the overdue mt. coot-tha hike

high wind and splendid sun for brisbane~ LL voiced her concerns on slippery tracks from the down pour last night but this weather is too good to miss :) however it was indeed a good foresight as mt. coot-tha wasn't spared by the recent flooding events in queensland. however, it was still a good 4hrs hike overall, combining various roads and tracks over a few creeks and falls :)

sigh, god does delay things for good reasons... first of all i would not have found my way across Simpson's falls today to a well hidden alternative for the closed down track if it isn't for the track maps that i had only foraged from the GardenCity library two weeks ago; and the trip wouldn't be as appreciated if a tropical wind hasn't blown colours back into my otherwise placid life just the nite before :)

an hour's travel on train and bus brought asa from Sunnybank to the Brisbane Botanic Garden at the foot of mt. coot-tha.

but nay, as much as my scholarly brother xuan might appreciate this place, today's destination is the hiking tracks that webbed all over the 287m mountain which happens to be the most Northern part of Australia to record snow. sit back and enjoy :)

lyrics: The Carpenters "Top of the world"

such a feeling's coming over me

there is wonder in most everything i see

not a cloud in the sky got the sun in my eyes

and I won't be surprised if it's a dream

Everything I want the world to be

Is now coming true especially for me

and the reason is clear It's because you are here

You're the nearest thing to heaven that I've seen

I'm on the top of the world lookin' down on creation

and the only explanation I can find

Is the love that I've found

Every since you've been around

your love put me at the top of the world

Something in the wind has learned my name

And it's tellin' me that things are not the same

In the leaves on the trees and the touch of the breeze

There's a pleasin' sense of happiness for me

There is only one wish on my mind

When this day is through I hope that I will find

that tomorrow will be just the same for you and me

All I need will be mine if you are here


Sekian :)

bits and pieces from busking

it was amusing to see the brisbane river swelled and swelled in the endless spring rain. until it finally caused a flood in a suburb neighbouring our yeerongpilly office. the river had flowed reversely and the flows joined head on just off the elanor schonell bridge less than half a kilometer away from our UQ office. The waterline had risen so much that part of the trees and bushes on the banks are now under water. and i kept on amusing myself watching the nature works.

hydrexia had officially moved to yeerongpilly. the UQ office is now quite deserted, except for mornings when fellow scientist marc and i need to tend our experiments in the hydrogen lab. being the sole figure in the office is a good experience for one to see the fuller operational expects of a small company. i greeted the mailman who is a familiar face, the delivery guy who's gutted with the weather, the fruitbox lady who marveled at the discrete location of our office; directed phone calls to each person in yeerongpilly; and now that most of the dirty animals a.k.a. "blokes" are gone, i've also cleaned part of the kitchen. the cleaning would need to be extended to the workshop, hydrogen lab and the office...

oh, and i've adopted the neglected hydrexia football. a good size 4 which we use for futsal :)

the shed in yeerongpilly that is to be our future hydrogen lab has been transformed into a jamming studio, equipped with instruments, amplifiers, electronic mixers and stuffs... the guys had been convincing me to pick up bass again, and there is one just lying in the shed as i type on. i'm forcing them to learn "海阔天空" from the hongkong band Beyond as a condition ^^ they are also trying to convince my boss andrew to bring his air rifle, and to make dave bring over his dirt bike so that ppl can jump ramps in the factory ="= the board members are coming for a visit in two weeks time, not sure that they'll be too thrilled with it...

these, are the weird, funny and good people of hydrexia :)
LL, now tell me my first impressions of ppl is not accurate ^^
and yet i come...
:)

mails

as usual, a light storm and gust had tumbled our battered mailbox yesterday and the contents spilled allover and were all wet. a mail that is supposed to be delivered to 67 Breton street was among others. the address is one that is along my jogging track, so it was easy to just have a short walk and drop it at its supposed destination.

