Pictures of the Day: Miu Fat Buddhist Monastery

Miu Fat Buddhist Temple in Tuen Mun

Today my cousin and I took the West Rail to Tuen Mun to visit some relatives for dim sum.

The animal zodiac painted on the ceiling

When we were almost there, the train passed by this giant Buddhist temple with golden dragons encircled around giant columns. Next to it was a strange modern building that jutted out like a box with its flaps open.

It turns out my maternal grandparents and great grandparents have tablets enshrined in the temple and after lunch we headed there on a short taxi ride over.

The temple was built in 1950 and it is an artistic extravaganza inside. Many of the walls and even ceilings are painted with Buddhist imagery. On the first floor there's a relief of the animal zodiac on the ceiling, and then on the second floor is a very elaborate display of three large gold plated Buddha Sakyamuni who sit behind a glass case and the high-ceiling room features chandeliers, and floral and fruity offerings.

Three Buddha Sakyamuni sitting in the main hall

Behind them are rows of tablets where my ancestors are and we paid them a late Qing Ming visit.

The place is quiet and peaceful -- not to mention grand -- and it's no wonder my grandfather chose this spot to have him and his parents here.

We headed down and crossed over a walkway to the modern building next door that is the new part of the temple. It was officially opened in March 2010.

Here the architecture is nothing much to marvel over, but at the top you can have a panoramic view of Tuen Mun. People can also come here to have vegetarian food which we'll have to try next time.

Two of the many lotus flowers now in bloom

Nevertheless we were appreciative of the garden that is meticulously looked after, featuring Japanese carp, very old olive trees with twisted trunks, lotus flowers and even Buddha's hand bergamot, where the fruits look like fingers. They were quite fragrant too. No wonder there are so many butterflies hanging around this place.

Buddha's hand bergamot growing in the garden

Miu Fat Buddhist Monastery
18 Castle Peak Road
Lam Tei
Tuen Mun
New Territories

Compassion Disappearing from HK

Tam Kin-wai in his old home; he lives in public housing

There was a story in the local paper today interviewing a man who lived in a communal space.

Tam Kin-wai, 76, has fond memories of communal living for 50 years and his story also reflects the rapid changes in society.

When he rented a space in To Kwa Wan in the 1960s he lived there for nearly 20 years.

"There was a time when for two full years, I couldn't pay rent, because I was out of a job," Tam recalled. "Instead of kicking me out, my landlord invited me to dinner with his family."

He explained the landlord was a tailor and leased the flat from the owner and occupied the largest room with his family, while subletting the rest of the space to people like Tam.

After he lost his factory job and was unable to find another one, Tam struggled for money. But the landlord never pressured him; instead his wife kept giving Tam food to eat.

"He was prepared to pay my share for me because he didn't want to see me on the streets," Tam said. "He could have easily found another tenant, but he kept me. I felt so guilty that when they asked me to dine with them, I'd refuse and say I'd eaten, even though I was starving. I felt bad for taking their food while I couldn't even pay rent."

However, Tam eventually found a job and he tracked down the landlord -- who had moved away -- and presented him his two full years of rent.

"Places are made by people," Tam said. "And it is people who change those places."

During that time, he explained people shared their food, help each other financially and become friends. "There was always room for another pair of chopsticks," he said, adding people were poor and so they did whatever they could to find work but also shared whatever they had.

It was also then that Tam remembers being able to leave his door wide open and his cupboards were unlocked when he went out because he knew no one would steal from him.

However, he noticed things started to change in the 1990s. "People became more complicated, and landlords were not as they were before," Tam said.

One theory is that because landlords moved out of the flats and refitted the rooms to accommodate more people, they were more focused on profits than tenants. This resulted in communal spaces and kitchens disappearing and places became more crowded and dirty, resulting in problems with fleas.

"There's less trust between the landlords and tenants. I don't blame [the landlords], as more people try to cheat them out of paying the rent," he said. "It's just a different world. Harder and meaner."

How did Hong Kong become this way?

I thought after SARS people were more friendly and more caring about the city. It's almost 10 years since those frightening times and people have already forgotten they live in this community together?

