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Kung Hei Fat Choi
Jan 31 - "Happy
Chinese New Year to all my friends and family in Hong
Kong and around the world!"
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Switching on Tai Peng Man
Jan 30 - Can you resist
the temptation to push that big button and find out what
will happen?
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Bike Park Start
Jan 28 - It's a
container office for the Bike Park construction, placed
outside the YSW Library today.
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Getting Rid of Ratty
Jan 27 - "Any
tips? An intelligent and cunning rat in my flat has so
far foiled all attempts at entrapment and eviction."
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Tai Peng Man
Jan 21 - "Have you
passed by the Tai Peng garden recently? We have a new
addition to the garden called Tai Peng Man."
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Geocaching on Mt. Stenhouse
Jan 20 - "sthlm
greystones couldn't find Lamma Island - Mt Stenhouse
(Traditional Cache)"
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30 Years of Four Peaks Races
Jan 19 - ...times to
get from the boat anchored off South Lamma to the top of
Mt. Stenhouse,...
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Fa Fa Fai Chun
Jan 18 - Chinese NY
Calligraphy - Fai Chun Writing
@ Fa Fa House, Sun, Jan 12.
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Dog Poisoning Meeting
Jan 10 - "A meeting
will be held at 6pm on Wednesday 15th January 2014 at
the Lamma Primary School..."
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Beach Party, by P. K. Pebbles
Jan 9 - Winner for the
most creative entry in the RTHK/SCMP short story
competition, written by The Lady in the Pink Hat:
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Secret Police Air Operations?
Jan 8 - "Incoming...
I hope no one is badly injured and needing a ride. Nope,
loadsa peeps. Strange cameo
get-up
and..."
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R.I.P. Diesel's
Jan 7 - Robert
Hope-Jones has been sneaking behind the tarpaulin hiding
the total demolition-in-progress.
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Become an Island Artist!
Jan 6 - To learn more
about Roz's children art classes, check out these
stories: Art Class; Birds & Butterflies.
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Beach Shoes
Jan 5 - "The shoes
were collected on a secluded beach just past Mo Tat Wan
Village, also some shoes were collected on Tung O
beach."
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Colourful Village Houses
Jan 4 - So many Village
Houses all over the New Territories and the Islands look
so much alike, often in the "Spanish Villa" style.
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Island Gym Promotion
Jan 3 - How about a
low-cost gym, open 24-7, not crowded, and located close
to your home in Yung Shue Wan?
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Yung Shue Wan Ferry Pier, by Sean Creamer:
"Happy Chinese New Year to all my friends and family
in Hong Kong and around the world!"
Lamma-Gung Hei Fat Choi from me and Lamma-Por, too!
This will be the last time the iconic YSW ferry pier looks like this with
the bikes all lined up along the railings. By next Lunar New Year the Bike
Park will be operational and all bikes supposedly forced off the pier. Lamma
visitors will have to find different pretty & unique sights to photograph.
They're becoming harder to find...
Close-up of the Tai Peng Man outside the Community Garden. Can you resist
the temptation to push that big, new button and find out what will happen?
 
Coming off the YSW ferry this afternoon:
 
