A few days ago I took the overnight sleeper from Hong Kong to Beijing. I have been on the old green train sleepers before in mainland China, but this is my first experience of a high speed sleeper.
I arrived at Hong Kong West Kowloon High Speed railway station about half an hour before the scheduled departure. As a local with all the right documents, the check-in, immigration, customs and immigration checks went smoothly.
Fifteen minutes before departure, we boarded. The sleeper carriage was split into several four berth compartments. I luckily bagged a lower bunk. The layout reminded me of a soft sleeper compartment on a green train with a table next to the window. On it was a teapot, box of tissues, boxes of complimentary snacks and a wash kit for each passenger. I bought my own wash items so I left mine unused. The pillows and duvets were fresh and neatly folded.
 |
| wash kit |
 |
| snack box |
 |
| my nightcap and bedtime story |
After checking out the toilet (clean but bizarrely without soap, soap is available on outside sink), I decided to lie down. The bed was surprisingly comfortable despite the thin mattress. I read my book for a while and then nodded off. It wasn’t a great sleep but it was good enough. The duvet was warm enough and it didn’t feel cold as we rolled into a chilly Beijing.
I brushed my teeth in the still relatively clean toilet just before the train arrived on time. I got off and went in search for a full Beijing breakfast.
I just completed another one of my second hand books, “Doom - the politics of catastrophe” by Niall Ferguson. It is centred around the recent Covid pandemic and Ferguson analyses how authorities reacted to it compared to previous natural and man made disasters. Let’s see what the highly regarded economist and historian has to say.
The book was completed during the darkest mid point of the pandemic, before any of the vaccines were rolled out. His main comparisons were the Spanish flu of 1918 and the lesser known Asian flu of 1957/58. He in particular looked at government responses to more recent disasters such as Chernobyl and the deadly Boxing day tsunami of 2004.
Ferguson is very fair in his analysis, although blame can definitely be attributed to governments, there was only so much they can do. Plus in the case of Covid, there was a natural lack of information early on. Once the information was available it was too late.
He doesn’t dive deeply into the science but he makes it clear that the transmission rate of the virus was but one part of the problem. It’s a very readable book on how past calamities have been dealt with and he does leave us with some best practices on how to deal with future ones.
If any of you are considering learning to play the piano or electronic keyboard, I thoroughly recommend this book. It is written in a very readable way and the lessons and examples are easy to follow. Also the author assumes you have no previous musical knowledge. Enjoy!
As you know, I have been teaching myself Teeline shorthand lately and I’m still on it. It’s been slow progress as I’m coming to the end of chapter 6. It has been a fun journey so far, as well as being a useful skill, it gives me an insight into the intricacies of the English language and the psychology of how we read words.
The book I’m using “Teeline Shorthand - made simple” is major reason I’m still carrying on with this task. It is very well written and has very helpful exercises to help practice what I’ve just learnt.
I devote about an hour to my Teeline, most days a week, usually before I start work, and I also spend several hours on it on one of my days off. I’ll let you know how I get on in a future post.
In an age of social media, internet memes, gifs, tweets, wikipedia and even AI why do I still read books, especially hard copy ones? I will tell you why.
As you may notice I’ve been borrowing books from Hong Kong’s various public libraries and been buying second hand books on my recent UK visit. I also have the Amazon Kindle app on my smart devices, although I hardly use it. It’s hard copy books that I like, even though they caused the death of trees. First, no power is needed, then, reading text on paper does less damage to one’s eyes. There’s also the sense of achievement in finishing a book of several hundred pages. To mitigate the ecological damage, I’ve been either borrowing them from the library or buying second hand. I find reading a book is extremely relaxing whilst I’m waiting for something or queuing, that’s why I regularly have a book in bag. I find that the Kindle is only useful involving books about programming languages where I can copy and paste the code. Therefore I’ve gone back to hardcopy books.
What do I do with them after finishing the bought ones? I tried donating them to Hong Kong public libraries but it no longer accepts new donations of English language books. So I’m trying to sell them on Carousell.
Call me a luddite but hard copy books will remain with us for a long time.
A few days ago, a few chaps started an epic Land’s End to John O’Groats journey by public bus (no National Express, Flixbus nor Megabus). Yup, that’s right, buses that cost a maximum of £3 a ride. One of them happens to be owner of one of my favourite X and Instagram accounts, Every Last Station. You can follow them here.
I’ve always wanted to do such a thing myself, can’t decide on the mode of travel. By foot would be stages over the summer months that could be done over a few years. Or since I like cycling I could do in a fortnight or so by bike. Such a journey would take me to many towns, cities and villages in the UK that I’ve never been to before. Not sure I would copy these chaps and go by public bus though.
Has anyone played any of the Total War games on the Apple Ipad? How was it? I’m thinking of buying a copy on Apple Store.
My Kerplunk game
Despite living in the era of mobile devices with their multitude of games and numerous consoles, I still play old style board games on a regular basis, but why?
