On your past trips, have you been to the same attraction twice?

I did, and I climbed Huangshan again in February this year. Mount Huangshan, known as "the most beautiful mountain in China" for its majestic landscape of granite peaks (many over 1000 meters high) and ancient pines.

 

What is the reason I went twice? Not only the following ones, but also various reasons can explain why I chose Huangshan after the reopening of China's national gate;...

Firstly, it must be recognized that when you visit a scenery spot (or a place) in a season doesn’t mean the scenery spot or the place is undifferentiated in other seasons, the scenery in four seasons may exist big differences as the climate of Huangshan varies on different elevations and the temperature changes. Some netizens said that the scenery is beautiful beyond description from December to March, the snow-capped yellow mountain absolutely is a fairyland, while the spring in Huangshan with all the flowers blossom merrily from April to July. They said the mountains are green and grand from July to September in Summer there, and the autumn, from October to November, with the leaves turning yellow and red makes the mountains of Huangshan city covered with different colors.

 

Secondly, Huangshan is one of the six famous mountains. Not counting Huangshan, they are Tranquil Mountain, Splendid Mountain, Balancing Mountain, Permanent Mountain, and Lofty Mountain……. These scenic spots are worth visiting and going again. Another fascinating reason for me to go to Huangshan again is Lianhuafeng, which is the highest peak in Huangshan, I expected to go once as I lost the chance to visit this peak on my trip in 2018. 

 

Lastly, Huangshan Mountain is famous for its 4 wonders: oddly-shaped pines, bizarre rocks, seas of clouds, and the thermal springs. As its beauty in winter becomes increasingly popular among tourists, the winter snow is becoming renowned as the fifth wonder of Huangshan Mountain, so the reason why netizens propose tourists to go Huangshan in February. Truly, it is difficult to say which season is the best time to visit Huangshan, but can be said that Huangshan including nearby villages is suitable for visiting all year round. The first time I visited Huangshan was in November 2018, it was in autumn, and the second was in late winter from 13 to 17 February 2023. Both trips fascinated me with their grandeur and mountainous landscapes. 

 

 

Photos below taken on 15 February 2023, show the wonders and snow scenery of Huangshan Mountain: 

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Photo 1 (taken on 15 Feb 2023)

The cableway is the best means of transportation to take me up the mountain. This is a photo showing the cabins taken on the cableway, the top of the car is suspended on the haul rope by a gripper. The rope is clamped by the gripper of a J-shaped structure that pulled and moved the cabins up along the ropeway to the top of the mountain. The Huangshan cableway system is a single-rope design, and the stability is not bad, which makes me feel safe. Its design is slightly different from the system of Ngong Ping 360 Limited, the former is a system with only a haul rope, while the latter is equipped with two sets of ropes to the system (a haul rope and a track rope). 

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Photos 2 to 7 (taken on 15 Feb 2023)

Magnificent scenery made up of many granite peaks and rocks emerging out of a sea of clouds, the sea of clouds is another wonder in winter on the Huangshan mountain, the clouds surround the mountains so that you may imagine your body floating in the space above the clouds。

Huangshan, is known as “the loveliest mountain of China” because of its magnificent scenery made up of many granite peaks (many over 1000m high) and the ancient pines. 

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Photos 8 to 15 (taken on 15 February 2023)

The yellow mountain in winter is the snowy heaven on earth. 

China has opened the gate, I hope that Huangshan is a place that you will wanna go, and hope you will go again after you have been there. You must experience and feel these beautiful sceneries in life so that you will not regret them.

Best Regards

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Can fabrics make bare walls in home look more elegant?

When it comes to the ways of decorating bare walls in a new house, what would be the first idea that pops into your head?

I had no idea to pop until I listened to some options for dressing up my walls to a designer who recognized my neighbor in her last engineering work. Options do mean proper methods to help fix problems that we need to take the most appropriate for our own. Two months ago, wall coverings (attach textile fabrics on walls with liquid starch), wallpapers, artworks, and wall retreatment with the best quality paints and moisture-proof primers, were proposed by the decor designer after she visited me.

Firstly, I assume that you would be like me to favor a new house in keeping feelings of comfort, warm, and charm to all visitors when they as your friends call on you, see it, and even live with you for a couple of days in it, but you must do mind, absolutely don’t want to experience messy operation in the dress-up period before it happens, sure to that I know. In addition, there’s no denying as all owner's thoughts are almost the same that they wanna make their walls look expensive, need innovative figures or something new and different on walls rather than the bare walls applied only with a thin plastering and simple top coat, color of paint always is white allowed and finished by building developers. Last, have we ever wondered if such makeovers can be taken down whenever we want no matter if they are wallpapers, wallcoverings, or artificial figures? Truly, from the things detailed above, fabrics (or said to be wall coverings) on walls can be an easy and cost-effective way to give rooms, public spaces, and corridors of your new house an instant makeover. (fabrics do add personality to it!) 

