My way home from work.

I guess a lot of people think of Hong Kong like just a huge crowded city. Well it is, or part of is, and then there is the rest, and the biggest part; the New Territories. Well that is where we live, outside the crowded city, on the countryside with the many hills, mountains, the jungle, the sea and the many small islands. We both work in on of the new cities in the Sha Tin district and build along the Shing Mun river channel. The area is called Ma On Shan, and is named after the second highest mountain in Hong Kong, and the settlement is build on the riverbank just at the foot of this mountain. I can't tell you how many people live in Ma On Shan or the other "towns", which is build in Sha Tin district along this river channel since the 60ties, but it could be close to 1 million. On my way home from work by bus I have this amazing experience to get on the bus, being surrounded by high rises and following an intensely busy 4 lane road along the overhead railway from Tai Wai to Wu Kai Sha.This railway ends here, at Wu Kai Sha, so does the city. From being squeezed in between mega housing structures, you suddenly finds yourself on a common country road entering an area with typical Chinese village houses before you get out on the country, driving through a subtropical jungle with a view to the sea through the trees on the left side. All this in only 10 to 15 minutes.And a bit later I'm home in Tai Wan Village.

Interview with PJ Harvey

Interesting artist, here she tells how and why.

Good cover songs.

I can get no; hey hey hey.

Fantastic song, fantastic women.

PJ Harvey - Artist in my playlist.

A golden birthday?

"Yes, it is my golden birthday". Jason looks like a winner.
According to Lesley, a golden birthday is when someone turns the same age as the date of the day they are born. In Jason's case this was on Monday the 27th of April, where he turned 27. Hmm, I've never heard of this thing; a golden birthday, and I think it is a little unfair for people over 31, because for them there will be no golden birthdays to celebrate. I'm born on Valentines day, so I've had my golden birthday many years ago, but without being aware that it was a golden one. When I start to think about this, then the next opportunity I've got for some kind of gold -silver -bronze or whatever birthday, could be when i turn 56, as it would be 14 X 4, and the previous one I've had, would have been when I turned 42 =14 X 3. Anyway, a golden birthday sounds like something to celebrate, but as the 27th was a Monday and therefor no good day for celebrating, the party was last Friday, and as good Americans, Lesley and Jason invited a bunch of friends and colleagues to the Dragon Bowling center in Kwun Tong.John tries his luck with a lot of dynamic.
Lesley, the inventor of; "Golden birthday" or maybe just an excuse for a party. Janice didn't mind, nor did the rest. Bowling is a nice sport, you can drink beer doing it.
No it isn't a pumpkin or a watermelon, Kelsey just lets her ball know who's the boss.

More memorable cover versions.

The Leningrad Cowboys and the red army choir from the fantastic "Total Balalaika" concerts in the late 90ties.
Here with Led Zeppelins; "Stairway to Heaven".

I promise to bring more from these fabulous boys later, they are worth it, just because of their haircut.

Which one is the most clever. The cat or the dog?

Size does matter!

Don't ever pull my leg!

That really confused me in my youth

I was brought up on the countryside in Denmark in the late 60ties and early 70ties.
The school I went to was a little village school in Stenderup with 7 classes’ and about100 kids from mainly Stenderup and two other minor villages, and from the farms in the surrounding countryside.My family and I lived in a village called Bråskov about 5 kilometers away. In the summertime we had to ride our bikes to get to school, and had to struggle with 5 hills and the protective dogs from the houses and farms alongside the road.
It was quiet around there and smelled mostly like cow and pig. Being a kid and upcoming teenager there, there wasn’t much influence from the big world outside, so we all did the same things and listened to the same music, like millions of teenagers around all of Europe at that time; and it was the Glam rock area with bands like “The Sweet”, “Slade” or whatever they were called.
Mostly it was my bigger brother who provided my sister and me with all information around these band, as one of his mates often got a copy of a famous German teenager magazine called “Bravo”, in which there was loads of stories and nice shiny colour posters to take out and put onto the wall, to make every teenager room a dream.
There weren’t many Danish magazines of that kind, the most popular one was called “Vi Unge” (We Youngsters), but this weren’t as shiny and absolute pop like the German pendant, and mainly the articles in there was serious and good researched subjects like social and cultural matters for youngsters. I wasn’t very interested in stuff like that; the only thing I would like to see was big shiny photos and posters of my heroes in their long high-heeled silver boots and tight golden or whatever costumes, so I could see who a real man should look.

