I've volunteered already, doing Lamma-zine/Blog/email promotions, plus email marketing and the Fun Day website, including the photo gallery of the event. See last year's photos & event summary. Contact Zein or Sonya now, please!

July 20:  Looking for a Holiday Resort?

Quite a number of local and overseas tourists are contacting this website for info about where to rent a holiday resort or short-term flat on Lamma, for a weekend, a few days or even several weeks.

The building boom still hasn't come to an end yet on Lamma - left, one of 4 new Village Houses built in my close neighbourhood within the last few months. There are lots of places available & the prices are holding steady so far, except the usual summer season surcharges.

Below right, I've scanned the name cards of most of the major holiday resort agents in Yung Shue Wan. None of them has advertised in this blog or the Lamma-zine magazine so far, so they're all listed in the same impartial way.

Prices start at around HK$250 per night in a little guest house, up to well over HK$1,000 in the only local hotel w/services & facilities, Concerto Inn. All known active websites (2) & email addresses (2) are linked below.

Man Lai Wah Hotel: right at Yung Shue Wan ferry pier, low-cost guest house, no breakfast or facilities, Tel +852 2982 0220, email (Eric Wong), no website.

Concerto Inn: 25 minutes from Yung Shue Wan ferry pier. A "proper" hotel, w/restaurant & facilities, but most expensive. They'll pick up your luggage from the ferry, 20 Hung Shing Yeh Beach, rooms from HK$450, Tel +852 2982 1668, email, website.

Sunrise Holiday Resort (part of Jackson Property Agents): 15 Main St., Yung Shue Wan, Tel +852 2982 2626, apartments from HK$300, website.

Bali Holiday Resort: 8 Main St., Yung Shue Wan, Tel +852 2982 4580, rooms from HK$280.

Kathmandu Guest House: Tel/Fax: 2982 0028, Back Street, in the middle of the village, 10 minutes from Yung Shue Wan ferry pier. From HK$100/night - HK$4,000/month.

Printed rate cards or anything printed (flyers, brochures, etc.) are usually not available from any of these places. Finding somebody speaking any English in some places is a challenge as well. The best way seems to be to just show up with your suitcase and book a room on the spot. Most of them will have free rooms all week, except Saturday nights, when prices increase up to 50%.

There's also one guest house in Pak Kok and a handful more in Sok Kwu Wan and Lo So Shing in South Lamma.

Any place I've missed and that should be included in my Accommodations Directory in-progress? All part of our upcoming, bilingual Lamma Yellow Pages...

July 19:  'Usual Telephone Hotlines'

A new, handy, name card-sized reference has been printed (see below). You can pick one up from Lammadonna's office - just beside the Lamma Gourmet - together with a wide range of free bilingual leaflets, maps, tourist info and flyers about community and govt. matters. Another good spot for this free literature is the G/F of our City Hall ("North Lamma Rural Council Committee Hall") beside the Policebox ("Police Reporting Centre").

July 18:  Helipad vs. Sewage Treatment Works

An alert reader of this blog has just anonymously corrected some of my outdated info on this topic. Many thanks! This new source has supplied public info on the Sewage Treatment Works (for Yung Shue Wan only) to be built in a few years in the reclamation - by the Drainage Services Dept - in the very spot of the current temporary helipad. Here's the updated, corrected info.

July 17:  What's That Praying Mantis Doing Inside My New TV?

I'm always on the lookout for new, funny or interesting stuff on the walls around Yung Shue Wan for this blog (see pictures, each is an "illegal" poster theoretically worthy a $1,500 fine). "Wall classifieds" are a great and successful way of selling almost any kind of goods or services in Yung Shue Wan and people actually do read them.

I just spotted an ad selling a 29" TV for a very good price of $1,800. After 5 years of straining our aging eyes with a tiny 12" TV, it was time to upgrade. But our modest financial means made a brand-new TV an almost-impossible dream.

Checking out the advertised TV the very next day, I liked the size and especially the price! But even after 5 years on Lamma, I obviously don't look trustworthy enough to the local merchant selling the TV. He even wanted a deposit while I had to scramble to raise the cash on such short notice. Checking out the Internet about this model, it seemed that it has only ever been sold in Russia and China, so repairs might be a challenge...

