Friday, February 25, 2005

mist


mist
Originally uploaded by little nemo in slumberland.
today it was so foggy that nothing further than 10 metres was visible, most things further than 5 metres were grey silhouettes [this is an old photo of a similar but less misty day] it's like being at the end of the world, you hear the ships foghorns but you can't see the sea. At around 3:30 the fog had cleared completely and the world was revealed again, overcast and damp and unnaturally clear and detailed, as the fog had taken with it the haze that usually fills the air. from the top of the roman fort i could see across macau, i could see planes taking off from coloane island, rising and disappearing into the clouds.

less love


less love
Originally uploaded by little nemo in slumberland.
best bar name in macau

neon cow


neon cow
Originally uploaded by little nemo in slumberland.
they make a nice ginger milk pudding

pointy land


yangshuo
Originally uploaded by little nemo in slumberland.
this is the view from the bridge from the paradise resort to west street. most of west street seems to have been rebuilt in the 80's to resemble the touristic ideal of a picturesque chinese town, although it sounds terrible it's actually quite appealing. most of the western tourist activity is concentrated on western street, where the cafes all have absurd names and they serve the finest in international backpacker cuisine; i had banana and yoghurt pancakes at the twin peaks cafe, the english breakfast at the stone roses, dumplings at dynasty of dumplings and a burrito at the green lotus. Because it was so cold [2C] and we were surrounded by europeans and north americans in coats and beanies, it felt like we were in some strange ski-village. The advantage of concentrating most of the tourist activity in one street is that the rest of the town felt relatively normal, which made me wonder if i had an ethical obligation to eat on western street in order to preserve the rest of the town from becoming as warped.

Thursday, February 17, 2005

camotruck


camotruck
Originally uploaded by little nemo in slumberland.
this one's for billie stone.
chinese army standard issue.

welcome to the future [circa 1980]


hkmorning
Originally uploaded by little nemo in slumberland.
kate and i went up to the peak. there were only two others out on the viewing deck. we watched the clouds drift between the skyscrapers.

balloon


balloon
Originally uploaded by little nemo in slumberland.
yep. high. beautiful.

in macau again


in macau again
Originally uploaded by little nemo in slumberland.
in the alleys

Wednesday, February 16, 2005

i've been to paradise, but i've never been to...

the hotel of modern art, which is just up the road from the Yangshuo Paradise resort, which was the home of kate and i for 2 deluxe nights and one standard night, we were demoted on the last night and were sad; no safe no bathrobes, no free bottles of water.

yangshuo was amazing; described by kate's friend's sister as one of the two pretty places of china; "people think that china must be beautiful, but it's not, it's just because they just show pictures of the only two pretty places..."

kate and i arrived at guilin airport after all the regular shuttle bus services had ended; we went to the information counter and asked about buses to yangshuo; "too expensive 450yuan, you get bus to guilin and get yangshuo bus from train station," and we were pushed onto the guilin shuttle bus. arriving in guilin we got off the bus in the deserted city centre, where all of the signs are helpfully written in chinese and the streets are as wide as football pitches...
"is this the train station?
yes, yes.
[complete absence of building resembling train station]
where do we catch the bus to yangshuo?
over there, turn right.
[broad wave of the hand encompassing wide empty streets, most of southern guilin city]
over there, turn right?
yes.
[look of irritation, talks to a couple of passengers from the bus, then tells us;] they go yangshuo, go with them.
we followed the two girls south and turned right, stood for a moment on an empty street corner, undistinguishable from any other corner nearby, and then a bus veered round the corner and we all got on.
when we arrived it was very dark and cold [2 degrees], and all we could see were the streets that were lit up and some dark spaces inbetween, we checked into the hotel and went down western street for some food.

the next day we woke to discover that the dark spaces from the previous night had been filled with huge, improbable mountains while we slept; sheer cliff faces rising straight up from the pavement, mountains very much like the one from supergirl, but instead of evil castles they had trees and pagodas (and television transmitters) on top. it was like waking up in the middle of the most cliched chinese painting you could imagine and discovering that they hadn't been making it up after all...

Wednesday, February 02, 2005

unavailable at present

simon is now spending free time with kate.