Once a week there was a top 20-radio show, and we were all excited and sat around our transistor radio with the cassette recorder of my brother and a microphone, ready to record our favorites.
For me with my curly hair it wasn’t that easy though. I wanted to look like Brian Connolly from the Sweet, with his long straight blond hair, so I guess I used hours and hours of combing my curly hair to make it look as straight and flat to my head as possible.
My parents wasn’t very pleased with this influence from the UK, as they still thought that long hair was for girls, and they continuously denied buying me tight leather pants with ultra wide legs and long high heeled boots, which, of course, made me call them for old fashioned, and I guess I could be a bit of a challenge some times, but I guess that is just the teenager thing; to be a complete alien for the surroundings.
But my parents accepted the fact that this was the style of the times, and at least they –our idols- seemed to be hygienic and clean and looked kind of sober and didn’t do –to many- scandals, and the live appearances on German television showed them acting surrounded by a well behaved and happy crowd, so more and more they got used to their 3 long haired youngsters at their table.
And so I lived in this world of Glam rock, and was convinced to have found the everlasting truth, and nothing would ever going to change, the world would continue as a Glam rock world, and everybody would sooner or later realize that and join in.
Sometimes I was helping out at the local grocery shop, and one day in one of the newspapers I saw a headline saying; “Chaos and riot after Punk concert in London”.
Punk; what the f… was that, so I started to read the article about this new youth movement from Britain and a concert with somebody called; “The Sex Pistols”, had ended in big chaos and fights, and the lead singer had been vomiting and spitting at the audience. Then there was some photos of some of these; “punks” who hate’s everything and sticks safety pins through their flesh and give a damn for hair style and good looks –as long as it looks scruffy-, and play a kind of music so fast &dynamic and sings hate texts against society.

I was convinced this was just a one of thing, and they –the British youth- would soon again see the light and turn back to Glam rock and long flat hair, as this was just to crazy.
As time went by, the Punk didn’t go away, it became more and more, and even I started to listen to some of the many new bands coming up, so this is what really confused my youth; from polished Glam rock to the influence of give the f… to every thing, I became kind of an strange in-between the two, a little mix of this and of that.
Being a teenager is very confusing, even then.

Amazing shooting in timelapse

I could say this has some connection to my professional life but I still think that this is interesting and valuable for most people because it have an influence on the TV and films we're going to watch in the nearest future; it's about the newest HD -High Definition- camera technique.
This is a show reel and it remind me about a film from the late 80ties called; Koyaanisqatsi.

Pixel's Revenge timelapse showreel from David Coiffier on Vimeo.

"I've turned on my computer"

Don't take it too serious, my computer has been on all day, all three of them. I'm not kidding- I really work on at least 3 computers at the same time. One where I am editing some documentaries, one where I'm creating and burning a DVD from the last theater performance, and then a kind of like office and planing one, where I am answering e-mails and adding tasks into Ical and stuff.
I've also been to the toilet, and eaten lunch.
Finally I could finish of the DVD from The War of the Worlds performance. They will then be for sale from next Friday and I'm sure a lot of the involved students will be happy to see that again.
Now I'm turning of this computer again, because I go home and then out to play football with my team, without computer.

If this should be of any interest?

"Twitter & Facebook" or what it is all called which people today spend there time doing to be connected.
I'm not going to be a "Twitter", I mean who would be interested in knowing that I've just put another 3 second dissolve between two shots to show a change of location, or faded down audio track 2 because of a disturbing female voice.
I think it is a bit scary that people does things like t hat, because to do it probably you need to be online and at your computer all the time, and as far as I'm concerned, nothing much exciting can happen in your life to tell about if you sit there all the time.
Anyway if you want to know, then I've just eaten breakfast -porridge, and am on my way to work, and now I'm logging out and turning my computer down.

Bands I don't have in my playlist - yet

Clawfinger, the Swedish heavy cross over band are not yet in my collection.
This video could be called; "Bond girl meets Reptilicus".
I you don't know who or what Reptilicus means, can I explain that it is a giant creature from a very bad Danish attempt from the late 60ties to make a horror movie a'la Godzilla. Unfortunate the attempt came out worse then any of Ed Woods bad films.

