hiking trails like the MacLehose Trail.

And so as we all approach the middle of March (beware the Ides of March!!:) Christine and I hope that everything in your lives is going well.   Keep doing good things for the people that are in your lives.  Holding the door, smiling, and sharing any little thing that you have are good universal ways to start (if you need pointers :)  Please know that you are being thought of with a big smile by two goofy folks in Hong Kong. 

Much Love and take care of each other for us,

Tim and Christine

The Standard Chartered Hong Kong 1/2 Marathon

Click Photos to make them larger :)

Last Sunday was the Standard Chartered Hong Kong 1/2 Marathon.  There were just over 72,000 people that participated in the full marathon, half marathon and 10K races that went on.  It was quite a memorable experience.  Both Tim and I participated in the 1/2 Marathon.  He ran the whole time and I mostly walked (but sort of ran the downhills - I'll explain more later).  Tim's race started at 6am and mine was at 9:30am. 

Tim met up with four other staff member from our school at a certain train station.  It was the 5-5-5.  5 people meeting on platform 5 in Tai Wai at 5am.  They all arrived with enough time to check bags and use the porta-pottie (there were two different options - a squatter one and a "western" style which is the one with an actual toilet in it) and be ready for the race to start.  People were swarming everywhere and the scent of wintergreen hung in the air.  He was happy with his time and said that he was ready to run the race again now that he knows the course.  He felt like he was still doing well at the end.

Getting ready in the MTR

You could smell the scent of the icy hot as soon as you got off the train

I got up and got to the train station by 7:15 (Tim was almost finished at this point...).  There were runners getting on at every stop along the way.  One of the things that we have noticed when it comes to athletic things in Hong Kong is that people have the gear.  There was a LOT of compression tights and shorts and most of the people in my race wore either their official race shirt, the shirt of their running team or a shirt from another running race.  The other accessory that about 3 out of 4 people had in their hands was their cell phone!  I had decided to check my phone in my bag so that my hands would be relatively free during the race.  I wish I had pictures of all of the people stopping to take pictures of EVERY kilometer marker.  There were usually 4-5 people waiting to take a picture with each sign.  The line for the toilets along the route only had 1-2 people waiting. 

Waking up and getting ready in the station

Last pic before packing the phone.  Sorry about the lack of photos of people taking photos.

Ok back to the beginning.  I arrived at the Tsim Sha Tsui station and it was FILLED with people warming up, stretching and applying a cream that is similar to icy hot.  The air smelled of wintergreen.  I followed suit of everyone in the station and stretched and got my stuff ready to go there.  I took a few pics pre-race and then turned in my bag.  I walked around slowly to stay warm and then eventually went to the start area.  There were a few people in costumes!  There was a spiderman, a ninja, and several people dressed up as sharks to protest against shark fin soup.  I had heard about the sharks before, it was fun seeing them in person :)  After seeing spiderman pose with several people, it was time to line up.  All of the race information was given in Cantonese so I'm not sure what was being said.  When people at the front of the waiting area started cheering, people at the back continued.  I don't know if they understood what was being yelled either from the huge time delay in yelling :)

Once we passed the starting line, the race was really quiet.  There was hardly anyone cheering until the last kilometer of the race!  It didn't really help that the first big chunk was an out and back on a big bridge and I don't know that spectators were allowed there.  There were a few bridges with some people, but it wasn't very many.  I mostly walked but I was able to run very small pieces (mostly the downhill sections).  I was in kind of a time crunch.  The fastest 1/2 that I have done was 3 hours and 17 minutes.  The time limit for this one was 3 hours.  They had the big double decker busses to pick up people who weren't going to make it.  I was hoping that was the case up until the turn around (where the half met up with the full marathon).  Thankfully that ended up being the case and they let me finish!  I didn't get picked up!  The only big bummer is that I have NO idea what my time was.  There wasn't a clock at the start to tell me when I started...  It is sometime between 3 hours and 3 hours and 25 minutes.  I'm hoping its closer to 3 hours. :)

One of the really interesting things that happened along the way were the huge teams of medics with icy hot.  You would go by them and if you held out your hand, they squirted some in it.  So many people were stopping to put some on!  I had never heard of that before. 

Yay I finished!!!

The last kilometer of the race was LINED with people!  It was really cool!  Strange that the whole rest of the race was so quiet, but an awesome way to finish :)  I got my tote bag of food and drinks and then headed to pick up my stuff and meet Tim.  We had pizza at one of our favorite places and then asked ourselves, "We just completed a 1/2 Marathon, what should we do next?"  After growing up watching the players answer the question after each superbowl, we concluded that the ONLY place to go next would be to go to DISNEYLAND!!!

:)

One of the perks about having a season pass is that we don't have to always run around like crazy when we are there.  We leisurely walked around, rode our favorite ride twice (the Grizzly Gulch runaway mine cars), watched some entertainers (in Grizzly Gulch and then the marching band), ate a nice dinner (super tasty ramen), and then headed home.  It was a great way to spend the rest of the day. :)

It was still decorated for Chinese New Year :)