Week 1: 4/3/05

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0 height="100%"><tr> <td valign="top" width=200 BGCOLOR="#FFCC80" TEXT="#080000" background="67cc8b83.jpg"> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id19.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Random Things to Make You Giggle"><B>Random Things to Make You Giggle</B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id77.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Hong Kong Disneyland"><B>Hong Kong Disneyland</B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id35.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Our Parkview Apartment"><B>Our Parkview Apartment</B></A></div> <div> <B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700f00000cc00.png" HEIGHT="16" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Week 1: 4/3/05</B></div> <div> <A HREF="id29.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 2: 4/10/05"><B>Week 2: 4/10/05</B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id30.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 3: 4/17/05"><B>Week 3: 4/17/05</B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id32.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 4: 4/24/05 "><B>Week 4: 4/24/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id33.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 5: 5/1/05 "><B>Week 5: 5/1/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id37.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 6: 5/8/05 "><B>Week 6: 5/8/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id39.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 7: 5/15/05 "><B>Week 7: 5/15/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id41.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 8: 5/22/05 "><B>Week 8: 5/22/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id42.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 9: 5/29/05 "><B>Week 9: 5/29/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id48.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 10: 6/5/05 "><B>Week 10: 6/5/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id51.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 11: 6/12/05 "><B>Week 11: 6/12/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id53.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 12: 6/19/05 "><B>Week 12: 6/19/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id55.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 13: 6/26/05 "><B>Week 13: 6/26/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id57.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 14: 7/3/05 "><B>Week 14: 7/3/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id60.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 15: 7/10/05 "><B>Week 15: 7/10/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id62.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 16: 7/17/05 "><B>Week 16: 7/17/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id64.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 17: 7/24/05 "><B>Week 17: 7/24/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id65.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 18: 7/31/05 "><B>Week 18: 7/31/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id67.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 19: 8/7/05 "><B>Week 19: 8/7/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id70.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 20: 8/14/05 "><B>Week 20: 8/14/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id71.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 21: 8/21/05 "><B>Week 21: 8/21/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id74.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 22: 8/28/05 "><B>Week 22: 8/28/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id76.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 23: 9/4/05 "><B>Week 23: 9/4/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id79.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 24: 9/11/05 "><B>Week 24: 9/11/05 </B></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id80.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Week 25: 9/18/05 "><B>Week 25: 9/18/05 </B></A></div> </td> <td valign="top" width="100%" BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000"> <div> <FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#BF0000" FACE="Australian Sunrise" ><B>Welcome to Chase family planet!</B></FONT><FONT SIZE="1" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Australian Sunrise" > </FONT><FONT SIZE="1" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >    |    </FONT> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Welcome to Chase family planet!">home</A></div> <div> <A HREF="id22.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Adventures in Asia">Adventures in Asia</A>   ·   <A HREF="id46.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Contact Us">Contact Us</A></div> <bR> <div> Week 1: 4/3/05</div> <div> <B>We Have Arrived!</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Hello friends and family!