Hong Kong Travel Blog: October 2011

Sunday, October 30, 2011

Sedan Chair Race and Bazaar 2011

Today is Halloween and also the The annual Sedan Chair Race and Bazaar, hosted by the Matilda International Hospital. If you happen to visit Hong Kong by end of October, you would have the chance to share the fun.

The First Sedan Chair Race was inaugurated in 1975 with four entrants running for "The Matilda Hospital Shield". In 2011, this annual event has over 50 teams participated from a wide cross section of Hong Kong's schools, clubs, associations and corporations competing for numerous trophies and raising funds for charity.

Today 30 October, 2011, our company participated in the event for the first time, so we were very excited in going up to the peak early in the morning as cheer leaders.

I’m really impressed that most of the companies are very dedicated in decorating their sedan chairs. Similarly our company and our team put in a lot of effort in practicing, decorating and fund raising.

The chairs have many themes, here are some of them.

Hudson Shrek

Elvis Presley - from which organisation?!
DFS's Guitars

Morgan Stanley Piano

The Yellow Submarine of Noble Group
The Honorable Guest of the Event is a TV Star

Teams of eight, carrying sedan chairs with ‘life human’ passengers racing around the Peak on a route of 2.1km start and end at The Matilda International Hospital.

Here are the trophies.

The fund raised goes to support charitable organisations that generally do not receive assistance from the government or other major charity bodies.

Teams from a broad cross-section of Hong Kong – corporations, associations, clubs and schools – are all welcome to join the Race.

For more information, visit Sedan Chair Race and Bazaar 2011 official website

Hong Kong Travel Blog - Sedan Chair Race 2011

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Bird Viewing in Hong Kong

If you are a fan of bird viewing, Hong Kong has some excellent sites to offer.

The Wetland Park is rich in mangrove birds and some of them are close to extinction such as Black-faced Spoonbills. If you enjoy watching birds in the wild, it is certainly an ideal site which has a lot of visitor facilities.

If you don’t want to travel a long way to the Wetland Park, there is a more convenient way to watching birds. Hong Kong Park has an aviary with plenty of bird species. Apart from the birds living inside the aviary, there are also many other types of bird habitants including the beautiful Cacatua Sulphurea 小葵花鳳頭鸚鵡. Bird watching groups gather here every Wednesday. Depending on opportunities, they may even set up binoculars for visitors to view the wild birds they’ve spotted. I had that chance to share the fun last week.

Last Wednesday October 5 was actually the Double Nine Festival (9th of September in Chinese calendar) and it’s a public holiday in Hong Kong. According to Chinese tradition, we need to go up to high altitude in order to avoid bad luck. Hence the Peak Tram line was long and other public transportations going up to the Peak were full. We’ve therefore decided to go mid level where the Hong Kong Park is. Conveniently situated in central Hong Kong, you can easily access the Park by MTR. Get off at Admiralty and you’ll be connected to the Park by escalators.

On a regular day, you can go watch the birds at the aviary and then continue to go up to the Peak, as the Peak Tram station is just next to the Park. Alternatively you can visit the Tea Museum within the Park. Also next to the Park is the Bank of China where mini exhibitions are usually held at the lobby. On the day of our visit, we decided to go there to see The Living Earth exhibition.

Back to bird viewing, below are a few of my photo collections. Hey, I’m not a professional photographer and birds are not photogenic models. The photos I’ve taken were results of luck.

Maroon-breated Crown Pigeon 紫胸鳳冠鳩