Scarlet

Met my friend L on Saturday. 

"Hey, man! What are you going to do for the weekend?" I asked.

"You know, I am recently addicted to the TV series Scarlet Heart (步步驚心)," he said with a curious smile.

Fortunately I know what that series is - Vivian told me that much. In short, it was about a modern woman who, via Return to the Future, got mixed up with the scandal around the succession of Kangxi (康熙) Emperor. Nonetheless, I couldn't believe my ears, "Why! I could hardly believe you are interested in soap opera!"

L laughed even louder, "In that case, have you heard of Palace (宫)?"

I nodded, "Yes, of course. It's another TV series around the same time as the Scarlet Heart - and the two had a remarkably similar plot."

"Quite true, although I'm quite sure they are independent and their similarities coincidental," L said - his mind seemed to have gone somewhere else.

Knowing perfectly well that my friend had an abnormally convoluted mind, I went on and asked, "But, what are you trying to talk about?"

"I am just reflecting the very truth that two different stories could be told in an unbelievably similar way, while ironically the same event could be described by two persons in entirely different manners - for example, the hospital discharge summary of our patients!"

Seafood

Shortly after the talk of Warren, I attended a regional meeting organized by a drug company.

It was a two-day event, but I shall not elaborate on what happened. There were no more than a dozen of people in the meeting, each from a different Asian-Pacific country. After we'd done with the first day, the organizer invited us for dinner in a elegant English restaurant nearby.

To my surprise, all of us (alas, except myself) objected to that idea.

The argument was simple: Since we were in Hong Kong, we should have the most famous dish here!

They meant seafood.

In no time, a table was booked close to a traditional seafood bazaar.

*********************
After the dinner, I asked my friend from Tokyo, "How do you think about the dishes tonight?"

"It's brilliant!" He was obviously delighted rather than being polite, "And you?"

"Well, I must say I've tried better ones," I smiled, "Seriously, I think the humble sashimi lunch set and miso soup I found in the Tsukiji market were more impressive.

"That's because you compare them with the Japanese food you have here - and I feel the same when I think of the steamed grouper and prawn in soy sauce we have in Tokyo!"

I was forced to agree.

Answer

(Warren's reply was, as always, illuminating.)

Dear X,

Nice to hear from you and congratulations on your new page of career!

There are lots of speculations on the real properties at Norway recently and therefore it may be a bit overpriced.

I still think there will be a marked correction of property market in HK. I don’t know when but this will definitely happen in a few years time when US has recovered from the downturn and starts to fight against hyperinflation by raising the interest rate.

However, if you can foresee that you will be staying in Norway for a couple of years, and you are not particularly interested (or talented) in buying stocks, I will still suggest you to buy a flat. Please buy a small and humble (preferably older) one rather than the extravagant new estate (promoted by the three old musketeers recently), so that you won’t lose too much in case there is correction of property market in HK. Furthermore, you can have peace of mind without worrying about where to park your money, timing of buying flat, bullying by the landlord or cash loss in paying rent. Of course, it is always better to buy a flat near the railway station.

Warren

Question

Shortly after Warren gave the talk, he showed me an email that he received from a new medical graduate. I believe it illustrates a common problem.

Here you go:

***************************

Dear Professor,

Sorry for disturbing you but there is something I really wish to seek your advice. Your opinion would mean enormous to me.

I am an intern this year and I am enrolled into a peripheral hospital as medical officer. It is a great place for working and learning. The people there are friendly and magnificent. I am so eager to have my career kick start in this department.

But there is a logistic problem. I live in Madagascar but shall be working in Norway. It can easily take 2 hours to travel to work, not to mention the everyday traffic jam during morning rush hours.

I figured out I probably need a flat nearby, but I am struggling between buying or renting one. Would it be too reckless to put myself into liability the first year I earn my salary? Should I wait and see the direction of our new CE before committing myself? Do you know any good site for buying or renting in the region?

I would really really appreciate it if you could enlighten me on this issue. Sorry for having to bombard you with questions but I am desperately in need of answers.