</B><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <bR> <div> Wow! What a week! This update is lonnnnng, and if you think you are overwhelmed reading this, you'll have an idea of how we've felt all week! And remember, I did invite you to join us on this journey! So grab a cup of coffee, put your feet up and come along with us!<FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <bR> <div> <B><U>Saturday & The Missing Sunday</U></B><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> After a frenzied packing and cleaning session at our house in the States, and a night of no sleep before the flight (primarily thanks to the party going on across the street that required us to call the sheriff at 1:00 a.m.) we were off to LAX at the dreadfully early hour of 5:00 a.m. on Saturday.<FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> Our flight was an hour and a half to San Francisco and then 16 hours to Hong Kong. I know you're all dying to know what it was like flying with a one year old and a four year old, right? It was surprisingly (miraculously?) uneventful. I tried not to think about what the flight would be like in advance, I just stocked a bag with all the Happy Meal toys I've collected over the last year, lots of snacks, lots of diapers, and then just prayed that all would go well. Fortunately the kind and generous (at least in this instance) Walt Disney Company flew us in business class, with enough leg-room for the four of us to sit and have a picnic on the floor for about two minutes before I grew leery of possible turbulence and made us all buckle back up (bad experience once, still can barely talk about it, didn't want to scar the kids, we do have to fly back at some point!). The kids slept, Mike and I attempted to sleep without much success (surprising since we'd already been over 24 hours with no sleep). Upon arrival in Hong Kong, the two darling angels from the flight took a southward turn. We believe Benjamin, our tender and sweet youngest son at 20 months of age, decided to enter the terrible twos promptly on the spot. Nathan, our four year old adventurer with a body that never can manage to stay in one place for even a second turned into a lump on the floor, refusing to walk even a step without trails of real honest to goodness tears streaming down his face. Normally, we would have just slung him over our shoulder, but in this case, between the four of us, we had nine suitcases, two backpacks, a tote bag, a computer case, a rolling carry-on, a duffel bag, and Nathan's Buzz Lightyear rolling case, plus the single stroller that Ben absolutely refused to sit in, screaming like a boy with a diaper on fire. Needless to say, there wasn't a spare shoulder to sling anything over! Going through immigration and then customs was a great deal of fun (that's sarcasm), with two wildly screaming and crying children, and the knowledge that the special visas we had in our passports had to be processed in exactly the right way or else we'd be booted out of the country only to have to get new visas and try the whole wonderful process over again in a couple of weeks (yes, this did happen to someone else on the project, I asked). We were successful, however, and then found a most welcome sight... a man holding a sign with our name on it! His eyes bugged slightly at the amount of luggage we were hefting, but he quickly called for backup and we jumped into the awaiting van which he promptly filled up with our luggage.<FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> After a 30 minute drive we ended up at our new home, The Parkview Suites. It sits in the middle of Tai Tam Country Park, a huge nature preserve area filled with acres of forest and several reservoirs. It will be fun to explore with the boys, I'm sure! Our two bedroom, two bathroom home seems spacious, but lacks practical storage space. We overflowed the provided dresser and nightstands, and then called the duty manager on up for a walk through. We asked him to bring up a crib and then to remove several pieces of furniture to make more room for our rowdy boys and their toys.<FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> <B><U>Monday-Holiday</U></B><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> Having completely missed Easter thanks to crossing the international date line, we were grateful to find that in Hong Kong, "Easter Monday" is a holiday which Michael gets off from work. So, being the "CHASE" family and not the "SIT AROUND LIKE LUMPS" family, we decided to "chase" down some adventures right away. In fact, the adventures started really early, thanks to the time change, we were all up at about 4:30 a.m. While we waited for the sun to come up, we decided to try and make some breakfast. The Parkview had thoughtfully prepared a basket of food and stocked the fridge with the basics, bread, eggs, milk, and coke (my breakfast drink of choice! How did they know? I'm gonna love it here!). Mike thought he'd make French toast, his specialty. After about 20 minutes, we still couldn't figure out how to turn the stove top on. It looks exactly like an electric oven with stove top that you'd find in any kitchen in the U.S., yet somehow, turning the knobs produced absolutely no heat. Trying to peer behind the oven, Mike