Diving in Cebu

Last weekend I was in Cebu, Philippines, for some diving with a few friends. Very, very nice.

We spent the day on this interesting kind of outrigger boat, apparently called Bangka:

They're fairly fast, and very smooth on the water. (I assume that this outrigger is used (rather than keel boats as in HK) because on one hand, there's lots of space, but on the other hand, the water can be very shallow.) Anyway, the water and weather were brilliant:

So, we went on two dives. A nice relaxing current moved us along, and we saw a variety of fish.

(I still have pretty bad sunburn on the areas not covered by the shorty wetsuit.)

We engaged in some (presumably ecologically questionable) fish feeding, and had clouds (schools? I love collective nouns, the English revenge for Chinese measure words...) of fish around us, among them a particularly greedy large yellow one that we dubbed the "investment banker fish".

Excellent dinner afterwards at this place called abacá:

On a side note, we had lots of fun emulating Asian poses, such as "Pointing":

Taxes, Sailing, and some edifying links

Just finished my Hong Kong tax return in under 18 minutes. You copy over a few numbers from your pay slip, apply a few deductions, and that's it. The top tax rate for salary tax in HK is 15% this year (last year it was 16%, but hey, the government made too much money, so they just returned everyone half of the tax they had collected (subject to a cap)). No taxes on capital gains, interest, etc. Can't complain, really.

(US citizens and green card holders pay US taxes, of course... (unless they're lucky enough to be dual citizens, and reside outside the US). And, if give up your US citizenship, or give up your green card (or the government rescinds your gree ncard!), you are subject to an exit tax of some 40% or so on your net wealth...)

On a different note, I've just completed sailing class (HKSF, level 1&2), that was a lot of fun. And great people, too. I'll carry on with it. The first two days the weather was awful, but the last two days it was brilliant. Mediterranean. Really nice.

Finally, a couple of good links (or, to be more precise, first two links to boring virtual presences representing good real places, then three links to good websites representing no real place):

Enoteca - my favourite restaurant in HK (well, it's just across the road, too, but the pizza and tapas are tasty, and the staff very friendly, and they have a good selection of wines open, as the name implies).

Chilli Fagara - Sichuan food. Spicy. Good for Western visitors (and me), in my opinion, in that it gets the spices and taste right (as far as I can tell), but has (what Westerners would consider) proper meat, rather than the mix of bones and skin and tendons that seem to be characteristic of authentic Sichuan food.

Kiva - Allows you extend a micro credit to a borrower in a developing country.

CouchSurfing - Allows a traveller to stay on someone else's couch, on a reciprocal basis.

Stickk - Allows you to enter a binding contract to help you fulfill a commitment to yourself, e. g. to lose weight, quit smoking, etc.

The etiology of "The shrimp fucks the cabbage"

here at the wonderful Language Log.

My first computer :-)

Just found an old bill from the Vobis Data Computer GmbH: I bought my first computer, a wonderful Sinclair ZX81, on 11 Oct 1983 (when I was 11 years old). It cost 148 DM, or about 75 EUR.

It had 1 KB of RAM, a membrane keyboard, and a graphical resolution of 44 x 64 pixels. I computed Mandelbrot sets on it (Apfelmännchen) - it would plot one pixel every few seconds. The CPU (a Zilog Z80 running at 3.25 MHz) had to render the screen, and there was a FAST mode that would disable screen rendering and run computations 4 times as fast. Storage was on a MC tape recorder.

The 16KB RAM extension cost 85 DM. The MacBook Pro I'm writing this on, 25 years later, has about 125000 times as much RAM (a compound growth rate of about 47% p.a. - remarkably close to Moore's law!).

Spiderman

This guy climbed up the Four Seasons today during lunch, and why not? (You'll probably have to click on the picture to see him - there are better pictures out there, I'm sure:)

Highlights from the JP Morgan conference call on the Bear Stearns acquisition

Mike Cavanagh - JPMorgan Chase - CFO:
Okay, I think we're going to take just one or two more, operator.
Unidentified Participant:
Hi, this is (inaudible). I'm an individual investor. I was just wondering how this valuation helps the Bear Stearns shareholders rather than go through a Chapter 11 and an orderly liquidation of the assets of the company?
Mike Cavanagh - JPMorgan Chase - CFO:
I'm afraid you have to ask that question to Bear Stearns.
Unidentified Participant:
Well, I vote not to approve the sale.
Mike Cavanagh - JPMorgan Chase - CFO:
Okay. Next question, operator?

and, close to the end:

Susan Katzke - Credit Suisse - Analyst:
Okay. And just to clarify, does Bear Stearns own its building?