 

The decor designer said we ought not to pay a very high price in peeling all original paints and primers off the walls but pay less money to make retreatment for the walls simply upon conditions. You may not wonder that the cost of such wall refurbishment work, for instance, peeling off original wall paints, repainting primers and top coats, and polishing finishes for surfaces, is extremely high, higher than the remaining three, say attaching wall coverings, or wallpapers on the walls, and sticking artworks. Even though you may have to rent a temporary compartment to live in, move affected furniture out as working zoom away the walls, and prepare protective covers for all affected pieces when the work begins to storm your new house. Within the options, I chose removable textile fabric (wall covering) as this was easily one of the most popular wall decor options and as strong advice from the designer. 

# Before work started, workers made for the walls with simple retreatment, removed the uneven plastering pieces, applied a touch-up top coat, and polished the surfaces of the walls.

  

# Decorating with fabric on walls is quite similar to the process of hanging wallpaper, if you have worked with wallpaper, you’ll have no trouble with this work or you may know what I am here saying. See the worth-talking thing which is left in the picture, removed the cover plate from the wall switch, this is good practice before work begins. 

# It was acceptable for such a messy operation, not too much debris and micro particulars had been seen but wall refurbishment would do.  

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# The technician used liquid starch to attach the fabric to the wall and was hanging the fabric, he was in this process that required him to take patience I saw that. The Left shows that he used a wallpaper smoothing tool (shape rectangular) to flatten the fabric against the wall, while the Right shows that he was cutting the excess fabric at the ceiling line with a sharp utility knife. 

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#The technician had to check residual bubbles by his mobile LED lamp, this process required all light fittings to be turned off, making sure no bubbles were trapped behind the fabric completely. He used a steam machine to heat up the surfaces making the adhesive paste underneath stick securely to the wall.  

WORK REVIEW

WORKING TIME: 26 hrs

TOTAL TIME: 2 days

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Thank God all the wall coverings were done satisfactorily, it was a perfect thing to put fabric on walls for my new house without damaging them over the refurbishment works and repainting. I appreciate so much all God's blessings as not only do they look great when done right, but this decor has added value to my house.

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Before fabrics

 

 

 

  

  

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After fabrics

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in him & best regards

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Not One Less 一個也不能少

Not One Less

記得多年前在電視「星期日影院」這個節目中，看過一部由內地知名導演_張藝謀先生所拍攝的電影作品，是一部講述偏遠山區學校一位小老師和她的學生們的感人故事。

很遺憾的是，當年沒有把這套電影從頭到尾地看透，只是在電腦桌前邊趕急地工作邊聽聽邊望望電視屏幕的播放畫面。說真的，當年的我，在心態上卻是未準備妥當，也未達至一位合格觀眾應有的觀賞深度，是的，電影是要用心看！由第一次聽到這部電影的名字，到之後多年一直令我念念不忘，電影名字是「一個也不能少，Not One Less」，這個由六個字組成的電影名字對我來說確實頗有吸引力，「一個也不能少」這句說話尤似一項命令，也可猜想該意思是一個承諾。

片中故事主要是圍繞一名十三歲女生_魏敏芝而展開，她被任命到中國大陸河北山區一間偏遠學校作代課老師。前任老師臨走前吩咐_魏敏芝不要失去任何一個學生，這些學生「一個也不能少」。可是在數日後，其中一個男生因為家境的問題而輟學，他跑到大城市裏尋找工作掙錢。魏老師知道後，為了要找他回來上課，便向學生們籌集路費買車票，一心想到城市裏找他，可是卻得知該男生在火車站走失了，片中敍述了魏老師千辛萬苦尋人的感人過程，她用袋裏餘下來的幾塊錢買了宣紙和毛筆，寫了一疊又一疊的尋人啟示，一心希望貼在城裏的當眼處讓那小男生可以看到。一位十三歲大的小女孩當上了代課老師，由起初害羞和不稱職的表現至隨後成為一位負責任的老師，尋找小男生的路上是艱辛的，是苦的、是未知的，肚子餓了便索緊褲頭。在香港，若是一名十三歲的女孩子根本不可能像魏老師這麼堅強和單獨走到陌生的地方。最後她在電視台的幫助下順利尋回小男生，並在各界的捐助下，這所偏遠的山區小學也因此得以重生。

在尋找小男生回家的過程中，魏老師（一名只是十三歲的代課老師）經歷了許多困難，累了便倚坐在街上的電燈柱睡覺，口喝時只喝街上的自來水。其中一幕由電視台主播邀請魏老師說說她尋找男生的過程確是非常感人，這一幕也令我有點兒眼淺，原來一位小老師可以如此勇敢，一人從偏遠山區走到陌生的城市去找她的學生回來上課，為的是前任老師對她說的一番話：「你要好好教導他們，我回來的時候，一個學生也不能少！」。拍得很好看，很有味道的一部電影，今晚我完完全全的看完這部電影了!

