Along the Seine

Pont Neuf - The Seine - Paris Oct 2019

Imagine, you can walk along The Seine, every morning, in the afternoon or at night, what do you think? To me? dream...dream...dream...I wish I could!

Once you've been there, trust me, you'll never forget the aroma of the breeze, humidity of the air, warmth of the sun, tranquility of the surrounding, so relax...

But on the same sunny day, while you are enjoying the fascinated twilight moment, a sudden shower arrive without alarm, together with crazy wind in the dark, sometimes cold and sharp. 

Watching people screaming with laughter to look for a shelter like myself, it's funny and still, lovely! Yes, this is a wonderful experience to live nearby, I did experience "Four seasons" in the same day, unforgettable and truly amazing.

My hotel was located on the Right Bank, if you love a more quiet place, you can choose those on the Left Bank, or even The Island in the middle; no matter where you are, simply Enjoy !

Why this for Book One?

Hi, hi,

A forever love feature in Paris, it may be familiar with many of you, right? 

Art Nouveau, one of my favorite style, beautiful ornate details, feminine, soft & stylish. You can find this everywhere in Paris, just locate at every metro entrance, this is the one at Pont Neuf near The Louvre. Besides this, any where at shops, apartments, signage,
posters, architecture...,etc.

I especially love the arrangement of this station...instantly at my first sight. I saw this quite a number of times in design book or traveler's guide before, but when I were actually there, right in front, the joy is speechless...

When I touched the metal balustrade, feeling the crafted details of the flower stem, how they were extended to the railing, embedded & "melt" into the base; how it hold tight to "Metropolitain", the "blood red" flower bud not yet light up and will then transform into "Moulin Rouge red" at night; four illuminate round "dots" lead you to the aged underground world... I think I should stop here :P

So when I returned to Hong Kong, decided to begin my Book One, it was used as my reference to draw the book cover. 
I hope you like it ,too.

Bird talk - First day in Paris

It’s almost 0600 when arrived Charles de Gaulle Airport, I must confessed that I am forgetful as well as a direction blind; after 13h in the air and finally landing, I needed an extra hour to find the way out from the airport to join my hotel driver... sorry to keep you waiting, Cary!

Although it’s only in mid October, the air was chilly; when we drove off from the highway into the street...so quiet in the dark, everyone was in their sweet dreams right now (it was not totally true when I was discovered something later ).

Sparkling of traffic lamps, red & green, here & there; decorated by scattered yellowish spots from shops or cars...”Midnight in Paris “ was the film in my head. Wherever our car stopped, I kept staring to the far end of alley or the street corner, wondering if that mysterious car or person of 1920s would appeared in front of me......I love this city instantly, in my twilight zone!

Cary was so nice that she drove me through Cour carrée of The Louvre  for a quick glance before arriving hotel...I’d loved to treat it as my first gift received in Paris, merci.

Truly speaking, I did or at least should feel tired, and the checked in time was 1400, as scheduled, I had to stay outside for 5 hours, but...I did received my second gift, early checked in at 1100, hurray!

How about the third gift? I shared with you already Pont Neuf...fresh air ,breeze from the Seine; warmth by the beautiful sun & rich aroma of my double espresso, be my guest :)

I chose Pont Neuf (1e : Les Halles) to stay because of it’s walk-able distance to most of my favorite spots, to collect my museum pass from the Office de Tourisme de Paris, I’ve already in the next arrondissement 4e : Le Marais. Metro, bus or cycling could bring you anywhere, but I preferred walking, because Paris is one of the most beautiful & delicate city that worth to take my time to explore in detail.

Walking along the Seine was always amazing , seeing family & friends gathered for a Sunday picnic, someone relaxing in the moment of his/ her own; photographers, professional or amateur? who cares......tourist, of course, like me slowing down our momentum to receive the sun bath, absolutely free!

Dark fell quickly after twilight, to Parisian, it’s just the beginning of another happy hour. But I needed a rest ......now in my cosy room with my late night coffee at 2310, jazz music flowing in the air......

Petit Paris - Pont Neuf

click to enlarge

Hi hi, 

It's been a while after our last chat, right? Cos' I am quite busy these days, to do what? To draw and write this, and finally released on Google Book this week...so...so...excited :D

Although it is only a short picture book that I've started with for this series, I did work onto it seriously, hopefully you can feel it, too!

Our publisher name is Oiseau Distrait (updated on Aug 20240,

you can find me from here also Oiseau Distrait

As a Welcome gift, a discount is offer right now until mid of March, Enjoy!

