Tokyo Tour 2006 Photo

Click here to browse my memory. I didn't bring my DSLR but just a snap shoot camera.

活著

遇著什麼煩惱，想跟我說都可聽到。翻到有趣圖畫，何妨大笑。讓妙事亦被我看到。遊玩時開心一點，不必掛念我。來好好給我活著，就似最初。仍然在呼吸都應該要慶賀。如果想哭，可試試對嘉賓滿座。說個笑話紀念我。

Tokyo Tour 2006

It is a nice and enjoyable experience for 5-days Tokyo trip. No work, no project, no call. Just relax, eat and play. It is just like a dream, full of fantasy but not enough time. I have a very peaceful sleep and beautiful dreams every night. For our friends, the trip means a bloody shopping trip, "Agnes B", "Bluberry", "Porter", "Two Percent" etc... Looking at their luggage photo at Tokyo Narita Internaional Airport before checking in!

Management and Leadership

Business leader need to provide the direction for the team to pursue. At the same time, leader need to "give up" the desire to control and let the team experts to drive and explore the best way to achieve the target results. By delegating the power of decision to the team, the leader actually help to build a strong execution team (which has the direct field experience) and free up himself to continue to shapern the strategic direction.

We've got a handful of sand if we keep holding tight, we've got the whole world by letting the hands off. " Quoted from the Movie "Croaching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"

三越鞠躬謝幕

【明報專訊】開業25載的銅鑼灣三越百貨昨正式向港人道別，時鐘搭正晚上7時50分，董事長萩野純司與幾位職員到門前90度鞠躬，其後大閘拉下，為在港的日資公司畫上句號。

「只剩兩小時，?就買埋，不要多想，無時間了。」售貨員傾力推銷，摩肩接踵的市民落力「入貨」﹕「我怕我落了下層上不到來」、「嘩，完全動不到……」

警衛準時6時在大門鎖上鐵鏈，但顧客並無去意，「各位顧客，公司經營了25年，到今天結業，多謝大家一直以來的支持，我們將重臨香港……」店內響起廣播，但一小時後，地庫還有幾十人「流連」，但職員沒有催促他們離開。

售貨員指顧客昨天特別豪爽，但與一般大減價不同的，是店內店外都人頭湧湧，不少市民及職員在門外拍照留念，連公司董事長萩野純司亦整日「（相）機不離手」，「把這一刻拍下來，除了公司需要，我自己也要留念……在三越工作的38年來，15年是在這間分店……這是我的商店，對我來說，很珍貴。」他指總公司未決定於哪一區「捲土重來」，但為答謝員工，他將於9月19日和全體職員晚宴。
(明報) 09月 18日 星期一 05:05AM

My Mandarin Class

This is my Mandarin Class, featuring my friend Cindy and another classmates talking in mandarin publicly. It is of great fun and learning. We have good teacher Ms Yung and good classmates. Yet, the class is going to completed in early October and given the demanding schedule (twice class for every week, each class last for 2 hours), I am thinking to take a break in the coming quarter before the next intake. Yet, the break means that I will spend the night time to study mandarin on my own. Add oil!

Tennis Course

Thanks God! It’s a lovely and sunny Sunday. It is hot and exhausting to have tennis in the sunny afternoon. Time go quickly. My tennis racket was purchased on 28 March 2006. I’ve joined my first tennis class at YMCA Kingspark a few days later. It’s the last day of our beginner’s class. And indeed it’s the second beginner’s class as I’ve joined the same class following same coach “Paul” for consecutive courses, almost half year. It is a nice experience and I’ve realized there is no easy shortcut to learn to play a sport. We all have our own habits and limitation that we need to control. In my case, I always kick the ball “too high” and step back after kicking the ball. Looking forward for next round of tennis course, and it will be a private training.

Identity

British Novelist William Boyd is working on his new novel near year. It’s about the loss of identity, but that’s forced on you. “What happens when you lose your credit cards, your home, everything?” This is actually a very excellent theme. In modern society, our identity is defined by our external possessions, our work titles, and our relationships with our family, friends, co-workers. What if we loss all of these possessions and relationships? Who am I then?

