Church door

Alice found this church door somewhere in Lisbon. She just loves the ornated arch over the door.

The door itself appears to be the prototype of doors in Lisbon - heavy wooden doors with 3 panels of pattern. It is quite difficult to take good pictures of doors in Lisbon as Alice was constantly standing on a slope or uneven cobble surface in narrow streets. It is difficult for her to get the picture to be right in front of the camera. Of course, the cobble streets are part of the charm of Lisbon.

Red Door...

Alice took her new toy camera Digital Harinezumi to Lisbon and found this red door. The camera is quite amazing because the colors came out very vividly. The fact that it is a digital camera/video camera also allows impatient Alice to see/upload her pictures immediately.

Alice found this red door in Lisbon, near the Castle of São Jorge. There are not many red doors in Lisbon and Alice just thought this door looks really impressive. Inside the door is a courtyard, then another red door. On the front door, the word 'palace' indicates that this may be a special building, but Alice couldn't find any information about it. It looks like one of those secret society from The Avengers TV shows.

What secret soceity operates behind red doors?

Futurist door...

Alice found this 'Futurist' door in Liverpool town centre...

The building itself is boarded up...is this a culture jam project?

It might actually be interesting to know what's behind the Futurist door...but Alice knew one thing...the smell of Future is definitely...#$xyz!!!

Tall tall building...no unauthorized entry

Alice went roaming with Fiona today and came across this service apartments building on Hollywood Road. This looks quite intimidating...

You need an access card to just get inside the building, it has a very corporate feel to it. It doesn't really feel like an apartment building, it looks more like a commercial one...does that explain the strange pattern on the outside wall?

It is a building with a door that said, 'No unauthorized entry'.

Where is the door?

Alice went to Mongkok to pick up some art supplies. On the way back to the train station, she saw this homeless guy relaxing under the bridge. He looks like he lives there. Don't worry, he has his shorts on. In fact, Alice saw him eating his bun.

The weather was really hot today, hope he is not going to have heat stroke.

Market doors...

This was taken last Sunday, Alice was typing in new entry but there was an unfortunate event with the internet connection. Everything was lost.

Alice loves going to Central on Sundays, it is so nice and quiet. These stalls are normally open, selling vegetables or tofu. On Sunday, the wet market looks very different.

It is so relaxing that people took the time to feed stray animals.

A metaphorical door...

Alice went to Mongkok for vinyl hunting and was surprised to see Wing Lo (羅金榮) doing his street performance. Wing Lo is a door to Alice because she bought 'Come Out and Play', a compilation indie CD several years ago and fell in love with Wing Lo's track, 非禮. Since that CD, Wing Lo appeared to have dropped out of the Hong Kong indie music radar.

But his song opened a door to great indie music for Alice.

It was great to hear him sang last night, and bought his CD. Hope Wing Lo will be back to the indie scene soon!

Outside a Taipei temple

Alice found this photo, taken with her little Golden Half. These pictures were taken outside the gates of a Taipei temple. She likes the incense offering urn and the mythical monster.

Slice of Life...

This is probably the only Pizza Hut in Hong Kong that gives out free wisdom...share a slice of LIFE!

What more can you ask for?

To get a slice of life, please visit the Pizza Hut at 28 Soy Street, Mongkok.

A building with one door and no windows...

Alice found this Tamkang University 淡江大學 building in Taipei extremely intimidating.

There is one entrance, but where are the windows? It is a huge blue box with no windows!

It looks very impressive from the outside, but Alice doesn't think she wants to be inside the building!

A giant door...

Alice took this photo for the steps to the giant door of National Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei. In the good old days, every imperial Chinese architecture (or at least those official one) has to have an impressive set of steps. Ordinary people had to walk up those hundreds of steps to pay honor to the emperor or deities (or officials). These steps are supposed to humble the ordinary citizens and remind them the greatness of whoever is inside the building.

It was a very different mindset back then.

Testing kindergarten kids...

On the subject of kindergarten kids, this sign is taken outside another kindergarten in the same neighborhood.

'About 300 kindergarten students took the Cambridge Young Learners English Test, and their average score reached 86%'

WTF?! Alice always thought that attending kindergarten meant making friends, learning social skills, having fun, sharing (and fighting over) toys and breaking cookies! Now kindergartens are advertising their international test scores? FYI: A lot of parents in Hong Kong do send their kids to take the test, a test designed for second language learner. Seriously, testing our preschoolers? There is something wrong with our society and values.

Colorful kindergarten...

This is the door to a happy kindergarten. There is something slightly wrong though...Is that supposed to be modern art or peas in the pod?

Chicken or burger?

Alice likes this picture: Battle of the Fast Food Shops. In the same corner, you can choose from the Colonel's chicken or Burger King. The entrances to the fast food shops are right next to each other. To spice things up a bit, there is even a 7-11 convenience store there! This must be one of the most visited block corner in Mongkok.

Is it really a good idea to have a KFC on top of Burger King?

A mysterious door...

Alice found another mysterious door today. On the first floor of an old building on Granville Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Alice saw this door. The door got a big sign 'Mystery' and there are those electricity meters and graffiti, it does look mysterious!

This all look promising until Kaz pointed out that 'Mystery' is just a brand name for skateboarding products. Well, one has to be a skateboarder to know this.

Door to antiques...

Alice went to the temple on the fourth day of the Chinese New Year. On her way to the temple, on Hollywood Road, she found this nice door.

Hollywood Road is a nice district in Central with lots of antique shops and stalls. It is nice to stroll around, but she wouldn't buy anything there, except second hand vinyl records. Everything else could be fake!

Alice just wondered whether this particular antique shop is charging its customers more for this nice door?

The gate to city green...