Thanks a thousand!

Regards, et cetera.

Avoid

It must have been a happy coincidence. Shortly after I was engaged in some insightful dinner discussion on retirement, my friend Warren gave a talk on fiscal planning to my colleagues.

I shall not repeat what he said. Nonetheless, I find his advice on what stock to avoid timeless.

Here it is (in case you did not come):

• initial public offer (IPO), or companies listed for less than three years
• allotment or right issues for two consecutive years
• companies that do not pay a dividend
• diversification (or, actually, diworseification)
• hottest stock in the hottest industry (for example, the Apple)
• "new economy" or company in transition
• price-to-earn (PE) ratio above 25
• recent merger
• hedge fund
• any derivative

For those who had read The Intelligent Investor, this list is very much similar to the advice of Benjamin Graham.

Study

(The dinner went on.)

I was sitting next to YL, a consultant from our brother department. After my brief congratulation for his recent promotion, our discussion came to colleagues who left us for private practice in recent months.

“I hear that A has sold his office. Where is he now?” My friend asked.

(A was a previous colleague of ours but started his own practice shortly after SARS.)

“He’s back to school in UK,” I said, “No, nothing to do with medicine. I think he is taking up an entirely different subject – purely for his own interest.”

“Oh, in other words he has retired!” YL pursed his lips, “How admiring! I always fancy I could retire before sixty – I shall study for another degree!”

“What a coincidence!” I exclaimed, “I have the same dream as yours - a PhD on history or archeology sounds good for me.”

“But how are you going to make your living?” WK – sitting on the other side – asked.

“I suppose I can be a part time tutor of anatomy or physiology?” I smiled.

PS. According to Agatha Christie, archeologist is the best kind of husband – he will have more interest in his wife as she gets older.

Retire

Being invited to a political dinner – it was not entirely boring even for someone with autistic personality disorder like me.

We met SF, a recently retired senior nephrologist. Knowing perfectly well that he’s a workaholic, one of us asked how he found his life now.

“Oh, it is true that I have retired from the hospital, but I’m still working,” he said, putting up a humble smile, “I’m just 60 and it’s too early to do nothing. I am actually working now for the the university to teach health care administration and risk management.”

I nodded; the job was probably an ideal one for him.

“Why don’t you come out and practice?” Another one of us asked.

“Seriously I’d love to. But, by the time I realize I’m about to retire, it’s too late to set up a clinic myself.” SF said indifferently.

“Why?” We all asked at the same time.

“Young men, lend me your ears,” SF suddenly became serious, “If you think you need to start a private practice eventually, do so before the age of 55. Otherwise you would find it tiring – if not difficult – to compete with doctors of the younger generation.”

Considering the story of other senior physicians who retired recently, I was forced to agree.

Wall

You may ask: There’s an important military construction in the ancient China – we have the Great Wall!

Very true, but the consideration is different.

You see? Although it was not prohibitively expensive to keep a large army at the border, and maintaining the Wall is often a nuisance, but, for the emperor, an large army far away is more risky.


Just think about the stories of An Lushan (安祿山), Zhu Di (朱棣), and, alas, many others.

PS. In that sense, the entire country becomes a gigantic castle surrounded by the Wall.

All of a sudden, I find that novel of Franz Kafka has an entirely different meaning.

Castles

My recent bedtime reading was Castles, Battles & Bombs by Jurgen Brauer and Hubert van Tuyll.

The book is about how economic principles explain military history.

I bought it some months ago as a bargain item. The title appeared attractive because both economy and history are my favorite subjects. Unfortunately it turned out a good hypnotic in some rare evenings when I got insomnia.

Nonetheless, the first few chapters do bring up a good idea: When looked at as a question of cost, the building of castles in Europe in the middle ages was inevitable. Although the construction was expensive, a good castle was way cheaper to maintain than a standing army.

For that reason, castle was never an important element of the military history of ancient China. Army was not that expensive to maintain; many soldiers were half-time and needed to work in the farm when the daily training finished. There was also always a surplus of manpower. For example, Zhao (趙) lost 400,000 soldiers during the Battle of Changping (長平之戰) in 260 BC – possibly more than the entire European population at that moment.

