茅盾 (Game Plan)

有时候，深深觉得自己是个矛盾的父亲。即想孩子们能发奋读书名列前茅，又不想太剥夺他们身为孩童所爱做的事。

看着女儿每天一堆学校功课，加上拜一直拜五的课外补习，可算相当忙碌，到了周末也就不强制禁止她上网或玩游戏。不过女儿的学业成绩却停留在中等阶段，父母亲期望她能更加进步。

儿子虽然只有五岁，却精通各种电脑与手提游戏机，虽然每天都有准时做完功课，学业成绩却也只算是中等。

美国华裔虎妈蔡美儿的新闻让我觉得身为孩子的父亲，也许因为自己不够严厉，以致孩子们的学业中庸。

寻找万全的育儿方针，是做父母的最大考验。。。

Sometimes, I feel that as a parent, I have not been stringent and demanding enough to the children in terms of their academic result.

Seeing the amount of schoolwork they need to do daily and the additional tuition classes after school, I do not impose additional restrictions (such as watching television & playing games) and do not stress them to be exceptional academically. Incidentally, both the children only have mediocre result so far.

Contrary to the parenting style of the controversial American Chinese, Amy Chua, I am more inclined to allowing the kids to have a more balance childhood life, but I am doubtful whether this is contributing to their academic result being mediocre.

Too much game may not be a good game plan. I will need to figure out properly….

Photographing Birds

I like to take photos of birds, however, it is extremely difficult to get close to the birds in the wild without scaring them away.

In the absence of super long telephoto lens, I resorted to visiting Jurong Bird Park where all the birds were waiting for me and surprisingly I could get in very close to them to take proper photographs.

I ended up taking many photographs of birds including a few that capture the moment of interaction between the birds. I pick a few for sharing here. The rest of the photos are here.

The first photo shows as if the bird was getting to know each other, the second photo captured the joy of the birds playing with each other, whereas the last one shows that it was time to part, probably to meet again in the near future.

乡情 (Homesickness)

家乡是个朴素的小镇，几十年来，变化不大。

也许我的性格简单，不会眷念城市的繁华，却对乡下的一草一木，当然还有熟悉的乡音年味，原汁原味的街边小食，以及对同乡人独有的，特别深厚的感觉。

新年期间在家乡拍摄的一些作品，都很简单，却藏着心中的一份乡情。

My hometown is a small town with slow pace of development.

Every time when I visited my little hometown, I was drawn to each small detail so ordinary but yet the sense of belonging was so strong.

The images here were taken during my last trip back to my hometown. They may be simple, but contain my deep feeling inside.

四十不惑生日 (Birthday of A 40 Something)

前几天，孩子们的老爸生日，做姐姐的和弟弟串通买了个他们最喜爱的卡通蛋糕回来庆祝。

A few days ago, it was supposed to be daddy’s birthday. My little girl and little boy conspired to buy home a cartoon themed cake for celebration.

姐姐首先让她的蘑菇小可爱和蛋糕拍了张合照，弟弟也不甘落后，让他的小熊和蛋糕拍张照留念。

The elder sister first posed for a photograph with her beloved mushroom cutie (instead of with her dad), then the younger brother posed for a photograph with his beloved little bear (instead of with his dad).

之后，姐弟俩开开心心的插蜡烛点火唱生日歌，天经地义的让老爸为他们和他们可爱的蘑菇与小熊摄影。这就是四十不惑年龄之后的老爸生日状况，你们快乐所以我快乐。。。

Both the sister and the brother then happily decorated the cake with candles, sang song and let daddy naturally took memorable photos of them with their cuties.

This was how, as a 40 something daddy, celebrated his birthday. As long as the kids are happy, I guess the parents will be happy, too.

Lion and Kids

This Lunar New Year, as usual I drove back to my home town with my spouse and my kids. The journey was a long ones from the southern tip of Penisular Malaysia to almost the extreme north of the country. Furtunately this year the traffic was smooth throughout probably because I went back on Tuesday morning when most of the people must have gone back during the preceding weekend.

I love the feeling of being in the home town with my mother and siblings eventhough the house is normally quite messy during chinese new year due to the large number of relatives and kids who were all around interacting with each other.

My kids also love going back to my home town so much that my daughter shed tears when we were on the way back, not feeling like leaving her "gang" there.

Lion dance is always the kids' favorite and this year was no exception.

I took some photos during my stay there and posted some onto my Flickr account. Surprisingly, one of the photos (posted here above) appeared on the Flickr Explore page on 10-Feb-2011 at position no. 18. However today it slides down to position no. 93, and I realise that the position will change over time subject to some criterion unknown to the public that are set by Flickr.

This is my first photo that appears on Flickr's most interesting photos page and I hope this will motivate me to explore further in the area of photography and throughout the process of continuous learning.

春意

忙碌中农历新年又快到了，在此献上两张穿上红衣裳迎接新春的红菊花跟大家拜个早年。祝各位身体健康，财源广进，万事胜意。

忙碌中闲暇的时间少了，除了工作以外，只能勉强抽空做些运动和摄影，上部落格的时间难免减少许多。

时间是最公平的，不管大人物或小人物，每天只有二十四小时，如何用这二十四小时可就因人而异了。

希望在老了一岁之后，可以更好的应用时间。。。

太鲁阁 (Taroko Gorge)

据说，台湾是400万年前，欧亚大陆板块与菲律宾海洋板块相互撞击，剧烈的地壳变动，使地层急剧上升而形成的岛屿。

来到太鲁阁国家公园，目睹了此地独特的地形与岩石，和人工开拓却不失其自然风貌的道路，步道，桥梁，庙宇等，大开眼界之遗，心境也顿时开朗起来，虽然背着不轻的背包，却一点也不觉得累。

太鲁阁国家公园范围极为广大，因为时间关系，我们只参观了长春飞瀑与砂卡礑步道(Shakadang Trail)一带九牛一毛的风景，不能尽兴而归。

相片中红桥（图一）左边有一座阶梯，往下走就到达砂卡礑步道的入口（ 图二）。在步道中行走，沿途可观赏左边幽美的峡谷河床，及右边和头上的岩石壁（图三）。这里的溪水清澈蔚蓝（图四），令人有下去嬉水的冲动。

长春飞瀑是長春祠与飞流而下的山水所构成的景色（图五），位于青山绿水间的长春祠，是为了纪念修筑中横公路的殉难者而建的。从弥陀岩（图六）前往長春祠的台阶中途，有座观音洞（图七），洞内有观音石佛及横贯公路的施工全图。古色古香的長春祠周围，有亭子石阶与山上流下的泉水（图八）。

As a nature lover, Taroko Gorge National Park is one of the places in Taiwan that I appreciate best. Unfortunately due to time constraint, we only managed to visit very few places of the national park. Below is some brief introduction of the photos taken around the place.

At one end of the red bridge (photo 1), there is a staircase that leads us down to the entrance of the Shakadang trail (photo 2). This trail is built along the river cliff so travelers can easily observe both the rock folds and plant ecosystem beside in the river valley (photo 3). The pool with clear blue water here is so enchanting (photo 4) I feel like going down for a swim.

The Eternal Spring Shrine and the waterfall (photo 5) present a scenic view to visitors. Near to the Amithaba Rock (photo 6), there is a Guanyin Cave (photo 7) built to commemorate the 226 personnel (military veterans) who died during the construction of the Central Cross-Island Highway. At the surrounding of the Eternal Spring Shrine, there are some nicely built shelters, stairs and natural stream of water (photo 8) that flows down from the mountain.