Grandfather goes visiting

Hong Kong has a population of over 7 million, crowded into a land-mass of little over a thousand square kilometres, making it one of the most densely populated areas of the world.

"Compact" is an understatement. Half the population lives in the New Territories which, as the map demonstrates, constitute 86% of the total area.

The other half live in Hong Kong and Kowloon, where any sort of accommodation is at a premium.

Soaring, close-packed tower blocks

The apartment buildings are so huge that it is difficult to find photographs that truly give he impression of the actual size. They are not merely high, they are also closely packed together which accentuates the feeling of being crowded-in-on.

Add narrow streets and laundry drying on poles sticking out from the windows and the atmosphere is truly claustrophobic.

A typical Hong Kong urban canyon

When I booked my trip, I asked my daughter if we could take a side-trip to Macao. Like Hong Kong, it's been a real eye-opener, with the affluence and living standards once again coming as a big surprise.
There are still some quaint pieces of Portuguese colonial architecture, but the bigger surprise are the gambling hotels.
All the big names from Las Vegas are in Macao: MGM, Sands, Venetian and so on, but on a scale that far outshines anything I saw in Vegas.

Old colonial Portuguese architecture

Part of the entrance lobby of The Venetian

A grand staircase to the gaming rooms

Everything is on a huge scale, creating a sort of Disneyworld for adults. The levels of service are very high, the food and drink are excellent and the clientele is 90% Chinese, affluent and out to spend money to enjoy their holiday. There are hundreds of them, shepherded around in crocodiles by their tour guides, who lead the way with a flag on a pole. They take thousands of photographs - Dad in front of the fountain; Mother by the statue, and so forth. The public areas get as crowded as Kings Cross London Underground station in the rush hour. They are unfazed by air of extravagance and sophistication and revel in the opportunity to sample another culture in the security of their own continent. That much, at least, they have in common with the American tourists in Las Vegas, who - I found when I visited - believed that Paris really is like The Paris Hotel on the Strip. 

Gondolas with singing gondoliers on a suitably cleaned-up canal - all indoors

Much of the time I was left speechless by the sheer scale of everything; much of it was hard to believe: Priceless antiques and works of art make one lobby look like a gallery at the Victoria & Albert Museum.
My greatest emotion as we left to return on the high-speed catamaran to Kowloon was probably one of sadness. I was left feeling that Macao exists as a temple to consumerism, greed, affluence and just about everything that is wrong with 21st century society.

But it was an experience I would not have missed, and am extremely grateful to my daughter Samantha for planning and arranging the trip.

Re-telling Retail

It was the sort of mini-crisis that tends to strike at the wrong moment. The end of the week had me locked indoors, fully occupied with the finalisation of a complex proposal document. I left my apartment only on Sunday, to go to the Cathedral in the morning and later, to watch the charity fund-raising runners.

My nice, chunky leather wallet

On Monday I started tidying the place up and sorting out my packing for my trip to visit the family in Hong Kong. 

Such an activity seems to be full of "senior moments" as I panic to locate my travel insurance or my passport or, as yesterday, to find my wallet.

Now, it's not the first time I have lost a wallet, but they tend to reappear in an hour or two. This very wallet disappeared in Mauritius only to reappear a day later, but not before I had rung the alarm bells and stopped my credit and debit cards. Very annoying.

In an uncharacteristic display of common sense, I usually carry a spare card separately, so on such an occasion there will be no real crisis, just the embarrassment of having made a big fuss over what turned out to be no problem at all. 

A choice of men's leather wallets on Amazon

This time was different. I didn't find it and I still haven't found it. Apart from the loss of bank cards and personal documents, there was something of an additional problem: I needed something to put stuff in! I couldn't visit my daughter in Hong Kong and carry my HK Dollars around in the plastic envelope from the foreign exchange bureau. The alternative option of using an old wallet that I found at the back of a drawer was not practical, as that one was literally falling apart.

Fortunately, even at 9.30 in the evening, retailing has changed.

I logged on to Amazon and picked the twin-brother of the nice, chunky wallet that I have mislaid, selecting the dark brown "distressed" finish instead of tan, just in case the missing wallet reappeared.

