Hong Kong Wet Market Cash Register

One of the things I like about Hong Kong is the wide abundance of so called wet markets.

They are vibrant centres in the community. Offering a wide variety of goods, from fresh vegetables, tofu to meat and fish chopped on the spot.

The operations are very low tech and look like nothing has changed for the last decades. Other than the occasional finger print checkin and energy saving lights rather than the traditional light bulbs.

Fruit and vegetable sellers have their wares spread out and nicely lined up to entice customers to buy it. Walking past a stall triggers a response where the staff highly recommend their products by touting they are the best, juiciest, cheapest or whatever is applicable.

In this case fruit is selected either by yourself or the fruit seller and put on a scale or the price is just shouted out if it is by the piece.

A critical piece of equipment is...the bucket. The bucket is where the money goes. It hangs at an easy to reach place, and on the other side of the string is a counter weight. When you pay for your goods, the  bucket gets pulled down. The merchant drops the cash and grabs the change. When handing over the change, the bucket is let go and flies back to its position.

Low tech, but highly effective!

New Running Exercise Shoes

My Vibram Five Fingers were coming to the end of their lifecycle so time to look for some new shoes.

Am a big fan of the Vibrams, so was definitely looking for something with a zero drop or minimalist shoes. IE thin soles so you have maximum connection to the ground you run on. The vibram model I had were not that brilliant for off-road conditions nor wet conditions. Those were on the requirements list when looking for something new.

Came across those New Balance Minimus, tried them on and they fitted well. And as there was some interesting pricing going on I could buy 2 pairs of those instead of 1 pair of 5 fingers.

The first few times I have been using them for CrossFit like activities. Meaning lots of jumping, push ups, pull ups, squats and the like. Stability and grip are important I find...and the shoes passed the different test thrown at them. Not as much contact as the five fingers, though definitely a lot more than some asics I still had.

Today I decided to do another run with them to figure out how they would behave there. When lacing them up properly they do give a similar snug feeling as the V5F shoes which I really like. The small drop was fine and I really did like the grip of the shoes. The grip with the connection provides nice agility when running. Although only just over 5KM, the shoes felt good and would support longer runs nicely.

So far so good! The next test will be taking them offroad and/or run in rainy conditions!