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Jun 21

The Prague Experience

by ccue

Prague and Berlin are only a four-and-a-half hour train ride from each other.  The train ride from Berlin also transported us to a different time and space.

Prague feels like a medieval fairyland with beauty that charms you over and over again. It is the most beautiful capital in the world.

Marriott Prague, our choice of stay, is in a great location, minutes walk to Old town, but far enough to be quiet. It is almost like an US embassy in Prague – comfortable, safe and modern and with an abundance of traveling Americans. 

The Old town has a town square surrounded by medieval buildings, the pink-colored Palladium shopping mall and a bundle of welcoming eateries. Further down the town square, is the Old town hall tower, with the medieval tower clock at its southern side. It presents a 30-second show of the procession of the twelve apostles set in motion at the top of each hour. With or without the show, the tower clock is a picturesque place to visit and is packed with tourists. The record tourist density does little to erode its charm and rare beauty. There are all kinds of shops but magically, the whole place does not come across as commercial. Among the narrow alleys crisscrossing the main attractions, there are endless discoveries of shops and beautiful buildings. I particularly enjoyed the toy stores, the chimney cake stores, and the Swarovski crystals stores. 

The narrow alleys open up to the Charles Bridge. Charles Bridge is the oldest stone bridge in Europe, constructed from 1357 to 1400 AD, connecting the east and west side of Prague. The beauty of the bridge certainly has stood the test of time. On our first evening of arrival, we strolled across the pedestrian-only Charles Bridge around sunset time. The dome-shaped castle, the gothic-style Vitus Cathedral across the bank looked inviting. The glittering lights and the mystical reflections over the river Vltava were dreamy. We came back the next morning to retract the same route. The early morning was tranquil and once again we were transported to a different time and space.  

The Baroque library at Klementinum  is arguably the most beautiful library. It is among the very few things that I am determined to visit after seeing the pictures of it. Klementinum started as a monastery in the medieval period, then transformed into a Jesuit college before becoming an observatory with a beautiful library. Famous astronomers Johannes Kepler and Tycho Brahe both spent important years here. The library and the astronomical clock tour needed an advance reservation. The narrow spiral staircase took us to the library floor, and we could only take pictures and view the library from its entrance. I tried imagining sitting there, and studying old books. More stairs awaited to get us to the astronomical clock. At the top of the tower, we were treated with a 360o view of the most picturesque Prague.

After seeing the Castle and Vitus Cathedral many times from afar, we crossed a bridge over river Vltava to  visit in person. There are plenty of vista points along the way. 

No-one would mind walking in Prague all day long. When our tiring feet complained, we took Bolt in Prague, the Uber-like app. Three Bolt rides cost us less than $10 in total. The fare for Bolt is a better reflection of the cost of living in Prague for locals than the price we pay for meals and stays.

On a cool evening, we watched the Okamžik circus in a park. The park was lively with local people. We walked past a climbing wall with people having fun climbing up a wall. There  was a skatepark with youngsters practicing skateboard tricks. The circus was inside a tent set up in the park. The show was in Czech. The cast put on a great performance to cross the language barrier. We recommend the show to fellow tourists. 

Palladium, just a few minutes walk from Marriott, made a perfect shopping venue on another evening. We pleasantly discovered many unfamiliar to us, making it differentiable from US shopping malls. As much as I enjoyed Palladium, I preferred the narrow alleys in the Old town for an endless exploration. It was also in those shops that I found the wooden musical box with music by František Smetana, the father of Czech music and a wooden cage puzzle.

Shopping is not limited to Palladium and the Old town. Farmer markets in Prague, located next to the river Vltava, are open on Saturday. We went there to experience the local street food and the produce, before settling down in a cafe, with a circular door, enjoying coffee while appreciating the river scene. 

One morning, my spouse and I decided to walk from Marriott to the Jewish quarter in an alternate route. The route started with very modest neighborhoods and ended at a street with super luxurious stores like Patek Philippe watches and a few jewelry stores.  After a few turns, we were back in a square, which was a look-alike of the Old town. We thought that we went to a parallel universe and Prague has two copies of the Old towns. It turned out that Jewish quarter and the Old town are just within minutes of walking. This stupidity and the hilarity will stay with us for a very long time.

Bond cafe was yet another funny experience. The Bond movie “Casino Royale” had a few shots made in Prague. The cafe was close to our hotel, so my daughter and I decided to meet up in the Bond Cafe after some shopping. I was late but my daughter was not anywhere to be found as I entered the Bond Cafe. This time, it was not a parallel universe. There are two bond cafes within a few minutes of walking. The bond cafe is decorated with many Bond movie pictures. We had the best pancakes in the Bond Cafe. We definitely recommend it as a great meeting place, but get the exact address ahead of time. 

If you choose to go to just one cafe in Prague, Cafe Imperial makes the top choice. The cafe, dated over a hundred years ago, has an art deco structure with many small tiles painted with different colors and styles. The design reflects its history. Yet it is so meticulously maintained that its beauty and cleanliness never stop impressing us. The cafe serves full meals. I recommend you make an advance reservation, try the beef cheeks main course and the chocolate “bomb” surprises as dessert, with additional rooms for the very beautiful cake desserts on display. 

The Prague cafes make perfect places to rest, to have a tea time, to write a blog, to write a story, to write a book. 

We went to Ginger and Fred restaurant at the Dancing House, to watch the sunset in this beautiful city. Ginger and Fred restaurant is a fine restaurant. Yet I found the food served at the no-frills, down-to-earth workers’ cafe Česká kuchyně  and the chimney cake (Trdelník in Czech) everywhere on the street to be more special and memorable. 