Bear Stearns shares traded at $170 a year ago, now they're bought by JPM for $2 a share because of (mostly) mortgage write-downs, and analysts worry whether that price at least includes the building...

HK humidity, culture, mango

Just bought a dehumidifier. It is hot and humid here. Also got a water filter, so I don't have to carry bottles of BonAqua from the 7/11 at the corner anymore - waste of plastic, really.

Last weekend, I had lunch with Jack (whom I know from London). His wife now works with my ex-colleague Philip - small world... After a goooood lunch, I strolled back to the Star Ferry terminal. On the way, I dropped into the HK Cultural Center. They have a free performance every Saturday afternoon, it turns out - I still haven't quite figured out how the HK economy works (however, apparently a third of tax revenues come from the financial sector - my colleagues, in other words). This week, there was a Mexican Mariachi band. It was fun - so far, I had only seen them on markets and streets in, well, Mexico. They play very rhythmic and passionate music, and in Latin America, will immediately have everyone dancing, or at least twitching. Here, in HK, nobody of the (predominantly elderly Chinese) audience was moving or swaying in the least. A classical clash of cultures moment. However, next a pretty Mexican couple appeared on stage and danced, and soon everyone was clapping and getting into the swing of things.

Just opposite the ferry terminal, there's my favourite Chinese sweet/dessert spot: 許留山 (Xu Liu Shan - little remember mountain?). Wonderful mango/coconut/aloe/grapefruit pudding-drinks. I had two. Internationally, they're known as Creation Dessert, and Xiaochen introduced me to it in the (significant) China town in Milpitas, California. I suggest to skip the items containing "Crystal Snow" (seems to be a mix of frog fat and frog ovaries, extracted from the whole reproductive tract...) and "Bird's nest" (an actual bird's nest, composed of "interwoven strands of salivary laminae cement", that is bird's spit).

This Friday, Thai dinner with Bjoern - his girl friend is moving here this weekend, so we bid farewell to his bacholorhood. Saturday, dinner at Enoteca on my street, then dessert (Tiramisu) at Peccato - the best Tiramisu in HK I've encountered so far (it still falls short of the one Almudena prepares though).

Back in HK

Monday had Thai/Malaysian food and then drinks in LKF with Ling and a couch surfer, including some fun live music by a South African band.
Tuesday, I finally met Neil - we had been playing telephone ping-pong for a while. We ended up in the Gecko just under the escalator - great live jazz, really enjoyable, and this rather unique Irish Whiskey, Connemara. It's peated (that is, the malt is dried over a peat (Torf) fire), and as such somewhat of a hybrid between Irish and Scotch. Now, I'm a big fan of pure pot still (that's what a year in Ireland does to you), but this Connemara is really rather intriguing. (Ironically, the only distillery in Ireland that produces "Scotch" type Whiskey is the only one that's actually Irish owned. Go figure.) A very pleasant evening. Wednesday went to the grand opening of Q bar in LKF with Paul - swish club, then pizza close to home.
Thursday some random hedge fund function in the Dragon-I ("Overrated, bad drinks and lots of people with attitude (bankers and too-skinny models)" - indeed. The next quote captures the spirit of the place perfectly - I think the irony is not intended: "People always say they don't like Dragon-I and that it's superficial and full of vapid people, but I always seem to have fun there!"). Then, however, great simple dinner with Ling and Neil in the Enoteca. To top it off, we had a quick drink at home: some Calvados and some 1994 Middleton Very Rare - now we're talking pot still (mostly). And from there, it went all downhill... :-)

Notes in passing:

1. One hour after I landed in Paris CDG recently, I was still at the luggage belt waiting for my, well, luggage. One hour after I landed in HKG on Sunday, I was at home (with my luggage).
   To get home, I had taken the Airport Express (around EUR 10) and then a cab (around EUR 2).


2. In the week since arriving from the airport, doing all of the above and working full time, I haven't had to use any form of transport at all (except walking and the escalator). No cars, busses, nothing. It's all just around the corner. Another reason I like HK.

Friday, then, was dedicated to work and sleep. Saturday a junk trip with some colleagues (including my excellent ex-colleague Philip) and friends. Visibility was rather bad, but jumping from the boat and (attempts at) wakeboarding were great fun nevertheless. Afterwards with Ling to the FCC ball - black tie, cocktails, dinner, and fantastic live music with Sérgio Mendes . He played his classic hits, and some newer stuff ("Bossa-Hop"). The keyboard did collapse on his knees at one point, and lamentably he walked out during the encore, leaving the (great) band to finish the song. 5am the guys had to catch a plane back. A fun night. Then to Hardys in LKF, where Ling's uncle Rudy performed on stage. And from there, it went all downhill... :-)

Qingdao (青岛）

Last weekend I was in Qīngdǎo (青岛, "green island" - very original. Note that while it's reasonably green, it (like man) is no island) in Shāndōng province (山东, "Mountain East").