Discriminate

I discriminate.

I laugh at stupidity because I admire intelligence.
I sneer at brutality because I praise humaneness.
I disparage coward because I worship those with courage.

I averse lies because I value honesty.
I hatred the wicked because I treasure the kindhearted.
I look down upon ugliness because I appreciate beauty.

I fear darkness because I enjoy sunshine.
I feel sick with the vice of Satan because I love the virtue of my Lord.

To me, accepting fairness means forfeiting justice.
Giving up discrimination implies conceding to the dark side of our world.

For these, I discriminate.

Withdrawal

Frequent visitors of this site would note the blog entry on 10 April was withdrawn a few hours after it was published. It had never happened before, and I will try my best not making it happen again.

Although I put up TW as the excuse, my response to her comment was swift because I had a subconscious feeling that the story may not be (politically) correct even before it was posted. My intelligent friend was the catalyst, but the process was a natural one.

EW asked if I keep a copy of the original post so that I could show it to my friends in private. Unfortunately, no. Contrary to my clinical and research work, I do not keep a backup copy of my blog. In retrospect, it is a pity, but everything happened too quickly that morning, and it really helps my conscience because I really could not remember what I said exactly on that day.

Nonetheless, I still remember my opinion.

俊傑

(An old story that I wrote over twenty years ago in an exceptionally long May.)


《柏和蘆葦》

平原上起了風，蘆葦都給吹彎了腰。而柏樹雖然枝葉顫動，仍屹立如故。有智慧的人於是說：「堅強的柏樹呀，不畏風暴，是多麼的有骨氣。」

風愈刮愈大，柏樹被吹得齊腰而斷，而蘆葦雖然零叮落索，仍生機盎然。有智慧的人又說：「聰明的蘆葦呀，懂得以柔制剛。愚蠢的柏樹，連命也給丟了。」

看到這裡，不禁要像莊子的學生問：子將何處？

最好的辦法，當然是在將要折斷前由柏變成蘆葦。

***********************

By the current standard, we call this very kind of plant genius (俊傑).

PS. It is amazing to see how different I wrote twenty years ago - but even more shocking to learn what I have not changed in my thought.

Extrapolate

The next day after I was back from Bangkok, I found myself enjoying a peaceful Easter Sunday. Vivian was on-call, and Uny, my Indonesian maid, was having her regular holiday.

Naturally I was responsible for taking care of my two princesses. Euterpe got to practice piano; she also had some homework to finish. Even Adler had a daily session on English.

Later that morning, when my mum was back from the wet market, I asked, “What’s there for our dinner?”

“Wintermelon and potato. There’s also a small chunk of beef in the fridge. Is that enough?”

“Quite so. Let’s take wintermelon as the veges; I can cook it with some dry shrimps and make a simple stew with beef and potato,” I was thinking aloud, “Just that I’d never try either, but I suppose they’re quite the same as zucchini and taro."

**********************

That evening, I realized I was badly mistaken - they were both too tough for our teeth.

In short, wintermelon is no zucchini, and potato should not be compared to taro. The taste of both dishes were right, but the time and amount of water needed are way different.

As I always fancy, cookery is the sublimed version of science and medicine. Treatment protocol of one disease should not be blindly extrapolated to another - however similar the two conditions appear to be.

As Martin Ruth said: You will find it very good practice always to verify your references.

訃告

The next morning, while I was stilling pondering the problem of copycat suicide and the Sorrow of the Young Werther, my friend KY announced a shocking news in the Facebook.

Mr. Gary Yang, an old classmate of us, died rather suddenly last month.

I shall not describe his career or achievements here. We were, at best, remote acquaintance, and, after reading KY’s message, it actually took me quite a while before I could recollect who he was.

But Gary was a remarkable person. We were admitted to the medical school in the mid-1980s via the Provisional Admitting Scheme. After one year of preparatory study, however, Gary decided that medicine was not his cup of tea. He withdrew, and was transferred to the School of Business.