With Nick the Bookman's help and a borrowed trolley we got it safely home. I connected it and we were in audiovisual heaven for a few hours. But the next morning I was woken up by Lamma-Por who complained excitedly about the new TV not working at all anymore!

To our big surprise, the merchant came right over within a few hours with his TV repair tools, obviously not just a fully bilingual, but also a multi-talented guy. He opened it up and what did he find inside the TV? A 2-inch-long dried praying mantis (right), too curious for its own good, probably causing a short-circuit in the electronics! Removing it solved the problem right away! The merchant didn't even ask for any additional payment for this quick fix!

The moral of this little true story? Caveat emptor! (Buyer beware!). You might get more (or less) than you've bargained for when you buy what's advertised on the walls. Sometimes it's just a Praying Mantis, sometimes much more...

There must be more and better stories like this out there!
Do you like me to publish YOUR STORY?

July 16:  Breakfast With Lammadonna

Just enjoying a nice congee working breakfast at Kiwi Cafe with Ms Yu Lai Fun (our District Councilor) and Lamma-Por (my wife &  interpreter). Here's the feedback to my three major questions for Fun Tse (Sister Fun, her Chinese nickname):

1. Late Ferries:

Let's start with the good news first! Lammadonna confirmed a recent, persistent rumour: 2-month trial run of new late ferries from mid-Aug!!!

Ferries every day of the week from Central to Yung Shue Wan at 2:30am and 2 more ferries from YSW to Central at 12:30am and 5am!

An official announcement is expected within the next several weeks and some of the above details might change, so don't hold me to them, please. The approval from the Transport Dept. is still pending, but is not expected to be a problem. A big advance Hurray! and Thank-you! for Lammadonna who was instrumental in making this happen! She's personally been negotiating with the ferry company for a long time on this and other issues. This always hot topic has been discussed for almost 3 years now in its own forum!

After the 2-month trial run, it'll be decided if and how to continue the new late ferries, depending on the number of passengers using them each day. Try to use these late ferries as much as possible!

2. Tree Felling at the Library:

I managed to piss off Ms Yu with my aggressive little story two days ago. I didn't mention her by name, but she was the one personally responsible for the tree felling I wrote about. As I suspected, it was done with the explicit approval of the local authorities. Here are Ms Yu's self-explanatory & attitude-revealing reasons for the tree fellings. I'll refrain from adding my own comments this time. I've also updated my little before/after animation.

1. The trees were a hazard as the branches were hanging too low and hurt some people's heads when walking underneath.

2. The trunk of the biggest tree was dry and rotten inside, full of worms and insects, as confirmed by a govt. expert who had a close look at the trees together with Ms. Yu.

3. The trees were old & "dirty", attracting mosquitoes & bugs, even snakes.

4. 3 burglaries have happened at the library. The trees might have given hiding opportunities to the burglars.

5. A public notice is usually required before the authorities can chop down any tree on public land. There's a notice for planned tree fellings in Tai Peng on the notice boards right now. But this tree felling was "urgent", so no notice.

6. New trees will be planted after it's been decided which type would be most suitable. We'll all be waiting with bated breath, maybe for a long time...
   Oops, I couldn't resist adding my own comment! Sorry...

3. "Premanent" Helicopter Site  (see spelling on poster below):

Some of you might have noticed this big banner (English and Chinese versions) at the fence of the VV Parking Lot, between the Chip Chop Shop and the former Lamma Bistro. These frequently changing banners put up by the local authorities are usually in Chinese only, sometimes partially bilingual, but an all-English banner is extremely rare! It might become a collector's item someday, especially with such a prominent "Premanent" typo...

The authorities are obviously looking for strong support for this hot death-or-life issue not just from the Chinese population, but also the large number of people of many nationalities who cannot read Chinese, including many Chinese who grew up overseas.

There's a temporary helipad now, inside the harbour reclamation, very close to the North Lamma Clinic. Everybody is universally happy about it. No more controversial deaths have occurred since this was made available. The best solution would be to keep it for as long as possible. But the temporary helipad area is just on loan from the Water & Sewage Dept. who might want to build (or not) a huge sewage treatment plant in that area some day and has had a fixed reservation for the area since the reclamation was finished many years ago.