「一個也不能少」令我想起近日的蘇丹撤僑事件，中國海軍在短時間內於蘇丹內戰地區迅速把國民安全送回中國(包括340名中國國民和百多名友好邦國的人民)。「一個也不能少」也令我記起當年2015年3月29日至4月12日間被稱為「紅海行動」的也門撤僑事件。這句附有承諾的說話和這部由張藝謀導演的作品「一個也不能少」，希望大家喜歡。

4 May 2023

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Breakthrough in Engineering and Renewal Energy

I am always eager to learn more about new technologies and articles on energy-related and engineering professional topics via the sites and the journals of the institutions, IMechE, HKIE, etc. I remember once I came across a project-century video while making a search on Google, the video is quite attractive and encouraging to those who love and are passionate about things in large-scaled engineering, renewal energy, and science.. et cetera.

 

The video talks about a new idea for the installation of wind turbines which is originally on land, but now people can make them float at the sea; the concept of the project was bold-innovative that engineers erected five numbers of wind turbines at the northeast coast of Scotland instead of building them on the land there. With the support of a team of engineers and wind-energy-related experts, this project subverts the traditional design and construction of wind turbines. Before that, someone may say it’s impossible to happen and not reliable even if the hardware installation is successful, but someone will think it can. In September 2017, five floating wind turbines located off the coast of Scotland generating 30 megawatt-hour (6 megawatts each) to the nearby communities and commercial bodies through power cables to connect the offshore wind turbines and the onshore electrical stations where the power is distributed to the bodies in need. 

 

I must say, I was relieved and found myself very excited while the last step of the process of the offshore installation was claimed, the step was the most challenging that the derrick needs to bolt the up-half and bottom-half of the floating wind turbine together, a prototype demonstrating the assembly was made in 2008 before this real fix in Scotland. The performance of the offshore floating wind turbines does work very well and they all are quite reliable in supplying green electricity as renewable energy. The most expensive one of the whole processes was to hoist up the parts and bolt them together by hiring a large-sized derrick dock which equips with two lifting cranes to help operate at the same time while having special needs, the derrick dock is nothing else can replace in this project. The video shows that the derrick dock its two cranes respectively hoisted for the 3-leaf propeller with turbine head and the upright post of the wind turbine on one hand, and it was driven to move slowly against the respective floating base on the other hand if there would have any error resulted from human factors or unsecured hold or a suddenly unintended movement of the dock due to uncertain natural like high winds and waves, then the turbine would have been destroyed with ease. That’s the exactly so-called “breakthrough in engineering” that I love! 

 

The floating base its total length is 90m with immersing 90 percent under the sea level (down 80m from the sea level according to the video), three (3) eye bolts are evenly welded on the outside of the base for connecting the tie-down ropes which are anchored into the seafloor. For the sake of transmitting electricity from the offshore floating wind turbines to the onshore electrical stations is by the power cables connected. By statistically, floating-type wind farms can increase 40 percent more in electricity compared with the traditional land-built wind farms, offshore ones can generate more electricity due to the location where benefits from the intensity of wind directly.  

 

I think a professional engineer shall have all-round ability and talents available for our community to resolve problems. Imagining a special inner-vacuum sealed steel-made bottle having a long-shaped profile and something like an oxygen gas bottle immersing two-thirds ratio of itself in the water that can stabilize its body and be adjusted to a prescribed floating-level by addition of the appropriate amount of ballasts and concrete. If a mechanical-disciplined engineer serves jobs just for the machines and hardware fabrication, then the way to resolve the floating problem of the wind turbine may not happen in the industry of renewable energy, this does not mean that A must rely on B, or B needs A, but mean that a person with more knowledge and talents will be better and more valuable. 

History of the Development:

[1] The above picture shows that 5 offshore floating wind turbines located off the coast of Scotland in 2017 generating electricity of 30 megawatts to the nearby communities. 

[2] On 23 August 2021, an article of the Professional Engineering was published about a Chinese firm that unveiled the world’s biggest wind turbine, this is the tallest offshore wind turbine in the world now being assembled by China’s MingYang Smart Energy, the model of MYSE 16.0-242 is interpreted as a giant-sized wind turbine got 242 metres tall and will generate renewal energy’s power of 16 megawatts, it’s capable of powering 20,000 homes with three 118m blades, that will sweep across an area the size of six football pitches. 

The world is changing!

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