It's a container office for the Bike Park construction (confirmed by an
indigenous Village Representative), placed outside the YSW Library (which
will be rebuilt later, several years from now). The beginning of the actual
Bike Park works hasn't been confirmed yet, but it won't be long now....
Discuss in our 10-year old forum topic:
"Cycle Parking Platform".
Zep, our Flora & Fauna Senior Moderator, writes:
 "Any tips? An intelligent and cunning rat in my flat has so far foiled
all attempts at entrapment and eviction."
That he's given his new pet with cute name, even though it's unwanted and unwelcome,
demonstrates the animal-loving nature of many Lammaites. His remarks almost show kind of
a grudging admiration for the clever rodent who's foiling even the highly
educated mind of this teacher and naturalist. If he can't catch it, maybe
he'll even adopt it as a pet?
As Zep's home is located in Snake Central - as Tai Peng Village is
called sometimes - maybe let nature assist his efforts! Awake one of the
abundant, hungry, currently hibernating rat snakes, relocate it into his flat and
let nature take its course! Just don't aggravate the snake, maybe stay out
of the flat for a day or two or ten...
But then catching and releasing the well-fed snake might be a bit of a
problem afterwards. Lamma's snakes can also be quite "intelligent and
cunning, foiling all attempts at entrapment and eviction."
Do you want to give Zep some good (or bad or silly) advice in our forum?
Many Lammaites already did: Getting Rid of Ratty
 It
started with a Letter to the Editors in the SCMP on Jan 20, 2014, by
Adam in Lo So Shing:
Desexing scheme for strays has been
an abject failure in village
This prompted a rebuff by Lamma's well-known and respected Dr John
Wedderburn on Jan 22:
Inaction by officials added to dog problem
This started another heated discussion in the
Lamma Dog Owners Facebook group, which is still reeling from the
lack of progress in the recent dog poisoning cases.
 Carole
of
LammaFlats.com (Fully
furnished 700 sf flat -1 Mar) introduces the new
gardener, guardian, and good luck mascot of the Tai Peng
Community Garden (Hippeastrum
for sale):
 "P.S.
Have you passed by the Tai Peng garden recently?
We have a new addition to the garden called Tai Peng Man.
He stands at the edge of the front pond and you can push the
button to activate his watering cans.
Chris Corke's latest creation and a tribute to Lamma
farmers. Tai Ping man was popular over the weekend with passing
tourists."
Keeping
a close eye on many Lamma activities, including the increasingly
popular
Geocaching activities on Lamma (What
is geocaching?),
I got this automatic notification the other day:
"sthlm greystones couldn't find Lamma Island - Mt
Stenhouse (Traditional Cache):
Log Date: 1/19/2014:
 I was so looking forward to log this one but my luck and ability
failed me. GPS was pointing me in a direction which didn't match
the hint, and on top of that a big camping family was all over
the place making a thorough search impossible. I sadly noticed
all the trash and toilet paper and continued my hike Eastwards."
This was the same Sunday as the
Four Peaks Race of the Aberdeen Boat Club. Mt. Stenhouse
is one of the Four Peaks. There was a checkpoint camp up there
with staff
OVERNIGHT at 11 degrees. This is most likely what this hiker
encountered.
It looks like Mt. Stenhouse is becoming a bit too popular,
with different interest groups clashing up there?
Aberdeen
Coat Club finally replied to my query:
"The Mt Stenhouse check point
was done by the Scout team whose leader had been doing this for
years. Our club has never received any complaints from any
authority or citizens from any of the peak check points.
The scouts are supervised by
leaders and they are fully aware of the environmental issues and
will remove rubbish of their own but also those left by others.
We have full trust in them."
 These are just a selected few of the numerous "Attributes" of
Geocaching locations worldwide. Most of the Hazards above apply
to the Mt. Stenhouse hike, you might need most of the
Equipment, and you'll find NONE of the above Facilities up
there! See the basic warnings for hiking/geocaching
Mt. Stenhouse:
One of the four peaks is Lamma's Mt. Stenhouse. Find
out this year's times to get from the boat anchored off South
Lamma to the beach, run up Mt. Stenhouse (!), check in with
their peak camp, run downhill and get back on the boat to
continue to the next island's peak. 52 minutes was last year's
record, 55 minutes this year!
30th Four Peaks Race.
 
 
Chinese Calligraphy @ Fa Fa House, YSW Back Street - Lamma-Gung
Residence:
Yearly tour by our Gardening
Forum moderator:
Let's update our Bilingual Yellow Pages for Lamma!
There are so many local business contacts in our forum
already, but many are quite out-of-date. Anybody wants to add
their best local contacts, shops and services to our Lamma
Yellow Pages?
A basic text listing with contacts and name card is free for
all local businesses and services, including handymen, movers,
VV drivers, speedboats, etc.
Prominent listings with picture and promotions are also
available (rate
card).
Just add the contacts you know
and like to this forum, in Eng. and Chinese (if available) and
I'll add them to the official, bilingual
Lamma Yellow Pages. These pages will be prominently
linked from the left side of the home page and other prominent
locations around this entire website:
North Lamma Primary School, Wed, Jan 15, 7-9pm (from left to right):
2 SPCA officers - John F. Cameron, Police Superintendent - Joyce Wong, Lamma
Police Chief - interpreter.
For recording and feedback on this meeting:
Lamma Dog Owners on Facebook.
For the bilingual police handout ("Dos and Don'ts for the Public -
Suspected Dog Poisoning Cases") and the police map:
Dog Poisoning forum.
All digital marketing will be free for new and
returning Lamma-zine advertisers, from banner ads, advertorials
& mini-websites, to email campaigns, Facebook marketing, SEO
consulting & our
bilingual Yellow Pages.
Special promotional offer only till end of Feb!
Contact us in English or Chinese!
Postponed to 7pm, due to popular demand!
Winner for the most creative entry in the
RTHK/SCMP short story competition, written by Lamma's
The Lady in the Pink Hat:
"My name is Pebbles, though for much of my existence I was
without a name.
That was before the lady with the pink hat came along. I like
the name. It suits
me. It's something to aspire to. The P. K. stands for Pak Kok, a
name of place
rather than character.
 I
came into being 6,000 years ago, give or take. My "birth" was
not so much a
big bang, but a gradual shifting of forces molded by destiny. My
mother sat
200 kilometres south of here at the edge of a vast plain until
the sea levels
rose and obscured her, allowing me to make an appearance on the
world.
And here I am. Pretty cool, eh?
The first few thousand years were magnificent – a series
of skies, seas and
mountain vistas. Yet after so long looking at it, I found it a
bit dull. Sure, there
were some pretty amazing sunsets, squally weather that got me
all of a quiver
and some lovely bugs, birds and the occasional beasty to gaze
upon, but not
much else. I was spoilt. I didn't realize what I had - nature's
canvass at its
best laid out just for me.
Then one day, I saw something I never had before. Of
course, I'd seen
creatures leap out of the water or fly across the sky. My mum
had witnessed
some that after a few thousand years evolved and moved from
their watery
home onto the land. Pretty amazing that – growing some legs and
learning to
breathe in air instead of water! There were similar changes
going on in front of
me, I suppose, but at the time these made me yawn. It was soooo
slow. Then
suddenly I saw something new and exciting.
People."
Read more and find out who's The Lady in the Pink Hat...
Howard Sheard, our Official Court Birdographer, has submitted these
photos, taken with a long & huge birdwatcher's lens, a heavy & huge bird of
the mechanical kind catching his expert's eye. These birds of the GFS
species (Govt. Flying Services) are usually grey, seen many times per week
medevacing people to hospital from the YSW Helipad. But I'd never noticed a
red-white one on Lamma before, I think.
Howard writes:
"Incoming... I hope noone is badly injured and needing a ride. Nope,
loadsa peeps. Strange cameo get-up and what looks like riot hats. Off they
go.
Then a short time later there's a repeat. Wonder what they were doing here?"
 