Prague is a city you won’t get tired of, you will take pictures of the same medieval scenery repeatedly, and the scenery will still make your heart jump a bit. 

If there is a ranked list of the most beautiful capitals, Prague has to be among the top. 

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Jun 9

The Berlin experience

by ccue

I have a few Berlin associations. During the pandemic years, I read the book “In the Garden of Beasts – Love, terror and an American family in Hitler’s Berlin”.  It told what life was like in Berlin in the late 1930s for the family of an American scholar, also an ambassador. Life was glamorous, political and difficult. It made a good book to see the city before World War II and the US/Germany dynamics back then. In my neighborhood, outside of a public library, there is a piece of the Berlin Wall. With the historical significance of the Berlin wall, it is intriguing that people walk past without stopping, I have yet to see anyone stopping to take a picture there, except me once. These two however are not my favorite associations with the city. My favorite impression of Berlin comes from its world-renowned Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and the Berlin film festival.  

Berlin has a lot of culture. I cannot think of another day with more arts and music, than this first full day in Berlin: Berliner Philharmoniker performance in late morning, Neues Museum and Museum Island after, followed by East Side Gallery/Berlin Wall. My spouse and I reserved two tickets at the Berliner Philharmoniker. The tickets cost us $25 per person, way more affordable in Berlin than San Francisco. The Philharmoniker building tells little about the world-class acoustic and magnificent organs inside the  performing venue. The concert hall sells one of the best morning snacks that we recommend for all concert-goers. The ushers are courteous and gracious. We got inside the concert hall with plenty of time to settle down, take some pictures before the performance started. It was a performance of Aurel Dawidiuk and the Karajan Academy. Dawidiuk, the organist, performed beautifully in solo, followed by the duo with woodwind performers, before joined by a mini-orchestra of the academy. Rather than being overcome by jet lag, I was absolutely energized by the music. It has been a long time since I enjoyed a concert so much. The Berlin Philharmoniker certainly lives up to its reputation. I would not hesitate any bit to return for other performances. We just didn’t have that luxury as a tourist. 

Museum Islands came next on this cultural day. We walked past the picturesque Berliner Dom (Cathedral) next to the river Spree. It was a weekend of free admission to museums. The Pergamon Museum was unfortunately closed due to safety concerns. The Neues museum is totally worth a visit. We enjoyed the world famous exhibits in the Neues museum: the most beautiful Nefertiti_bust (1345 BC), the feat of engineering Berlin gold hat (900 BC), Berlin green head (396 BC), the mystic wooden cult figurines (5th Century). 

Our daughter then joined us to appreciate the murals and the messages at the East Side Gallery/Berlin wall.  

Reichstag, Brandenburg Gate, Europa & Berlin Bikini 

Advanced reservation, with in-person proof of id, is required to visit the Glass Dome atop the Reichstag (Imperial Assembly) building. We started the self-guided tours as we walked up the spiral slope inside the large glass dome. The headset is  a smart device which seemingly can detect our position and play the audio automatically and appropriately. We took all the time we wanted to appreciate the 360° view of the Berlin cityscape, to learn about the construction of the glass dome, as well as the recent history of the country. Brandenburg gate is just minutes of walk from the Reichstag. With the construction, it became more of a meeting place, though the murals on the walls of the gate would still be worth a brief look. 

We picked a German restaurant nearby for a family lunch. It served the woodruff green-color beer and the raspberry pink-color beer alongside the familiar German cuisine of sausage, pork knuckles. Beer is a water substitute for many of our meals in Berlin. Berlin Beer seems to taste better too.

Berlin arguably offers the best Turkish food outside of Turkey, due to its sizable Turkish population. After shopping at Europa and Bikini shopping centers, we enjoyed a Turkish dinner. As much as we like trying the German cuisine of currywurst, the pork cutlets, the pork knuckles, they are just a bit too meaty, so  the Mediterranean Turkish meals come across much healthier and make a better choice as everyday food. 

Fine dining at Facil 2-star Michelin, Sanssouci Palace 

It was my birthday. We took the subway to the Berlin film festival area. Facil, a 2-star Michelin restaurant was our choice of fine dining for a family lunch. The restaurant, located inside the five-star Mandala Hotel, is elegantly decorated but not over-the-board. It is inviting while giving out a relaxed elegance. The service is attentive with considerations to leave us alone to have our own conversations and to enjoy the dish. The dishes are all pleasing to our palates and to our eyes. The price performance is superior over the Michelin restaurants in the Bay Area. The restaurant became my new favorite. If you are in Berlin, check out Facil.

After lunch,  a combination of trains and Uber took us to the rather “remote” Sanssouci Palace, at Potsdam. It is not a convenient stop. Sans Souci translates to no-worry in English. And the palace was in some romantic scenes in a recent Korean TV drama hit “Queen of Tears’ ‘ we just watched. It made for a fitting stop for my birthday. 

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Berlin is not a picturesque city like some other European capitals. Berlin is versatile in big ways. People, we encountered, are courteous, educated, reserved without attempting to be overly familiar. It reminds us of NYC. Every time we are in NYC, we find new things to do, new places to visit, new cafes to relax in, and new shows to watch. Berlin, like NYC, is a city of endless discovery.

Concerts Dear Diary Misc. Travel

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Jun 9

Let’s go travel Central Europe

by ccue

Like many travelers, I am more often attracted to visiting new countries and new cultures miles away from where I live. It is a guilty pleasure to count the number of countries traveled. 

