...

So I got these for my birthday...

Do you recognise them? These are the power-up mushrooms of the Mario universe!

Yes... Super Mario Brothers! (cue retro music)

The red one is a Super Mushroom, which emerges from the flashing blocks marked "?" when they are bumped, and if a player touches it, regular Mario doubles in size!

The green one is the famous "1-up Mushroom" which gets the player one extra life aka a "1-up" in video-gaming language.

More mushrooms...

In case you were wondering what they did, the two mushrooms sitting on them yellow boxes marked "?" in the first picture are actually...

(drumroll)

SUPER MARIO BROS SOLAR MUSHROOMS!

What do they do? How do they work?



I wanted the stuffed mushroom sometime ago when I saw it on sale in a tiny shop in a random building in Causeway Bay.. But I wasn't sure if it was a genuine product so I decided to look it up on the internet first. Somehow I forgot, but I was given these anyway ^_^

On Saturday, we visited a couple of church friends who live in Discovery Bay (DB) on Lantau Island (same island where the HK International Airport is located). After a week of rain and thunderstorms, we were pleasantly surprised at the sunny, albeit humid, weather that greeted us that morning. We caught the ferry from Pier 3 at the Central Ferry Terminal, which was a relatively bump-free 40-minute ride. Betty our DB resident took us on a walking tour of DB, which proved to be quite taxing in the heat and also the hilly relief of the township wore us out much sooner than expected. After the walk we visited her apartment for some ice-cream and cold drinks before having lunch at another church member's place which was right next door. It was fun and there was too much good food! There must have been at least 15-20 people attending and we were all squeezed in her cosy living room where, remarkably, all of us got a seat!

DB is quite a surreal place, it is full of expatriates and it doesn't feel like Hong Kong at all. In fact it reminded me of Singapore, of all places! There is a man-made beach, where a strip of beach-front houses reminded me of chalets at Pasir Ris. Private motor vehicles are not allowed in DB, so private residents usually travel on the numerous bus routes that link the various housing estates to the plaza area near the pier. You are allowed to buy and drive a golf cart though - no wonder the place resembled a golf resort ;)

Later in the evening CN cooked us dinner. It was a real treat: he bought some wagyu steak which we panfried (after researching the internet thoroughly on the best way to cook wagyu in order that the flavour is preserved) medium-rare. It was a piece of velvety perfection. It went very well with the laughing magpie!

Time really flies, I had my bridal shower at this time last year! :-o