I'll try if I can find some Reptilicus for you.

Here is the maybe most known song from Clawfinger, at least it is the first one I heard from them.



The last one from Clawfinger for now. This one make me think of a clone between the German band "Rammstein" and "Iggy Pop.

First Chinese (Mandarin) lesson!

Here is your first Chinese lesson but you have to do it the other way around as he is explaining in Mandarin (the official language) how to order a pint of beer.

Photo of the day!

Some signs of civilization in the landscape between Queenstown and Te Anau i n the southwest of New Zealand.
I would loved to be able to show you a picture of the famous Kiwi bird, but I didn't get any. I saw two of them, but in a wild park, and because they are active at night it was too dark in there for a photo, and using a flash would only scare them, and we don't wanna do that, right.
But they are quite cute, round and nearly as big as a Handball covered with brown feathers, two short strong legs with fat feet, a little round head and an amazing long beak.
I can show you kind of how it looks, because it is the logo of the "Little Brown Kiwi" travel agency.

Some of my favorite Artists.

I've been posting some of the bands from my Itunes playlist because I like them, so I could also post some of the artists that I like.
The first one I'll show here is Roberto Matta. In fact his name is longer and more exciting, but that will take up to much space here, and if any one is interested to know more then here is the link to the know it all site; Wikipedia, and this one; www.matta-art.com
"L'Interrompeur, 1958
"Les Puissances du désordre", 1964-65
"Coigitum", 1972

Pictures of the day

Today you'll see two pictures. The one of them is the dog called; "Cheese" from our little fine coffee shop "Colour Brown" in Sai Kung, and the other one is a painting from one of our year 13 diploma graduates - Natalie Wong from their Art Exam and exhibition which took place just before the Easter break.I really like Natalies painting, because it is actually a nice painting of a baby. When I studied History of Art years ago, I was always discusted by the way the famous artist have portraied children and especially babies througout history, so here was finally a very nice one.

Photo of the day!

I just want to share this with all of you. One of the official photos which I got the day I jumped. In fact it was the 12th of April, the day of our 2 year wedding anniversary -does that mean anything?

From southern hemisphere autumn to subtropical springtime in 11 hours.

Now I'm back up here from down there. For me coming coming from the far north -Denmark- it was quite a different and opposite experience to visit New Zealand down under. Living in Hong, we're so to speak just mid between Denmark, Scotland and New Zealand, and looking at a globe one realize that it is just opposite each other, so the weather conditions is very similar, just opposite. Here in Hong Kong we're like in Europe approaching springtime and if you travel north it is getting colder and finally you reach the north pole. I've been use to it being like that all my life, but there- down under- it is the opposite, they are now approaching autumn and it gets colder when you travel further south, and then you reach the antarctic or the south pole.Even that I was joining 35 young Hong kong students on the trip, then the ten days I've spent there has definitely been one of the best travel experiences I've had for a long, long time and I'm trying to find out the reason why.
We were mainly visiting places on the south island, which is the biggest and the less populated, so what we found was stunning and unspoiled clean landscapes and a tourism industry which made a big effort in treating the nature with big respect and to let the visitors understand the importance of being environmentally friendly.The activities we did was kind of unusual and I could never have done that anywhere else than there, I think. We've been climbing on a mountain, horse riding through the landscape from 'The lord of the rings", been bungy jumping from the Kawarau bridge and doing the sky swing 400 meters above Queenstown. Jumped into 11 degrees cold water in the fjord of Milford Sounds, been swimming with hundreds of Dolphins on the open pacific ocean, seen the amazing Kiwi bird and two majestatic Albatrosses, been invited to stay at a Maoi tribe community in Kaikoura and been to a Super 14 League rugby game in Eden Park, Auckland. Well the list is long and not even complete, so maybe the next few posts will be reflections about this experience. Now I will just say a big thank you to James, Cane and Pete from our Agency in New Zealand who made all this possible for all our students, my colleagues and me. Cane and James at our departure in Auckland.
This company is called; "Little Brown Kiwi" and they have specialized in organizing this sort of trips for schools around the world, who want to visit New Zealand.Looking back on ten fabulous days down under and only one thought in my mind; "I'll be back"!