suppose that tiny deed had brought me a non-proportional reward in the form of a mail from karin this evening, with Poseidon, Gothenburg's guardian, proudly stamped on it ^^ so she hasn't move to the north as mentioned in her last mail I received in Malaysia. guess that would mean that the move will not happen soon, as winter closes in up north there in Sweden. in this era, it is probably a bit strange to know someone who you can only correspond with by traditional pen and paper mails ^^ information is delayed by a certain period and people talk about things that are a few months old~ imagine that a soldier writes to his wife, and said everything is fine, but when his wife receives his mail a month later, he's actually X_X already :P

all those thoughts passed me as I tear open the bright yellow envelope. kinda glad she hadn't use a stamped seal or i'll really let my imagination bring me back to ancient times ^^

a birthday card? hasnt been expecting that! not yet in the correct season of the year afterall... equally elating anyway :D

it's probably the joy i feel when receiving physical mails from private acquaintances that motivates me to continue sending them out myself :) though it is also ever a pleasure to mindfully word the sentences, carefully design the decorations, and thoughtfully consider the attachments. each of those is almost a work of art and creativity. mails is probably the one and only thing that i never discard and bring along no matter which bit of the world comes under my feet.

no, email can be fast and effective, but it can never replace the posts :)

continue busking

每朝一剂的生命泉源--咖啡，午餐后的奶茶，和晚上呷着喝的herbal tea，不知不觉变成生活的规律了 :)
peppermint也取代了大学时代喝惯的chamomile，成了俺滴最爱 ^^

here another month begins.
as suggested there --->
yup, right there --->
over the right hand end, it says i should find the right balance of this place and start to build the foundation of a home. as indicated in a few posts down, it seems like a simple but sturdy shelter would do the job. so i started to work on the frame of a tree house, in reaching for more light and wind, while closer to nature and sky and further from earth, where simplicity is the essence, and creativity the charm.

and i felt more solid.

baby spring flowers to cheer you up :)

the Rain Wild Chronicles

Nighteyes the wolf from "The Assassin's Apprentice" had first captured my likings. reading on, the series had got me totally fallen in love with The Fool the court jester, who brought the reading further to the introduction of more delightful characters in Althea the sailor-trader girl and Reyn the rain wild treasure hunter. and belatedly the spirited Malta. to develop a liking of Malta might stir a storm with other readers, but nah, cant help, Reyn loves her, 我只好爱屋及乌 ^^ Robin Hobb is good in sculpturing her characters :)

her newest release, the Rain Wild Chronicles had been on my reading list for a while. Moving to brissy certainly do no harm to the opportunity to lay hand on a copy of it.

my fondness of Trehaug the rain wild city, featured in the book title, might not be totally Reyn-induced ^^ the swampy marsh where an acidic river flows, had forced the rain wilders to engineer an entire city on sturdy tree tops. unearthing treasures from the ancient Elderling city buried under Trehaug was the sole reason that the city existed. not so much different from Kiruna up in the arctic circle aye? ^^ having that inclination, to be presented with a whole chronicle based on the rain wild would be an utter joy~

so far, the reading had been living up to expectations. Althea, Brashen and Paragon from the Liveship Traders Trilogy have paid a short appearance, which is always nice to have for sentimental reasons :) the only minor complain is that the characters in this series are not outstanding enough, just yet. Having high hopes for Thymara the “rain wild-touched” girl who’s borned with reptile claws.

Reading on, good day to y’all :)

橄榄树

咦？是蛔虫effect作祟？咋果然是身无彩凤，心有灵犀呀 :)
之前msn的pm才放“为了天空飞翔的小鸟 为了山间清流的小溪”咧~
LL还问zomok会听那个年代的歌^^

嗯，真的和歌词一样，虽然小鸟和小溪，还有广阔的草原都是流浪远方的原因，但coffin上的最后一根铁钉，还是为了那棵梦中的橄榄树吧。。。
经过两个月半的沉淀和不同的冲击，很多事都理得比较清楚了呢 :)
上个post里面的决定，算是确定了橄榄树的方向，开始自己的千里之行吧。。。