I paid £3.95 for "1-day delivery" more in hope than confidence and went to bed, lying awake and mentally retracing my steps over the last 5 days. I calculated that I had definitely pulled the wallet out of my pocket last Wednesday, when I was shopping in the market, and I vowed to retrace my steps in the morning. But before I left the house to head down-town at 8am this morning, I booted up the computer and found an email from Amazon. I followed the link to "my orders" on the website.

It had already arrived in Lincoln

Amazing! My wallet reached Birmingham by midnight and was in Lincoln before seven in the morning. 

I hurried off to the market, but alas, my lost wallet had not been handed in. I drew out some cash with the debit card of my second current account, then headed back uphill to get on with my sorting, cleaning and packing

When I returned to the house, I found another email, this time with an update advising me that my new wallet was scheduled for delivery, later the same afternoon .

Retailing has changed dramatically. 

When I look at my credit card record, I realise that I don't use shops much any longer. I buy my clothes on-line, avoiding the embarrassing hunt for anything in my size - from footwear to shirts. 

I do my bulk  supermarket shopping every couple of months; I buy fresh produce from the market, and milk etc. from the corner shop. All my computer needs - ink, paper, labels and so forth, come off the internet and I even upgraded my phone on-line (which was another next-day delivery.) 

But I must procrastinate no longer, and even though I know I'll find the missing item within minutes of blocking my credit and debit card, I know it's the sensible thing to do. I just don't like feeling so incompetent - and knowing all of this is almost certainly age-related. 

Sad, very sad.

I still haven't found my wallet, but my new wallet was delivered, as promised, at 4.30pm.

Charity runs and Croci (Crocuses if you didn't do Latin.)

The keen ones racing around the final bend

The first Sunday in April, and the energetic are out this morning: hundreds of runners are pounding past my front door in the Lincoln "Active Nation" 10 kilometre run for charity. They estimate up to five and a half thousand participants. Some are national-class athletes and most are so lean and fit that it makes me tired just to look at them. 

Royal Air Force veterans warming up before the start

There are a number of wheelchair participants, whether in 3-wheeled Olympic class racers or in standard issue National Health Service 4-wheelers (like these ones, similar to the one Dad had in his later years,) being pushed at a jog by a supporting partner.

Dressed for the occasion

And then there are the people who cannot resist the opportunity to dress up, though if you ever try and get them to a Fancy Dress Ball, they will always find an excuse to stay away.
Even in this wintry weather, I am sure these men in green Morph suits must have been uncomfortably warm by the time they reached the finish. 

I'm sure this participant will also have ended up in a bit of a sweat, and he certainly deserves congratulations on the seasonal attire! (- or maybe he was just Welsh? )

The emphasis behind the event was on getting out and getting some exercise (he writes, as he taps at the keyboard and sips his G&T,) and I do feel I have been letting the family down while my son in Canada has been mountaineering on ice; and my daughter in Oxford and son in Rhode Island are both in training for local charity runs. 

So, time for a resolution, and after seeing the number of participants striding along as Nordic Walkers with their hiking poles, I could be tempted to get some rubber tips for my poles and join the next event, later in the year. 

I enjoy Nordic Walking, but when I used my hiking poles in Italy I received puzzled looks from locals who asked what I had done with the skis.

Spring flowers in a corner of my garden

Meanwhile, the garden is waking up and the Spring flowers are pushing through. 

I can once again walk across the front lawn when I come back from the cathedral, and feel that wonderfully springy turf of grass that hardly feels a footstep from one year to the next.

The boys and girls of the Cathedral School are now on holiday, so we had a guest choir today, singing the Haydn Little Organ Mass. For the anthem  they sang the Easter Carol "This Joyful Eastertide" in a beautiful unaccompanied harmony.

It takes many months to become part of the cathedral community, but I feel less of a visitor now and I'm less hesitant when It comes to chatting to people over coffee. I shall once again miss the community as I fly off this week to visit my daughter in Hong Kong, 

...and I really must clean and tidy up before I leave!