Blade Runner

I updated my earlier picture post with some explanations.


I had my first experience with downtown Hong Kong last night and it was mind blowing, I was so overwhelmed, but it was a blast.

To get to Hong Kong Island, we have to take a 15 minute bus ride from Pui O to Mui Wo and catch the 30 minute ferry into the pier in Hong Kong.
This is a shot from the pier right after we got off the boat.

This is the building Batman jumped off from.

I was amazed at everything walking around, we walked from Central through Mid-Levels and eventually made it to Wan Chai, it was a pretty crazy night and we caught the ferry back at 3am. I really need to go back during the day.


There were 3 different Seven Elevens visible from the point that I took this last photograph, 3! 3! That's a lot of free chili and cheeze and Big Gulps

Hong Kong Random Thoughts

I've had a long past two days of training, learning the overview of the way things work. They took us for a hike last night and we came across either a python or a cobra. It was pretty cool to watch it make its way back into the woods.

We also saw the Big Buddha, the largest bronze Buddha in the world, the day before yesterday. I took some pictures, but my memory card lost them all and I couldn't recover them. Karma maybe?

The kids are coming next Monday for "Adventure Racing" which will consist of repelling, kayaking, initiatives, and a bunch of other cool stuff.

I took some tricks from my ALE tool bag and taught my co-workers the wonderful games Bunny Bunny, Yee-Haw, and Mrs. Sally Walker with a rhythm circle thrown in there. It was great.

This is a pretty random post, I miss my banjo hopefully I can find one here or get mine sent to me soon. There are a lot of British people around here too. The public transportation is excellent and cheap, pretty much everything is 10-25% less than its American equivalent. It's been probably 10 years since I could buy a soda for less than $1 in the states and this stuff has real sugar in it! I also bought some Pocari Sweat, solely based on it's name, it's like Powerade but less concentrated. The only coffee you can get around here is instant, which pretty much means it's aweful. I still drink it, I can't help myself.

I'll have to leave my experiences with the Pui O/Hong Kong culture for another time, it's been pretty interesting so far.

Picture

These top two pictures are taken from the middle of the two buildings that Treasure Island owns and they show the Pui O public beach.


These are some of the ~70 water buffalo that run wild around Pui O, they were let go by farmers years ago and they are running around wild in the pasture areas near the ocean where we work.













These bottom two pictures are from us walking through town to get to the Treasure Island buildings, it's about a 7 minute walk from where we live

Dreamt I went away in a steam powered aereoplane...

I bid farewell to everyone Saturday night as we left for Albany. We decided (mom, dad, and I) that rather than risking driving down early in questionable weather on Sunday we would go Saturday and sleep a night in a hotel.

After a restless nights sleep we woke up around 7am, ate the continental breakfast, and went to the Albany airport to check in.

The flight from Albany to Newark was pretty uneventful, one of my checked bags was one half pound less than the maximum limit (50lbs), I was pretty happy about that.

I ate at Newark and I am writing this aboard the 777 somewhere east of Hudson Bay, it is -72 F outside right now. We have travelled 1000 miles and cruising at 564 mph right now at 32,000ft. We will be withing 60 miles of the North Pole before we start heading south again. I'm so lucky I have an outlet for my laptop, but there are also personal movie screens for each person.

I just had the in-flight dinner and it was alright, steak, rice, and salad as I looked over the frozen wasteland of northern Quebec
-5:22 pm EST


I'm watching the sun come up over the Siberian tundra as I hit the halfway point of the flight. I've been staring out the window for almost an hour, awestruck with the sight of all the ice, snow, and cloud formations. I napped for a little while earlier, hopefully i can get a little more sleep soon.
-11:09 pm EST

Hong Kong Blues

So I'm looking at my last full day in the US tomorrow. Three weeks of preparation have lead up to these moments. I'm 90% packed and ready to tie up the loose ends tomorrow. I'm hoping everything goes smoothly as I transition into a new lifestyle, but I expect it to be a challenge for me and I accept that.

I feel like I'm ready now. I've been saying goodbye to the same people for the last 3 weeks. I'm ready to get it over with, which is hard for me to say. I always feel so tied to this area and my network of friends and family. This became more and more evident over the last few weeks since I confirmed to work at Treasure Island. I keep thinking that a year is such a long time to be gone, but I know it will fly by once I get into the flow of things. Who knows, there might be a chance to come back at some point before 2010.

This is a test to see how photos work on this blog. On the top we see a dashing, khaki wearing young gentleman partaking in the ancient art of icefishing, you can hardly tell that he spilled 3 cups of coffee all over his gear, but thanks to the absorbent qualities of his wool pants he's ready to catch his limit....or not. If only good weather and good fishing weren't mutually exclusive .

And on the bottom, 3 brave souls battling the sunrise to pursue their bountiful harvest, of which there was plenty, let me assure you.

One Piece At A Time

I'm chipping away at my list of things to finish up before the big departure. I fitting in my last chances (for a while) to hike in the Adirondacks and icefish. I'm starting to pack a few things and starting to look for stuff that I want to bring. I want to bring a lot of stuff so it's going to be hard to narrow everything down. I'll probably need to go all OCD about weight like I did for The Long Trail (yea right)

There's no such thing as China

There's No Such Thing As China


I purchased my airfare on Monday and I will be leaving February 22 from Albany International. I go from Albany to Newark, then Newark to Hong Kong on an 8,000 mile 16 hour economy class marathon. I arrive around 8pm their time, which would be 9am our time. It's going to take me a bit to get adjusted to the time difference I think.

Where the hell is Adam?

Where the hell is Adam?

I bought a SPOT Tracker to use on The Long Trail and I talked to quite a few people that followed it. I paid for a year of service with it so I'm going to have it until August at least. I works pretty much everywhere in the world and according to their website it works in Hong Kong and most of Asia. I'll try to post some links to my location every so often. Here is the link for anyone interested you can also type in www.tinyurl.com/drbones There are no points up there at the moment, but I take it ice-fishing, so some might show up every once in a while

Boy From The North Country

I'm getting more excited about leaving New York for a long time. At first I was very anxious about this, but now I've accepted it. I continue to gather more and more information about Hong Kong each day and chip away at my ever increasing list of things to take care of before heading out.

Most recently I've found out that Verizon will waive your termination fee if you move out of the country as long as you have your employer fax them a note. I probably won't have my cell phone for much longer, I'm going to miss the sweet 22% ALE discount that was on it, but I still have a year on the contract so it's best for the long run. I have Skype (NOLScgp) and I might look into getting an actual number for it so people can call me.

I've also realized I need to take my car off the road before I leave, so that is added to the list. Within the next 24 hours I need to purchase my plane ticket, find out about immunizations, and look into travel insurance.

So it begins...Hong Kong here I come

Actually, the process to start working at Treasure Island Hong Kong began last September. Just within the last week has it actually become a reality for me. I will be a Senior Program Leader there for 13 months starting April 1, but I need to be there by February 25.

The last week was quite a blur, starting with a Skype interview with the owner last Tuesday, completing the application, receiving and signing the contract, organising visa documents, and getting recommendation letters in the works, among many other things. All while trying to make the decision on whether or not this was right for me. Then, by surprise, getting a chance to sit down face to face with the owner/director on Friday and easing much of my anxiety and concern.

Ultimately, I decided that opportunities like this are the reason that sent myself into a spiral of academic indecision in my second semester of college when I changed my major from computer science to undeclared. A spiral that was only finally arrested three semesters before I graduated when my Individualized Study Proposal was approved.