Back in UK!

We are going to stay in UK for the next few months :)

Police

Written by SP

We were at Cologne 2 weeks ago and we came by these posters at the airport. They ain't anything interesting about it at the first glance but then as you walk along the hallway, things are getting more fascinating, and ideas start to came into your mind. Which of the following police you want to see when you in trouble...?

 

Russian and Dutch?

Polish or English? You start wondering if she a model or an actual cop, coz I never seen one so elegant and slim on Oxford Street!

Indonesian? You better have some "minum coffee" $$$ at hand!

Egyptian? or Belgian?

American? you better not run if you have a beard, you'll just get shot at the back! or Spanish? Is he really a cop? I never been to Spain but I don't want to meet one of this...

Italian? Time to make an offer that he can't refuse ! or Czechian?

Canadian? or Swiss?

Swedish? Yeah, they only good at giving out parking tickets coz there are no crimes in Sweden.

Danish? or German?

Irish? Now I got your attention....definitely a traffic stopper!

Another English? That show how grumby English people are in this sad city...

Dutch? hmmm....you got some weed?

So what are your choice?

A Christmas Carol

No, I haven't read the book. This post is about real carol singing.

Today, I've joined a small group of people to sing at Liverpool Street station to raise money for 'Help the Hospice'.

A bit about Liverpool Street station, it is one of the busiest train station in UK, with around 125 million vistors each year. So there we were, 6 of us, standing near one of the entrance, singing X'mas Carols for St Joseph's Hospice.

'Help the Hospice' is a charity organisation which helps fund and provide palliative care. As some of you may know, I don't sing and I don't really enjoy performing. But it is for a worthwhile cause. 

Singing in a train station is especially difficult because our group is small and we have a big space to cover. I overcame my shyness and put a lot of effort into project my voice. As we warmed up, we were getting a good flow of donations. Nobody threw eggs at us. So it was a pleasant experience afterall. :)

Japan Trip, Oct 2006 - Travelling on train, Japanese style!

Train traveling in Japan is relatively easy. Although I was told by my UK collegue that they had great difficulty in matching up the station names to their guideboook, I have the advantage of being able to read kanji (Chinese characters). It has made my life much easier. When I make a booking, I just write down the name of the destination and tell the assistants what time we want to travel. Then they would issue the tickets for us. It also helps that we had a train travel pass, so we don't have to worry about paying the wrong fare.

The most difficult part is finding the right platform. But people are generally helpful and if you show them your tickets, they would offer directions to the platform. And if you have missed your train, there is always the next one. The trains between the larger cities and town are quite frequent.

When traveling longer distance, it is common to bring your own 'take-away meal' (bento). We saw a family sharing a few bentos on one train trip and subsequently decided we should follow suit in the future.

So, on the following trip, we bought an eel bento to share between us. It's only small because we travelling to another city for lunch. But still, it was an authentic 'Japanese experience'! hahaha

Japan Trip, Oct 2006 - Bumping into a fellow Australian in Kyoto

Around the temple area, there are some well-preserved Meiji period streets.

We wander around, and suddenly, a couple of girls wearing kimono caught our sight. That day was a national holiday in Japan and it is not uncommon for Japanese to wear their kimino to the temple during special occasion or holidays.

What caught our eye was that the two girls were trying to communicate in broken English.

It turns out that one of the girl is an exchange student from Brisbane, Australia. Her host family has got her all dressed up for the national holiday, and was showing her around East Kyoto.



I thought she looked good in the kimono so I asked her to take a picture with me.

Ms YI told me later that if I really wanted, I can take a couple of hours out of my trip to get dressed in a proper kimono and get myself painted in white as well. But the prospect of having this powdery stuff all over me is just too scary. I gave it a pass.

Japan Trip, Oct 2006 - Ohagi (御萩) and matcha (抹茶)

We took a walk around the temple area in Kyoto, and took the advice from Lonely Planet to stop by a local tea house to have afternoon tea the Japanese way. We picked a small shop and walked in. The owner doesn't speak English and she doesn't understand my Japanese, so we were 'forced' to order two sets of ohagi (御萩) and matcha (抹茶):

 
Ohagi with proper matcha

Ohagi (御萩) are steamed and pounded balls of glutinous rice wrapped in sweet red bean paste (so the reverse of Daifuku). Traditionally, they are made during the Spring and Autumn Equinoxes. According to one page on the Internet, the term 'ohagi' derives from the autumn flower hagi (bush clover).