I cannot think of a better birthday treat  than traveling with family to charming and beautiful new countries for the first time. In this fortnight, we visited three capitals in Central Europe: Berlin, Germany; Prague, Czech; Budapest, Hungary. 

Over the years, I came to enjoy the travel experiences more than checkbox as many attractions as possible. I became aware of my “spotty” and non-photogenic memories. And I no longer have the energy of youth. The children need their space. The four of us had some sub-itineraries that fit in our preferences and travel styles. If you are like me, I find a flexible itinerary works the best to experience what each city is famous for, and find time for at least one fine dining and some shopping.  

With this approach, we fixed the  travel logistics weeks before. We identified a good list of attractions and made a very small set of cafes and ticket reservations. Our travel itinerary remained open until the day.

There is no direct flight from SFO to Berlin. For the convenience and price-performance, we decided to fly from SFO to LHR (Heathrow airport)  in London, transition to the much modest STN (London Stansted airport)  via a 90-minute shuttle, and fly from STN to BER (Berlin Brandenburg airport). We allowed plenty of time for airport to airport transition. Just hours before departure from San Francisco, our flight from SFO to LHR was canceled. The notification of cancellation arrived after midnight local time, and it took a few hours of scramble to get a different airline and different flight to get to LHR within an hour of the original arrival time. Drama aside, we arrived at Berlin as planned.

May | Central Europe : Berlin, Prague, Budapest

  • Day 1, May 3, SFO to LHR, STN to BER (24 hours with 8 hours of layover in London) 
  • Day 2 to 6, Berlin, Germany; stay at Adina Apartment Hackescher Markt
    • Day 2, arriving, BBQ kitchen dinner
    • Day 3, Berlin Philharmonie performance; Neues Museum and Museum Island; East Side Gallery/Berlin Wall
    • Day 4, Reichstag Glass Dome tour;, Brandenburg Gate; Europa & Bikini shopping center, dinner 
    • Day 5, Facil Michelin 2-star; Sanssouci (no worry) Palace
    • Day 6, Berlin Hlf to Prague Hl.n (~4.5 hours)
  • Day 6 to 10 , Prague, Czech; stay at Marriott Prague
    • Day 6, Old town; Charles bridge at dusk
    • Day 7, Old town; Charles bridge in early morning; Klementinum library and astronomical clock tour; city library; Prague castle; Circus in the park
    • Day 8, National museum; Wenceslas square; Cafe Imperial early dinner; Palladium shopping
    • Day 9, Farmers’ market; Old Town Shopping; Bond cafe; Dancing house dinner
    • Day 10, Train to Budapest, with stops at Brno (where Gregor Mendel and his peas experiment to discover heredity) and Bratislava, Slovakia   
  • Day 10 to 14, Budapest, Hungary, stay at airbnb on Vaci Utca
    • Day 10, arriving from Prague; check in airbnb on Budapest’s major thoroughfare Váci Utca 
    • Day 11, Anna cafe breakfast; Buda castle; Castle district; Fisherman’s bastion; Matthias Cathedral; Vigvarju restaurant dinner inside Concert Hall
    • Day 12, Cafe Gerbeaud breakfast; Szechenyi bath house; Hungarian Parliament tour; Costes dinner; Danube night cruise
    • Day 13, Taste of Canton (粤之味) Chinese Dim Sum; Boris Godunov at Opera house and shops
    • Day 14, Dohány Street Synagogue tour, BUD to LHR

There is the commonly asked question “which city do I like the most?”. I found these cities are all charming in their own unique ways, each bringing once-in-a-life moments for me and my family to cherish for a very long time. Here I share my experience in each city. 

Check out The Berlin Experience and The Prague Experience. Enjoy our Central Europe Attractions video.

Upcoming blogs: The Budapest Experience, later.

Misc. Dear Diary Travel

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Apr 26

Book Reviews of AI and diverse reads

by ccue

Artificial Intelligence has arrived. 

In the AI-powered world, the Large Language models, Gemini, ChatGPT and the like, can summarize a book, give a nutshell of things, answer questions, and even analyze a book together with you. It is impressively powerful. It meets the ever raising expectations of what it can do. AI writes book reviews well too. I am sure that AI can do a better writing job after it digests trillions of words which I never would be able to. 

Let AI have the better ability in reading and writing. There is no existential crisis about it. I am pleased to keep the enjoyment of reading a book at the speed of a snail. I have the choice of my own interpretation of a book, the intent of its author and writing the book reviews.

You look like a thing and I love you
By Janelle Shane

It is a book about how Artificial Intelligence works and why it’s making the world a weirder place. With the hype of generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI), it feels like eras have passed since this book was published in 2019. The ChatGPT / Generative AI debut is however not a baby born out of nowhere. The breakthroughs in computing, memory and storage power, the leap in machine learning and the focus in data science are all important notes leading to the Generative AI crescendo in November 2022. Many of the “how it works” are as relevant now as in 2019. 

This is a highly engaging and informative book. AI has already arrived. The best way to go forward with AI is to understand it – understand what problems AI can solve, what issues AI can create, and what can we do to manage the situations.

This book will endear you to AI, and why there’s every reason to be cautiously optimistic.

