Hong Kong - Day Two

**Having some issues with uploading photos at the moment, will fix this tomorrow for the next blog**As with most things, no matter what quality or size of the photograph, it will never show you just how amazing this place is. I still can't believe how 10 mins from the centre of Hong Kong, you can be sitting in the middle of a forest in pretty much silence. I'm beginning to see why this city is so popular with tourists, and am yet to set foot on Hong Kong island. Two photos above, the first one is Hong Kong by night, you can just about make out the lights of Hong Kong island in the distance. Second one is the view from my bedroom window in the apartment. Woke up at 4 this morning, went back to sleep and then got up at 10am. My body clock is a bit all over the place but that's jet lag for you. Hopefully when I go to bed at 11pm Hong Kong time tonight it'll sort itself out. Today has been a nice day of relaxing and seeing the local area. Have been looking at Hong Kong island all day but haven't quite made it there, that's what tomorrow's all about. After a late start, food shopping was needed, nothing special really to talk about there...the best bits about shopping in this sort of country is the markets. Everything is available on the markets, even cats and turtles! Though i'm not sure these are to be eaten... It was meant to be a traditional chinese lunch tonight, instead we ended up in a Japanese restaurant...minus the Sushi. Was very enjoyable, looking forward to a proper Chinese dinner when we get round to it. Cost was only £14 for the 3 of us. Heading to the tourist area tomorrow so that'll be a bit more pricey. This was followed by a short walk down to the the sea, took the above photo of my dad looking out of the South China sea there. Headed up to Nina tower which is the 33rd biggest building in the world, originally it was planned for the tower to be made the biggest building in the world but due to its close proximity to Hong Kong airport at the time, they were restricted to its height. This towers, as does most of Hong Kong, among tons of greenery and hills. My Dad described it very well, it's like something out of "Sim City", it very much is like one of those cities you build with everything in it.

Once we'd headed back to the apartment, got a drink and cooled down it was decided to head over to a viewing point which looks over Lantau Island in the direction of Hong Kong International Airport. Lovely weather to jump on a motorbike for a quick drive through both city and countryside to check out the views out to see and over the surrounding islands. Some excellent photos from there, but can only really upload one without me being here all night, so tried to add the best one.

Just chilling out tonight, watching the footy. South Asia cup final tonight...Tottenham Hotspur vs. Hull City, very eastern I know! Tomorrow is gonna be a good day, going to take the short tube ride to Kowloon, take some photos of Hong Kong island, and then head over for the first time and explore. Keep Posted!!

Hong Kong - Day One

**Photo not taken by me, i've only been here 6 hours!**

I guess this is day one, we'll class it as that for the purpose of this post. It's currently 22:30 here on the South Eastern Coast of China, it's quite strange because i've pretty much lost a day. I left Heathrow at 22:30 last night and got to Hong Kong at 17:25. Slept very well on the plane, which is a huge change, I can usually never sleep but this time I managed about 4 or 5 hours so for me its about 3:30pm and i'm not really tired. Even so going to try to head to bed soon or i'll just make the jet lag worse. Landing at HK airport is a bit scary, because it's on an island all you see until about 5 secs before landing is water getting closer and closer!

The good news is that the view from my Dad's apartment is pretty good, 62 floors down...well minus the number "4's" because apparently in China the number 4 means "Death" or something similar, so you don't get a floor with a 4 in it. Floor 40 to 49 is non existant...you figure it out"! As I say great views, can just see Hong Kong island in the distance and saw bits of the lights show tonight, see the full thing on saturday.

Managed to get tickets to South China vs. Spurs at the Hong Kong stadium on Sunday so that'll be quite good. Very weird driving into Hong Kong from the airport because its nothing like what you imagine, all very hilly and green, until you reach the city. It's like a metropolis jungle, surrounded by a totally green jungle. Probably one of the most unique cities in the world from what i've seen so far.

Tomorrow's a quiet day, see the more local area before it's off to Hong Kong Island on Saturday, lots more photo ops there!

