Words from a book!

I am reading a book right now , and it is not my MacBook or a cookbook, no it is a real book. Not that a cookbook isn't a real book, no what I mean is, it is a kind of story and though it is not fiction -or not completely. It is a story about a young American teacher who volunteered to teach English at the teachers college in Fuling in the Sichuan province, and he is telling about his first impressions in a Chinese city.
The book is called; "River Town" and is written by Perter Hessler. At one point he is reflecting about the noises and the traffic in the city, and when I read that I nearly couldn't stop laughing as it was the best description to the phenomenon we experienced this summer on our visit to China. So I'm going to quote Peter Hesslers words:

"Noise was even more impressive. Most of it came from the car horns, and it is difficult to explain how constant this sound was. I can start by saying: Drivers in Fuling honked a lot. There weren't a great number of cars. but there were enough, and they were always passing each other in a mad rush to get wherever they were going. Most of them were cabs, and virtually every cabby in Fuling had rewired his horn so it was triggered by a contact point at the tip of the gearshift. They did this for convenience; because of the hills, drivers shifted gears frequently, and with their hand on the stick it was possible to touch the contact point ever so slightly and the horn would sound. They honked at other cars, and they honked at pedestrians. hey honked whenever they passed somebody, or whenever they were being passed themselves. They honked when nobody was passing but somebody might be considering it, or when the road was empty and there was nobody to pass but the thought of passing or being passed had just passed through the drivers mind. Just like that, an unthinking reflex: the driver honked. They did it so often that they didn't even feel the contact point beneath their fingers, and the other drivers and pedestrians were so familiar with the sound that they essentially didn't hear it. Nobody reacted to horns anymore; they served no purpose. A honk in Fuling was like the tree falling in the forest-for all intents and purposes it was silent."

Page 62 and 63 from the book "River Town" by Peter Hessler, published by John Murray Paperbacks, 2001.

Exitement in the little village!

Normally there is not a lot of excitement in our sleepy little village here at the east coast of the new territories. The exitement we sometimes have is normally about some pitty fallouts between some of the poeple visiting the little watering hole, we use to call the "Dong". But the typhoon from last week then turned out to have left something for us, to occupie our imagination.
A ship was wrecked on the beach and left there with no way to get out on it's own.
I'm not sure if somebody really knows where it came from or who it belong to. The day I went down to get my curiosity fullfilled, I saw how somebody actually had buildt somekind of scaffolding -of the Hong Kong typical bamboo kind- around the backpart of the ship, and this seemed to be an obstacle if the owners wants to pull the ship out to sea again. Onbord there was one guy with a mobile phone, and he seemed to guard the ship. I tried to ask him when and how, but he didn't understand and just made a sign to the sky, showing that it had something to do with the wild weather. He wasn't chinese nor caucasian, more like from india or so. So now all the speculation goes on; where did this ship come from and why was it in the bay of Sai Kung.
And ofcorse the imagination among the sleepy villagers come out with the fiercest theories. What fact is, I can't say at the moment and maybe never, but it is a bit exiting, and if I ever get the true story about this incident, I promise to tell you.

More morning Music!

In Fact I'm trying to find some useful clips here on youtube, which I can use as examples when teaching the students some different tricks and methods of storytelling and editing, but then I always find this stuff, and want to share it.
So if you need some power for the Monday coming; then listen to this Native American tune.

Good morning music for a grey Monday!

Back in the early 90ties I was quite happy about the band EMF and their record; "Schubert dip!"
For a long time I haven't heard anything from them, but then I discovered this amazing version of the song; "Unbelievable" featuring grand old master; Mr. Tom Jones.

Good morning Picture of today.

"Thin red line"
Digital Photo, Korean autonomous region, northeast China
July 2009

Teddybear for PEACE!

Today is the international peace day.
All over the world has this day been celebrated with thousands of events to mark the demand for peace.

Eddie Kang.
"Cornered"
mixed media on canvas.
80 x 80 cm, 2009

What have you done for peace today?