somehow managed to make the entire unit collapse, crumbling the wooden base that the oven sat on. Things were not looking good, and it was only our FIRST morning in Hong Kong! I called up the reception desk to say our "oven" was not working. Housekeeping arrived with a new toaster, proceeded to plug it in and grabbed our old one and said "this one will work". Uh... oh yeah, have I mentioned that although many people here speak a little English, it's the Queen's English, as in the Queen of England, where you can ask in vain and never find an elevator, but be pointed in the direction of the lift when you try to describe what an elevator is. So our use of the word "oven" brought a new toaster! When I turned the nice man from housekeeping around and showed him what I would normally call an oven, laying back in repose on top of broken slats of what used to be it's pedestal, he dramatically exclaimed "what did you do!". I was a little frightened! I mean, we'd only been here for maybe 10 hours and already I was being shouted at! I pointed out that beyond the obvious problem with the oven, we were unable to make it work prior to it's laying down on the job. He pointed a long bony finger at the giant red switch on the wall (that was no where near the oven) which was clearly labeled "Electric Cooker" and said "you must turn on the electric cooker at the switch before you can turn the knobs". Ah ha! It's all clear now! As clear as the fog that results in my mind when I've had about five hours of sleep in a 48 hour period. So, we turned the "electric cooker" switch on, turned the knobs on the oven, and viola! Heat! Yeah, I know, you normally wouldn't want to cook on a stove that's slanting like the Tower of Pisa, but we were all starving and hey, the stove worked, so we ate French toast after all! </div> <div> We took the elevator from our suite on the 17th floor to the lobby, and then boarded the Parkview bus that deposited us at the Central Star Ferry Dock. After wandering around for a bit looking like confused tourists, someone pointed us in the direction of the entrance to the Star Ferry. This has got to be the best feature about Hong Kong (okay so we've been here exactly 7 days, I'll probably tell you something different as time passes). The Star Ferry is a two level boat that crosses Victoria Harbor from Hong Kong Island (where we live) over to the mainland side. There are several of them running across the Harbor throughout the day and night every 6 or 7 minutes, and they celebrated their 100th birthday a couple of years ago. And the best part? This "ride" costs only about 30 cents U.S.! Bargain! </div> <div> Being our first outing in our new country, and having heard nothing but how hot it is, how miserable it is, how you are going to wish you are dead to escape the heat, we all were dressed in shorts and tee shirts. We all felt very comfortable, not too hot, not too cold, I personally thought a bit smugly, <I>we'll be able to handle this, I don't know what Mike was talking about when he said he had to change his shirt twice during the day last summer on a business trip</I>. As we got our bearings and started looking around a bit, we noticed everyone else was dressed in long pants, sweaters, jackets, even the occasional scarf and woolen hat. And the kids were bundled up like they were going into the snow! And then, that smug feeling was replaced by a lead weight in the pit of my stomach... if <I>THIS</I> is how the locals dress in Spring when it's 70 degrees out, come summer, <I>WE ARE GOING TO DIE!</I> </div> <div> We wandered the streets of Kowloon (I promise more meaningful layouts of the geography in the weeks to come) and came upon what I was quite excited to see, Nathan Road! This is a major shopping destination, and the sights and sounds, not to mention smells were overwhelming as we strolled up and down various alleyways. It was only about 10:00 a.m., but we all found ourselves starving. Walking up the road, we had passed many recognizable restaurants, like the Hard Rock Cafe, Pizza Hut, etc., but now we found ourselves in the middle of nowhere... until we saw a sign exclaiming "Great Sandwiches!". Great! We went in, only to find they were still serving breakfast. Okay, breakfast twice in one day can't be all that bad, and the first one hadn't been that great, so let's go for a second round, right? Mike and Nathan went to the counter, Ben and I found a table by squeezing in between diners packed into tables like sardines. As soon as Ben and I were ensconced at our table, a switch flipped in Ben, and he started screaming at the top of his lungs, louder than I'd ever heard our sweet young child scream! I caught Mike's eye across the room and mouthed "Hurry UP!" (like he really could do that!) and tried to appease Ben with various things... his blankie, a cup of water, a book, the promise of the car of his choice on his 16th birthday... all to no avail. Mike showed up with our tray of food, and even then Ben could not contain his displeasure with everyone on the planet. A well meaning old gentleman made Ben a paper airplane out of his receipt, and tried to give it to him... and Ben scrunched it up and shouted "NO! NOOOOOOOO!" Mike grabbed Ben and ran from the restaurant, while Nathan and I gobbled down our food. Nathan seemed quite perplexed, since he's the one that normally is the more disruptive of the two, and you could almost see the wheels turning in his head "how do I fit into this family if I'm not the one complaining about everything?" I went outside and traded off with Mike, and then we headed down the road to a huge park called Kowloon Park. We found baby turtles in the park, which amused the boys briefly before they continued in their crankiness. Then we found a playground, which really made the boys happy, until Ben fell and skinned his knee in a quite impressive manner... he will definitely have a scar, his very first! And on his first day in Hong Kong! How special! Not to be outdone, big brother Nathan later fell on some stairs and got a matching scrape on his knee as well. Good thing we got that out of the way and can move on! </div> <div> We took the Ferry back to Hong Kong Island, then the bus back to the Parkview. Tired Ben passed out in an upright position on the bus. At home, we put Ben in bed for an afternoon nap and bribed Nathan (who was alternating between bouncing off the walls and throwing world class tantrums) to lay down himself. We set a timer, since we didn't want them to repeat that morning's four a.m. wake up call. An hour and a half later, nothing could wake them, including blaring the radio, opening the room darkening shades, even rubbing them with an ice cold wet washcloth (mean mommy, I know). We had to hold them in an upright position until the screaming seemed to slow down a bit, then we all jumped into a taxi and headed for Ikea, that wonderful store filled with semi-disposable and incredibly cheap furniture. We got two more dressers for our place, and a couple of other random things that caught our eye. Then we wandered around a bit in the Causeway Bay area after dark, lots of neon lights and shoppers loaded down with purchases. We headed home where I managed to make spaghetti on our newly repaired stove without damaging the stove, myself, or the spaghetti! Way to go Heather!<FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> <B><U>Tuesday- Legal Aliens with driver licenses</U></B><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> Tuesday we hopped into a cab and set off for immigration. We went through this crazy procedure of having our photos taken, and our thumbprints taken electronically. Then we entered another room, where our thumbprints were verified. Both boys were on the edge the whole time, the fine line between acceptable behavior and the kind that has lasting repercussions! Then we went to the Hong Kong equivalent of the DMV, where Mike got his HK driver's license, or at least applied for it. One more stop, off to the bank to open an account in Hong Kong. We were dragging, and Ben fell asleep in the stroller so we stopped in for lunch at a place in the mall where the bank was. In the afternoon, we were to meet our relocation coordinator to take us to the nearest hospital, drive us by Nathan's school, get me a cell phone, and help us find Mike an electric shaver. Understand that at this point it wasn't just the boys on the verge of melting down, Mike and I felt like a Dali painting come to life. Our relocation coordinator was zipping us in and out of alleys and train stations and malls at what was probably a normal speed, but what felt like fast-forward to me. Some of the places (like where we got my cell phone) I actually have to go back to, and I have no clue how exactly to do that!<FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <bR> <div> <B><U>Wednesday- Our stuff arrives!</U></B><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> Wednesday Mike jumped straight into work, and the boys and I waited around for our shipment of stuff from the U.S. to arrive. As boxes and boxes of clothes and toys arrived, I looked at our home and wondered where we'd put it all! The boys were thrilled to see toys they hadn't seen in six weeks. I managed a trip to the grocery store with the boys by myself, no small task since you have to carry all your groceries home, plus convince the kids to stay right by you and not touch anything (man I miss my minivan and the huge Costco double wide grocery carts right about now). I managed to make dinner once again, after calling my long-suffering mother at 1:00 a.m. her time to remind me at what temperature and for how long you should cook chicken breasts. Dinner got cooked, the kids got bathed, and Mike and I passed out very quickly.<FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <bR> <div> <B><U>Thursday- I think we're alone now...</U></B><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> Thursday I decided that it was time to make my first solo trip with the boys (our suite seemed to be shrinking and the boys seemed to be expanding so we had to get out). We boldly boarded the bus, then the ferry and entered a mall across the bay, all sans stroller, which is pretty useless here due to the genius who installed stairs to <I>get to</I> all the escalators and elevators. As we wandered around, we found two familiar sights... the Disney Store and a Toys R' Us. The kids were behaving so well on our inaugural trip without daddy, I felt compelled to reward their cheerful faces with toys, and then we enjoyed (sort of) our first fast food experience with lunch at KFC. As we returned home, I was so excited... thinking to myself <I>I can do this, it won't be that hard.