整篇都寓意很深哟
却也惊人的贴切 :)

和三毛一样，最后也会回到远方的故乡吧。。。
说，我欠你们一幅画。画得好就放上来。好久没有画画的触电了 ^^

先来这个吧，刚刚不小心找到的，又是寓意深重呀 ^^
由crane吊起的橄榄树 ^^

啊
决定了。。。

这样的话，建起来的又会只是个挡风雨的、清凉简单的小木屋咯。
什么时候才会认真建筑一个可以last常常久久的家呀。。。

嗯
就觉得不可能在这里久留呀。。。
哪一天回去，
不要再担心我走的路，
不要再赶我走了，
可好?

re-living uni time

one would have thought that the life of a professional should be quite different from that of a uni student who had to live with a monthly budget at half of the national poverty line. in simpler words to describe the second part of the statement above, the poverty limit in sweden cuts at 7300kr per month, and i was happily surviving at 3500kr-ish (hey, even that is a lot of money!). and needless to mention, melbourne days were even more to the extreme.

but, but~ even though the monthly cap has been mentally lifted, the basic ways are still very much unchanged. the food, the accommodation, the trasportation, the pastimes and even the way people back home are missed ^^ it is especially amusing when looking at all this from the perspective of food. still cooking our all time favourite bacon risotto (edited recipe with herbs, and bacon de 绝配 mushroom! see picture ^^), sipping chamomile tea at night (no longer adding honey to it, tht's suppose to be an adult's twist ^^), only buying potato chips when they are 2 for $4 ^^ (no longer need to hide them under the bed~).

a guy who went up to mt cotton with us over the weekend was putting in picture his nightmare of having too much sweet and sour pork in his 4 UK years. ironically i am still having a profound weekness for honey chicken as it was something that i could only afford to consume on special occasions (geez, i was really that poor) ^^ it later became a dish that the shanghai chef relied upon to cheer me up when i was having a particularly though shift at the food court in Northland. he would purposely cook a tray of honey chicken 1hr before close of business so that there will be leftover for me to bring home for dinner :)

all in all, enjoy awakening and reincarnating memories at the moment :)

Wot is on their mind?

Just had a look at the KPI my boss drafted for me. Is it surprising that my main tasks for this quarter comprise of taking over the two topics they fired at me during my face to face interview in April? So they actually hire me to solve those two problems based on the proposal they asked me to prepare for the interview??? No wonder they were feverishly taking notes back then.

and brilliant that this only dawns to me after serving them for a good month 0_o

new kid in town

hi all, meet Bracken :)

3" tall at birth, his favourite food is fat and juicy eucalyptus leaves ^^
right now he just love getting cozy with Yellow ^^

lazy weekend

really should be doing the house assembly for SN1670-72...
instead half a day was happily spent doing house courses, laundry, cleaning, grocery shopping, the usual stuff. the other half was equally happily spent between hook and yarns, haha. dunno when will the final product be ready but will definitely post it up here! ^_^

the cash deposit function on the ATMs has proven to be such a convenient invention. a few buttons and my swedish account is practically empty. swedish crowns has become aussie dollars. half of them goes straight back into the machine, and into my aussie account. the other half will become september's expenses.

LL'd drove us to the foot of mount gravatt yesterday. not sure if hiking is an easy hobby for a friend to accommodate, haha. LL's de best~~ anyway, we went up and came down unscratched la. it wasn't a tough hike, want more details then come and hike with us ^^

ah, cant beat my conscience, going to have a look at house assembly ^^ have a good week ahead!

more tracks, toohey forest

a rather easy navigation through the Brisbanian public transport system, i was at the edge of toohey forest. too hungry for nature and too thirsty for endorphin, my badly itching legs were difficult to constrain from breaking into a run towards the eucalyptus clad land. with the impatience and without a map in hand, the entrance i found was therefore an unconventional one.