Live 21st century learning post.

Amazing possibilities in this world nowadays. Live blogging from the 21st century learning conference at Hong Kong International School.
I’m at a forum, discussing the role of a possible digital technology coach in schools.
It is a bit funny to attend a conference like this, with over 500 teachers from nearly all over gets together to discus and reflect on the 21st century learning. Every subject or presentation is nearly about technology and how to use it. Everybody has his or her own laptop, and all presentations has an underlying soundtrack of keyboard tipping or what ever people are doing sitting around with the laptop lid open. Myself included.
As I wrote in the recent post, I also had to do a presentation, or in fact it was a workshop, but any way, my own presentation went well and I didn’t mind people having their laptop open and switched on, as I am sure they just took notes and wrote all my “fantastic golden” points for later use. So you might guess that I’m a bit – or aid in a better way- a lot more relaxed and excited, as this has been my first public or official presentation -outside my own school- I’ve done since coming to Hong Kong, and I can’t stop thinking about this, that again here in Hong Kong, I am doing the same thing, as I did in Dresden, now it is just in English, but again; I always have to educate Teachers.

21st century learning.

First of all I want to thank Sabrina from "Medienkulturzentrum", who placed comments about our well being after the typhoon, an who also responded earlier at the "lifelonglearnig" post.
It is nice to feel that somebody is really reading this.
Saying this I also want's to pay all respect to the "Medienkulturzentrum", to the "Filmcamp's" project, and to "Medientraktor.e.V., for what they are doing.
They do the right and have done this for many years, because now aspects of this work is the content of a conference here in the south Asia region; called "21st century learning."
People from all over has traveled here for some wise words about technology in schools and in the education, everybody with their own laptop, twitter and facebook account..
I am going to be -or I am a official presenter at this conference, and I have to speak about; "the story in students videos".
I will for sure use all of the experience that i gathered at the; Medienkulturzentrum, for doing so, and in the same breath, say thank you to them for giving me this experience, and for seeing how things is done here, apart from better cover of computers, the considerate use of them was better "back there".
The "Medienkulturzentrum" is -how I see it - still in many ways, one of the front runners of the 21st century learning.
I've just came back from the conferences opening "cocktail evening", and writing this, I'm following a game of pool at my local bar, reflecting of the things I've heard so far at the conference.
Blogging from a bar; so to speak, which also has something to do with the way the 21st century has been kicked of; now you can be online everywhere.

Night of yet another T8!

I can’t say we’ve had a lot of these typhoons this year. Last year I think we had about 7 of them hitting or affecting Hong Kong. Yesterday it kind of came unexpected. In the morning they –Hong Kong Observatory- issued the warning T1, as a typhoon was about 200 kilometers from Hong Kong. It was forecasted to pass on a southern route into Mainland China, and therefore leave Hong Kong seemingly unaffected.
None of us had expected the way it went. At noon signal T3 was hoisted and wind and heavy rain was over the city. By 4 PM the message came that the signal T8 would be hoisted at 6 PM as the typhoon had chosen a more northern direction as previously expected, and therefore also have a big impact on Hong Kong.
The signal T8 is also a signal to leave work or whatever you might do or wherever you might be, and seek home to take all precautions to secure house and belongings.
The storm came and was roaring through the valleys and over the mountains and the trees was swinging back and forth like in the hand of a big angry giant.
We were cuddling up in our house with a good film.
By bed time the wind was extremely heavy and we could hear all kind of noises from the outside. Suddenly a big bump came from our rooftop, I thought it was one of our plants falling over, and just hoped it didn’t break. There would be nothing I could do anyway.
Later a series of loud bumps woke me up, and I went to the rooftop to have a look.
Between our roof top and the neighbor there is a wall, and on that wall a bit metal fence. This was bend all over and threatening to get ripped of, with bolts and everything.
I do not know what I was thinking, but suddenly I found myself standing there in the heavy storm, at 2 AM in the morning, trying to hold a metal fence to avoid it from breaking of.
I realized it was meaningless and left it as it was as I just didn’t know what to do, in fact I could do nothing at all, just hope it would stay up there and not be blown away or fall down on anybody or anything.
Later the rain came, and by the morning there was still the T8 in force, but along with that the Amber Rain warning, which meant; School would be closed for the day, and we just had to get in and report after noon, if the signal was lowered to a T3 by 10 AM.
I guess this is one of the good things coming along with the typhoons, to get the day off.
The signal T3 was issued at 10, so we got to work in the afternoon, but off cause there was no students there, so we had yet another half day to get some preparations and some planning done. Now the typhoon has gone but left us with some very heavy rain falls, so again we’re just stuck inside the house, and most of the tidying after the typhoon has been impossible, so all over in our village, the path ways and slopes is covered in leafs, branches and what ever might been flying through the air.