I'm Swine Ridden

...well at least my house it anyway. Apologies for the lack of updates, one is coming prior to my Hong Kong trip, I may even post a brief itinerary for anyone in Hong Kong so they can stalk me. Ay just think of that all you freaks out there. My mum has had Swine Flu, she's at the tail end of it (it's a pink and curly tail) so i'm desperatly avoiding that. In between hiding from the swines and organising my holiday I came across this video. It's by the Amateur Transplants, who i've always been a fan of, I think some of the stuff they do is absolutly hilarious, and I thought the same about this video. It's definitly only for over 18s and if you're easily offended then i'd recommend you avoid it. Enjoy!!

Good Ruler, Bad Person

Bernie Ecclestone has today been forced to apologise after his comments about Ex German Dictator Adolf Hitler, Ecclestone commented that "the leader had a great ability to get things done". He was subsequently rapped, Jewish Chronicle editor , Stephen Pollard described Ecclestone as "either an idiot or morally repulsive". The full Sky News story is available here.

I can see where Bernie Ecclestone has gone wrong here, I think its a simple misunderstanding. Hitler was a very evil person who persucuted thousands of jews for no crime, however despite this Adolf Hitler was a very charismatic and intelligent bloke. He managed to convince the majority of the German population to follow him and his destructive policies. In the 1930's Germany was in a similar state to what the world is today, it faced a deep economic crisis and it's industrys were in turmoil. Hitler came in and rebuilt the economy and did alot for Germany. But he did alot wrong. Hitler had a strong personality, a personality and the strengths that could have been put into doing so good, unfortunatly through his own doings he used it for evil, an evil which will never be forgotton.

I think Hitler was a ruler, not a leader. He ruled his people well by bringing them to power, but he did not lead them to be decent humans. Nor did he bring himself to be a decent human being. Despite what history says, you have to admit to what a great ruler he was, and the huge amount of charisma and political talent he possessed.

Politically Correct Controversy

Numerous people have commented recently on my controversial facebook, twitter and blog comments. I'm sure people by now do realise that I say what i think, and I don't hold back, and unfortunatly it's one of my strengths but also one my weaknesses. If I don't like you, then why should I spend days kissing your arse and acting like we're great mates, instead if I get it out in the open we can move on. This is not to say that I can develop working relationships with these people, sometimes it is a nessecity and it needs work from both parts, but if I think you're talking out of your arse than i'll damn right tell you. There are alot of people I don't like in this life, people who I think are complete arseholes and I have no time for, however I have a working relationship with these people and we can get along, saying that i'd never consider going out for a beer with them. This is my exact feeling on Politically Correctness, taken from urbandictionary.com:

Something that started out as a sort of moral common sense - actually not a bad idea, eg. saying 'black person' instead of 'god-damn cotton-pickin' nigger'. However, the whole thing got utterly out of hand in the early 90s to the point where a lot of people will say 'Afro-Carribean' or 'Afro-American' because they think it's racist to say 'black'! It gets even more ridiculous when you consider that in some parts people think it's offensive to 'blackboard' or 'black coffee'.

What began as a force for good (considering the number of people who really are racist, sexist and homophobic) has since become a laughing stock beacause of the ridiculous extremes to which certain neurotic ultra-liberals took it - cf. a person being 'vertically challenged' rather than short. This has actually undone a lot of progress made in changing bigoted attitudes (as bigot can claim any offence taken at their views is 'political correctness gone mad), whilst making people feel guilty for enjoying anything but the blandest, most anaemic humour for fear of being 'offensive'. I mean, seriously, what's funnier out of 'Friends' and 'South Park'? (Or 'The League of Gentlemen' for the benefit of any Brits out there?)

At the same time as straight white able-bodied men are going out of their way to talk about 'ethnic people' (who ISN'T ethnic!?) and those of 'different sexual orientation', there are blacks calling themselves niggas (which has been going on for years), gays calling themselves (and eachother!) poof, queens and queers, and so on - the real way to neutralize a term used as as an insult is for those to whom it was applied to use it themselves.

