31 May 2007

Yumla!



Yesterday we met with Tereza after work at her favorit bar called "Yumla". The outside wall of this bar is painted every two or three month by a diffrent artist - something you hardly find here in Hong Kong. We really had a relaxed time after a hard day of work!

29 May 2007

25th floor!


28 May 2007

Our first day at Tommy Li Design Workshop




Yesterday we started the first job at Tommy Li Design Workshop.
On our way to work we realized that the so called »Escalator« - a moving staircase starting in Central and going up to Mid-levels ( 800 m) is changing its direction in the morning: from 6 to 10 o clock am it goes downwards - after that upwards until 12 pm.
We had our next little adventure when we took the »Minibus« - a small bus that does not really have busstops. You just tell the driver, where you want to get on or off. Luckylie we found some very friendly chinese who told the driver in Kantonese where to stop (it does not help to show them your adress in English). In the end the whole bus knew where we had to go and were discussing were which streetcorner would be the best to drop us off.
We have to say, most of the people here are really really friendly and intend to help us even though some of them hardly speak any English.
Unfortunately we cannot tell on what project we are working on at Tommy Li, just so far, that we are really enjoying our job and to be able to work at his studio!
Our first lunch we took together at a really typical kantonese »Dim Sum« restaurant was delecious and a completly new experience for us: before any of the food was ordered the woman, who lead us to the restaurant started washing al the dishes, chopsticks and cups with boiling water, which they serve you in a pot, mainly for this purpose. Because of the huge size of the restaurant all food is carried on trollies by the waitresses through the restaurant, shouting out, what kind of dim sum they have to offer. You just stop the ones you are intrested in and they put a stamp on your receipt. In the end you pay the amount of money according to the stamps you collected.
So in total we really had an exciting and great first day at work!

moving to Central


Sunday we moved right into the center of Hong Kong! After one and half week of a quiet life in the outskirts of Hong Kong, Tereza from Carbon invited us to stay in her place in »Central« We are really really happy here and had our first chinese beer (Tsingtao) in an open air bar together with Tereza and Jay from »Salon de pigeon«. And the best of all: it took us about 5 minutes to walk home (instead of two hours metro, train and bus ride before!)
We really want to thank Tereza for offering us the possibilty to stay here!!!

25 May 2007

Collecting vegetarian robots




although I have to admit the meat- and fish-bots look more atractive...

Bun Festival






On thursday was public holiday here in Hong Kong and we met Joe Choi, a graphic designer from Hong Kong and his girlfriend, who took us to an island called "Cheung Chau" to visit the yearly celebrated "Bun Festival". That day around 25 000 people visited this small island to see the traditional parade and the bun towers. (you won't believe it, but buns taste quite similar to "Germknödel"!)
After almost one week of rain finally the sun appeared behind the clouds and it became incredibly hot. First sunburn of the journey for the both of us! So we decided we prefer a clouded Hong Kong instead of a sunny one.
We want to thank Joe Choi and his girlfriend for the great day and are really looking forward to meeting them again !

23 May 2007

Supermarket collection






Twocollect meets Tommy Li Design Workshop



Javin took us to Tommy Li Design Workshop, who welcomed us heartily even though it was already 9.00 pm. We had a really great time exchanging interesting and funny stories about chinese and german design experiences. We enjoyed it a lot and if you want to know more about Tommy Li and his team, check out their webpage www.tommylidesign.com

...



...so reist Buddha

Twocollect meets Javin Mo from Milkxhake



We would like to thank Javin for the great afternoon we spent together. After a traditional chinese noodle soup we had a very exciting walkthrough all the hidden design bookstores in Causeway Bay. Without his knowledge we would never have found these shops behind the secret small doors on floors high above the teeming crowd.
Please visit his website www.milkxhake.org where you will also find his most recent work "Design. No Junkfood", which is presented in several bookstores in Hong Kong right now.

Twocollect meets IdN

In the morning, after another walk through pouring rain, we visited the IdN studio. IdN stands for "International designers Network" and besides representing creatives all around the world in their fabulos magazine, Laurence Ng and Victoria Ip told us about all the other activities like conferences and exhibitions, they are organizing at the same time.
Right when we arrived they received the report about the succesfull show at the Typo in Berlin last weekend.
Since it's IdN's 15th birthday this year, they a running a design competition - if anyone is interested in participating please visit: www.idnproshop.com

21 May 2007

still collecting...

20 May 2007

19 May 2007

New Territories

Fabian and his family welcomed us very heartily here in Hong Kong. Right now we are living in a district close to Hong Kong, called New Territories - very appropriate for the first stop of our journey.
Our first morning we spent cheering for Cecilia (9 month old daughter of Fabian) at the babies swimming class - we begrudged her a lot for being in the water: 31°C and about 90% humidity in an indoor swimming pool...
After that we had lunch in a Chinese restaurant, which was situated in one of the big shopping malls of Hong Kong - only to give you an inkling of its size: the police patrolled the basement garage with bicycles.
During our visit to the supermarket we had to contain ourselves of not spending all the money on chewing gums, noodle soups, dried octopus... because of their amazing packaging!

Hong Kong

Hong Kong we´re coming - almost there...
We nearly had a first class flight, because only a few people took the same plane. So we could spread ourselves over two rows, each with three televisions and 50 videos on demand (sensory overload) and had our personal stewardess. Thank you British Airways!

Berlin

Goodbye to our families and friends in Germany!

14 May 2007


Only 3 days to go! All the equipment is packed and we're already wearing our traveling-suits...
All the best from Antonia & Julia

8 May 2007

new!!!!

Test, test. This is our first post on our brand new blog! 9 days to go until take off !!!