I am personally not a fan of red bean, so I didn't enjoy it so much. It was even too sweet for SP!

The frothy green tea (抹茶) was nice though. It was a thick version of the whipped green tea (濃茶) so it was stronger in taste. The sweetness of the ohagi is supposed to match perfectly with the bitterness of the green tea. 

I prefer the green tea on its own.

Tornado in London

Limescale

When we first moved into our flat, we found that there are white chalky deposits in the shower and sink. We subsequently found the same thing in kettle and cooking utensils as well! Later, we were told that this annoying white stuff is called limescale, and it still haunts us til today.

So, why are there white deposit all over the place?

It has to do with the quality of water. In Melbourne and Sydney, I never had this problem. It also wasn't a problem when I was in Hong Kong, where the tap water is not drinkable. 

The white chalky stuff is from the hard water, which contains calcium carbonate and other similar salts. The salts are in the water because it has been pumped from or filtered through natural underground reservoirs called aquifers. These salts come from the rocks underground.

Calcium carbonate is rather unusual, in that it becomes less solution when the water is heated up. As a result, there are white deposits in places where hot water has ran by.

The built-up can eventually block pipes, as shown in this photo from http://www.tamhil.com:



Scary stuff.

The hard water would also combine with soap to form scum on almost all surfaces. It is often rock solid and is almost impossible to remove.

Worse of all, using soap on the body in hard water can also cause scum to be formed on the skin. This stuff remains on the skin even after rinsing, thus clogging pores and coating body hair. It also encourages growth of bacteria!

So, what're the solutions?

(1) You can scrub off the limescale with the help of chemical limescale cleaner.

(2) You can use an ion exchange water softener, which effectively replaces all the calcium in the water with sodium. It is rather expensive to run and the water may not be suitable for drinking as the level of sodium has increased dramatically.

(3) There is also a third solution, which is not exactly confirmed yet. This involves the use of electronic or magnetic water descaler, which is wrapped around the incoming water pipe to pass a magnetic field through the water. As the water passes through, the salts molecules lose their attraction to one another and are prevented from combining into larger structures to become limescale. The molecules are held in suspension. The water treated in this way will eventually return to its original structure (the limescale forming salt), but the treated water should be used and washed away before this happens.

Right now, to make ourselves feel better about the water we drink, we are using Brita. If you know of any other solutions which works, please let me know.

England 551-6 dec & 129 vs Australia 513 & 168-4

(Source: Sydney Morning Herald.  http://www.smh.com.au/)

Australia in 2-0 up in the Ashes series! This is such exciting news to wake up to!

Nine wickets gone for only 70 runs. Rumours have it that some morning newspaper in London actually said it was a draw. I guess they were sent to the print too early! :)

Good on Collie for staying until the end, while his partners were constantly 'on-the-go'.

It would have been exciting watching Warne bowling on Day 5 of any Test match, but 4-49! Gotta watch the highlights on BBC Two tonight!


Warney sovenirs a stump!
(Source: News.com.  http://www.news.com.au/)

How much for Christmas did 'my True Love' spend on me?

Now I caught your attention! ;P

This post has nothing to do with SP, but rather the PNC Christmas Index. hehehe. 

No, I didn't make it up. It really exists! Here you go:



The PNC Christmas Index tracks the index of the current costs of the gifrs given by the True Love to the singer of the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas".

For those who don't know the song well, the gifts are:

Twelve drummers drumming,
Eleven pipers piping,
Ten lords a-leaping,
Nine ladies dancing,
Eight maids a-milking,
Seven swans a-swimming,
Six geese a-laying,
Five golden rings,
Four calling birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree!

According to the data, the cheapest gift is the 'two turtle doves'(USD$40), while the most expensive is the 'nine ladies dancing' (USD$4,759.19). 

The 2006 index is USD$18,920.59 and it is the most expensive year since the index started 22 years ago.

The “True Cost of Christmas”, which is the cumulative cost of all the gifts with the repetitions listed in the song, runs to USD$75122.03.

It is really an expensive Chrismas!

For more information:

http://www.pncchristmaspriceindex.com

Lots of catch-up to do!!

I should relly make an effort to write more blog entries!

I still haven't finished writing about the Japan trip. I haven't even mentioned my Paris trip and I am going to Colonge tomorrow

I need more time! :)

Valerie thinks so too! Poor thing, she hasn't seen daylight for weeks!