Never let me go 
By Kazuo Ishiguro

In a dehumanized world of dystopia, what would the experience of growing up, falling in love, making friends and the sense of mortality be like? The novel starts with a mystery that the protagonist is a carer unlike any carers we are familiar with. She takes care of different donor patients who need to recover from donations, and at times multiple donations. As the protagonist recalls her school lifes, her friends, her guardians and her years as carers of her closest friends, the readers discover a dystopia, unlike anything we have seen. In that world, their growing up, their relationship and mortality still resonate. 

Song of the Cell : an exploration of medicine and the new human
By Siddhartha Mukherjee 

Mr. Mukherjee is among my favorite authors. His book is always well researched and is a joy to read. Cells make up everything in our body. There are step jumps in our knowledge of the cells and there are still more to be discovered. Mr. Mukherjee perfectly combines the technicality of the deep complex topics and the poetic touch of his personal experience. Through his writing, the scientists, the doctors and the patients each come alive with their own unique characters. It is a book that requires focus to read, pause, and resume. As I finish the last page of the book, I feel there is so much in it that I would like to start all over again. 

Reading his book not only gives you a good set of knowledge of the topic. Reading his book  gives ideas on how to write a technical topic filled with beautiful personal stories, each with a human touch. It is these human touches and their stories that endears us to the doctors, the scientist and the new scientific discoveries about the cell. 

Determined. A science of life without free will
By Robert M. Sapolsky

The initial chapters of the book are pretty dense as the author introduced the framework among the free will, deterministic, nondeterministic, predictable, unpredictable together with different terminologies and how our brain works in neuro-science terms.

Halfway into the book, I got the gist of the author’s position and his argument. There is no freewill or there is much less freewill than what we think we have. Our behaviors, decision-making, failures, and successes are results of our nature (genes) and nurture (environment, family, friends and societies). 

So what? Why did the author, professor of  biology, neurology, neurological sciences, and neurosurgery at Stanford University suspend his teaching commitments, and spend time to write about the topic?

The second half of the book would provide the answer.

Do you believe that illness is a punishment of evil acts of our doing? Do you believe that schizophrenia is caused by bad parenting? Do you agree that people committing crimes deserve  the most severe tortures so justice is served?  Society has changed a lot in many things.  Depending on whether it is a “Yes” or “No” to these questions, we see the world with different degrees of empathy and compassion with one another. 

If more people agree to no free will or limited free will, there will be more support to change the education system, the justice system, and the moral system. The author conveys that we don’t need to be heartless, and judgmental to others with less fortune. There can be better systems and societies. 

This book has been named one of the best books by the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal.

I suggest reading it with patience, taking breaks and taking as much time as needed. I get a lot a lot out of the book, and it gives a new perspective of many things around us.

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Mar 25

Let’s go Messi, Inter Miami, Ft Lauderdale, Florida 

by ccue

The March plan for Florida was simple: buy expensive soccer game tickets, fly to Ft Lauderdale, see god. I am talking about Messi. Soccer is at best the distant fourth popular sport in the US after football, basketball and baseball. Yet, Messi has become the most popular US athlete since joining Inter Miami CF last July. He is 36 years old. In the demanding contact sport of soccer, he is as aged as a dinosaur. His star power peaks further after he won the World Cup for Argentina. With the diminishing opportunities to see Messi magic live, there is little time left to earn the bragging right “we have seen the soccer GOAT”. Injury and retirement can happen any moment. He did not play in the Hong Kong stop of the pre-season world tour. He has only one or two seasons playing for Inter Miami. These cemented our plan to go catch him. Until the game starts, it is anybody’s guess if Messi would show up on the pitch. 

We pushed luck to our side by following what the Inter Miami coach said : “The Concacaf Champions Cup will be the most important game(s) of the year”. Messi is more likely to play in home games in Ft Lauderdale, Florida. Few know Inter Miami narrowly won the game against Nashville last season to grasp the first ever team cup, in the nail-biting penalty shootout. We bet that if there is any game Messi will most likely show up, it will be this Concacaf game featuring Inter Miami vs Nashville in Florida.

We still needed luck after lining up the stars. Luck was on our side. 

The game time was 8:15pm. Before the pilgrimage to see Messi, we visited the Everglades National Park (NP) located slightly over an hour’s drive away.  

Everglades NP is unlike any other NP we have visited. It has limited parking spaces, and we had to wait for enough cars to get out before we could get in. We waited for about an hour. The time went by fast.  There was this couple of colorful Halloween pennant dragonflies hopping around, inviting us to picture them. There was this peaceful stream of water. The visitor center was within a short walking distance, making it arguably the shortest walk to any NP visitor center from the entrance station. The visitor center has exhibits and gifts that help to kill time with meaningful information.

The Everglades NP is unique in another way. It is not hikers friendly. There are some paved roads, little trails, and hardly any shades. In May, we felt the warmth already. Instead, the park offers a 2-hour tram ride every hour, and a bike rental for visitors. The tram-ride is first come first served. It was a very enjoyable ride, with diverse geological landscape, alligators of all sizes, lovely blue herons, elegant egrets, colorful purple gallinule and muscular anhinga. It is one of the best NP to visit without prior planning. The park is full of life especially in this season of Spring.

We rested in the hotel briefly to build up the energy for the Chase Stadium pilgrimage.

We arrived at the Chase Stadium about 3 hours before the game time at 8:15pm. We were hardly alone. There were families. There were several food trucks outside. There were boys playing soccer and I was hit by the soccer a few times. It was a lively atmosphere. No-one seemed to be in a hurry. Truth be told, we expected the fan zones to have more activities for the fans like other sport events. We expected better food choices. We expected better facilities for the over $200 per person ticket we have paid. The stadium looked dated too. 

