ChriSpace

33 dead in Virginia shooting

What a sad day in the states.  33 dead in Virginia Tech shooting.  This is total craziness.  As America continue to legalize gun ownerships, these thing will continue to happen.  Some say more people should carry guns to protect themselves as the government won't protect you under these circumstances.  I think gun ownerships should be banned completely to dis-allow  young people from easily obtaining guns.

May the Lord heal the wounded and comfort the victims' families.

Interesting trade scenario

How about getting Kevin Garnett for the Mavs? Dirk and KG together - a force to reckon with. KG mend the middle. He's also a passer and a great rebounder. But, Mavs might need to give up Dampier or JT or Stack for KG. No one really put this scenario on the block.

Watched Mavs vs. Lakers in HK

After I moved to HK, NBA games have become a rarity to me because my cable TV does not have many games aired.  I can get the HK$400/season pass which is quite cheap.  However I didn't as I don't wanna watch that many games (and I am POOR at the same time!).  So, all I get is 3 games per week.  And random games as well (like the loser Hornet vs. Clippers, duh!).  HK people don't really care about basketball...

So i was super-lucky yesterday as I got to watch Mavs. vs. Lakers.  However, why did the Mavs lose!!??!  I was so disappointed because they had their 13-game win streak coming into this game vs. Lakers.  Then, with an obvious foul to Jason Terry and a fake 3-point play by Sasha Vujacic, the Lakers escaped with a W...unbelievable.  The refs must have received $$ from the Lakers to make 2 insane mistakes at the end of this game.

Hmm, I think this blog shouldn't call NBA blog.  It's more like Mavericks blog, hahaha.

Dallas Mavericks is the current hottest team in the NBA

Can't believe after they let Steve Nash go and traded Michael Finley away two years ago, they become the team with the highest win-percentage stepping into Year 2007.  They have the young legs in Josh Howard and Devin Harris to run the backcourt, which gives them a lot of energy and spark for a potent offense.  They've the more and more consistent plays from Erick Dampier, which is traded from Golden State.  While Dampier was in Warriors, his inconsistent plays are his major weakness.  Who will have imagined he is now a major component of a championship-caliber Mavericks team which lead the team in blocks and sometimes rebounds?

Of course there is the killer instinct of Jason Terry, which cannot be compared with Steve Nash's passing skills at all.  But his daggers during late games are cold-blooded and any great teams will need a guy like this to win at tight games.  6th man Jerry Stackhouse always give a spark to the team when he got off the bench.  Then, the 7-foot captain Dirk Nowitzki concludes the excellent team of Dallas.  His silky-smooth jumpshots, his unguardable 3-pointers, his solid rebounds, and his increasingly potent passing skills all make this team better and better.

No excuse not to be the NBA Championship this year :)

Dirk is Mine!

Gilbert Arenas is sick

I think my typepad blog has become my NBA rants :)

Gilbert dropped 54 on the Suns in an 144 vs. 139 OT win over the Suns, on their homecourt.  Wow!  What a thriller, I wished I was there to witness the craziness.  This Gilbert guy dropped 60 on the Lakers in OT the week before, and Kobe can't do anything about it although he scored 45 against the Wizards.  Then, Steve Nash matched his career-high with 42 points and 12 assists and STILL LOST, wtf.  Gilbert is totally show-time.  Now Kobe got to stand aside because Gilbert IS the Showtime!

If I am Steve Nash or Kobe, next game playing the Wizards I am going to drop 100 on them  :P

The Mavericks will reach the Finals again

"It's tough to come back the next year because the season before is so long," said Bryant, a veteran of four Finals. "At the beginning of the season, there's going to be some rough patches. All in all, [the Mavericks] are doing well. They'll be there in the end again. They have great versatility."

This was what Kobe Bryant said about the Mavericks.