The All Blacks vs. the Tartan Army!

Everybody knows that the All Blacks do their Hakka to intimidate their opponents before a match of rugby. But what does the Scots do?

And while I'm already at the very good commercials, I'll ad another -Ad- which funny enough also was shown by a major rugby event.

Good acting in both of the films!

Cuddling up for typhoon Koppu!

Since 6 PM we have a T8 warning. Typhoon Koppu is passing and the wind has risen to severe storm gale and we cuddle up in our house with a good film, some tea and a little post here. Outside the wind is blowing and we hear the howling in the windows and doors.
Unfortunately the storm couldn't wait to come so near. I mean if it just had waited like 6 or 7 hours, we might have got a day of work, as when the T8 warning is up, everything closes down, so also the school. Now it probably will be over in the morning, and we can get back to work at 8 AM.
Then it is only to get out to see which damages the nightly visitor has -Koppu- has left behind on its way to the western Guangdong province.

Video surveillance!

Since this day 8 years ago cctv and video surveillance has got a complete new meaning.
Everywhere and always do we get scrutinized where we go and what we do. Not many public and private areas are without these devices, and politicians even demand more and stronger ways to decrease our privacy and freedom by increasing the surveillance by means of protecting the society against terrorist and other “hostile” intruders.
Some gets very upset and makes a lot of noise when they encounter strangers, others are more calm and let them closer to get a good look at them.

the 9th of the 9th 2009!

This datum needs a post. I mean how many people are getting married today world wide because of these magic numbers, which aint magic at all, it is just how we see it.
I'm quite tired and have been up for many hours and don't really know what to say -or write.
But I feel that the date need to -or earn a post from here. So I'll give you some photos.
Two to be precise, and these two shows kind of the contrasts and the diversity you can find, living in Hong Kong.
So if it is true what people say; that a picture tells more than a thousand words, then here you go; 2 thousands words!
Good night!

Lifelong learning!

Two years ago when we first arrived here and moved in to our house, we also got some mobile phones from a tele company here. I wont mention the name because I don’t think it would be that good advertisement for them.
Anyway these cameras could –like all of them nowadays- take photos and even some kind of video, and for me that was exciting as I was a complete novice in using these modern forms of telecommunication, and then also to get a camera.
I’d worked with film and video for the last 15 years, but on the real art with filming and editing in one to one quality and broadcasting on master tapes and stuff like that, never on the new art of videoing with a mobile phone and boost it to youtube 5 minutes later and all.
My first mobile phone I got was in 2006, and then just a simple one without camera, so I was very keen to the prospects, being able to do some photos and some videos from our new home; Hong Kong.
Along with these phones we got a CD to install on the computer, so we should be able to synchronize calendars, e-mails and other stuff, and to transfer photos and videos. We were –and are- Mac users, and that was a problem as these CD’s and phones was only for PC.
At the beginning I tried everything, but no; I just couldn’t get the footage of that phone. After a while I just forgot about it and also my fascination with the phone and text messaging dropped rapidly as I found out that my messages didn’t reach my friends back in Europe –or not all- and when I got a text from somebody –even here in Hong Kong- then it was a couple of days old, so I forgot everything about the mobile camera and the footage already on it, I didn’t have access to it so what!
Last week at work a thought suddenly struck me out of the blue; “Bluetooth!”
My laptop has Bluetooth, so does the f…… phone. Please do not laugh at me now when I reveal that I’ve never used this technology to transfer anything, but as I realized this could be the solution, I just tried it out, and –swupetiwup- after some minutes the two devices was connected and started to transfer the secret footage.
So now some of these first shots ever I did in the new “heimat” will have their premiere on this blog.

