On an old ferry boat

Hi Mika,

Every day when I am in Hong Kong I take the ferry across the Harbour.   The harbour is called Victoria Harbour, just like the harbour in the city of Victoria in Canada!   I am a little confused about that.
The little ferry is called 'Star Ferry' and it is famous.

There is a Star Ferry behind me

These pictures show what happened when I took the ferry across the harbour.  You can see how it goes from one side of the harbour to the other side.

I am on board!

We have left the ferry dock ....

and we are getting close to the other side!

I am on land again and the Star Ferry is going back

I like taking the Star Ferry so much, I take it every day!

Maybe one day you can take the Star Ferry.

Chris

Taking an elevator and catching the Metro Train

Hi Mika,

Today is Saturday and I am still in Hong Kong, but on Sunday I will be back in Vancouver.

Today I wanted to show you what the Metro (Another word for Skytrain) in Hong Kong looks like.  The Skytrain in Vancouver usually runs above the streets, but the Metro in Hong Kong usually runs far below the streets. That is why the people in Hong Kong take escalators down to catch a train.

Here is a little video of me taking an escalator down to the trains.  When I am half-way down the escalator, many people start taking the escalator up, because a train just arrived.  At the end of the video I am running because I want to catch the train.

How the Umbrella Wrapper works

Hi Mika,

remember how I showed you a picture of a machine to wrap wet umbrellas?

Today it is raining. I bought an umbrella, so I could try out the machine.

Here I am with my new umbrella:















I took the umbrella to a nice park so it could get wet.

 I think it is wet enough now!

And here is a video of how I put my wet umbrella into the machine.  At first I do it wrong, but the second time my umbrella ends up in a bag, even though the machine does not actually do any work.

Now the shiny floor can not get wet and slippery!  Good Stuff!

A strange machine (an umbrella-wrapping machine?)

Hi Mika,

here is a picture of a machine I saw in a mall the other day:

I am not sure what it does. But when people carry their wet umbrellas through a mall, the floor gets wet. And wet floors can be slippery!  So I think the people of Hong Kong put this machine there so that they don't get wet slippery floors.  When it rains, I will buy an umbrella and then stick my wet umbrella into this machine (like the sign says in English and Chinese), and then I will find out how the machine works.
I will let you know how the machine works after I try it.

Uncle Chris

An evening view of harbour lights (and lights moving on a building)

Hi Mika,

this morning I took an elevator up a very tall building. I will show you pictures from the top of that very tall building tomorrow.

This afternoon I took a ferry to the island where the Big Buddha sits on a building.  That island also has a very nice beach, so I went swimming in the ocean.  The ocean in Vancouver is called The Pacific Ocean', but the ocean here is called "The South China Sea". It is a bit confusing because they are actually the same big pool of water.

I came back home late (at 7:30 pm) when it was getting dark and I got a nice video of ships in the harbour in front of the same very tall building where I was this morning. The lights of the building change and you can see that in this video:

What do you thing of that?

More tomorrow,
Uncle Chris

A trip to the General Post Office in Hong Kong

Hi Mika,

today I went to the Post Office in Hong Kong. This is the General Post Office:

 This is where I had mailed the postcard that you have received.
I dropped the postcard in this box:

 So all the postcards you receive should be stamped the same way as the box in the picture, with a ship and the name Hong Kong!


But today I was not mailing a postcard but a much bigger parcel. I went to a very tiny store to buy packing paper, address labels, and packing tape. The store was much much smaller than Staples but it had everything I needed.  The store was only about as large as the kitchen in your house! It was very packed with stuff!

I think you can guess what is in the parcel. If you do not know what is in the parcel then you will find out in 10 days because I sent the parcel to you!

They have another drop box for parcels, but today there was a tour for a kindergarten at the Post Office. Does your kindergarten teachers take you on tours of things?
All the teachers and all the kids were standing right in front of the box where your parcel had to go. When the teacher saw me, she told the kids in Chinese to let me through. But then I said in English "Let the kids put my parcel in the box", which everyone was happy about.  The teacher put the parcel a little into the box.One of the kids looked at me and when I nodded, he pushed it all the way into the box  I think he liked doing that.  Then I said "Mh Goi" to the boy, which means "Thank you" in Chinese.  All the Chinese children thought it was very funny that I said that in Chinese!

Uncle Chris

Helicopters

Hi Mika.

Today I went to Macau.  Macau is another city close to China, just like Hong Kong.
I took the ferry to Macau. But you can also fly to Macau in a helicopter.
Here are some pictures of a helicopter flying to Macau:

I think next time I will take the helicopter to go to Macau!

Uncle Chris