Taking snow pictures is my annual routine and fortunately I've been able to discover different photography spots every year. City in the park in Edmonds has been my new favourite recently. It's definitely a gem in this neighbourhood because it's so quiet and nicely decorated. I dare say every corner of it is worth a picture and it will make your picture look pretty effortlessly.
I should let my pictures do the talking to justify my statement.
Feels like I just stepped into a small palace.
I also took some pictures around Joyce. It gave me a different feeling here, as if I just stepped into a forbidden forest.
I can tell my photography style is evolving as year goes by. I've encountered snow for several times now, but nothing beats my affection towards one of the very first snow pictures I took when I first came here. It has a calming effect on me.
I didn't have a professional camera at that time, nothing but a regular 8 megapixel digital camera but it walked me through every season of the year and embraced the special moments with me. I was just a girl who loved to look through the lens and took as many pictures as possible to share with my family who was a few thousand miles away from me.
My photography skill is still no where near professional but I enjoy this hobby a lot. I guess that just tells me about how passion can keep non-living things look alive, how simple tools can make some magic to my life. :) I have to thank this beautiful city as well, for allowing me to capture its beauty and stay sensational and grateful towards the smallest thing in the world.
Since I uploaded my baby cola collection album onto Facebook, I received different responses from my friends. Some funny ones would be:
“Wow, your room must be like a recycling factory! I suggest you frame your cans so that they look more artistic.”
“What would you do if someone threw all your cans away?”
Hmm, these are good questions which may take time to figure out the answer.To me, the latter question is similar to asking you on your response if I took away your bolster which has been accompanying you for years. You get the idea now?
Over the years, my project has become a joint-collaboration among my friends because they are being so supportive of my hobby. Just recently, I received 2 very special cans from my friend.
Let me open up my happiness to you.
Firstly, Michael got me this 2008 Beijing Olympic Cola Box Set when he went back to China for CNY.
Eu even said it looked like 皇帝诏旨because there’s a layer of yellow cloth embracing the can.
Like this:
Seriously, empty cola can in a box @.@ !! I’ve never ever had a box for my cola can and that’s what makes this commemorative gold can special.
On the same day, I saw this:
This is the cola can which is released in conjunction with the celebration of Canadian Men’s Ice Hockey’s Gold Medal in Vancouver Winter Olympics 2010.Instead of joining the craze and running nakedly in Downtown, I chose a much more peaceful way to celebrate their victory- Drink coke at home.
It has been almost 1.5 years I haven’t carried a dozen of cola cans home. The last time I did that was also because of the Vancouver Winter Olympic 2010 can.Mom was beside me at that time and she encouraged me to bring it home.
“Just buy it and then finish it slowly.”
How sweet my mom was!! She never objects my hobby although it’s not that healthy. Also, I know my dad doesn’t like us drinking carbonated drinks, so I promised myself to halve my Coke consumption in appreciation of their support.
Nowadays, I usually drink Coke for the can.
However, nothing beats this:
It’s one of the limited edition bottles which was distributed during Winter Olympics at Yaletown (The place which I regretted the most for not going when Eu asked me.) Like how it’s shown on the video, it’s a glow bottle and it changes to 4 different colours when you switch on the button at the bottom of the bottle, and there were only 12000 bottles available for this design.
The awesomeness is really beyond description, it's like a light appears and shines on you when you're super gloomy and can't sleep at night.Yesterday when I was walking back to my dorm, I saw something hanging on the door handle. I opened up the small card and my name was written on it. When I went inside my room,I looked up the gift bag and I saw the Coke Glow Bottle.
Awesomeness to the maximum!
Thank you Michael, I will definitely add your name to the supporter list of my project.
Tada! So here's my collection in Vancouver 2009/2010 so far.
Surprisingly, I only bought 1 can out of the 6 cans there. Sincerely thank everyone for the hard work in helping out my ongoing project, making my series of coke collection a wonderful and enjoyable one. I’m glad that my hobby has made a difference in some of my friend’s life, because they will now think of me whenever they see coke. To me, that’s a sweet way to remember a friend.
I’m not a person with inborn singing talent as my singing skills are considered average, I don’t find a specialty in my voice. I barely have confidence in myself regardless of the compliments I've received.
Last time, I used to think that having a good vocal meant a person’s ability to deliver a song completely, but time has proven me wrong because singing meant much more than that to me nowadays.For now,I'll spend more time thinking how to perfect the high pitch to make it sound richer, meanwhile catching the appropriate time to pause in between verses, or even learning the correct way to breathe when I sing. Those are the blanks I need to fill in.
I’ve been searching for my voice for the past few years, tried out different singing methods to establish a stronger vocal and singing style which suits me the best. I like to sing, but it doesn’t mean that I have to perform on stage all the time. Becoming a celebrity is not my dream, what I’m looking for is enhancing my skills when I know I can do better than this. It’s more about gaining personal confidence to me, it’s more about singing my heart out for my buddies.
Some people asked me to join singing competition, just like how they encouraged me to join beauty pageant contests, but I’m still not convinced even until now. I sure know my strength well enough to understand the fact that I’m not up to that level, so don’t dream so big. Thus, just leave the task for someone else who’s better.
I’m still a tiny dot on a piece of white paper, there’s so much more for me to embrace and conquer.
I realized that I haven't really blogged about Coca-cola although I’ve been keeping up with this habit of collecting cola cans for 8 years.
I started collecting cola cans when I was 13 years old. One day, when I was in a supermarket in Shanghai, I saw a coca-cola can with chinese writing on it “可口可乐”. I thought it was an interesting thing to collect cola cans from all over the world since they consist of different languages, sizes, designs, and also some limited editions cans when a special occasion is around. That marked off the start of my habit with coca-cola cans.
When people go for travelling, they’ll usually make up a list of must-do-things in a foreign country. A little different from theirs, one of my must-do and must-buy things in a new place would be coca-cola can, therefore drug marts or supermarkets will usually be one of my targets.
Why do I love coca-cola so much? Why not pepsi since you like blue colour?
That’s a good question. I guess it’s the mouthfeel of cola because I’ve been drinking coke all the while.It’s more gassy, less sweet and tastes better. So if I were given a chance to collect something between these two brands, I would definitely go for my personal favourite.
To me, coke somehow resembles world union because it does not discriminate, it is universal and majority of the people from all walks of life love it. Everyone will be able to get a can of coke with less than 2 dollars. Coke speaks different languages too, although the taste may be different for different countries,but when I see the red can, I know my love is somewhere near. Having said that, I’m not really crazy over coke and I don’t drink it every day. Over the years, my main reason of drinking it is to collect the can, besides the sudden crave occasionally.
I took some pictures before I left home last year, when I was packing for my new home.I roughly calculated my cola cans and they were approximately 110 cans.