You could imagine the pressure and resistance he faced in those days.

Alas, by any standard he made the right choice. He graduated, worked in the field of finance, and became the director of a famous European Bank.

Gary is survived by his wife Connie and his ten-year-old son Owen.

*************************

嗟吹箎而無聲兮，悟鶺鴒之抱痛。
傷嵇氏之幼男兮，唯安仁能作誄。

《壬辰季春太宰塗鴉以輓》

Goethe

I was back to my home town on Saturday evening; Vivian was waiting for me in the airport.

On our way home, the radio in my wife's Golf GTI was tuned to a talk show on copycat suicide after von Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther was published.

I was amazed to find such a philosophical program in a local channel.

"My dear, we should salute to the producer! It is something more than calculation and kitsch," I said, "But I must say von Goethe was more than upset when he saw young persons killed themselves following his young Werther. Our great German author loved life as much as anyone - inspite of his remarkable medical history."

Here is a brief summary:

• 1768 (age 19): massive hemoptysis with neck tumor (It was probably lung tuberculosis with collar stud abscess.)
• 1801 (age 52): erysipelas of face
• 1805 (age 56): kidney stone with recurrent renal colic
• 1823 (age 74): heart attack, which was probably complicated by Dressler's syndrome
• 1830 (age 81): massive hemoptysis, presumably the result of post-tuberculous bronchiectasis
• 1832 (age 83): recurrent heart attack

The first episode of coughing out blood actually happened when he was a college student, and it took him nearly two years to recover. It was fortunate to lovers of art and literature that the disease did not take over the later-to-be great author, and he did not give up himself either.

Card

(Cont’d)

My friend returned after another 15 minutes or so. Our journey was, after this little incident, peaceful and unremarkable.

When everything was over, I eventually met my friend when we were both standing in front of the carousel and waiting for our luggage.

"I saw that you were answering to the call. What's going on?" I asked.

"Oh, nothing," FW smiled, "A young woman had a bad palpitation after our plane took off."

"Was she just anxious?" I went on.

"No, the cause was rather obvious. She had a big goitre and her eyes are almost falling out. She had every sign of thyroid hormone excess that you find in any textbook."

"But what could you do?" I was curious.

"Very little. I just asked her to relax and reminded her to see a doctor when she arrived Hong Kong. Well, I believe a tablet of propranolol would help for a while. To bad they do not have any on the flight."

"But I saw that you came back and fetch a small box! Why on earth do you travel with this sort of medicine as hand carry?" I became incredulous.

"Alas, don't be silly. I don't have any with me either," my friend smiled with embarrassment, "I just tried to give her my name card!"

No wonder FW shortly became one of the most busy private nephrologists in the city.

Announcement

I stayed just one night in Bangkok. In the next afternoon I found myself in the return flight back Hong Kong.

In the middle of the journey, the pilot made an unexpected announcement:

Is there any doctor or medical profession on board? A passenger fell sick suddenly and need some urgent advice.

I do not want to tell you what I did – or what I did not do. Nonetheless, a old story came through my mind.

Here you go:

************************
It was shortly after I took up the academic post. After attending a conference in the States, I was on a flight back Hong Kong together with FW – a nephrologist from another hospital.

It was a long journey from Chicago. Five or six hours after we set off, I was half asleep after filling up my empty stomach with some suspicious semi-solid that United Airline labelled as lunch.

Suddenly, there came an announcement: Is there any doctor or medical profession on board?

My Glasgow Coma Scale was too low for me to make any response. Peeping through my half-opened eyes, I realized FW was getting up from his seat and waving at the attendent.

In no time I was completely comatose again.


I regained a certain degree of consciousness some twenty or thirty minutes later – just the right time to see FW coming back from his unexpected urgent consultation.

Seeing that I could open my eyes, he gave me a friendly nod, and, then, he took out his small suite case and searched carefully.

After a few minutes, he found what he needed. It was a small box. He took it with him and went away again.

(To be continued.)