the sign post at the entrance

magnificent eucalyptus gum trees

to quench the hunger and thirst, the GPS inside me naturally guided my feet towards a rocky climb. having to constantly wipe cobwebs off my face were telling me that the track i took was one that is less used by others :)

the lookouts at the end of the climb brought a glimpse of the distant brisbane city.

the descend then took me to a more established trail with posts for self guided walks and milestones marking the mileages are in place.

someone's dwelling is obviously within the range of the map...

so it was time for a paced walk then!

through the woods of different ages and densities~

and accompanied by their more colourful and delicate companions~

bumble bee working hard~

one wonders if these patterns on the silver trunk of gum trees are trails of vermins? ^^

the mass of protoplasm and hydroxyapatite which forms me emerged from the forest two stops down the road of the stop i got off the bus earlier. a two and a half hrs' walk in total :)

you know when i write like this, is when i'm picking up paperbacks and hardcovers again ^^ 果然是三日不读书则面目可憎啊~ 呵呵。the sequence of robin hobb's bingtown series was borrowed from the Garden City Library on LL's card. Been craving for it as it wasn't in any library in Gothenburg! ^^

work and walk

the job... is. just. like. wot. i. imagine. it. would. be. :) hope it will only go better as time passes :) the actual work is very very similar to my master's thesis which had given me such pleasure working on, taking care of very cranky machines, and working with mysterious materials which no one knows how they will behave subjected to different kinds of food to eat and beds to sleep. enjoying the challenge of working with the lack of resources :) though sometimes it does remind me of how thing were conveniently done in favco and were not appreciated XP

for two days now we've reverted to summer weather :) LL tour guided me around the brisbane river on the citycat ferry and we had a good walk from the powerhouse market back to the city :) will definitely visit the powerhouse again, captured by the overhead cranes in the old factory building XD

after two weeks, it's finally my turn to clean the house according to the roster. only have to clean once in 4weeks' really aint bad ^^ especially in this weather~

had a nice walk down the Les Atkinson park just opposite where we stay after a good half day's worth of labour. at about 500m x 100m, the park has some good tracks and nice sceneries with lots of lalangs. but seems a bit too small for my appetite ^^ should have brought the camera coz the sun was putting make ups on the park ^^ will do it nxt time and post some pics here :)

the track outside hydrexia's UQ (uni of queensland) office is another gem :) a band of aged trees and wild life it is. will continue to look for more good walking tracks :) see wot sweden's done to me ^^

this is a diary

didnt remember that there's such a mountain of procedural things that's needed to be done when one moves to another country... though it's much better this time around since there's the company behind me and we've got LL over here! as compared to the time in sweden, when i wasnt a part of any organization nor any programme and knew absolutely no one in sweden, and doesnt speak the language, wow wee... thx to karin and fellow classmates that i'd survive!

though it seems like the troublesome part is almost done now. just the driving license left. hydrexia promised to pay for it, good little company it is ^^ but guess it's gonna be put off until there's a need in my later australian days, lazy lazy~

the office will be moved in the best part of next week. so my first contribution for hydrexia seems to be a good hard office mover~ and it also does seem like there's at least gonna be another week of winter installed for us.

wonder how are 1636 and 1641-42's testings going. and if they are making fuss for the dear MEs who took over ^^ miss those babies.
:)

taipei in pictures 4

the forbidden city museum 故宫博物院

and their toilet signs..... absolutely liked it :)

taipei 101~ not very tall oni ma.... ^^

my hair dresser asked me to push it.... u guys can find the more conventional view on internet anyway ^^

new york new york

street performances: the yoyo boy

more street performances and all the hype at ximending 西门町: spray can artist

he's cool, dun u think? well, at least photogenic ^^

paper cut (ouch) 剪纸艺人

flour patung little 7 面人7仔

sand art

cheeky umbrella shop

OMG who's that?

the last supper: toilet theme restaurant??? *cough cough*

the food was actually pretty good~

erm... that just looks like.....

unfortunately that concludes our taiwan trip. strapping up the backpack at deserted LCCT, and time to go home!