I can't believe it.  The arrogant Kobe has changed!  But that doesn't mean I like him a bit.  Thanks Kobe for predicting the Mavs will defeat everyone in the Western Conference (including Lakers) and reaches the Finals again.

Culturally Fit - Part I

I want to start a series of entries about the cultural stuff I have encountered throughout my time in the states.  I want to be as objective as possible.  The purpose of this is to give my own perspective about fitting in a culture across the continent. 

For people like me who grow up in Hong Kong til highschool, then went to college in states and worked for many years, there are two scenarios for people like me when it comes to deciding a long-term 'home' in a cultural context:

A. Assimilating American Culture
To fully utilize or enjoy what America can offer to individuals, you have to totally immerse yourself into the American culture.  What does that mean?  It means giving up your own Hong Kong culture (or what they called FOB-ness) and be ready to be Americanized.  Action items are:

• Build your social circles around caucasians and those who enjoys living in the states but born and raised in a foreign country.
• Give up your hobbies you have developed while you are a kid in HK, and embrace what American culture gives you.
• Cut ties with your FOB friends, and hang out with your Caucasian or Asian American friends
• Develop American hobbies, like football, baseball, basketball, skiing etc.
• Stop following HK news and gossips! 
• Be aware of U.S. news and politics.

B. Go Back to where you belong (be it Taiwan, or HK, or China)
Go back to work and live where you have grown up.  This is the only way for you to completely get back to your own cultural identity and not feel alienated.

• Re-build friendships with old classmates, relatives and childhood friends.  Since you have not been seeing them for quite some time, TIME is needed to re-build these friendships
• Be mentally ready for adjustments in living style and working habits.  U.S. culture and Chinese culture, afterall, is two vastly different culture.  I am talking about reverse cultural-shock here!!  Some people can't take it, some can; some takes shorter time, some takes longer.  Be adaptive and flexible.
• There will still be some 'American Way' inside you.  Treasure it and use it as your 'edge' towards locals.  It always comes in handy - your English, your oversea's experiences, your broad exposure, your friendship circle etc......

C. Experience a brand-new culture
This is for the young and brave who can challenge themselves to live in another country - Europe, Middle-East etc.  Yes, I know friends who are multicultural-aware and spend time in foreign countries exploring and learning lots.  This is probably the most rewarding experience one can get.  But of course, can you sustain life with this kind of backpacking lifestyle?  Can you live a nomad life?  This gets tougher if you are married and/or have childen.

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I have seen numerous people who are 'in-between'.  Some can tolerate it, some cannot.  A lot of people ended up getting stuck with the same group of people for many many years, because they neither 1) want to transform themselves into a more Americanized person, nor 2) Go back to the country where they belong.  Of course, if you are close or ready to retire, it doesn't matter as you just want to live a quiet life doing whatever you like.  But if you are still young, then why not give yourself a chance to be A or B or C?  Calculate your risks, and pick something that is suitable to you.  No one but yourself can control the destiny of yourself.

Travelog - Trip to Korea Day 2

Day 2: Modern and Energetic Lifebeat of Seoul

押鷗亭(Apgujeong)

Day 2, we got up really late, like 10:30am because the night before it was too exhausting after doing so much sight-seeing.  During lunch-time, we went to an area called Apgujeong, which is a high-end shopping area.  The district has a lot of shops selling international brands.   We decided to have Korean-style cold noodles for lunch.  The restaurant is small but very authentic.  You need to remove your shoes and sit on the tatami.  Again, we spoke no Korean and there was no food pictures anywhere in the restaurant.  What to do?  We pointed at the food pictures in our tour-book and the waitresses immediately got what we wanted.  Two bowls of auhentic Korean cold-noodles arrived shortly!  Then I saw some 餃子at the other tables, so I pointed those to the waitress and we got some of those too.  Oh they were all so yummy and cheap. 