A new alternative location for a permanent helipad was decided upon more than one year ago, on a round platform in the harbour, close to the temporary helipad, opposite the ferry pier (see Google Map, click to zoom out). Budgeted at HK$16 million, construction was supposed to start about now. But then the Environmental Protection Dept. stepped in, objecting that the future helicopter noise level would be above their standardised limits. So construction can't go ahead, as noise complaints can be all-powerful these days in HK politics, as strange that may sound. The relevant departments still remember the extremely face-losing case of the HK Stadium where noise-objections (after the opening!) killed off most of the intended uses of this wonderful venue which is now standing vacant almost all year long.

So the local authorities, the locally ruling DAB party and basically everybody else (see banner) is pushing for the go-ahead with this mandatory permanent helipad, even petitioning recently elected LegCo member Tam Yiu Chung, a friend and political ally of Lammadonna. Uncharacteristically, the local authorities are even mentioning unspecified "actions" if the govt. won't approve the permanent helipad soon. A most unusual tactic in the usually quiet & peaceful world of Lamma's village politics!

This will remain an interesting issue to watch as it potentially affects everybody's health & survival in any medical emergency. Most of us know people who had to use the helicopter to hospital at some point in their lives (including Lamma-Por). Almost everybody, Chinese or non-Chinese, local or expat, agrees that we need to have a permanent helipad close to the Lamma Clinic ASAP!

But it would be best & cheapest if we could just keep the current temporary helipad for as long as possible, even making it permanent, hopefully! There's no noise problem with the current helipad. They could try to convince the govt. to forget about the still hypothetical future sewage treatment plant. It would become hugely controversial with Lammaites anyway, as huge amounts of sewage would be shipped (and piped?) in from many parts of Hong Kong, for treatment in Yung Shue Wan!

3. Correction: The above info seems to be outdated, a reader of this blog has just anonymously updated me with the latest news:

The Sewage Treatment Works (STW) on North Lamma will be used to treat sewage from Yung Shue Wan (YSW) ONLY! We're creating that sewage locally, so we can't complain too much about treating it locally, I think.

It has been planned some 8 years ago and the process of inviting the detailed design assignment has started now for the YSW and Sok Ku Wan plants (Yes, a second one for South Lamma!). The plants will be commissioned in 2008 to 2009. The YSW site is small and was purposely built for the Lamma STW under the previous reclamation project.

So it looks like they're going ahead to build the STW in the YSW reclamation, on the very spot where the current temporary helipad is located, the most suitable spot, they claim. But if the govt. won't go ahead with building the permanent helipad before the STW construction starts in a few years, we won't have any helipad in YSW anymore and will have to revert using the one at the end of the HK Electric Powerstation. It'll take 1.5 years to build the permanent one on a platform in the harbour, so construction has to start pretty soon!

July 15:  'Thinking Out Loud' Won't Go Out Quietly!

Sad news from bbChris, lead singer and mascot of Lamma band Thinking Out Loud - "The POP band with ATTITUDE"

"Hello Everyone!

Thinking Out Loud are breaking up! Come to the last gig ever with Chris W and Mysterious Mr. B! We promise to kiss goodbye to the "Rock N Roll Machine"! We may burn some of Chris B's underwear! Show your support for our aberrant pop music one last time!

15 July 2005 - Friday, 10:30pm start

Fringe Club - 2 Lower Albert Rd. (Next to FCC), Central. HK$80 (includes one drink). Free entry for Fringe members.

PLUS a guest appearance from Luke Chow & Friends - a great upcoming indie pop band. Thanks for supporting live music in Hong Kong!

Chris W, Chris B, Egg, Matt & Mysterious Mr. B"

This breakup sounded like something worthy of this blog which is trying to keep track of all local bands with at least one member living on Lamma, dubbing them "Lamma bands". I enquired for more details, getting the PRESS RELEASE below.

The photos below come from my photo shoot of TOL's gig in a SHOPPING MALL.