A little break for the commercials!

"Bless you!"

Could happen to anyone I guess. Being on your own for a long time and then suddenly there is a baby there, but you might forget about it, if not suddenly...

Harbin Diary# 4 - Treatment and frustration!

I felt relieved because we’d managed to see a doctor and to get some treatment. The problem in my ear had caused distress and I was worried and couldn’t really enjoy our trip as if I had been ok. Where it had come from, I don’t know.
The doctor asked me if I’d been swimming, but no I had not. I could have got some water in to the ear from the shower, but I can’t imagine that this would cause a fungus infection like this. More likely is it, that I’ve scratched my self in the log with my finger, and that some bacteria on that finger got in there and started growing their little ugly colony. But what ever, we had to go to the Hospital again the next day and we needed to figure out how to get away from Harbin in direction of the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture just at the North Korean border.
One of the biggest attractions here is the Changbai Mountains. We kind of wanted to go there, so that was why we wanted to go to the city of Yanji, because from there you could have access to trips in that big fantastic nature reserve, although we didn’t know how and what it really meant going there.
Along the streets in Harbin, hidden in gates and doorways, we had seen young people sitting at desks with some big signs and posters with pictures of fantastic landscapes with mountains, forests and lakes. These were kind of travel agencies, and from the pictures we could understand that they were offering trips to the Changbai Mountains.
In my state of being relieved and content that my ear was going to get better, and the fact that we’d managed the stress of the Hospital, even it was hard because of our complete lack of Mandarin language; we went to one of these small desks hidden under a staircase in a doorway, hoping that we would be able to organize the train tickets ourselves anyway, and not put any more stress on Mr. Ding Yu at the hotel.
Two young women were sitting there occupied with their mobile phones. As we suddenly appeared in front of them, both jumped up of their chairs and stood straight like a bow, hiding the phones behind their backs.
“Hallo, we would pretty much like to go to Yanji and the Changbai Mountains, could you help us?”
Their professional smile faded as quick as it appeared. They looked at each other, then at us while they shook their heads simultaneously.
Then one of them took a brochure from the desk and handed it over.
Everything was written in Chinese.
The other managed to get; “no English” over her lips.
We could only reply; “no Putonghua!”
This was going to be difficult, and after some fractions of sentences, we could understand that they couldn’t organize any train tickets, but we could join a three days trip to the mountains and back again to Harbin, which meant one day in a bus, one day in the mountains and one days bus ride back. That was not what we wanted to do, so we said; “che che” and “bye bye” and went away. I could see the relief in their faces as they both realized that they got rid of us, and they could again concentrate on their phones.

Some kind of coincidence.

This post I owe another blog I read once in a while, but I like it so much that I need to share it here as well.
A webcam in Szentgotthárd, Hungary captured this curious bird looking into the camera. The webcam is set to shoot only one frame in every minute, so what are the chances?

The original origin you can find here.

From the good old days!

It isn't meant like that, I mean that it is that long ago, and I guess and hope that it is still going strong like it did back then when I used to be a little part of it; the Medientraktor.

It was founded to implement and support young European film makers and international relations.
It did so and some very nice projects came out of the this organization.
Check it out yourself here, and if you are a young enthusiastic film maker -or want to be one- it might even pay out to contact these guy's and join the next workshop or camp.

Photo of the day!

Strohhalm mit Flasche.
Digital
Qingdao, 2009