After we filled our stomach with good food, we decided to walk around Apgujeong district.  The streets of Apgujeong are very narrow but clean, reminding me of streets in Japan.  On the way, I saw a very nice bakery shop with cafe on the 2nd floor.  Went in and took some pictures.  Then we went into a Korean CD shop and sampled some local Korean pop.  They were all so good and both Jayson and I purchased a few.  On the way back, Jayson saw an HSBC branch and he got real excited and took several pics of it (since he works there).  We took the train and moved onto our next stop.

龍山電子商城

Lung-Shan electronic city is a place selling all sorts of electronic goods.  It also has a 'normal' mall besides it selling different goods and have another building featuring all sorts of restaurants.  It is indeed a huge place.  Each floor of the electronic city features like 40-50 small shops selling one type of goods.  For example, one floor sells entirely mp3 players; one sells video games; one sells computer accessaries.  We got onto the floor selling mobile phones.  The folks on that floor all tried to stop us on our way and pursue us to buy their mobile phones and plans with Korean.  We must have passed like 6-7 sales before we could reach the escalator to escape from this floor!!

We got into yet another CD shop and purchased more CDs.  We also browsed around a shop selling Japanese Gundam models.  We checked our emails for a while at a free internet booth.  Then we had some Japanese fusion food for the night, a break from traditional Korean food.  Food was okay, not exciting and not un-edible.  We then took the train again and moved onto our next destination - Hong Ik University.

弘益大學(Hong Ik University)

Actually to be more precise, we didn't actually go into the university itself, but went to the surroundings.  As there are lots of young students for this university, the districts around the U are geared towards young people.  It was already night-time when we arrived the area.  The district was packed with young people - cool!  There was this street music festival going on, and we sat on the street for a while to listen to a singer-song writer performing some indie-type music.  Quite good with accoustic guitar and very unique music.  Then we walked around and felt a little of the night scene of Hong Ik district, with street food, street stores etc.  We passed by a 3-storey karaoke shop featuring all-transparent glass.  Everyone on the street can actually see what the customers are doing inside the rooms!!  Very very cool.

新村(Sinchon)

Our next stop is Sinchon.  We wanted to go check out the Hyundai Department Store (yes the Korean automobile maker.  They've their own departo).  Unfortunately it was already late at night so it's closed.  We then found this nice cafe called 'A Twosome Place' and decided to get some desserts.  This place has some real amazing cakes and desserts.  I couldn't stop myself taking pictures of cakes.  Some staff of the cafe needed to stop me from taking all those pictures :)  I then ordered a Korean-style yogurt called Yogi.  It's probably the best ice-cream yogurt I've ever had - not sour, very soft and tasty, not too sweet, very chill.  With some berries on top, this was definitely one of the best desserts I've ever had.  Not cheap though, I think it was like HK$50.  But well worth the price.

This concludes our second day trip.  Not as intense as the first day. But we still managed to check out the modern life of Seoul.

Some Updates

I haven't been seriously updating what's up with myself here for a while.  So i think it's a good time to write something here.

So I have been living in Hong Kong for the past 6 months.  Although still finding that right job, living in Hong Kong is better than I originally thought.  I enjoy the convenience of taking MTR, KCR, buses and mini-buses daily going to various places; there are so many air-conditioned malls and shopping centres it is so great just do window shopping inside them; then there is the variety of food and beverages and desserts available anywhere in the city.  The prices are very cheap and the taste is good; the convenience of calling friends and have fun - sing K, go to concerts, just chat, have dinner etc; TV is local - informative news covering world news, lots of funny shows and variety programmes, movie channels 24 hours a day plus music channels; convenience of going to nearby asian countries for vacation like Korea, Japan, Singapore, China, Taiwan; and then my flat is great.  It is quiet and cool and I try to keep it as clean as possible; making friends at church, meeting old friends who come back from bay-area to live, seeing relatives, spend time with old classmates...

So far I just have to say I am so glad to have made the decision to come back to HK
this past March.