My office is closed today as Typhoon Signal 8 is hoisted. A nice surprise as I have not experience this for over 10 years!

Here is some information about typhoon signals in Hong Kong.

http://gohongkong.about.com/od/travelplanner/a/typhoons.htm

The Tai Hang Fire Dragon Dance started around 1880 at Tai Hang Village in Hong Kong. The dance usually takes place around Mid-Autumn Festival. According to local legend, Tai Hang was attacked by a giant python and ate the villagers' livestock, some villagers believe the python was the son of the dragon king and rumour has it the dragon is terrified of fire. Hence the villagers make a giant straw dragon each year and covered it with incense sticks, together with a 3 day dance to ward off the python.

http://www.discoverhongkong.com/promotions/mid_autumn/eng/overview/index.html

The Bridge of Sighs (Italian: Ponte dei Sospiri) is a bridge in Venice, northern Italy . The enclosed bridge is made of white limestone and has windows with stone bars. It passes over the Rio di Palazzo and connects the old prisons to the interrogation rooms in the Doge's Palace. It was designed by Antoni Contino (whose uncle Antonio da Ponte had designed the Rialto Bridge), and built in 1602. The view from the Bridge of Sighs was the last view of Venice that convicts saw before their imprisonment. The bridge name, given by Lord Byron in the 19th century, comes from the suggestion that prisoners would sigh at their final view of beautiful Venice through the window before being taken down to their cells. In reality, the days of inquisitions and summary executions were over by the time the bridge was built and the cells under the palace roof were occupied mostly by small-time criminals. In addition, little could be seen from inside the Bridge due to the stone grills covering the windows. A local legend says that lovers will be granted everlasting love and bliss if they kiss on a gondola at sunset under the bridge.

The Bridge of Sighs in Cambridge is a covered bridge belonging to St John's College of Cambridge University. It was built in 1831 and crosses the River Cam between the college's Third Court and New Court. The architect was Henry Hutchinson. It is named after the Bridge of Sighs in Venice, although they have little architecturally in common beyond the fact that they are both covered. The bridge is one of Cambridge's main tourist attractions and Queen Victoria is said to have loved it more than any other spot in the city. A common myth states that it was the students who named this bridge "bridge of sighs," as the context of its existing within the college grounds means that the "sighs" are those of pre-exam students. This belief probably has much to do with the function of the bridge--linking two quadrangles of St John's College together in a covered path, as opposed to Kitchen Bridge, which is an open-air bridge. Students are rumoured for their sighs on proceeding from their quarters on the Backs to the tutor's offices in the main college quadrangle.

There is also another Bridge of Sighs in Oxford. The bridge is often referred to as the Bridge of Sighs because of its supposed similarity to the famous Bridge of Signs in Venice. However, Hertford Bridge was never intended to be a replica of the Venetian bridge, and indeed it bears a closer resemblance to the Rialto Bridge in the same city.

Baimei Village is situated at the border of Bada and Ake townships of Guangnan County. Surrounded by mountains around and without available roads, the village can be only accessed by waterways in two Karst caves in the back and front of it respectively. A 10-minute journey along the winding Ake River would lead you to unveil the hidden village.  

Situated in remote areas and isolated from the outside world due to the inconvenient traffic conditions, Bamei is seldom known to people as a pastoral Zhuang ethnic village shrouded among mountains. Being simple and kind, the Zhuang ethnic members in the village have kept the orthodox traditions of their own. They organize or spend assorted folk activities/festivals such as the March 3rd Festival, the Dragon Sacrificial Ceremonies, the Ancestral Worship Ceremony, Antiphonally Singing, the Colored Rice Festival, and Kicking Shuttlecock etc. 

The residences of Bamei Village are designed in “stilt” style, locally called “Ma Lan Lou” and “Diao Jiao Lou” (Stilted House). Composed of two floors, a traditional building in the village is the dwelling of human on the second floor and the barn or stable on the first floor. As the manifestation of the long history of the village, these traditional houses are deemed “living fossils” of the Zhuang ethnic architectures.

Setting foot on Bamei Village, you will find yourself in a dreamland. It deserves to be called the “Peach Blossom Valley”. (The Peach Blossom Valley is derived form “the Story of the Blossom Valley” by an ancient Chinese poet Mr. Tao Yuanming, 365-427. Blossom Valley equals to utopia.)