I am still working on to distribute in other platform such as Apple Book, and will be announced once it is ready.

If you would like to see the "story" of producing the watercolor painting inside, there will be another post in Cocoa Design Life Instagram a bit later, be our guest and hope to see you there :)

To write short, I better tell you "behind the scene" of this book in next post, good day!

P.S.- read book in landscape view to display double pages 

Magic moment at Tsukiji Market

It must be over 20 years of more, this photo was taken at the Tsukiji Market, our second visit to Japan; as far as I've remember, I was still using my Minolta SLR camera and this was scanned from my washed out photograph. 

When we arrived at around 7:00 am that morning, every workers had already finished their distribution work except some small shop like this one. We walked slowly and acted as quiet as possible to avoid disturbance, actually I was a bit disappointed while thought of nothing great would happened due to our late arrival, so I just looked around and wondering what were these guys still busy on?

Suddenly,  a beam of sun ray fell onto them in front of me, it was so beautiful...I just shoot without hesitation. 

Every time when I look at it, all my memories return...the huge high ceiling market, dark and wet, faint light bulbs in yellowish grey swinging above stalls, large or small; aroma of sea water mix with freshly scent of seafood, trucks here and there, noisy but energetic, so busy...and suddenly all gone......

It is still one of my favorite photo that I've ever took. I hope you like it, too.



 

窗外

回想年前當我決定放下室內設計師的工作, 轉換成部份時間教書及全職寫作的時候, 其中ー個原因是享受在家工作, 那時並沒有想過有一天, "外出返工"會變成並非必然的事. 返送中運動再加疫情, 不單打擊我們的心靈和健康, 連帶維持生活也變得格外困難. 每天當我坐在窗邊工作之時, 總會偶爾望望街外的巿民,今天...大家又要為着什麽躊謀?

輪椅上的伯伯打開回收箱搜索他人棄置的鐵罐...找到兩個......
沒帶口罩的一家, 爸爸和兩個孩子等待橫過馬路, 小孩子的笑臉沒有絲毫不安, 父親呢?
拉低口罩吸啜着一口一口香煙的他/她, 在陽光下看似一齊如常.
兩手拿滿生活戰利品的太太, 為什麼在僅見的眉稍眼角之間, 仍然流露著哀愁?
和朋友談得興奮的大漢, 一臉天不怕地不怕的"豪氣"繼續遊走在人群之間;
口罩少年相聚的笑聲夾雜著嬸嬸們交流物資情報的憤怒聲, 你一句我一句地反複迴蘯......

這邊廂陰謀論不停, 怨聲載道, 投訴安排不善, 決策不當; 那邊廂堅拒成為檢疫隔離中心, 原因種種; 囤積、搶購、罷工...同樣, 各有因由. 今天我們在同一個天空下, 是什麼令人類忘記了這一切管理地球的失行, 不都是我們一同有意無意地製造出來的呢?!

群組上仍然散佈的種種訊息, 反映着惶恐、不安、自私、無奈、憤慨和怨恨......但慢慢地開始被愛包裹, 縱然很有限! 但願, 我們能回轉, 

明白金錢權力買不到一刻鐘的生命; 
明白唯有愛能讓人團結, 重新出發;
明白我們的狂傲和自大只帶來無知, 因為
只有神掌管明天!

趁還有時間, 但願我們能回轉!

Cocoa Studio Update

I have to write this post for three reasons:  

First of all, I must say thank you  to a blogger Ms. Emma, without her tutorial in liliflorapretty.blogspot.com 
I am still wasting time to find out a workable solution of building a photo gallery here.

Well, you may say why not using the "converting apps" from the market? After spending two whole days to test those apps and discovered, either they are not working smoothly inside Blogger, or with additional tons of codes that we really don't need, but the only reason to insert them is for their promotion banner. 

In fact, Emma share the simplest code and effective way to complete this job, the result is nice and sustainable without third parties control. Thanks again!

Secondly is the discontinue of Your Shot of National Geographic, a platform that we used to share our photos and learn from others. It's sad because it was a really good platform gathering professional & amateur photographers. So many good quality and amazing photos there to enjoy, comment from the supporting team are valuable; we were always longing for the "Photo of the Month". Although you can still find them in Instagram, most of us miss the Good old days.

Finally, as an amateur, to share what we captured in our own blog is the perfect place that we always wanted, but time...time...time...and now, this moment in Hong Kong, we are "trapped" at home, what a perfect time :P and so we did it.

If you do have a minute, why not visit our updated Cocoa Studio page, hope you'll like it.