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| We had a wonderful trip to New York City this past weekend and connected with several people we have not seen for many years. We did not run into any construction delays. Our timing was also very good and were always going against traffic.
Our first stop was in Manhattan to see Chung-Li's former colleague Seymour Roth and his wife Annette.  Chung-Li worked with Seymour when he first graduated from Columbia University School of Engineering.
We talked for several hours, then had dinner in a restaurant on the upper East Side.
 We then drove out to Stony Brook on Long Island to the home of Cecilia and Clemen Verbeck. Cecilia and May were classmates at the New York Hospital Cornell University School of Nursing. They are having their 45th class reunion, and that was the main reason for our trip. We stayed at the beautiful home of the Verbecks.
 There was not enough time to tell all the stories. We are looking forward to a visit from the Verbecks to continue exchanging our experiences.
Then on Sunday we drove to Forest Hills and had lunch with May's uncle and aunt and siblings.
From left to right, Standing:
Stanley, May, Chung-Li, Annette, Kenneth, Vera and Jody. Seated: Alice, Xiao Ba Ba, and Uncle Wellie.
Charles was present, but for some reason was not in the photo.
After lunch we drove to see Wang Xiao Xing who is doing her doctoral studies in biomedical science at New York University.
We had dinner at the Mt. Fuji Japanese Steak House.
I am still learning how to use this program. So you will have to put up with the amateurish format.
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| I came to Irvine on 20 November and am staying with Maurice and family. 
It's always a joy to see them. The persimmon tree in their backyard is loaded with fruit. So today I went out with Ryan and picked nearly 70 and there are still at least two dozen more!
Here they are, ready to be shipped out!
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| Our cruise from 29 October to 5 November was very interesting. We called at Ocho Rios, Jamaica, Grand Cayman Island, and Cozumel, Mexico. With less than 12 hours at each port of call, we decided to do something which we would not be able to do at home. At Ocho Rios we went on a Canopy Tour. We strapped into a harness which hooked onto steel cables and we swung from treetop to treetop. Supposedly this tour lets the participants get a good view of the rain forest up close from the top. But we were too thrilled just sliding on the cable that we really did not observe the rain forest very much. 
 There were eight or nine platforms to traverse. A couple of them were just sheer vertical drops. A very thrilling experience. An attendent is on the platform at each end of the cable to launch and recover the participants.
When we finally got back on the ground we did see a number of exotic flowers. Here's one of them:
Ocho Rios literally means Eight Rivers in Spanish. But that's not where it got the name. It refers to the many waterfalls in the area. (The corresponding Spanish word escaped me at this time.) The most notable of them is the Dunn's Falls. It runs right down to the ocean. There are two ways to climb the Dunn's Fall. You can either walk along side it, or actually get in the water and have a very wet climb.
Our next port of call was the Grand Cayman Island. We visited the Sting Ray City, a sand bar on the north of the island that we reached after a fifteen minute bus ride and a twenty minute boat ride. We got into waist deep water which is teeming with sting rays. You literally have to be careful not to step on them. They are very friendly and would swim right up to you and rub against your legs as a cat would. Here are a couple of shots of close encounters:
  It should be pretty obvious that I did not take these two photos. There was a professional photographer on board. She charges $30.00 to download the pictures onto a CD. If I had known that I would have her take some photos of me also, all for the same price! The CD also includes a lot of other scenic shots.
We also spent three days sailing. There's a lot to do on board while at sea. We made good use of the fitness center, and also did some unusual activities like rock climbing. 
And there's always the spectacular view of sunrise and sunset.
Our last port of call was Cozumel, Mexico. We did some serious snorkelling (about one hour from a boat) at the Palanca Reef which was supposed to be one of the best sites in the world. But it was kind of a disappointment for us. Maybe it was because the sky was overcast. We did not feel it was as colorful and lively as what we saw at San Blas, Panama. I took some photos with a single use underwater camera, but have not developed the film yet.
After docking at Galveston Sunday morning, Ellen's husband met us at the dock and took us on a sight seeing trip through Galveston and Houston. We had lunch at the Aquarium Restaurant in Kemah, a suburb of Houston and a tourist mecca. We also visited the Johnson Space Center which deserves at least a full day. We also visited XingZi, who used to take care of Amy, Ben, and Andrea. She took us to have dinner at the Yao Restaurant, owned by none other than YaoMing! 0
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This is at the Zion National Park.