Within the family, we still play Blokus, Top Trumps, Rummikub and Kerplunk on a weekly basis. It brings us together, and now the children have left home, just me and the wife. Like everything, I play to win and sometimes a human opponent is harder than the highest level CPU one. I do love a mental challenge. It’s also the satisfaction of setting up the game and putting it away afterwards.
Regardless, I still play my Sony PSP and the Sony Playstation 3 when I’m on my tod. As a technophile I believed board games will rendered obsolete and made extinct, along with museums, cinemas and hard copy books, but no, still here.
Do you still play boardgames? Let me know in the comments.
Like any good perfectionist, I wanted(and still want) to improve the output of this blog so I bought the this highly recommended book for blogging and online content. Did I find it useful though?
“Everybody writes” is broken down into five parts and a total of eighty three chapters. Most of the advice given is aimed at online marketing people rather than bloggers. Although as a blogger it gave some useful advice in how I write to engage the reader as well as to entice the reader to read the post in the first place.
More detailed advice included the style of English to use, how to use headings and sub headings to break down the text and fair use of stock images.
In terms of blogging advice, I was expecting more practical items and give the reader detailed real world examples. Still it was an interesting read and very enjoyable. Not bad considering I bought it second hand.
Is anyone else sick of hearing about Israel, Palestine and Gaza on the news? I am.
Anyone in the UK seen England flags or Union flags being flown in public? Or has anyone been involved in hoisting such a flag? I find its a great idea, flying your national or regional flag is not racist.
I’ve noticed in the stats column that my blog is most popular amongst netizens from Singapore. Even though I haven’t written anything about the place nor have I been there. I hope to rectify the latter bit sometime soon, I hear its an interesting place. Anyone from Singapore or anywhere else please feel free to leave me a comment and I will endeavour to respond to them.
In the past few weeks I’ve been learning Teeline shorthand from the book “Teeline Shorthand Made Simple” by Harry Butler. It has been a useful and enjoyable endeavour. Teeline is spelling based system, not a phonetics based system like Pitman, which I started learning and gave up on a few years ago. Therefore it substitutes symbols for letters and its like speedwriting with enhancements.
So why am I learning shorthand in an age of voice and video recorders on my smartphone? First its an interesting skill to learn, although I’m very unlikely to use it in my professional working life. Secondly, as someone who is vaguely interested in foreign languages (A level French and GCSE Spanish) it gives me a deeper understanding of how written languages work. Thirdly, I find the best way to take in new information is to write it down and later write up about it. Yes, voice and video recorders are better at note taking but written note taking forces you to actively listen to what is being said.
Butler’s book is well written and each new item has an exercise afterwards to let you practice and test what you just learnt. And like I mentioned earlier, I bought it second hand on Ebay.
After nearly two months and four library renewals I have finally read Christopher Lee’s six hundred page book on British history from the Romans to the death of Queen Victoria. And here’s what I think of it.
The book contains many extracts from Sir Winston Churchill’s “A history of the English speaking peoples”. It gives an overview of the English monarchs(post 1066), along significant people and events throughout the last two thousand years of the UK. These events and personalities all add up to Britain, its culture and society that we see today.
As expected, lesser known parts of British history were given less coverage than usual, especially the post Roman Anglo Saxon kingdoms, it was the ‘Dark Ages’ after all. Without going into too much detail, it tells you the origin of some of our institutions and certain words. Did you know that ‘Parliament’ got its name from the French word ‘parler’ to speak. It always been a place to ‘parley’ or to speak. Elsewhere I was interested in the rule of the some of the lesser known medieval monarchs such as Henry I and Henry III.
In brief, its a very readable book and the chapters are broken down in ten to fifteen page chunks. Despite the intimidating thickness I would recommend this book if you are in any way interested in British history
Day before yesterday I was in Portsmouth to specifically go on the Hovertravel hovercraft service to Ryde, Isle of Wight. However there’s more to the city than meets the eye, with a few pleasant surprises.
I arrived the night before so I can start off early. First item was the hovercraft, I took a bus to the hovercraft terminal, then bought a day return ticket at the ticket office. The ticket seller asked me what time I was coming back, this question surprised me at first but I found out the reason later. I got on the next boat and the passengers (me included) boarded from the beach, as the front of the craft opened up to let passengers in and out. The staff counted each passenger in, as the number of seats were limited and there were no seat reservations. This explained why ticket seller asked what time I was coming back. Once on, I sat on the first available seat I saw. Once everyone was in(it became nearly full), it was ready to leave.
First it reversed into the sea and turned itself around to face the direction of travel, then it accelerated off. The crossing was smooth and quick, it felt like less than ten minutes had elapsed when it was pulling into Ryde. I got off, went for a look around the terminal and it was back onboard for the return trip. Now I can tick “travelling on hovercraft” off my to do list.
The place I went to next was the D Day museum just along the coast from the hovercraft port. On arrival, the first noticeable thing was an actual D Day landing craft outside the main building. It was actually used on the day and it carried tanks. Still looking intimidating after all those years, thanks to painstaking restoration. Next to this was a memorial to those who fell that, lest we forget.