In 1897, two German missionaries were hacked to pieces in Shāndōng. So, Kaiser Wilhelm II sent the German navy to occupy the area. Next year, the Chinese government leased the bay to Germany for 99 years (same year it leased Hong Kong to Britain for 99 years), but canceled the lease in 1914 (but not the HK lease).

So, anyway, the area was under German administration for some 15 years, and, needless to say, has since been home to China's largest brewery, Tsingtao Brewery (very original), which, incidentally, held the Qingdao International Beer Festival in Qingdao that very weekend I happened to be there with my good friend Ling to study Mandarin.

Here, I'm practicing how to order a beverage in Mandarin (普通话):

Here, I'm practicing how to consume a beverage in China:

They had quite a number of huge beer tents there, Paulaner, Weihenstephaner, Erdinger, with wooden benches, beer, barbecue, and a stage with singers and entertainers of dubious quality - just like the Oktoberfest. Of course, they also provided equally attractive non-alcoholic beverages (EANABs) for teetotalers, such as Bud Light. (Note: EANAB is not a term I made up. Every year the Stanford German Student Association organizes an Oktoberfest. When submitting the 3 or 4 party application forms one has to submit in Stanford to have a party, we have to agree to provide EANABS (that is, not just water or Bud Light, but juice, smoothies, et cetera. For the excruciating details, see this "party" planning document, appropriately hosted by Stanford's risk management department. Another note, while we're at it: We also organized an annual "Feuerzangenbowle" in December. We'd watch the movie (a fun old film with Heinz Rühmann), and prepare and drink the eponymous traditional Christmas drink. Until, well, one year the administration realized that the Feuerzangenbowle is an alcoholic (!!) drink. Now, there is a guideline that events at Stanford may not be promoted with alcohol, and in particular not contain references to alcohol in the title. So, we had to rename our traditional Feuerzangenbowle where we watched "Feuerzangenbowle" and drank Feuerzangenbowle from "Feuerzangenbowle" to "Traditional German Pre-Christmas Movie Evening" or something like that. Land of the free.)

I wasn't sure what food I'd get here (note the 2nd picture):
so I bought a lamb (I hope) kebab with wonderful cumin from this very funny guy instead.


Next to all the beer tents there was a fun fair, and they had the "Ranger" there, which I fondly remember from the annual autumn fun fair in Moers, Germany, years ago. It got stuck occasionally up-side-down. This one here did, in fact, display warning signs in stern German.


Next day, we braved some more dangers,

including

• an incredibly hot (as in spicy) Sichuan (四川) dinner. (Note: surely no accident that the language of England has no word for hot (as in spicy), and has to resort to "hot" (as in warm) instead to describe the somewhat similar sensation). Anyway, this food was seriously hot; in fact, I experienced the tingling numbness in my mouth caused by Sichuan pepper (the "ma" in málà (麻辣)). (The dish was called "Kung Fu Beef".) All Sichuan food I had previously eaten (in the USA, HK, and mainland China itself) was just a weak knockoff. Fun Fun. Another Sichuan food experience.


• an evening in a Karaoke Bar. Not necessarily my cup of tea - nothing against Black Label with Green Tea, but this whole singing thing is not my thing.


• Some sailing the next day. The 2008 Olympic Sailing Regatta will be held in Qingdao. So, we rented a 6m boat from a local club, and went out for two hours with Teddy, the lovely Bulgarian from the club, and Xiaoqin, the Chinese instructor. A good morning. It was relaxing and peaceful, and we were tempted to jump in the water for some swimming, but then saw some huge jellyfish. Not so appetizing.


• Oh, and we also missed our initial flight with Dragonair to Qingdao Friday morning, as we were both out late on Thursday evening. So, survived a flight with China Eastern instead.

Beethoven.


One more thing: Ling speaks Cantonese very well, but Mandarin less so (he grew up in England). Now, when the cab drivers talked to us and realized that there were a few select phrases I (foreign devil) could utter (after lots of practice), while Ling spoke freely, but hesitantly with a Cantonese accent, they'd berate him without end how on earth it was possible that my Mandarin was better than his. Very entertaining, and certainly gave my study motivation a boost :-)

Korea: More

The Peace Museum:


The Seoul Dano Folk Festival 2007 was fun. I enjoyed the singing:

So did this guy:

Most of all, I liked the drumming. Sounded good, looked good.

Traditional hair washing. Don't ask me.


Here, a time capsule is buried. I reached out for aliens.