Signboards

When our car came close to the city center, we saw many more new modern shops intermingled with old dingy ones. The notable thing was I found Chinese signboards outside many of the shops.

That’s hardly surprising; there is a huge population of Chinese immigrants in Bangkok, and I was once told over 90% of the Thai people have a certain degree of genetic trait from Chinese.

But, something was remarkable: All Chinese characters should be read from right to left.

Seasoned visitors may recognize this is, in fact, the traditional way of writing Chinese. Before 1980s, most of the Chinese signboards in Hong Kong went from right to left. Our habit of reading gradually changed in the past 30 years because we put more and more English words into our formal Chinese writings, so much so Chinese newspapers and books are forced to print horizontally and from left to right. Once we get use to this direction, signboards naturally follow.

Once again, I am forced to think about the old sayings of asking the barbarians for a lost tradition (禮失求諸野).

The apparently unexplainable phenomenon is: Thai scripts are also written form left to right. Why didn’t the people here change their direction of writing Chinese?

Alas, I suppose Thai scripts do not often mix with Chinese ones. In fact, like most of the other southeast Asian countries,  Chinese emigrants may not mix all that well with the local people.

Outdated

Shortly after I wrote the letter to my lovely friend from Saturn, I set off to Bangkok to give a talk.

(Yes, it was the Easter holiday. To make the thing worse, Euterpe, Adler and Vivian were all sick on those days. My Broca’s area and larynx might have flown to Thailand, but I’m sure my soul stayed at home.)

There were three of us on the same flight: CH was the representative of the company, and IL was a young doctor from another hospital. Our flight was slightly late. On our way from the airport to the hotel, we passed a series of dingy huts and old-fashioned shops.

“Alas, Thailand remains quite the same since I was here last time. Everything looks like Hong Kong in the 1970s!” I sighed. (For my previous trip to Chiang Mai, please refer to http://ccszeto.blogspot.com/2009/12/blog-post_15.html and related posts.)

“Yes, the city seems so outdated!” IL nodded.

“Not that bad,” I put up a bitter smile, “Yes, 1970s is a long time ago. Nonetheless, I find that period entirely acceptable – and, in fact, enjoyable. I was brought up in the 1970s and am accustomed to every detail of that era. You find this epoch archaic simply because your were born after the 1980s!”

As Winston Smith noted, history may not exist objectively because people who remember the old days will eventually fade out.

Disability

While I was working on that incident of sick leave, I received another memo from a lovely creature on Saturn.

Once again, I shall not tell you what that memo was about. I would rather show you the letter I wrote back to the King of Saturn - whose title, in our usual language, is the Director of Social Service.

Here you go:

************************

Sir,

I would like to draw your attention to the request for assistance of the above patient.

In essence, this patient had a previous stroke as well as other medical problems. She was assessed by my colleague in 2010 and permanent disability allowance was recommended. The undersigned received today a medical assessment form for urgent review. It specifically asked us to certify whether the patient is eligible for normal disability allowance. In view of her medical history, and, since this patients is already 88-year of age, I am very interested to know what employment on earth she would be suitable for.

Sincerely,

Your obedient servant on an inferior blue planet

Allowed

(This post is removed following the advise of TW - my highly respected friend and possibly the most intelligent person I ever encountered in real life.)

續昨

再上是小籠包。一客四只，皮薄餡鮮，湯汁豐盈，最難做的收口位亦無乾硬之弊，算是比較滿意的一味。

主食消化大半，小吃方至。涼拌百頁實為腐乾切絲，拌以辣油。口感不錯，只略嫌夠「味」。蚵仔豆腐炸得香脆，餡亦軟滑濃鮮，只是頗為油膩，一碟八件，兩口子吃便過猶不及矣。

風捲殘雲一番，便到焦糖燉蛋上桌。此即鬼佬creme brulee也。太座一看苦笑，謂：到外江館子吃西式甜品，未免不倫不類。然入口倒是做得不錯，滑而薄有蛋香，只是焦糖面稍厚，混入蛋中便略過甜，倒也可以接受。