The impression did not improve, when we got into the stadium with over an hour to spare. We were surprised that the gift store was no more than a line for the most enthusiastic fans. It was just a place to order exactly the products you have in mind. There was no shopping experience. It was a buying experience. We were surprised with the portable toilets. We were surprised with the limited food choices inside the stadium. 

With little to visit, we were among the earliest to take our seats. We had plenty of time to take pictures. After some waiting, the visiting Nashville team started their warm-up first, followed by the Inter Miami home team. From the practice, we could guess the starters. It felt like waiting for the dream to come true to see all four ex-Barcelona stars (Messi, Suarez, Alba, and Busquet) as starters. We were lucky. The Messi effect was felt through the stadium every time his name was mentioned by the announcer, followed by the “Messi” chanting. 

The Inter Miami vs Nashville Game started on time as expected. Inter Miami scored the first goal within the first 10 minutes by Suarez with an assist from Messi. It was a beautiful play. Everyone in the stadium was on their feet, with cheers, drumbeat, drum roll, and firework. What a moment. Shortly after, Messi scored himself. The Nashville team played well enough to keep the atmosphere tense and keep us in suspense. As the second half began, I noticed Messi had that uncommon hands-on-knees position that came across as strange at first. Within seconds, he turned over his captain armband to another Inter Miami player, and walked towards the bench. Simultaneously, the substitute board was raised, and he was substituted. I sensed that he may have an injury and the substitute was unplanned.  

We have watched the soccer god play live – Messi assisted, scored, and then seemingly injured. What an unbelievable experience of a lifetime. It was not quite the same as checking the bucket list of watching the World Soccer Cup live. This one seemed even sweeter. We felt that we watched on behalf of the many HongKongers who were heartbroken when Messi did not play in the Inter Miami pre-season stop in Hong Kong. That Messi Mess in Hong Kong was something to be forgotten.

Before we flew out the next afternoon, we took a 45-minute airboat ride at the Sawgrass recreation park. The lobster claw scoobies served in the Coconut Seafood were exceptionally delicious, and spent some time on the Ft Lauderdale beaches. The beaches, the bars and the lounges screamed to tell us that this was the Spring break week of the college students.  

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Mar 24

Let’s go the ageless Pop Concerts

by ccue

Watching a concert is a good live-in-the-moment experience. In the concerts, you are in a different place, and forget about a lot of troubling happenings in the world, or stress at work, or other hardship. You got into the theatre, you waited as a collective unit for the star to show,  you clapped, sang, or screamed collectively. The audience came alive as an entity.

Last October, we went to Napa, California to watch Christopher Cross in the uptown theatre. It brought back childhood memories of how we listened and discovered our favorite songs, and how much the world has changed since. We carried the theme of childhood reminiscence into 2024.

Valentine’s day this year was a few days after Lunar New Year.  On Valentine’s day, we caught the Air Supply concert at the San Jose Civic center. There was nothing more fitting to watch their concerts on Valentine’s day. Their songs literally created love in the air. The songs in their 1980 “Lost in Love” album and the 1981 “The one that you love” showcase their talents at the peak. At one time, I remembered the lyrics of almost each song. Several decades later, the duos are still at it, still passionate at singing in concerts every week at different venues. I can no longer remember the lyrics as well as before.

We continued the ageless concert theme during the President’s long weekend a few days later. We went to watch the Wynners, from Hong Kong, at the Reno event center with a friend. We watched Sam Hui last May at the Reno event center. If you were in Hong Kong in the 70s, it was impossible not to have heard of the Wynners, just as every HongKongers grew up with the songs of Sam Hui in that era. The Wynners, made up of Ah B, Alan, Chan Yau, Ah Kiang, Ah Jian, was the most popular boy bands of the era. The five members never broke up even when they went solo over the years. Ah B, Alan and Ah Jian went solo with great successes. Chan Yau, the drummer, went to film production. Ah Kiang, the most quiet member, immigrated and kept a low profile. For one night at the Reno Center, they were together again. They sang and danced. They were energetic in their 70s. They looked happy, healthy and united. I was particularly impressed with the solo of Chan Yau and Ah B. Alan Tam was the most popular of them all in the 90s. Alan seemed to have grown so much in width and in depth. Maybe he just enjoyed food and enjoyed life with all the money earned. We had a great time as their songs transported us from our childhood to the present. Ah B seemed to still be at it, while others looked more settled into other things in life. It was a good show!

It took us almost eight hours to drive from Reno to the Bay Area due to the heavy snow and rain. The concert was worth the hassle.

In a nostalgic way, it could be the last time they would show up together in the US to present a concert. Check out our Wynners 2024 Reno Sound Track on YouTube.

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Mar 23

Let’s go travel US West

by ccue

Like many travelers, I am more often attracted to visiting new countries and new cultures miles away from where I live. It is a guilty pleasure to add to the number of countries traveled. After a few days traveling the West and another few days traveling in Florida,  I am reminded once again of the many attractions in the US. 

Few things are more enjoyable than family traveling together. Traveling at a time with less crowdedness just a week after the holiday season, makes the experience better. We did just that in January, when most were getting back to school or getting back to work. Kauai was our first choice. The airfare was not particularly expensive. Yet that sentiment of “why we pay for this price when we can get a cheaper airfare another time”. Truth be told, we were a bit late in our planning. The “let’s go somewhere” won the family vote over “let’s stay home”. We planned, within a day, a scenic “wild west” trip to Las Vegas, Antelope Slot Canyon, Monument Valley, and Grand Canyon. Arizona and Utah’s hot summers are particularly well known. Little did we know about the snowstorms in the cold winter in these places. These snowstorms turned out to be beautiful, dangerous and scary.

