Alexander Chiu Tech, Food, and Everything In Between

Sophie’s Birthday Dinner

Sophie's Birthday Wednesday January 27th:

It's nearing the end of the 3rd week that Sammy and I are in Hong Kong. Last night, Wednesday the 27th, was one of my best friends from college's birthday. For those of you that don't know her yet, her name is Sophie. She's a crazy, fun-loving, party-hearty heck of a gal. Photo evidence is provided above ^_^. We had dinner at Frites which was a belgian moules frites place. I had a delicious deep fried Camembert to share with Sammy and also a steak tartare which was quite yummy. Sammy had half a kilo of mussels with tomatoes and cream which were also quite yummy. Surprising to me was my bucket O' beer which was a Hoegaarden and Sammy had a Leffe. Sophie ordered a giant roasted pork knuckle which looked amazing. We met so many new people at dinner which was very enjoyable. The evening was a blast as you can clearly see from the pictures. Happy Birthday Sophie!!!

The day was spent getting lunch at IFC's Cuisine Cuisine and also an attempt at finally opening my Hang Seng account.  Even for HKID card holders, you need a secondary ID that verifies you are in Hong Kong as well as a proof of residence.  Unfortunately, I brought neither and I now have to go back Friday morning to open the account.  Not bad but not good either in terms of quickly accessing money.  This does however protect the government from money launderers and other such elements from doing business in Hong Kong.  Lunch was dim sum style today and comprised of crunchy dough in rice flour roll, shrimp dumplings, vegetables dumplings, char siu (BBQ pork), suckling pig, deep fried eel rolls, deep fried frog legs, and a delicious dried fish fried rice.   Everything was delicious and again, I affirm that Hong Kong has some of the best food in the world.

Nighttime was spent teaching beginner and advanced lindy hop at DanzStage Tin Hau.  While we had a few new students, it was great to teach some real connection in beginner classes.  I think that it's very important for newer dancers to get a feel for the dance rather than learn moves.  Advanced lindy hop class was concentrated on the 2nd 4 8s of the california routine which focused on more connection and the beginnings of aerials and floorials.  I think the toughest part of teaching the advanced group is displaying my experience and footwork as something necessary to technical dancing instead of me just being picky.  I think about each step before I teach it and at times it seems like the advanced students are saying "I already know that move".  For me, when I went through similar training, I was already at the biggest plateau of my dancing life.  It was more frustrating for me to dance the way I normally danced rather than try new moves and techniques.  In a way, it's what shaped me into the dancer and that I am today: a little more humble and a lot more technical.  In the advanced lindy hop class, I try to open up everyone to what I saw as the most important tricks and parts of dancing.  I want people to really feel each other when they dance and communicate with their bodies on a new level that they haven't experienced before.  I'm glad that I get the opportunity to open up minds and show them what I figured out over my many years of dancing and training.  So the 2 people I need to really thank for this opportunity are Samantha Simmons, my partner in life, and Karen Tong, head of HKSwings and the provider of this awesome opportunity.  Of course, it takes people to make things happen in life so I am very thankful for all the students that enjoy learning from me.  I can't do these things alone so I'm really glad that there are people that want to connect with me on this level.