此時鄰座老先生的甜品亦至，看來是蛋白杏仁茶。老先生微呷一口，芫爾而謂：此等糖水，極熱極冷，皆大有風味，最忌是如此溫溫吞吞，不燙不涼，中庸而兩不討好，真不知所謂也。

區區竊以為此話實有至理，內人聞之，卻是笑得人仰馬翻。其實此店也非一無是處，祇是一星之謂，未免過譽。而聽鄰座品評月旦，倒是不期之幸矣。

利小館

講座後到銅鑼灣利小館午膳。太座謂此店乃米芝蓮一星食肆，倒頗有期待。

到步時尚早，店已八成滿。食客喧雜而座位甚逼。鄰座為一對年邁夫婦，也是坐下未久。

匆匆點菜，計為涼拌百頁，蚵仔琵琶豆腐，小籠包，鱔糊炒拉麵，另加侍應推介焦糖燉蛋。

須臾，鄰桌先上嫩雞燴麵。身旁老先生一看，嘖然有聲，半响，呢喃而道：嫩雞燴麵而湯清若水，實所罕見。如此創舉，無非店家不知燴麵何物，濫竽充數，而掌廚亦不珍惜羽毛，隨波逐流，各打三十可也。

其妻矜持，只隨聲附和。老先生大扺麵難下咽，一股腦往下說利苑歷史及經典名菜，區區聽着，亦增廣見聞，不無受用。

正傾耳聆聽之際，餸菜亦至。先上是鱔糊炒麵。碟頭甚小，鱔條稀疏寥落，心下暗自一沉。乘熱啖之，麵身略腍，味道卻是不錯。只是較之其他平民食府，索價雙倍，份量減半，便稍覺不值。

（未完待續）

Preparation

Shortly after we held the examination for our third year students, I attended a seminar on the approach to teaching young children.

It goes like this: Euterpe is in the middle of the second year of her kindergarten study. As part of the continual collaborative work between the school and the family (see, I can talk in the language of extra-terrestrials), the kindergarten invites we parents to have a session of class inspection.

Yes, we shall be in the classroom for a morning and see how our kid is doing in the class.

I must say that’s not an extraordinary event; many kindergartens make similar arrangements. The only thing remarkable is, before we parents do the class inspection, we have to attend a seminar on the Dos-and-Don’ts when appearing in the class, follow by some practical tips on interaction with kindergarten children.

We really need seminar of this kind for our academic staff.

PS. On my way home, my mind was not at ease.

What would happen if we invite the parents of our medical students to do a class inspection?

Klamm

The sobering truth is I do play Klamm of The Castle, and has been taking up this role for some time.

No, it is no fun to be summoned as the land surveyor but, at the end of the day, is lost in the jungle of bureaucracy. Nonetheless, Klamm does not own the castle; he is not Count West-west – and not even close to be an imperial messenger. It is fortunate for K not having a formal meeting with Klamm. Otherwise, the land surveyor would only be more than disappointed…

… like what Sisyphus found when he pushed the stone to the top of the hill.

Throughout the novel, you know very little about Klamm's doings - because I’m sure it is also something that Klamm wishes to find out for himself. In a sense he is another surveyor summoned by the Count – just that he comes earlier, pretends to be taking up a position in the castle, appears to be doing something, but, in reality, is trying to figure out what he is supposed to do.

PS. In Czech, klam means illusion. I’m quite certain that’s what Kafka intended to imply.

And I cannot help having the lyrics of Simon & Garfunkel’s Wednesday Morning 3AM flashes through my mind.

Responsible

(I’m sure you would be interested to know my reply to that remarkable email. Here it is.)

Dear Student,

Please write to the Faculty Office for this matter. I am not in the position to comment and am not responsible for organizing the examination.

Sincerely,

Your malicious nephrologist

***********************

PS. I did not lie. Klamm is not responsible for any message from Count West-west of The Castle.

Not to say I believe I am playing K.

Complaint

Soon after I visited the zoo, we held the clinical examination for our third year medical students.