Anti-climb paint

When we first moved to London, we noticed signs which say 'Warning: Anti-climb paint'.



(Source: http://www.ultimatehandyman.co.uk/acb.jpg)

It sounds like a silly idea and I have certainly not seen them in Australia.

I did some research today and found that it is actually a non-drying oil based paint. In theory, this should make the surface very slippery and impossible to climb. It also marks people's clothes and skin should it come into contact with the paint.

However, the paint that we saw generally look dried. And I don't think it is going to stop anyone from using a rope to climb in.

Anyway, it seems sad that we have to come up with these kind of measure to stop people from entering a premise. *sigh*

Japan Trip, Oct 2006 - Kiyomizu temple (音羽山清水寺)

Back to the sight-seeing bits of our Japan trip.

The first sight that we visited in Kyoto is the Kiyomizu temple, or 'Otowasan Kiyomizu-dera' (音羽山清水寺).

Entrance to the temple.


SP and I


Cleaning my hands before entry.


Wishes of the faithful


The bell of the temple.

The most notable structure of the temple is the veranda, which is supported by hundreds of wooden pillars. It offers an impressive views of the city. Wasn't a bad way to start our day!


A photo of SP! The platform is in the background.


The platform is supported by these wooden pillars. All supported by joints. No nails involved!

Apparently, there is a say in Japanese: "to jump off the stage at Kiyomizu" (「清水の舞台から飛び降りる」), which refers to an Edo period 'belief' that if one were to survive free-jumping from the platform, one's wish would be granted. The platform is around 13 metres from the ground, and it would be difficult to jump off it without injuring oneself. According to Wiki, "234 jumps were recorded in Edo period and of those, 85.4 percent survived." The statistics is better than what I think.

The temple is also famous for its waterfall, called Otowa-no-taki (音羽の滝). The water is split into three channels, which fall into a pond. The water is believed to have 'therapeutic' properties. It is also believed that drinking the water from the three streams would confer health, longevity and success in studies.

I took my chance to try two of the streams, but I have no idea which is which. Haha.


First attempt!


Second attempt!

I saw some one filling their water bottles with the water. Perhaps they are doing a take-away?

The temple site also contains several little shrines, the most famous being the Jishu-jina (地主神社), which is dedicated to a god of love.


One of the shrines for love.

It was one of the busiest part of the temple! Vendors were selling lucky charms all over. It was very commercial.

Kyoto is the city of temples and shrines. But I will probably just write about this one. I think I am getting lazy.

Pietersen is OUT!

Fourth ball of the day and Pietersen is out! (Pietersen c Martyn b Lee 92)

The tail is opened up. Let's hope Gabba won't be bothered with rain today.

England 347/8

Jones' out. Giles' out.

Com'on. Finish them up! I wanna go to bed!

Australia 602/9d & 202/1d vs England 157 & 0/0 (0.0 ov)

England is about to play! I think this first Test is ours! :)

For those who don't know much about cricket, this seems to be a good link.

http://www.cricinfo.com/link_to_database/ABOUT_CRICKET/EXPLANATION/CRICKET_EXPLAINED_AMERICAN.html

Milton Keynes

Milton Keynes is a large town around 75km (45 miles) north-west of London. It is roughly half way between London and Birmingham.

Due to its access to major highways, it is quite a popular spot for large corporations. Some of the big companies are: Daimler Chrysler, Royal Mail, Argos, Abbey, British Telecom, EDS and Tescos.

I went there for an engagement this week. The train ride takes about 45-50 mins and it is generally pleasant in the morning. The autumn leaves are really beautiful against a countryside backdrop.

Anyway, as I was passing by the train station today, I saw a very interesting town map.

Milton Keynes Central is a planned city. Its infrastructure was built with scalability in mind. First of all, most of the commercial and industrial district is built with a grid square system. Roundabouts junctions were built at almost all intersections since the roads were intended to carry large volumes of traffic.

Look at the roundabouts!

(Source: http://www.lastrefuge.co.uk/)

The major grid roads are separated by large grassed areas, which are essentially reserved land for future upgrade should the need to upgrade the single carriageway to dual carriageways arises.

(Source: http://www.lastrefuge.co.uk/)

Here is something from the Internet: "When the city was planned, the main roads, forming the sides of the grid squares were given numbers. There were horizontal roads going east-west and vertical ones going north-south. They were known as 'H' roads and "V" roads." (Source: http://www.mkweb.co.uk/urbanis/DisplayArticle.asp?ID=1816) The roads are in fact very square! Just like the roads in Beijing!

