Curious Cat

23 October 2011 @ Victoria Peak Garden in Hong Kong Island

Last Saturday, Mariam (my newfound Singaporean-Indian friend) and I decided to make up for a lazy Friday night by getting up early for a picnic at Victoria Peak garden. Along with Justin, we took the bus (no. 15) from Exchange Square in Central up to the peak and walked up Austin Road to this park.

We made the mistake of laying out our ‘mat’ (Mariam’s blanket) as soon as we entered the park (we were too tired to explore immediately). Later on, a bit frustratingly, we discovered much better picnic areas on higher ground, with a fantastic view of Hong Kong harbor and both Kowloon and Central skylines (oh, snap!). Unfortunately as well, I wasn’t able to stay and wait for the others to arrive (I had to leave early for work); nevertheless, it was an amazing day sans the wild dog attacking Mariam’s Brie. I’ll surely return another weekend for better views and better jump shots!

xx

my first mid-autumn festival

Two Mondays ago (September 12), I celebrated the Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival for the first time in my life. Although I do have some Chinese blood in me (I may be 1/8 Chinese), my family (both on my dad and mom’s side) is culturally Filipino all the way. 

It started when Elaine, Dutch Alex’s AIESEC buddy, came into the office bringing a *load of Mid-Autumn Festival paraphernalia: red candles, paper lanterns, traditional mooncakes (the bean and egg yolk one), glowsticks (yes, glowsticks! the ones you snap to make them fluorescent), etc.

Alex and Elaine

from Wikipedia: The Mid-Autumn Festival (中秋節), also known as the Moon Festival or Mooncake Festival or Zhongqiu Festival, is a popular lunar harvest festival celebrated by Chinese and Vietnamese people.

the bit of mooncake that I had. I know I publicly vowed to stuff my face with them, but I simply could not bear it. I should’ve just bought the Haagen Dazs or Mrs. Field’s mooncakes. :|

After work, we headed to Victoria Park at Causeway Bay to see the celebrations. It was hellishly crowded, but I was glad to have seen the lanterns and to have gotten a feel of the spirit of the festival. 

with Alex. I don’t know what he’s trying to do with himself here.

with Chino, a friend from Manila who was in Hong Kong at the time for training with HSBC. (By the way, Chino, the weather is so much cooler now than it was last week! It just went down by 10 degrees overnight a couple of days ago, and stayed that way. Too bad you missed it and had to put up with the sweltering heat!)

with Kuba.

I stupidly left the red candles we were supposed to use to light the lanterns in the office. We were just carrying unlit paper lanterns like idiots the whole night. It felt so incomplete :<

Tiina (going crazy) and I.

Chi and I with this amazing massive fish lantern doing crazy light patterns

the crowds… and properly lit lanterns

And that’s it for today. I thought I’d put in a few paragraphs since my last entry was so shit! haha! 

It’s 3:46 in the morning right now, and I just came from LKF ladies’ night after partying with the 5Alive! team (my colleagues) following a successful dinner event we had earlier:

Had more fun tonight than I’ve had in the past few weeks (hopefully it’s not just because I was buzzed)… Going to sleep well tonight and tomorrow will begin the countdown to the final hours of my 22 year old life..

Have a good weekend, everyone!

xx,

Yeni