January | Horseshoe, Antelope, Monument Valley, Grand Canyon, Las Vegas  

  • Day 1, Jan 5, SJC -> LAS, drive to Page, Arizona
  • Day 2, Horseshoe Bend, Upper Antelope Canyon tour, drive to Monument Valley, Utah-Arizona
  • Day 3, Monument Valley, drive to Grand Canyon
  • Day 4, Grand Canyon
  • Day 5, Grand Canyon, drive to Las Vegas, Nevada
  • Day 6, Jan 10, Las Vegas, LAS -> SJC

Our flight from San Jose to Las Vegas was smooth. We crossed from the State of Nevada to the State of Arizona, arriving at Page in less than 5 hours of highway driving. Along the way, the landscape changed from the dry desert landscape of Nevada to one of the otherworldly and peaceful brownish-red rocky landscapes of Utah and Arizona. The less well-known town of Page makes excellent base camps to many amazing National Parks (NP), including Zion NP, Bryce NP.  It also makes a convenient hub for our itinerary: Antelope Canyon, Monument Valley and Grand Canyon.  

The next morning, we were greeted with chilly and sunny weather. Sunrise time was between 7 and 8. It was still dark when we arrived at the parking lot of the Horseshoe bend. After a short and scenic walk, we arrived at the Horseshoe bend, before the sunrise. The gradual sunrise painted the sky and the rocks with changing colors. Its beauty was better described in pictures than in words. I felt the acrophobia even looking over the fence to see the bottom of the horseshoe bend. The river at the bottom was partially frozen, making it a half mirror and half flowing water. The time to stay there varied with personal preference. We stayed there for a while to soak in its beauty, and take pictures from as many angles as possible. In spite of the chilly and windy condition, I would have liked to stay there much longer. 

The Upper Antelope Canyon is famous for its wave-like structure, and the light beams. It is one of the most-photographed slot canyons in the world. The slot canyon is narrow and cannot be more different from the Grand Canyon. It is under the management of the Native Americans. They offer guided tours providing short lorry rides to take us there, and serve as visitor guides in the walk through the slot canyon. The wave-like structure comes in different colors and shapes. With some imagination, I could see a fox, a president, a monument valley and many more. We enjoyed the tour and the pictures immortalized its unique beauty. I would have loved to hike to experience the slot canyon. Unlike National Parks, we are not allowed to explore on our own.

Like the Antelope Canyon, the Monument Valley is also managed by the Navajo Native Americans. Its landscape is best appreciated from the View Hotel, Monument Valley. We did just that. The sunset was nowhere to be seen with the cloudy sky. There was a forecast of a snow storm in the evening. The View Hotel has one of the best gift shops with some unique offerings from rugs, carpets, sand paintings, and many different souvenirs. There is also a museum sharing the history of Navajo Natives since the early twenty centuries, and their contributions in World War II. I would not have known that their unique language codes have been used as encrypted communication channels during the war. I got a better understanding of the history and how their land has been colonized. I recommend fellow travelers to visit the museum as they enjoy the natural beauty of the Monument Valley.

There was snow overnight. The weather was quite gloomy the next morning. The monuments in the valley had more patches of snow that looked like layers of shattered glasses at the base of many monuments.  These monuments looked different from the evening before. The scenery in the overcast weather was unique in its own way and we could not get tired of taking pictures. We intended to spend an hour driving in the valley, before heading to the Grand Canyon. Similar to the Antelope Canyon, the Monument Valley is not a National Park. There is not much of a sign on where to go. We made the wrong turn and exited the valley accidentally. As we U-turned back to the entrance, we were told that we had to pay the entrance fee again. We had been told clearly the day before, when we paid for the admission, that our ticket was valid for 24 hours. After some back-and-forth, the entry station agent absolutely denied everything we heard what they said less than a day ago. We were upset enough to skip the driving tour, and headed directly to the Grand Canyon. It was unlikely we would make a return trip any time soon. We were pretty annoyed. Only a few hours later, we realized it was a blessing in disguise as we ran into a bad snowstorm on our way to the Grand Canyon. If we had taken the time to explore the Monument Valley, we might have been dangerously stuck in the road, and risked not reaching the Grand Canyon.

It is a four hour drive from Monument Valley to the Grand Canyon. We did not foresee the danger awaited. Once on the road, we felt the effect of the snowstorm the night before, when the landscape turned into the Christmas white. The road was still good. The scenery was beautiful. We stopped near Flagstaff for a quick lunch and were still on track to arrive at the Grand Canyon south rim before dark. 

No-one could predict the weather. We walked out of the restaurant to find heavy snow and we were in the middle of a snowstorm. The snow plow was working hard to clear the parking lots. We were still relaxed knowing that we were about 90 minutes from the Grand Canyon south rim, we had a SUV, and we had enough time on hand. We realized the full scale of the danger when the brake of our SUV did not respond in one downward turn. Our SUV skidded to the other side of the road, which left us shaken to the core. We had to thank God that the SUV stopped just in time. There were no incoming cars which would have hit us badly. Afterwards, we were driving at 20 miles per hour on a highway with snow all around us, and were nervous at the most gentle grade of the road.  