Further from the centre, the roads look more like coral reefs, or like the 'Palm' development in Dubai. I suppose this allows for more privacy for families.

Milton Keynes is also home to one of the largest entertainment and business complex in the UK. 'xscape' is a multi-purpose building with restaurants, shops (LOTS of them), bars, health centres, fitness clubs, 24 lane ten pin bowling alley, 16 screen cinema multiplex, rock climbing, airkix, ski slope, conference centre and exhibition centre. Too bad I didn't make it there this week! :(

For those interested, the map of Milton Keynes can be found here:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?oi=eu_map&q=Milton+Keynes&hl=en

It doesn't show the roundabouts very well, but it is nevertheless a good interactive map.

For more information:

MKWeb
http://www.mkweb.co.uk/home/

xscape
http://www.xscape.co.uk/snow/milton-keynes/

Manchester and my first taste of X'mas market

I was in Manchester yesterday.

I was pretty impressed when I found out that the city operates a free bus shuttle (called Metroshuttle) that operates in the city centre. It runs 3 circuits around the major landmark in the city (including the bus terminal, train stations and town hall). The bus runs rather frequently (Route 1 runs every 5 mins while Route 2 & 3 runs every 10 mins). It is really quite efficient.

A little background about the city: Manchester is the first industrialised city in the world. Manchester was involved in heavy industrial construction during WWII and as a result, it was heavily bombed. Nowadays, the city is not that industrialised or polluted. It is quite pleasant, actually. It also has a large Asian (oriental) community and its Chinatown is relatively big in comparison to London's.

My office is right by the town hall so I took an opportunity to visit the Christmas market at the Albert Square. The people from the office told me to specifically ‘search for Santa'. Well, you can't really miss the giant inflatable Santa on top of the town hall building. Nevertheless, I found that quite funny.

Added 29/11/2006: I was just  told that the Santa is made of bullet-proof material because someone tried to shot it down some time ago.


(Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/manchester/content/articles/2005/11/08/171105_festive_markets_event_feature.shtml)

The Christmas market is continental European-style so you can find German bratwurst, Glühwein (a spiced mulled wine), gebrannte Mandeln (roasted almonds), Lebkuchen (gingerbread) and also French and Dutch crêpes, cheeses and charcuterie. Of course, there are also Christmas trees and handcrafts. It is really quite ‘festive'.

I bought some spicy sausages, which always goes well with wine. I was kinda in a hurry to leave Manchester for London so I didn't hang around for as long as I want.

Anyway, SP and I are going to a few more Xmas markets in the coming month and I am really looking forward to it now! :)

Zafferano

I am having dinner at Zafferano tonight.

 
(Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4079041.stm)

Zafferano is the restaurant which bought the giant white Alba truffle for £28,000 in 2004. The chef subsequently left it in the fridge for too long and the truffle became inedible! What a waste!

I was never going to forgive them. But I will have to see tonight! :P

Dining at Zafferano

Zafferano has been forgiven. It's official.

Definitely worth a visit during the truffle season! They have a menu full of truffle dishes!

Bread. The bread are freshly cut at the table in the main hall.

Tuna Scallop Carpaccio. Nice and fresh.

Cured ham with marinated mushrooms. I love the ham. It was definitely freshly cut. Look at the moisture!

Venison with mushrooms in wine sauce. I only tried the mushrooms. Very tasty sauce!

Tagliatelle with white truffle... MUST TRY! very simple yet very satisfying!

Vanilla ice cream with 100 years old Balsamic vinegar and white truffle. The vinegar is sweet and has a very thick consistency. See end of article for more info on this old vinegar.

Here is my reaction to the dessert:

Posing for photos. 'Hurry up! The ice cream is melting!!'

The smell is divine!

I'm digging in!

It's really yummy. Do you want to try some?

No? Ok. I will have the rest!

Update 26/04/2007: I've just realised that Zafferano is a one-Michelin-starred restaurant!

For more information:

Zafferano
http://www.atozrestaurants.com/zafferano/

100 year old Balsamic Vinegar - $USD 500 per 100 ml, no wonder they only gave us 6 drops!!!!
http://www.farawayfoods.com/hundredyear.html and http://balsamic.com/pages/balsamic_article2.htm