</I> Once home, I visited the bathroom very briefly while suddenly the sounds of WWF Smackdown erupted from the living room. As I waded into the foray and pulled the boys apart, I found Nathan with a quickly swelling black eye, and Ben with a two inch gash on his forehead that exactly matched the pattern on the side table next to the couch. Nathan's injury seemed worse, but he wouldn't let me put any ice on it, flailing like a cat who won't take it's medicine, so the swelling continued and eye was quickly closing up. Fabulous. Just when I thought to myself <I>I lied, I CAN'T do this, it's too hard</I>, Mike called and said he was on his way home. We once again jumped on the bus, met him at the Ferry, and then we all rode across the Harbor together for dinner and a quest for work boots for Mike. On the way home, we saw Hong Kong Island in all it's glory, magnificent sky scrapers glowing in the slight fogginess of the Harbor. It was better than driving down Christmas Tree Lane to see the Christmas lights back home. </div> <bR> <div> <B><U>TGIF!</U></B><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> Friday the boys and I visited our neighbors, the Wilkie Family, who are also a part of the project. Roze has a little girl named Pyper about three months younger than Benjamin, and a tiny two week old baby girl named Jade, born here in Hong Kong. The boys had begged me to go to "the little tiny baby's house" all day, and being done with my feeble attempt to assemble the Ikea furniture without Michael's help, I relented. The boys were both maniacs, embarrassing me to no end, I was so mortified. Roze's mom is here to help out with the baby, and Nathan kept asking her for food... he ate an apple and a loaf of oatmeal honey bread, and then started asking for crackers! I swear I had just fed him lunch! Two sandwiches, an apple, and some yoghurt! Pyper has a cool Little Tykes play set with a swing and a slide in her living room. Nathan nearly destroyed it by practicing his acrobatics on it... Roze said it's rated for kids up to four, but Nathan is about 20 pounds heavier than the average four year old, so it's now off limits to him. Mike and Roze's husband Darren got home together and then the boys acted even worse. It was like "oh good, the testosterone has arrived, we really better act out now!". We quickly left, came home and put shoes on and we decided we'd go to one of the restaurant on site, that says it has an "exciting children's menu". I figured that meant it was child friendly. Well, it's about the fanciest restaurant I've ever been to. A waiter stood by and kept dabbing the ketchup off Ben's face and it had a high ceiling which the kids enjoyed making loud noises since it bounced off so nicely. Then Ben totally lost it and went crazy screaming, once again pulling his I'm-angry-at-everyone-on-the-planet routine that he's been practicing so frequently. I came back upstairs with Ben, while Mike and Nathan finished eating. As soon as Mike came back up, I took off for some alone time at the grocery store! Woo-hoo! When did going to the grocery store without your kids begin to equal an oasis? Good thing this particular grocery store has an abundance of really good chocolate!<FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <bR> <div> <B><U>The Weekend is finally here!</U></B><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> Thinking we hadn't quite crammed enough into our first week in Hong Kong, we boarded a double decker bus (much to Nathan's delight) on Saturday morning and headed down an incredibly curvy road to a town called Stanley on the south side of Hong Kong Island. This is the bargain shopper's paradise. Everything you could ever want is there at a fraction of the price of anywhere else. Nathan wanted EVERYTHING, and when we finally said he could choose <U>one</U> thing, and that he should look everywhere before choosing, he immediately begged and begged for a little train, which he broke moments later when he saw a cooler toy in the next shop, demanding the new toy. Ah, the frustrations of teaching your children about delayed gratification! Ben slept through most of it, but then when he woke up he let his presence be known at lunch, where in a little sidewalk bistro he loudly condemned everything and everyone within a two mile radius. Once again, I bailed with the Benster, allowing the other tourists a peaceful lunch while I walked up and down the shoreline with a screaming and hysterical baby. Will we ever again eat dinner as a family? As soon and Mike and Nathan found us, we hopped in a taxi and went home for a change of pace. We explored the Parkview and all it's many buildings and activities. This place is huge. As in Downtown L.A. huge. It's pretty much it's own city, really. On Sunday we went to the church Mike attended on a couple of his business trips over here. One of the girls from Nathan's school in Torrance (named Natalie) moved to HK about a month ago. After the service, a couple came up to me and said "are you Heather Chase, Nathan's mom?" I totally freaked out, thinking, oh no, what has my son done now??? Turns out they were Natalie's family and they go to the same church. Nathan was thrilled to see his old friend and I have to say I'm continually amazed by what a small world it really is. </div> <bR> <div> <B><U>Are you still with us?