Mid-Autumn Festival

Today is the 15th day of August in the Chinese calendar. It is the Mid-Autumn Festival, also called the 'Moon Festival'.

Lanterns are very important at the festival. Traditionally, kids play lanterns on this day. Being nostalgic, we went to Western District this afternoon to see the traditional lanterns. There were quite a few shops close together to sell both old and new style lanterns. The shops form a tiny market. There you could find 'the lanterns of your childhood'. They were the rabbits, the fish, the star fruit and many others. The lantern shops made a manificent scene of the area. There was a large variety of different kinds of lanterns for you to choose.

Rabbits are the most significant traditional lanterns.

Star fruit - my favourite. My father could make it.

Gold fish again - very cute

When I was a kid, we could not afford to buy these kinds of lanterns. We could only play with cheap lanterns in cylindrical shape. However, our genius father could make us beautiful lanterns like the ones we saw in the shop. He made us rabbits and star fruit, etc. We are proud of our father and we still talk about it at time :-)

The full Moon at the Moon Festival

It was told by the Observatory Department that the moon was the roundest at 11:38p.m. tonight. (03-10-2009)

Mid-Autumn Festival dinner

We had family dinner at the night of the Mid-autumn Festival. Is it delicious?

New meets old

New meets Old

The picture shows the traditional and the modern style lanterns. You can compare the new plastic ones on the right to the old ones on the left side of the traffic post.

The latest lantern I have seen. It's soft rubber with a ball inside. If you shake or hit the ball, there will be light . If it is in a still position, there is no light.

Plants for teachers

Each year, the Methodist church gives us a small gift as a symbol of respect to our contributions to education. I have received some strange gifts that I didn't like for the last three years. I forgot what the gifts were because every time I received it, I either gave it away to someone at once or put it somewhere and forgot about it.

Surprisingly, the gift was different this year. It was the green plants. I liked it because I myself was planning to buy a plant for my desk. Someone must have read my mind :-) The plants not only promote greening in the staff room but also give lives to the teachers. Why I said that because I feel that the teachers there work day after day from morning till night like a machine. With the plants on their desks, I hope they spare some time each day watering the plants and take a look at them instead of burying their heads in the piles of books on the desk.

An underground trip

I have travelled on Ching Ma Bridge to and fro Chap Lap Kok Airport for many many times. That morning was the first time I travelled under the bridge. It was typhoon no. 8 early in the morning when we saw Alex off on 15th September. The wind was so strong that no cars were allowed on the bridge. I was interested in it only because it was my first experience under the bridge. Besides that, I would rather stay on the bridge to enjoy the beautiful scenery.

Birthday Girl

Yesterday was my birthday. The night before I went to Sai Kung with my friends. We went to a very nice restaurant called Anthony Catch. It was quite small but warm. The food there was fantastic. My friend Kwai Kwai nearly gave it 100%. I think I will go there again. This evening I will go to Sai Kung with Peter. Maybe we will try another restaurant. We go there tonight because tomorrow is Saturday and we can stay late.

It was happy to receive the birthday greetings from my friends on the face book. :-)