Saturday, September 16, 2006
the next time when you are at city hall station, look up and chances are, you will see a camera pointing at you. that's something that i thought was a little too exaggerating.. i've read about the installing of more cctvs, but little did i expect that the addition was so, erm, intimidating.
suntec city is currently soooo heavily guarded that shoppers are really discouraged from going. it was virtually empty and even if its slightly past dinner time at 8-plus, the entire mall was likened to a ghost town. these few days should really be the prime time for shoppers who hate the crowd to shop around and eat. But still, getting there took me n wx about twice the usual time, cos of the closure of certain entrances and detours.
but of cos, when approached by delegates to ask for directions to suntec city, i SMILED lor, cos "3 million 999 thousand 999 smiles welcome the world" is much longer compared to "Four Million Smiles Welcome the World" right? I also gladly rendered my service to take pictures for 2 female visitors, who took notice of the nice temporary and short-lived blossoming flowers around the convention centre.
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And anyway, i was really glad that the "saturday" section of the straits times today ran a long special report on the railway system linking Beijing and Lhasa, which was opened on July 1st, earning the glory of the World's highest railway and World's longest plateau railway.
i've always wanted to visit tibet, for reasons that i myself cannot fathom. perhaps its the mysterious nature of the place, or perhaps due to an invisible religious connection. I don't know. And when i heard of the completion of this great engineering challenge in july, my curiosity of this railway ran high, and hoped to have a chance to witness it. Moreover, the high-altitude (averaging more than 4000m high) made it a necessity for the trains to pump in oxygen-rich air into the cabins, and also the tracks must be permanently kept cool as it would be unstable if the frost thaws. These, combined with a series of glimpses of Tibetan Plateau (the longest and highest plateau in the world) over a 48-hour journey, gave me a strong desire that i really would make this trip sometime in my life.
there are many places that i will not miss out in my lifetime, and Tibet will definitely be one. But i really do hope that the unique Tibetan culture will not be eroded by the influx of Han Chinese, through the convenience of this railway.
人生是黑白的.
11:59 PM <3
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