I have, however, very little to say about the examination, which was amazingly smooth under the organization of VM and PS. To me, the only memorable story of this examination came from an email complaint that I received a few weeks ago.

Here you go:

***************************


Dear Professor,

I am a Med 3 student and has heard from our class representatives about the splitting of this year Medicine OSCE to two days. Actually, would it be held after 30th March? Because according to the "ALREADY ANNOUNCED SCHEDULE", I have already booked the flight tickets on 31st March for a 6-day-trip with my father and mother, and this is in fact the first ever overseas self planned trip with my parents who will fall into big trouble alone overseas. Also, the holiday tickets are so full and it would be beyond our financial ability to change the flight this late.

I understand that it is a personal problem and many from our class are also worried about the faculty using up one of the two days after the MB for this amendment. Can the department consider not making this serious abrupt change for the sake of your students in terms of fairness and humanity?

I am very sorry to disturb professor with this long letter not concerning academic questions. But this problem is really depressing especially for me, who would have difficulty settling the bill, if the exam is suddenly delayed by the faculty. It would be very kind of you if it is possible to convey more information about the OSCE arrangement before it is too late.

Thank you very much for your attention and sorry again for the inconvenience caused.

Best regards, et cetera.

Lion

You may ask: Why’s there a dog after all?

Alas, because the zoo-keeper wants to cut down the amount of water to be used!

Well, this little visit to the zoo taught me at least one thing:

There is a chronic form of rabies.

*************************

In the second afternoon I went to worship the lion.

To my surprise, the king of all beasts was standing in front of another water tap.

But there was a difference. Unlike the Shar-Pei, the lion did not appear to stop the others from getting the water. All it did was wondering around and scrutinize everyone who tried to get close to the tap. If it was someone whom he did not recognize, the king of all beasts would turn around and mutter to other onlookers – wolves, serpents, and some hounds that were more handsome than the Shar-Pei.

The consequence is expected: Scared by the lion, the other fierce animals would jump around and bark like mad, and the gate would become sufficiently chaotic to turn away whoever coming close to the tap. Seeing all these, the lion usually just stood still; his eyes seemed to say that he had nothing to do with the behaviour of the other animals.

On my way home, I was still puzzled: Did I see a lion, or a fox with a wig?

Zoo

In two consecutive afternoons I had the opportunity of visiting a local zoo.

The weather was lovely, the place of gorgeous, and, to put it simply, I had my eyes wide open.

To begin with, zoo is a misleading name. Although zoology broadly encompasses the study of all animals, not every mobile creature could find a place in zoo. By and large the place is for beasts – lions, wolves, foxes, snakes, vultures, sharks, and so forth. There are no pigs or cows or horses. Yes, occasionally you may find dogs or even mollusks – but they’re uncommon, and, their presence is almost always because of good reasons.

For example, I met a Shar-Pei at the south gate, which led to the water tap. Naturally the place was always full of thirsty people who tried to pass and moisten their throat. But, the canine just wouldn’t let go. It barked and bite, trampled all souls under its feet, and turned and tore every flesh-and-blood into pieces.

Well, no, not everyone – not those who used to share the same dog house with this Shar-Pei, or the few who had their smell being recognized.

HIV

During a casual lunch time discussion, our conversation turned to the recent incident of a doctor who had HIV infection.

"The media is mad," one of us said, "If we have to respect the privacy of our patients, why's there no respect to the privacy of doctors?"

"I presume they call it public interest?" I said.

"What interest to the public could there be?" Another one from the other side of the table said, "The chance of transmission is minimal even during surgery - otherwise no surgeon would operate on an HIV patient."

"But the damage is there. You know, this morning, when I was in the clinic, a patient asked how he could be sure his doctor - which is me - does not have AIDS!"

"You should say: That's none of your business!"

"But your patient has a point; we are not sure ourselves," I smiled, "In fact, we should put up a notice outside our Emergency Department and every medical ward, stating that the Hospital Authority does not guarantee patients are treated by doctors without AIDS. I am sure that would ease off the bed crisis a bit."