AT its worst, political correctness is nothing different form Orwell's - an attempt to change the way people think by forcibly changing the way they speak. So let's have a backlash against the nannying, interefering, cotton-wool Stalinism 'ploitical correctness' has become - not to placate bigots, but to speak the truth and enjoy outrageous humour like we're meant to. Remember, the next time someone says they don't like Harry Potter because Hermione is a stereotypically sensitive girl, the relevant word to call them is 'cunt'.

And yes, that is exactly how I feel about politically correctness. There's too much other shit happening in this world and in other peoples lives, for our government and the current nanny state to tell us what we can or can't say. If I want to say Michael Jackson is a kiddy fiddling Gary Glitter wannabe then I will (I don't agree with all this statement), if I want to call a vertically challenged person a bloody dwarf then I will. This is everything that is wrong with this world, so much of the "oh you can't say this cause you'll upset this person", or "you can't say that cause that person will get annoyed"...well fuck them.

On the Jackson topic, I know alot of people have been annoyed with some of my comments about the late great Michael Jackson. Allow me to make it clear how I feel about Michael Jackson: "I'm utterly bored of all the news being full of it now. Yes he changed the music industry, yes he was a phenomenally talented bloke who could dance and sing like noone ever known. But in my opinion he was a very ill man, who fiddled kids. And yes I have compared him to Gary Glitter because there are similaritys. His Child Abuse charges were never help up, but who pays out $22million in an out of court settlement if you're entirely innocent." That's where I will leave it, as I think its time Michael Jackson was left to Rest In Peace. Let's change the record, some new news please, how is Hazel Blears's husband's porn collection lately anyway?

I'll never change, i'll always be the person I am, and I quite like me, I have a sick sense of humour, but its time this world lightened up and I know that people smile when they see my facebook and twitter updates. In this current climate, making one person smile a day can't harm. Let's all lighten up and tell the nanny state exactly where they can shove their politically correctness.

Midge Ure playing "Vienna" Live at HBMF 2009

Check out this great video of Ultravox Bassist and Live Aid co-producer Midge Ure at this years Hastings Beer and Music Festival. The crowd just loved it when he kicked off with this song. A true legend.

If you get the chance, check out some of the other videos that the creator of this has done. Andy has some great vlogs on his page, some very interesting topics. So check that out while you're on there.

How much for a pair of sunglasses???

You know how festivals are, you're always going to lose something, this year I lost my sunglasses. I don't even remember them falling off my head, which is quite surprising cause they were quite well fitted and i don't have much hair to hide the feeling.

So anyway I decided to go into town to get a new pair. Walked into Boots, how much???? £25 were the cheapest pair...for a pair of sunglasses?! Went to a few other shops and found them no cheaper. I couldn't believe how expensive sunglasses were. I remember a colleague of mine buying a pair when we were in Scotland, these were a designer pair and cost him about £160, and I was actually shocked. I don't think I could ever bring myself to buying a pair of sunglasses for that price. I just want a cheap £10 which will do the job and look reasonably good. As always Ebay saved the day and I got a nice reflective pair for £7.99 which will be arriving in the next few days. I mean, why spend stupid amounts when you can get a fairly decent pair cheaply. I did notice that there were numerous ones on ebay going for about over a grand....seriously, who buys these?

On another note, finished another Hastings Beer and Music Festival, this year was my 4th year mainly because of my love of the event. I think its a great festival and an event that Hastings would miss if it weren't there. As always some great acts, and we got some hilarious texts on the big screen on Saturday Night, some of which I may post here in a later blog for pure amusement purposes. We also had Ultravox Bassist and Live Aid producer Midge Ure there on the Friday Night, this was a cracking night and i'll post the video in a second. If you couldn't be there then you missed an amazing event, make sure you come to the 2010 event...which I'm already looking forward to.