We cannot be more thankful to the well paved straight roads all the way to the Grand Canyon south rim. It was already dark as we parked outside the Grand Canyon Bright Angel Inn. We breathed the biggest sigh of relief and appreciated our dinner even more. The Grand Canyon was substantially colder than Monument Valley. We snuggled in our cabins. As we drifted off, we still felt the shock of the earlier SUV skid. That shock stayed with us for weeks.

We were delighted to see a clear blue sky the next morning.

The weather could not be better for our mule ride along the south rim. We got busy preparing for the ride: received a water bottle, cleaned it, filled it with water, and attached any loose items (eye glasses, phones) to our body. The mule guides helped us to get on our mule, one at a time. We were more than ready to go as we shivered in the cold on our mule. Shortly after we started our tour, we arrived at the south rim, and were in awe of the grandeur of the Grand Canyon. When our mules turned to face the grand canyon, it was quite frightening even though we were still more than a few feet away from the cliff. According to the guide, having the mules facing the grand canyon would remind them of the danger. I could not tell if the mules knew the danger, we certainly felt it and could only comfort ourselves that no mules had ever jumped into the canyon. Soon we got comfortable on the back of the mule. We appreciated the canyon views and the forest areas more and more. We were relaxed enough to take pictures. It was certainly the highlight of this road trip. We recommend the mule ride to all visiting the park.

After the mule ride, we took a leisurely drive and strolled in the park. We caught a beautiful sunset over the Grand Canyon. We finished the day with a nice dinner at the El Tovar Dining room to celebrate a family birthday. As we walked back to our cottages, the stars were twinkling on a clear night sky. It made a perfect night for star gazing.

We felt we were back to the safe urban zone as we settled in the super size hotel suite at Las Vegas. Our adventures were not over yet. The next morning, we mistakenly put an electric kettle, placed next to the stove, over the stove. It was burnt badly. The smoke triggered the fire alarm.The hotel agents reassured us that it happened before, and we had nothing to worry about. Then without any mention, we were charged over $1000 for the kettle on our bill. It took us another few weeks and we had to involve the Better Business Bureau to dispute the charge.

The road trip was memorable. We were treated to unique and amazing landscapes. We encountered unforeseen incidents and thanked God for overcoming them.

We are ready for a more relaxing family trip in January, 2025. Kauai maybe.

Dear Diary Misc. Travel

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Feb 17

SCMP: Inter Miami + Messi Mess in Hong Kong

by ccue

Few in the States follow the Inter Miami pre-season world tour. Its stop in Hong Kong was a PR disaster for the pre-season. The no-show of Messi and the seemingly lack of empathy towards his fans have turned a Messi-mania in my beloved city to a Messi-mess. After a few days of ubiquitous  media coverage, the government demanded explanations, the organizer agreed to a 50% refund, and the sports authority in China canceled two upcoming exhibition matches of the Argentina team in China.

The reaction of the city dwellers, the organizer and the government are surprising. I wrote an article to the SCMP, the top English newspaper in Hong Kong, with the intent to those who still felt anguish about the situation. HongKongers hated to be disappointed, even worse, hated to lose face 唔俾面, and hated to be caught as dumb consumers 水鱼. Looking back, there is the silver lining with the unity of the city in their anger and frustration. I have missed the unity of the city in the last many years.

SCMP is a Hong Kong English-language newspaper founded in 1903, has a daily circulation of 100,000+ readers and an online version. SCMP published my article about “Give Messi the benefit of doubt” here, with some minor publishing edits and some related pictures/links. 

Here is the original version.

Title: Reason and Respect : Messi deserves the benefits of doubts

The 2022 Qatar World Cup was a fairy tale moment for Messi. My family has followed Messi & his matches since. After defeating France in the final, he was often booed when he played for PSG in France. At age 36, he joined Inter Miami in a city of many Spanish speaking people. This opinion is for those who are still suffering from the anguish of the Messi no-show.

In sports, injury happens, fatigue happens. Messi is an “old” man in the soccer world. He played so many matches last year. He has not been close to 100% for at least a few months.

Soccer is not even in the top 3 sports in the US. Yet, Messi created a Messi Mania last year when he and Inter Miami won matches one after another. Many bought the highly inflated stadium tickets, drove hours only to find out Messi could not play. While disappointed, most understood and enjoyed the game. It is unfortunate that he had a no-show in Hong Kong. Soccer is a team sport, not a solo concert. The game carries on with or without Messi.

Inter Miami was ranked the lowest in the league for a reason. Often, their games were even hard to watch. I thought the Hong Kong team had a real chance to win. Sadly, the Inter Miami team never trailed, and the Hong Kong team lost comfortably. That was the only game Inter Miami won on this world tour. If you were a coach, what decision would you make? Would you risk the stars?

There were many theories about disrespect. Do people know Messi rarely showed up in US press conferences? He arrived in Hong Kong on a long flight after losing the last game six to zero, in Saudi Arabia. He was likely not 100%. Give him a break. He is not a PR pro. 

With the no-show, the Hong Kong exhibition achieved international coverage on CNN, Times, CNBC and more. The US media covered the complaints from HK CEO Mr. Lee and the HK fans; and was overall empathetic.  

This is no doubt a PR disaster for Inter Miami. Hong Kong receives some sympathy. Let’s wish Messi a quick recovery, a great season and show up in HK soon.  

For the super fans, there will be an Argentina vs Chile game in June in New Jersey. His show up is no guarantee.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

About Learning Dear Diary Hong Kong Misc.