Check out this video on Baimei in Yunnan, China.

http://bit.ly/oSCSSf

For more travel related and life-style articles, please follow me on Twitter.

http://bit.ly/hIQaEa

Watch the video here http://cctv.cntv.cn/lm/travelogue/shangrila/index.shtml

Venue:  Greenwich, London

Date: All year round

Website: http://www.visitgreenwich.org.uk/

In Greenwich, a leafy suburb of south-east London, it’s possible to straddle the world famous Greenwich Meridian Line, the Prime Meridian of the World, known as Longitude 0º. The line - from which everywhere else on Earth is measured - is the very home of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT).

The town became the site of a Royal palace, the Palace of Placentia from the 15th century, and was the birthplace of many in the House of Tudor, including Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. The palace fell into disrepair during the English Civil War and was rebuilt as the Royal Naval Hospital for Sailors by Sir Christopher Wren and his assistant Nicholas Hawksmoor. These buildings became the Royal Naval College in 1873, and they remained an establishment for military education until 1998 when they passed into the hands of the Greenwich Foundation. The historic rooms within these buildings remain open to the public; other buildings are used by University of Greenwich and the Trinity College of Music.

The town became a popular resort in the 17th century with many grand houses, such as Vanbrugh castle established on Maze Hill, next to the park. From the Georgian period estates of houses were constructed above the town centre. The maritime connections of Greenwich were celebrated in the 20th century, with the sitting of the Cutty Sark and Gipsy Moth IV next to the river front, and the National Maritime Museum in the former buildings of the Royal Hospital School in 1934.

To mark the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II, it was announced on 5 January 2010 that in 2012, the London Borough of Greenwich is to become the fourth to have Royal Borough status. The three others being The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and The Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead Royal Borough. Due to its historic links with the Royal Family, and its status as home of the Prime Meridian and as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

Venue: Guangzhou
Date: All year round, especially at night
Website: http://gztvtower.info/

Guangzhou hosted Asian Games last year and the city has its new clothes. One of the most exciting new landmark is the Canton Tower, originally named ‘Hai Xin Ta’ (Center of the Seas), a name based on the historic reference to its location on the Pearl river delta. There were over 100,000 proposal for its name in a competition.  The locals also called it ‘Xiao Man Waist’ or Supermodel as the tower has a narrower waist. The waist of the tower contains a 180-metre long open-air skywalk where visitors can physically climb the tower. There are outdoor gardens set within the structure, and at the top, just above 450 metres, a large open-air observation deck. The interior of the tower is subdivided into programmatic zones with various functions, including TV and radio transmission facilities, observatory decks, revolving restaurants, computer gaming, restaurants, exhibition spaces, conference rooms, shops, and 4D cinemas.

The tower is designed by Dutch architects, Mark Hemel and Barbara Kuit of Information Based Architect. One of the architects, Mark Hemel, noted: “Where most skyscrapers bear 'male' features; being introvert, strong, straight, rectangular, and based on repetition, we wanted to create a 'female' tower, being complex, transparent, curvy and gracious. Our aim was a subtle and fragile but sexy tower that would represent Guangzhou as a sensitive, dynamic and exciting city.”

The idea of the tower's design is simple. The form, volume and structure is generated by two ellipses, one at foundation level and the other at a horizontal plane at 450 metres. These two ellipses are rotated relative to another. The tightening caused by the rotation between the two ellipses forms a ‘waist’ and a densification of material half way the tower's height. This means that the lattice structure, which at the bottom of the tower is porous and spacious, becomes denser at waist level. The waist itself becomes tight, like a twisted rope; transparency is reduced and views to the outside are limited. Further up the tower the lattice opens again, accentuated here by the tapering of the structural column-tubes. 

Venue: Check event and tour details

Date:  31st December and January 2010

Website: http://www.discoverhongkong.com/festivehk2010/eng/winter/countdown.jsp

Get ready for the party of a lifetime as Hong Kong counts down to welcome the New Year. Join the happy, festive crowds and head for Victoria Harbour for this magnificent year-end celebration. The air is electric with a sense of anticipation as hundreds of thousands of people head for the waterside to witness the main New Year Countdown event. When the clock ticks down to midnight, your senses are sure to be dazzled by the magnificent pyrotechnics display that will be launched from one of Hong Kong's landmark buildings, Two ifc and nine other major buildings on Hong Kong Island, as they light up the sky in a radiant shower of lights, brilliantly illuminating the beautiful harbour.