</U></B><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <div> So is anyone still reading? That's the end of week one, and like I said, probably the longest update you'll get. We were told all week that everyone else's kids took about a week to adjust, and lo and behold, at lunch on Sunday we got a glimpse of the children we thought we might have left back in California... hopefully the clouds will fully part and we'll all be back to "normal" again soon, whatever the current "normal" for us is these days! </div> <bR> <div> <B>Happy traveling!</B><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" > </FONT></div> <bR> <div> <B>Heather, Michael, Nathan, and Benjamin Chase</B></div> <div> <TABLE BORDER="2" CELLPADDING="2" CELLSPACING="1" WIDTH="611" BORDERCOLORLIGHT="#C0C0C0" BORDERCOLORDARK="#808080" FRAME="BOX" RULES="ALL" ALIGN="LEFT" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" > <tR> <tD VALIGN=CENTER HEIGHT= 265 WIDTH="296"><div> <IMG SRC="0b518d20.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="210" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> Business class - the way this prince was meant to ride... unless first class is an option!</div> </tD> <tD VALIGN=CENTER><NOBR><div> <IMG SRC="0b818d20.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="210" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> Are we there yet?</div> </NOBR></tD> </tR> <tR> <tD VALIGN=CENTER HEIGHT= 264 WIDTH="296"><div> <IMG SRC="0ba18d20.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="210" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> It takes two guys to push all our luggage through the Hong Kong airport!</div> <bR> </tD> <tD VALIGN=CENTER><NOBR><div> <IMG SRC="0bc18d20.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="210" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> Home at last, with tons to unpack!</div> </NOBR></tD> </tR> <tR> <tD VALIGN=CENTER HEIGHT= 318 ><NOBR><div> <IMG SRC="0bed2180.jpg" border=0 width="210" height="280" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> Luggage.  Lots of it.</div> </NOBR></tD> <tD VALIGN=CENTER><NOBR><div> <IMG SRC="0c0d2180.jpg" border=0 width="210" height="280" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> The Poster Children for Jet Lag.</div> <bR> </NOBR></tD> </tR> <tR> <tD VALIGN=CENTER HEIGHT= 248 ><NOBR><div> <IMG SRC="0c218d20.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="210" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> Little turtle friends in Kowloon Park.</div> <bR> </NOBR></tD> <tD VALIGN=CENTER WIDTH="296"><div> <IMG SRC="0c418d20.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="210" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> A much needed break, a playground in the bustling metropolis.</div> </tD> </tR> <tR> <tD VALIGN=CENTER HEIGHT= 351 WIDTH="296"><div> <IMG SRC="0c6d2180.jpg" border=0 width="210" height="280" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> One minute he was enjoying the bus ride, the next he was passed out.  Poor baby Ben.</div> <bR> </tD> <tD VALIGN=CENTER ROWSPAN=3 WIDTH="296"><div> <IMG SRC="0c818b90.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="697" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> In the background: Two IFC, the tallest building in Hong Kong and the </div> <div> fourth tallest building in the world.  </div> <bR> <div> In the foreground: Nathan Chase, the fourth tallest four year old in Hong Kong.</div> </tD> </tR> <tR> <tD VALIGN=CENTER HEIGHT= 281 WIDTH="296"><div> <IMG SRC="0ca18d20.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="210" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> The first casualty in Hong Kong: Ben's perfect skin now has permanent damage.  Phew... glad we got that done with!  Now for the next several hundred...</div> </tD> </tR> <tR> <tD VALIGN=CENTER HEIGHT= 248 ><NOBR><div> <IMG SRC="0cc18d20.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="210" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> Aren't you glad gas in California </div> <div> is <B><U>only</U></B> $2.50 right now?</div> </NOBR></tD> </tR> <tR> <tD VALIGN=CENTER HEIGHT= 265 WIDTH="296"><div> <IMG SRC="0ce18d20.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="210" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> "Our" island at twilight, passing another Star Ferry.  Photographer:  Nathan Chase</div> </tD> <tD VALIGN=CENTER WIDTH="296"><div> <IMG SRC="0d018d20.jpg" border=0 width="280" height="210" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> The Star Ferry pier with the brilliantly lit Hong Kong Island glowing in the background.</div> </tD> </tR> </TABLE></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>