Traditional Chinese Medicine

While cleaning my den recently I came across this old wood plane, purchased for a pittance on a tool auction years ago, and now used in my den as a decoration.  Looking at it, I wondered how many previous owners had also handled this tool?  How had they used it?  Had it also been a decoration for them, or was it a tool used every day?  Had it been used in a cabinetmaker’s shop?  In a coffin maker’s shop?  Had it been a trusted tool handed down from father to an apprenticing son?  Had it been replaced by a shiny new power tool?  If so, did technology trump artistic and aesthetic form?

This last question stuck in my head.  Read the rest of this entry »

So did you guess the secret to the video clip that I posted earlier? Well here it is: the snowboarder is none other than my boss. That’s right, I work for that guy carving up the powder!

He is energetic and brilliant in his field of herbal medicine, well respected by his colleagues and something of a legend among his peers in the natural products industry. Success is frequently reserved for the bold, and Dr. Leung is one of the boldest people I know.

If you’d like to see more of why I get inspired by Dr. Leung, here’s a second YouTube video, this time of him discussing his life (warning: this one’s a little longer!).
Please accept my apologies. The clip of Dr. Leung visiting about his history has been taken down for further editing. When it reappears, I will again link to it here.