Inside, there were two exhibitions, one was about the landings and its preparation. Due to the small size of the building, it was less impressive than the same displays at the Imperial War Museum. Nonetheless it was still informative. The other exhibition featured the D Day embroidery, similar to the Bayeux tapestry it stretched all around the exhibition room. Unlike the tapestry, the pieces were stitched in. It shows the preparation, execution and aftermath of D Day, an impressive piece of art.
After that it was off to my next port of call, the Charles Dickens Birthplace Museum. I took the bus there and it was hidden down a cul-de-sac, amongst modern buildings. A restored three storey building where the great author was born and grew up. I never knew Dickens was a Portsmouth boy until then. Although well preserved, there wasn’t much to see, it was more a Georgian/early Victorian social history museum than about the author. Still it was must visit place for Dickens fans.
Then it was back on the coast to go on the Portsmouth to Gosport ferry. Not quite as impressive as the hovercraft but still interesting. The ferry reminded me of the Star Ferry in Hong Kong. After getting off, I had lunch in the nearby high street and then return trip back to Portsmouth and took a photograph of the Spinnaker Tower.
It was getting to mid afternoon and still time for one last museum, and I chose Portsmouth Museum and Art Gallery. Tucked away on the outskirts of the city centre I took another bus. The museum is a former barracks and the exhibition is spread across three floors. On the ground floor we had displays for Arthur Conan Doyle and the nightlife scene in the Portsmouth. Moving up one level, I saw an extensive display on the history of the city also its famous maritime and naval connections. On the same floor there was a display of oil paintings. Second floor had an exhibition about the local football club, Portsmouth FC.
Finally, I was done for the day and headed back to Portsmouth and Southsea station for the train home. Just outside the station lay the Portsmouth Cenotaph, a poignant reminder of locals who fell in both world wars.
All in all, I had an enjoyable day, it wasn’t my first visit, I took the ferry to the Isle of Wight from here twice and I did the historic naval dockyards a few years back. It was nice to see a bit more of the city and I’m glad to have done it.
Have you ever considered going on a journey, car less, in the UK and found that the rail network forces you to go on a detour? I have and many times I took the expensive detour or hired a car. A possible solution is available and I tried it.
Since I discovered the Travelling Turtle and BackPack Travels youtube channels, I found its possible to use the local bus to go on these longish journeys which require a rail detour. Yes, it only works if time isn’t a factor and if Sundays could be a problem, but it’s cheap, thanks to the bus fare cap, now set to £3 at time of writing.
For instance on Wednesday this week I travelled from Reading to Leighton Buzzard, since I was going somewhere else later that day, I would have had to buy a single rail ticket ticket, which would cost me more than £50, even with a network rail card. This was because I would have needed to travel into and out of London at peak times.
Thankfully in nearby Oxford, there’s a bus to Milton Keynes, just north of Leighton Buzzard. I could have taken the train to Oxford quite cheaply but instead I took the bus from Reading to Oxford and once there, it was a short walk to another bus station to take the onward bus to MK.
When the second bus arrived at MK Central station, I got off to take the train to LB, with a single ticket price of £8, which was more than the two bus journey’s combined.
In all, the whole journey door to door took over four hours compared to just over two if I took the train. Of course this is not applicable for all journeys but it’s well worth investigating if you ever find yourself in my situation.
After a hard day’s walk, what better way relax and refill the calories than a meal at a curry house tucked away on a corner at the edge of Dymchurch, Kent.
First impressions was a dark interior with 1970s sofas lining against the walls. We were greeted by a chatty and talkative manager. He first offered us popadoms and they came served with the usual sauces and also a spicy ketchup which I haven’t seen before in such an establishment.
Separate menus for drinks and food. I opted for the vegetarian starter and the King Prawn Roshni. It was the first time that I ever ordered prawns in a curry house. Oh, there was light, easy listening music being played in the background but unfortunately didn’t distract from a screaming toddler in a nearby table.
The popadoms were crispy despite being cold. The starter was a rather mixed affair, the fried paneer was crisp on the outside and had a good texture inside. The samosa was a little bland and the onion bhaji was acceptable but I expected more. It was more like a standard take away bhaji rather than a restaurant standard one.
Now for the main course, I ordered a peas pilau to go with prawns. There was an ample portion of rice dotted with green peas, both well cooked. Sometimes pilau is served too hard but this was just right for me. For the prawns, which I needed to peel myself, the flavourings overwhelmed any taste of the prawns. That’s the reason I never go for a prawns dish. Anyway the spiciness was about right but it would have been better to be able to taste the prawns.
We decided to have the desert and the staff gave us a desert menu each. I went for the lemon sorbet, it arrived inside an oversized hollowed out lemon. The sorbet wasn’t too sour, although I do have a high sourness tolerance. The portion was good value for the its cost although I would have preferred a more mature lemon to have a fuller flavour.
The friendly manager came round to chat with us about what we’re doing in town and our plans for the next day. We then paid and left satisfied.