"I did it" - The original Bungy

I was scared like never before as I knew that I was going to do the bungy jump to entertain our 35 youngsters. I didn't sleep very good the night before as I was just thinking of me standing 43 meters over a wild stream with a rubber band tied to my legs, and everybody just waited for me to throw myself into the deep. As we approached the bungy venue at an old wooden bridge over the Kawarau river just outside Queenstown in the southwest of New Zealand, I got more and more afraid. Just one thing kept me from going back, and that was all our youngsters on the viewing platform, screaming to me; "C'mon Mr. Mortensen - JUUMMMPPP, you can do it"

So there I was, realizing that I wasn't able to face a defeat like this and have to face all these disappointed faces, so I pulled my self together, looked straight into the horizon before I closed my eyes and then I jumped. After a second I opened my eyes a saw the jade coloured river coming towards me. It was the most incredible feeling to fall straight towards the water, and then gentle be hold back and swung up again by the rubber band.

I never thought it would be possible that I would do that as I've thought to be quite scared of heights, but now I can say; "I did it and I will certainly do it again".

Right now we are in Kaikoura waiting to go out to swim with dolphins on the open sea.

Before that we've been staying on a boat at a fjord in Mildford Sounds, where we also had a little feeling of the Tasmanian sea.So that's it for now, tomorrow we're heading back to the North Island and Auckland and
on Saturday we will fly back to HK.
Amazing so fast ten day's just goes, when you are having fun.

Traktor in New Zealand

Ahoj every where, here is the first post from the southern hemisphere, ever. We are all safe and sound here in New Zealand. We, means me, my two colleagues Lesley and Jason and our 35 youngsters.
We have been in Christchurch for one night and half a day before flying down to Queenstown, from where I post this.

In Christchurch we visited the Antartic center and stayed for 10 minutes in a storm room, where we felt how an Artic storm feels. Brrrrr. And we got a ride with the Haagland artic car, and that was like sitting in a rollercoaster, just a bit more bumpy.

We've been on a Steam ship on the Lake Wakatipu, and this morning on horse bacfk through some of the locations used by Peter Jackson in the movie the "Lord of the rings".

Me on my horse called Che.
Later attractions will be Jet boat cruise, Bungy Jump (help, as I am not sure if I really dare to do this, but let us see) and some other exciting stuff.

The firrst impression of New Zealand is possitive, and it reminds me a lot of Scotland, just a bit mor spectacular maybe, and the weather is like that of Scotland and Scandinavia as well, just it is now the beginning of authum down here, and up there it is the beginning of spring.

I'll try to keep you posted, but can't promise how frequent it is going to be, as I have to see if I can find some free time and an Internet Cafe, but in 2009 this doesn't seem to be the biggest problem in this world as global village.

On the other side.

Easter break! Holiday, traveling & excitement. Catriona is back in Scotland to visit her family for the next 2 weeks, and I'm sitting here, left alone in Tai Wan Village. Cruel?
No,because from tomorrow I might be able to post you something from New Zealand! From Auckland, Christchurch and Queenstown. I'm traveling with 2 colleagues and 35 students from school, on a 10 days adventure trip to the south island of All Blacks country. I'm exited of course as I've never been on that side of the world yet and then to the south island doing every possible exciting things, like whale watching, bungye jump, water rafting, mountain biking and on a horse back through the country side from "lord of the rings". Wauw, my brother will be envious again.But serious, I have to get of this blog post now as I have some packing to do. See you fron the otherside of the world, and big warm thoughta at my wife, who soon wil be on tne excat oopposite site than me.

More good cover versions of big hits

I've always liked when somebody picks up a good song a make their own version, maybe because many years back I played in a street low budget band myself, and we also just took the music we liked.
Here you have a couple of less known cover songs.

Some time back I promised you more of Freddie Wadling, so here he is.

"The children of the revolution" by Marc Bolan and T-Rex, is probably one of the most covered songs, but here is a less known version:

Mrs. Mortensen sings at the Canny Man Folk club in Hong Kong

Sometimes when I sit here and fight with my imagination to write something, I can listen to my wife Catriona playing her guitar and singing some songs she likes.
Once a month she takes her guitar to a folk club at the Canny Man bar in Wan Chai, to play and sing together with other musicians.
Last time a guy with his camera appeared and asked if he could record her playing.
Just before the week-end this clip was found on YouTube, so now you can also enjoy this song written by Robert Burns in 1791.
Here she is; Catriona Mortensen