BBQ With My Thesis Supervisor

1 week prior to my departure to Malaysia, my thesis supervisor invited all of his students and the ’support group’ from the studio for an amazing Australian outback experience, we had BBQ for dinner and an eye-opening tour of his backyard (its huge, plenty of land in Australia for such a small population).

While strolling in his backyard, we saw a Bobtail Lizard (I think it’s a Bobtail Lizard), surprisingly it remained motionless as if we’re invisible. Since the Lizard had no teeth, I grabbed Bob the Lizard by its neck, toyed with it and BBQ it release it.

Next stop, Leonardo Da Vinci’s workshop. My supervisor loves to build stuff, currently he is building a small canoe for his son, I think its 70% done. As shown in the image above, the pond was dug by him in his backyard, how I wish my family had a pond in our own backyard for canoeing. I always wanted a radio-controlled toy boat, well, since I am all grown up, I might as well dig one in my own backyard when I own my own house.

Anyway, according to him, he completed building a propeller-driven general aviation aircraft with one of his good friend, he got the engine off from the shelf and the body kit shaped and welded according to the blueprint. If I am not mistaken, it is currently parked in Perth’s airport and awaits to be painted in orange and black.

Behind his workshop is where he stores his ‘Space Shuttle’, prototype 1 and 2.

I think the space-like-bike is known as a ‘Tilter’ (google), this is version 3. Believe it or not, he actually commute the tilter to his office everyday and to Curtin University. I’ve got to say, this is an eye-balls magnet machine.

Finally, a get together photo session of his thesis students for year 2008. It was an amazing year, I learned a lot from him. Would like to take this opportunity to thank him again for his wonderful guidance.

China Silk Road Tours, Famen Temple, and Qianling Mausoleum

We paid the infamous Silk Road a visit, the scenery and sights along the Silk Road are spectacular and intriguing. Shown in the image above, those are the infamous caves not made by prehistoric men but during the failed Great Leap Forward revolution, the communist early years and many more, back then China was in great poverty and the need for shelter forced many to dig a cave from the side of a hill as homes. Known as the cave dwelling. As for today’s modern age, no longer homes, these caves are not for the hardcore poor but as a corn storage center during winter.

We visited the Commemorative stele at Qianling Mausoleum, where Wu Zetian and her husband Emperor Gaozong were buried. Wu ZeTian was the only woman in the history of China to assume the title of Empress Regnant, which is something amazing consider Chinese prefers male over females for some unknown stupid reasons. Anyway, I noticed all the sculptures at the mausoleum are decapitated; even sculptures of horses and camels are not spared.

The local are absolutely clueless on who or what causes this, it was probably vandalized by one of the many emperor after the fall of Zhou dynasty, or the infamous Cultural Revolution by Mao ZeDong that witness the destruction of millions and millions of Chinese art, sculptures, paintings, books… in the name of progress. Bloody communist!

Ironically, these two lions are spared, notice the tail? These must be the oddest pair of Chinese Guardian Lions (also known as Lion of Buddha) because it has a tail, normally they don’t. Have you ever wondered why do they call them lion dance performance when lion is not indigenous to China? For your information, the male lion has his right paw on a ball, which represents the “Flower of life” The female is essentially identical, but has a single cub under her left paw, representing the cycle of life. Symbolically, the female fu lion protects those dwelling inside, while the male guards the structure.

And we visited Famen Buddhist Temple, during Cultural Revolution, the Red Guard damaged temple halls and Buddhist figures under the name of “breaking four old fashions”. Most of the architecture and relics are not exactly antiques of yesteryears, after the Cultural Revolution, artifacts are reconstructed based on what they managed to salvage from the ruins, and architecture are rebuild to mimic as if they existed for thousands of years, an imitation, I guess nothing is truly original in China.