Take a Break

First time to remove tooth at dentist, and enjoy the luxury of a day of rest and sleep at home

Hong Kong Watch & Clock Fair 2006

Last Sat I have visited Hong Kong Watch & Clock Fair. Indeed I have been rushing between CEC and Wu Chung Building for this week to conduct survey with the participants of Watch & Clock Fair.

My friends may be surprised to know that I have been visiting every TDC trade shows during weekend (“non-office hour”). Some may say that I spoil the weekend. I find it very rewarding to visit the trade shows although I am not responsible for organizing exhibition. While it is related to my company’s business, it is not related to my daily work and project directly, but I did enjoy visiting these trade shows.

I learn more about this industry by reading the fair daily and brand name gallery booklet, looking at the products and chatting with the exhibitors.

I have chances to talk to our customer face to face directly. Some knowledge is actually hidden inside the fair ground and you need to find them out. Slowly and slowly, I am accumulating my knowledge and perspective on the sourcing industry.

If I am not working in TDC, I virtually have no opportunity to visit these specific industry trade shows. I am looking forward to visit the Electronic Fair in October this year!

In memory of 911

(via today’s New York Times)

New Compact Flash

Finally I have made up my mind to buy a new 2GB compact flash card for the coming trip. I have used 2.2GB micro-drive, 256 MB compact flash and a mobile hard disk. Micro –drive offer huge capacity but slow access speed, while additional mobile hard disk means additional equipment to carry with. I always want to buy a new compact flash card but wait until the last moment of my holiday. You know, the price of hardware drop every week.

This is my Kingston 2GB Ultimate 133X. It is just so nice that Kingston is so creative and put in a very beautiful picture on it. It is no longer a brand-centric memory card, but a very pretty image carries around with me. What’s more Kingston offers free “Ontack EasyRecovery Professional 6.1 software that can recover JPEG, TIFF and Raw image data. Given the access speed and lifetime warranty and all soft of bonus, I turn away from my favorite brand Sandisk. Sandisk Ultra II can offer up to 50X access speed.

A good marketing technique, who say that we always need to put our “corporate brand” on the memory card? Why can’t it be a lovely picture?

Yeung Xue Fei Private Guitar Concert

Tuesday is a great day for me, it is my first time
- to leave office so early at 6:00
- to join the private guitar performance concert
- to sit so near to the performance artist and hear her live guitar music
- to get the autograph signature by the performance artist.

It is my great honor to get caught with the Yeung Xue Fei private guitar performance poster at Tom Lee Music last week. Yeung Xue Fei is one of the youngest and gifted classical guitarists in the world. She has great skills and play really well with passion and emotion.

She played four tunes on Tuesday night and it was a memorable experience to me. It is very impressive and touching. The tunes are so smooth like a stream of water flow along the river. Her skills are outstanding with unique style and beat.

Yeung Xue Fei is a legend in classical guitar history, with her gifted talents but an amateur guitar. The story started with her childhood where she started playing guitar at school at age 7. Yet, she could never afford to buy “expensive” guitar as her family is not rich. Many musicians were touched by her music and willing to give her a better concert grade guitar. The story repeat again and again with a Spanish guitarist sent her a Spanish guitar through the Spain embassy in Beijing, a famous Japanese handcraft guitar manufacturer Masaru Kohno brought her to his factory and ask her to pick whichever guitar she like. In 1995, John Williams left his Smallman guitar to his friend in Hong Kong after his concert (for the opening of the Hong Kong Cultural Centre) and asked him to bring it to her. The Smallman guitar is a treasure and open new possibility and rooms for Yeung Xue Fei to express her music. Not until 2003 can Yeung Xue Fei afford to buy her own Smallman guitar!

I am looking forward to hear Yeung Xue Fei’s guitar concert again, but may need to wait until 2008.