There are many green pockets scattered around the most densely populated areas in Hong Kong. Alice found a gate installed by the Hong Kong Water Work in Lok Fu Service Reservoir Rest Garden. The gate has a nice rusty pattern. It was a nice and quiet walk up a small hill. The reservoir gives the existence to a rest garden. Otherwise, there would not be any green patches in Hong Kong.

Door gods

For Chinese New Year, Alice found a nice door for everyone. These photos were taken in a temple at Stanley. The two deities were the Door Gods...the military and the civil door gods. The one with a paler complexion is the civil door god (presumably because he is studying indoor)! The darker complexion one is the military door god (tanned from the outdoor activities)!

Chinese people like to put up images of door gods (must be in pair) to guard the home against evil spirits and bad luck. The gods' faces should thus face outward, and they must never be put back-to-back.

There are so many different portrayals of the door gods. They could be holding different weapons or wearing different armours. But the intention of putting up the door gods is the same: protection.

Now, this house is protected! May the new Year of Ox bring you good fortune and health. Kung Hey Fat Choy!

Door to tea dance...

Alice found another door to luxurious enjoyment...this one is actually a small dim sum restaurant, Colorful Dragon Restaurant, in Shek Kip Mei. The restaurant is located in an older part of the town, surrounded by public housing estates. The entrance to the place is still maintained in the 1970s style: gold-colored columns, the name of the restaurant in big Chinese character and the coin-operated mechanical rides! Alice hasn't seen any of these mechanical rides for ages! Just when Alice thought this is just another regular neighborhood dim sum restaurant, she spotted the poster.

The poster:
Colorful Dragon Night Club
Great music and fancy dancing at Colorful Dragon
Tea Dance: $68 Night Dance: $108

The neighborhood dim sum restaurant will be your neighborhood night club from afternoon onwards! Tea Dance, once a dirty word for something else, has made a strong comeback in Hong Kong in recent years. Now, it is not the men who go to these tea dance venues in various neighborhoods, but the housewives. The mamas put on their fancy dresses and dance with their friends. It is all about having a girls' night out!

Though the poster doesn't say when Tea Dance will start, Alice saw the waiters clearing out the regular dining tables for the dance at about 2pm. One night, Alice will call up all of her friends to enjoy a night out of dancing!

Stairs to somewhere?

There are quite a lot of old buildings in Hong Kong. Many of them are located in older districts like Sham Shui Po.

In these buildings, lifts are usually not available. This set of stairs is an interesting contrast to Alice's earlier picture of stairs to nowhere. The staircase is extremely dark and smelly. The question, then, is...does this set of stairs leading to somewhere?

Alice can imagine all kinds of monsters lurking around the corners, the truth is, it just leads to someone's home. Ordinary homes in the older part of Hong Kong.

The stairs seem to be a forgotten part of the city, the building is too old to be considered for redevelopment. The area is forgotten on the economic map.

Gates...or just lines?

Technically these are not really gates, but they do look great in the sunset. The lines worked quite well with the fisheye lens.

Alice has been experimenting with her FishEye2. This was taken outside the Hong Kong Art Museum in Tsim Sha Tsui. Surprisingly, the place is really lively during weekends. Not that people are actually going into the museum, they are going to the harbour front square to enjoy a bit of fresh air. Passing through this long corridor with the partitions (are they partitions?) was the only way getting to the square.

Herbal shop?

Alice found another funny door. This one leads to a herbal shop. Strangely, it is sort of 'attached' to a school building (the yellow brick building). The door is at the back. It must be a very tiny shop.

According to the writing on the wall, you can buy herbs for all kind of pains: lower back pain, sharp bone (?), shoulder pain and just pain. There is no call for medication or needle. Just put the herbal pad on!

Unfortunately, it never opens! Maybe the herbal pad seller is already so rich for his miracle invention that he doesn't need to work anymore!

Stairs to no door...

This is one of the strangest staircases Alice has ever seen. It is next to a highway intersection in Shek Kip Mei. You can walk up the steps from either side and then there seems to be another short set of stairs leading upward. After about 10 steps, you will run into a concrete wall! There is no sign of any door. There is no sign of a passage leading anywhere. What's the point of the steps then?

There are a lot of rumors about funny empty and pointless steps in Hong Kong, especially in the rural areas. If you see a set of steps that don't really lead to anywhere, don't go that direction. Some steps were laid down by villagers to confuse the restless lost souls. If you walk on the steps, you may become one as well!

Door to luxurious enjoyment...

Alice strolled around the Flower Market today, the stroll in itself is already a very pleasant experience. She didn't expect that there is actually a door to luxurious enjoyment! At the start of the Flower Market, there is one old building with three hourly hotels. On one advertisement board, it said, 'Hotel facilities/luxurious enjoyment/hourly/over night/reasonable price'.

The building itself is interesting. If one looks carefully, there is still one of those really old-style lift where one has to open a door and push an iron grille. The building materials at the entrance also suggested that this could be a building built in the early 1950s.

What kinds of 'luxurious enjoyment' can one find in a 1950s building?

The Paramount, Shanghai

Alice has been writing something about her Shanghainese in the last week or so, and she rediscovered this photo from her trip to Shanghai two Christmases ago.

The Paramount was once the most luxurious dance hall in Shanghai, in the heydays of jazz from the late 1930s to mid-1950s. Jimmy King (Jing Huaizu), the first Chinese jazz band leader, also played there.

The Paramount is located in 218 Yuyuan Lu, Jing'an, Shanghai. There is no missing of the massive building. Andrew Field, a historian, made a short film about the building, the place and the time. It is a spectacular art deco building, and it was also among the first buildings in China to be fully air-conditioned in the late 1930s. It is not even possible to imagine the wealth and extravengance in those days: the fancy cars, the men in cigars, the beauties and the music. It was the place to be at that time!