Scattered through the burrow are countless street food venders selling: fish balls, stinky tofu, egg tarts, steam buns and bubble tea. Noodle houses provide a quick and easy sit down lunch, during the workweek. But, McDonalds and KFC seem to be gaining a foothold in the neighbor hood. Hourly “hotels” and “massage parlors” are also prevalent in the area.

Mong Kok gets a bad rap for being grimy and smelly. The intoxicating / nauseating odor of stinky tofu, durian and motor oil floods the streets; punctuated with scents of designer perfume, fresh seafood and incense from doorway shrines. I fell in love with the unique mystique of Mong Kok. Its strange mix of modern and traditional; western and eastern, can only be found in Hong Kong.

Cross Walk, on a Slow Day

Man in a Newspaper Hat

Fish Street

Produce Market

Chinese cuisine usually serves seafood whole, to demonstrate it’s fresh. Most of the seafood is sold alive, to ensure a fresh product on the table.

Many fish that Americans would not consider food fish are sold at the market, such as these Sergeant Majors.

Cleaning Fish

Dried shrimp, scollops, seahorse, pipefish and shark fin.

Noodle House

Japanese octopus balls

Smoke Break

7/26/08

HONG KONG- This week we treated cultured gill epithelial cells to determine the effect of DEX (synthetic cortisol) on Cl^- cell expression. Cortisol is a hormone produced when an animal is under stress. It is thought that expression of structural proteins used in Cl- cells will be higher hypertonic environments. Gill cells in isotonic and hypertonic mediums were treated with five different [DEX]. After six hours of treatment a Western blot was performed to determine the presence of signaling proteins, that may induce a change in expression.

Looking back on the internship, it was far form what I had expected. It was more than a little frustrating seeing the other students work on their projects, and move to a conclusion on them, with out initiating one myself. While I never had a project with specific goals and objectives, I did practice some molecular biological techniques I had not done before. But I feel the growth of my scientific knowledge over the past two months has been minimal.

I am fortunate that everyone in my lab were: kind, gracious and all around cool people. From the beginning they assisted me in experiencing the culture of Hong Kong. They provided ideas and logistical support for weekend trips, and took Dean and I to restaurant we never would have found (ushering us through an ally, past hawkers and drug deals, to an amazing Indian restaurant - for example). On Friday, the undergraduates asked Oscar to keep me busy in the lab late, while they snuck out. When they returned they surprised me with Best of Hong Kong, a book on pop culture in the city, with a photo and note from them placed inside.

7/16/08

HONG KONG- Several moths ago Oscar, the graduate student I am working with, acclimated four Japanese eels (Anguilla japonica) in one of four hyposmotic environments.

1) deionized water (DI)

2) DI and NaCl

3) DI and Na⁺

4) DI and Cl^-

^{Then dissected and removed kidney tissue, which was stored in the freezer. Last week we extracted a subset of sequence of DNA, from those samples that codes for stanniocalcin (STC). This hormone it responsible for Ca2+ regulation, but could possibly affect Na- and Cl+ too. Once the DNA was amplified it was electrophorised, to determine if the gene was present.}

22:00 HKT

HONG KONG- The remnants of Typhoon Fenshen arrived onshore today, canceling work and downing several trees around campus. Over the past 24 hours the tropical storm brought constant rain and gusty winds, but no significant damage.

The BBC reports the Typhoon hit the Philippines over the weekend leaving 155 dead and over 700 missing. The English translation of Fenshen means: “wind god”.

HONG KONG- When using an ATM in Hong Kong you must remove your card before the money will come out. If you wait for the money to come out first (like in America), your card will be sucked back in and your money won’t come out. Then you will have to call your parents at 3:00 AM and ask to have the ATM card shipped to you, because your bank won’t ship internationally.

Line Leader A city famous for crowed public transit is trying to westernize one of its practices. It is common to see crowds pushing their way onto buses. In preparation for the Olympics, the Chinese government has posted instructors with flags and bullhorns at bus stops through out the city. The instructors are charged with getting the city inline by the time western visitors arrive for the Olympics.

Street Calligraphy With brushes made from a water bottle, pipe and sponge Beijingites practice calligraphy on the stone streets of the Summer Palace.

Fishermen on Kunming Lake The 2.2 km² lake was dredged by hand in the late 18^th century. Like the rest of the Summer Palace it was created for the enjoyment of the Emperor, but is now a public park.

Westerners attract a lot of attention from many Chinese, who are not usually shy about asking for a picture.

Dragon statuette on a roof at the Temple of Heaven.

6/4/08 14:50 CST (Hotel)

BEIJING- Today we visited the imperial tomb of the Ming dynasty and the Great Wall. Before reaching the tomb the tour bus brought us to the state run jade carving factory/store/museum. Judging by the scale of the facility, it produces jade carvings and jewelry for other stores and export as well. The concept of the jade facility and a similar vase producing one, visited later in the day, is odd but makes a lot of sense. The facilities put on a show explaining the history and construction of the product, then ushered you into the store to push merchandise. I imagine similar facilities produce all of the Chinese Kitsch found in stores across America. Both of these facilities pumped tourists in by the buss load.

The Ming tomb is a massive complex, created to inter the desisted emperors and empresses of the dynasty. We visited the tomb of one emperor of the dynasty. He along with his wife and 16 sacrificed concubines were buried in a mound behind the mourning hall and monument building.

Horse carving on the Ming Tomb monument

The portion of the Great wall we visited was a younger section (100s not 1,000s of years old) that has also been restored. I can’t image the logistics hauling and setting stones across a mountain range. I would think the mountain range would have been enough of a physical deterrent, to invasion but a stonewall with arrows raining down would make it nearly impossible.

Great Wall

]]> http://www.eckerd.edu/academics/china/2008/06/ming-tomb-great-wall/feed/ http://www.eckerd.edu/academics/china/2008/06/some-where-north-of-russia/ http://www.eckerd.edu/academics/china/2008/06/some-where-north-of-russia/#comments Mon, 09 Jun 2008 07:54:56 +0000 Eric Fortman http://www.eckerd.edu/academics/china/?p=4 6/2/08 23:30 UTC (Zulu)

SOMEWHERE NORTH OF RUSSIA-This experience did not feel real until set foot on the plane. Three months ago I knew little about China. In several more hours I will land in the capital city, Beijing.

Everything I have read so far suggests China suffers from a bit of an image problem. A relic of the Cold War, China is perceived as “those commies across the Pacific”, threatening democracy. China is a several thousand year old teenager coming of age socially, politically and economically. It knows it is bound for greatness; look at the progress made in the last decade. Undeniably, China still has miles to go, but it wants to be part of the global community, and seem willing to play the game. Hopefully my experience here will reveal the truth of this situation.