More about Yeung Xue Fei Guitar Story

Yeung Xue Fei latest CD “Romance de Amor"

Passion

What is life? What do we want? That’s by far the most difficult, fundamental and philosophical questions in human. Some may say “money”, “love”, “happiness”, “career” or “family”. Health is for sure the most important element and the passion come right next under on the list. Passion is the drive and belief that you had with in your mind regarding to your life, career, relationship and even everyday tiny little things.

Without passion, we will not have any motivation to wake up and go foreword everyday, we will not have the drive to wake up and come back to work everyday, we will not have the motivation to come back home and care our family everyday and we will just keep complaining everyday…
.....“Why it is like that? That’s not fair!”
.....“How come I work in such a terrible company?”
.....“Why I need to work so hard while all my colleagues go home punctually?”
.....“Why boyfriend / girlfriend is such an asshole?”
.....“How come he / she treat me this way?”

With passion, we will strive to pursue what we want, and determined enough to overcome whatsoever obstacle in front of us. Our passion is our motivation and weapon to drive us to pursue our direction and outcome. The passion is in us, it is the FIRE that deeply rooted in our soul. The spark is there. We cannot buy it or trade for it. With skills and experience, the spark will fly up the chimney and light up the world.

Guy Kawasaki is the most influential entrepreneur that I aspire and look upon. He is a renowned evangelist in Apple Computer in launching the famous “Apple II” in 1984. In his book “Selling the dream”, one of my favorite book, he said “Evangelism means convincing people to believe in your product or ideas as much as you do, by using fervor, zeal, guts and cunning to mobilize your customers and staff into becoming as passionate about a cause as you are.” Evangelism is about passion, the passion to believe in your ideas and to sell it to the world. It may be a “Dream” by Martin Luther King, or a “song” by John Lennon, or simply a dish cooked by me tonight.

I always look at my career not as an e-commerce specialist or web project manager, but a product development evangelist, where I am responsible to create the product for customers. Do I still have the spark in my heart to move on?

My Soci So

20 Aug was my friend Patrick’s birthday. I've invited my Sociology Society comrades to gather at my house to celebrate with him. It was a happy and cozy Sunday. We all have so many appointments and obligations and therefore difficult to squeeze the time to come out together, in such a big group of people. It was so interesting to hear Winnie’s experience to local “spa and sauna” shop. It was also exciting to hear Zoe’s business trip experience around Asia. Even Julian could join us with MSN messenger! Feel free to say anything and we all are here listening carefully. I treasure the friendship and emotional bonding.

I have invited them to come to my house 10 years ago. Time goes so fast. I am looking forward for next gathering!

My silent guitar

This is my “latest” baby at home, my Yamaha Acoustic Guitar “SLG100N” The SLG stand for “Silent” and “N” stand for nylon string. Another model is SLG100S means steel string silent guitar. You can just play it silently with headphone as it does not equip with the side hole or thick body of traditional guitar.

I used to live “alone” after my elder sister married two years ago. I can play guitar anytime I like, after work or at night. However, once get married it will mean a different and new life where I need to be considerate about my other half’s feeling and living habits. I do not want to create so much “noise” and so I think I should consider buying a “silent guitar” where I can play anytime, when she is watching television or she is sleeping sweetly.

There is not much this type of “classical guitar” in the market. For sure there are electrical guitars and acoustic guitars but seldom can you find a “electrical classical guitar”. Mixing the word electrical and classical seems ironical and contradictory. Finally I find the Yamaha SL100N. Yet, the Yamaha Silent Series is not cheap and I hesitate to pull out my money, even though I have been tempting every week at Tom Lee Music showroom. It was such a great time when I discovered Tom Lee Music offer 20% off discount for specific music organ in Easter Promotion, and SLG100N is one of them. It is the most expensive guitar at my home now. It can produce "concert" grade sound. I really enjoy it playing “silent” as it just like holding and talking to your beloved one silently. Indeed I can play with it continuously for an hour. It’s now one of my two favorite guitars at home.

SLG100N at Yamaha Website