This evening I finished working out at the gym and didn't get to near my neighbourhood until 8:45pm. I walked into a cha chaan teng (HK diner) I'd been in before and the waiter seemed to look at me like he recognized me but then brusquely stated the place was closed even though there were customers in there.

Did he have to be so rude about it? He could have said, "Sorry we're closed at 9pm", but made no effort to be polite.

I won't be going there anymore.

With Hong Kong's economy slowing down, he doesn't realize he's lost a potential customer for the long term?

But of course not -- it's not his restaurant. And with seven million people in the city, he's bound to have other customers.

Should we just shrug our shoulders and forget about it?

Or should we stop and wonder how we became this way?

This is not a problem the chief executive should solve; it's really up to each of us to make an effort.

Pricey Porcelain

The Ru Washer sold at record price at a Sotheby's auction

A small, simple but elegant-looking bowl from the 12th century was sold at the Sotheby's auction yesterday for a whopping HK$207.86 million ($26.65 million), over three times its estimate.

It's called Ru Guanyao or government ceramics kiln and it was a brush washer, and the shallow bowl was used exclusively by emperors to wash their calligraphy brushes. Dating from the Northern Song dynasty, it is just one of five in private hands, and only 79 are known to exist, as the Ru kilns were only in production for 20 to 30 years, producing the most refined ceramics at the time.

The fight for the 900-year-old bowl lasted 15 minutes with eight bidders; an anonymous phone bidder won the round and set a record for Song dynasty ceramics.

"The bids mostly came from Asia. I understand that the buyer was ready to pay a lot more," said Nicholas Chow, deputy chairman of Sotheby's Asia.

Really?

In this economy?

Paying almost HK$208 million, including "administrative expenses" to Sotheby's is mind boggling to most of us. It's the equivalent of say two luxury flats in prestigious neighbourhoods in Hong Kong.

While it is understandable these items are rare and in very good condition, does it really warrant three times its estimate?

However the real test comes when the buyer actually pays up.

There have been cases where successful bidders at auctions do not pay in full and the auction houses must chase them up with legal letters.

Some have trouble paying up because a group of people bid together and not everyone has their share of money ready; others seem to "forget" to pay up.

Sotheby's and Christie's have smartened up and in the last few years have demanded unfamiliar bidders to put down a certain amount of deposit to show they have the means to shell out.

But HK$208 million?

Either Hong Kong or China's economy is still going strong or some bidders are out to make a joke out of this record price.

We shall see.

Wen Pushes for Banking Revamp

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao is still on his reform rant, after effectively sacking Chongqing party chief Bo Xilai in front of a live audience and said the country needed to move away from its dark Cultural Revolution days and continue with political reforms.

He doesn't mean universal suffrage, but more democracy within the ruling party.

But I digress.

Yesterday Wen said it was time to break the cartel China's four main banks have enjoyed for years.

"Our banks are profiting too easily. Why? That's because only a few big banks command monopoly positions -- [business] can only get financing from them and [it is] hardly [possible] elsewhere," Wen told private entrepreneurs during a three-day trip to Fujian and Guangxi.

His solution is to have more private capital enter the banking and financial system to break up what is basically a cartel.

However the government have created the situation the four state-owned banks are in now -- Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China and China Construction Bank.

These four make up 40 percent of China's total loans and last year they made net profits of $99 billion, more than double their US equivalents of Citibank, JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Wells Fargo.

The rest of the loans are made by smaller banks or underground ones that charge exorbitant interest rates, making it inevitable for lenders to default, and as a result skip town or worse, commit suicide, as in the case of some businessmen Wenzhou about half a year ago.

State-owned banks prefer lending to state-owned enterprises, knowing they will get their money back, and less interested in loaning to small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that desperately need the capital to expand their businesses.

As a result, Wen wants to make credit more accessible to smaller businesses because they are the ones creating employment and stimulating local economies.

However, his words were not conveyed by all state media. Neither Xinhua nor People's Daily carried Wen's remarks, which indicate his ideas were not endorsed by the government.

We shall see if the leadership is interested in entertaining Wen's suggestions and if so, how long it will take to implement them.

And while Wen's at it, why not break up the mobile phone monopoly as well? For 1.3 billion people there are only three providers in the market?

So much work to do, so little time...