 
I've asked two senior marine police guys:
This was a training exercise of the tough and well-known Police Tactical
Unit in North and South Lamma, involving quite a number of helicopter
transfers.
They were practicing to catch the crafty and elusive incense tree poachers
and smugglers in the future!
Read more about the illegal, long-term and extremely lucrative incense (heung)
tree poaching operations on Lamma:
Rare and Valuable Incense Tree Vandalised
Diesel's Bar this week, the end of an era in Lamma's (bar) history
Robert Hope-Jones has been sneaking behind the tarpaulin hiding the
total demolition-in-progress, to be replaced by TWO Village Houses this
year.
A few more photos by Bob Davis of the Farewell Party:
 
 
More photos...
To learn more about Roz's children art classes, check out these stories:
Art Class @ Banyan House
Birds & Butterflies @ Banyan Bay Bar
 
'Jimmy Shoe':
Lamma Island's Beach Trash Curios
Welcome to the Lamma forum, Grainne! I saw your web pages about
your recent Jimmy
Shoe exhibition and was very fascinated. We're doing so many beach
cleanings all over Lamma, combined with children art projects sometimes, but
rarely something innovative like yours.
I love your beach shoes photos and would love to feature them in the
Lamma-zine as well. OK with you? Full credits and links to
your
website, of course.
Grainne
Quinlan in Mo Tat Wan replied:
"The shoes were collected on a secluded beach just past Mo Tat Wan
Village, also some shoes were collected on Tung O beach.
These curios littering the beaches are due in part to the busy water ways
of Hong Kong. Each month thousands of sea going vessels arrive and depart,
churning debris, shrapnel and human remnants as they travel.
My neighbours here on Lamma weren't too perplexed by the Jimmy Shoe
project as they too have an interest in environmental waste. Indeed
environmental waste is frequent topic of conversation. Most residents on
Lamma are concerned about our beaches and will frequently make an effort to
clean up the beaches."
A little more about the clean-up efforts this weekend:
You might have been wondering why so many Village Houses all over the New
Territories and the Islands look so much alike, often in the "Spanish Villa"
style, usually all tiled in the same greyish/brownish colours. So it's kind
of refreshing to see something very different from the boring standard, like
this new, almost completed Village House high above the Pak Kok Ferry pier.
Look, no tiles!
If somebody knows the (Singaporean?) owner - no luck contacting them so far
- it might make an interesting interview?
  
Local opinions about this design and colours vary widely, but might this
start a new trend of non-conventional, colourful houses on Lamma? See this
"artist's impression" from a new video about the YSW Harbor Reclamation,
still tentatively scheduled to start middle of this year (click for video):
 Is
one of your New Year's resolutions to get fit(ter)? But do you think it's
too crowded, expensive, time-consuming or inconvenient to start going to the
gym?
How about a low-cost gym, open 24-7, not crowded, and located close to your
home in Yung Shue Wan?
The Island Gym in Sha Po Old Village (just behind where the former,
long-time gym used to be located)
has got a special promotion running right
now, exclusively for Lamma-zine readers, running only till Tue, Jan 7! I've been a member for years and can warmly recommend it.
Contact Sol who runs this not-for-profit place:
Island Gym promotion till Jan 7
  
Click to read whole story...
Straight from our forum into the SCMP, 4 of my photos made it
on the City-2 page today, featuring
The Island Bar's Treasure Hunt.
This is great and well-deserved exposure for
The Island Bar and the fantastic Treasure Hunt team and
all the participants!
By sheer coincidence, I hiked to the top of Mt. Stenhouse
yesterday with the winning family team pictured above...
Sign and photo by the Ed Williams family. They were just 40
minutes behind us climbing Mt. Stenhouse today. My pictures are in
processing. Our group:
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Lamma-zine
started in 2002, and will be updated (almost) daily with anything
vaguely related to Lamma Island or its residents, be it news,
stories, events, links, photos, artworks, videos, etc.
Contact Lamma-Gung with
anything relevant to Lamma or Lammaites that you'd like to see
published in the Lamma-zine, Events Calendar, Photo Galleries, Links
or in our Eng. and Chin. forums!
 All
text, photos & graphics by Lamma-Gung, if not otherwise
credited. Click on button on left for
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