Amy and 3 dragon fountains

Meeting Amy started a special something in my life.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

The test of whether I was a good guy began a few weeks later, without my knowledge whatsoever. For the May holiday week, the 2 of us jumped aboard a southbound train for a mountain retreat in Anhui province. Visiting locations of several gorgeous scenes from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon certainly excited us. Also the ancient villages we stayed in, were added to the UNESCO World Heritage list in late 2000, the same period when the film was released. I have to admit I was more than a little surprised to find the name of the first place we visited, is Lovers’ Valley.

Here, everyone is surrounded by it, drenched in it, soaked in it. Love is everywhere It’s not only written in the gardens but also painted on the rock floor – of course in red, the Chinese colour for love!

But wait, there’s more! Not only chock-a-block full of love, the valley also has gorgeous waterfalls, a sea of bamboo, and a free show of the sky high trapeze trio!

We’d spent such a long time in Lovers’ Valley that the third destination for the day had to be cancelled. Onto the second place we visited, The Phoenix Source. Since the main Chinese symbol of womanhood is the phoenix (whereas the dragon is the male counterpart) this relentless gushing could easily be thought of as an ongoing re-birth origin of water. A day in China inevitably involves that water turning to tea.
Read the rest of this entry »

This years main Australian Photographic Expo is in Melbourne, May 3-6. The show is run by the Photo Marketing association of Australia and the Photographic Imaging Council of Australia.

A feature of every years show is an exhibition of photographs from the Australian Institute of Professional Photographers.

This year however the organisers would like to invite members of the Melbourne Flickr groups to submit images to be used in a special ‘Electronic Gallery’.

In keeping with the sharing nature of Flickr, we have created a wall of LCD frames of various sizes that will feature a constant electronic slide show of images of Melbourne. This Electronic Gallery will feature nothing but images of Melbourne taken by Flickr members.

I won’t be able to make it to this event. If you are in Melbourne though, please check it out and tell me what it’s like.