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Feb 2

AI Challenges

by ccue

Toastmasters, a global organization about communication excellence, is celebrating 100 years. Toastmasters has global presence, with over 200,000 members and counting. I served as president of one toastmaster club for two terms. I remain active in two Toastmaster clubs including the AI club, the first toastmaster club with an AI themes. It is fitting to combine communication excellence and the latest AI technology as Generative AI storms into our lives, like no other technology before. Below is the speech script of my 7-minutes speech about AI challenges and how everyone can become an AI ambassador to have more people participating in the AI future.

I have been an active Toastmaster member and served as president of a Toasterster club for two-terms

We wake up with water, electricity and the internet. What if I decide not to use any of them? From where I live, the nearest body of water is over 5 miles. I would walk without Google Maps, no electric car, in the dark, to fill up buckets of water I need for the day. It would take over 4 hours for the round-trip. Technology has made our lives better. We have taken for granted people use helpful technology all the time. 

To my AI club fellows, I would like to share the obstacles facing AI adoption. By being aware of it, we can concretely set plans to address these obstacles.

I’m leading an initiative focused on upskilling and enabling AI, particularly GenAI, at all levels, to as many as possible for the company .  Every single day, I am humbled “people are not rethinking how their work and life can be improved with AI technology”. The reality is, technology adoption requires intentional effort to bring people along. Why is that? There are technical obstacles and psychological resistances.

Starting with the technical challenges,

  • We live in places with cutting edge technology. Do you know just about 65% of the global population are online (w/i internet). AI depends both on electricity and the internet. That means around 3 billion who do not have reliable internet, likely cannot benefit from AI. 
  • AI is intimidatingly complex. Some techies unconsciously throw out jargon. Terms like LLM, gpu, tpu, langchain, multimodal, neural network, encoder, decoder, transformer, hallucinations…just scared people away. 
  • Concerns about data privacy, biased input and security are real. Can you trust technology? When to trust , when not to trust AI? 

We develop strong opinions and emotions about things too. Every new technology challenges our comfort zone and injects the fear of the unknown, fear of mistakes and fear of losses.

Many people fear errors or lack of control when using AI for tasks traditionally done by humans. It is natural we are uncomfortable with machines generating creative content or making decisions in their personal lives.

  • Elon Musk said “We will have for the first time something that is smarter than the smartest human. There will come a point where no job is needed.“. He may have spoken his mind. How would you react about AI replacing human jobs and YOUR jobs?
  • When Singapore Prime Minister Lee was recently interviewed by Bloomberg, he said “There are a lot of things in AI that we don’t know.  We don’t know where it is going. The researchers do not know where it is going.”.  How could you manage the unknown?

You belong to this ai club toastmasters. I think you can do something. You can start with one thing.  Here are some suggestions.

  1. Listen to others’ concerns in adopting the technology. 
  2. Share how AI has benefited you
  3. Invite their curiosity to learn more.

Thomas Edison brought electric light to part of Manhattan in 1882. Even 4 decades later, only half of all homes in the US had electric power. Many Americans still lit their homes with gas lights and candles.

I invite you to stay aware of these Ai technical and psychological  obstacles, it is as easy as starting with one thing. Take the time to listen to concerns, share how AI works well for you and invite curiosity from others.  If you all do at least one thing, AI can be in more hands. We don’t need to wait 50 years.

Are you willing?

Thank you.

About Learning ai Career Management Dear Diary Misc.

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Dec 10

Transitions: “the” vs “one of the”

by ccue

Particularly in technology, “the” new kid on the block is to be admired and loved. We like knowing about the new kid so do the media like reporting them for the audience. OpenAI is arguably “the” technology story of this year. The recent ousting and reinstating of its CEO Sam Altman in OpenAI has added to the storyline. Just before Thanksgiving, there came a failed coup in the boardroom. We are fortunate to live in these modern days where no-one dies in the process in a coup. Being THE new kid, there has been more forgiveness and relatively few punish the company as a result of the coup. 

We unconsciously ask for more from the other players such as Google or Amazon or many others “once-the”. These other players now belong to the “one of the” club. Last week Google announced its latest, if not its greatest, multimodal AI: Gemini. Surprisingly, the magical six-minute demo  “Hands on with Demo : interacting with multi-modal AI” has attracted quite a bit of criticism. It was a concern that the demo is not a real-time demo of how the actual multimodal AI product behaves (yet). Rather tweaks here and there to help the narration and to show what is possible with the technology. When was the last marketing demo not piecing things together to make a more impressive narrative? 

Transition happens when one changes from “the” to “one of the”, or from “one of the” to “the”.  

I particularly worry about potential transitions of the US being “the” superpower to the possibility of “one of the”. Will there be more “wars” to resist “the” to “one of the”?

I particularly feel these transitions as the years go by : transition from being “the” most important person to the children to “one of the”; transition from “the” youngest in a group to “one of the”; transition from “one of the” oldest to “the” oldest in a group.

Mastering these transitions makes life good. Mastering these transitions among the geopolitics make the world more peaceful.  

In this book Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin, the characters need to face with many many transitions.

Set in the backdrop of the computer game industry from the 90s, the novel weaves in the novel of three co-founders creatively designing, coding and producing computer games. Not only do they creatively produce unique games for the gamers, they find themselves needing to creatively live through the different lowlights, and highlights along the way. There is always a new life after the “game over ”, as long as you keep playing.

You’ll enjoy the read of this beautiful story about growing up, love and friendship, whether you play or create computer games.

About Learning Book Review - English Dear Diary Misc.

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