remember: winglin

Winglin was the home to one of the most infamous and long-lasting community in online TVB history. It is the mother of all forums that succeeded it.

As a fanfic haven
Winglin started out as a fanfiction site in the late 1990's. Writers would post their stories based on their favorite TVB artists and/or series and share with fellow fans, who would read them. The site was easy for writers to use and publish their works and it was hassle-free for fans to read and comment. To this day, Winglin remains to be the headquarters for TVB fanfiction writing and is the only remaining fragment of Winglin still accessible.

As a forum paradise
The boardmasters of Winglin decided to create forums for fan discussion (rather than just be a site for fanfic postings, reading, and discussions) of TVB artists and series. The layout followed a similar structure as those of the original Winglin fanfic site. The forums' threads were linear and fans could post without registration. The forums were free to the public and it soon became the "hot spot" for English TVB discussion. In particular, the "New TVB Discussion Forum" was very active. People would post news and have lengthy discussions on the latest releases.

The "golden years" of the Winglin forums remain to be the early 2000's. In those good times, Winglin wasn't just a forum. It was a home to many online TVB fans. It was a strongly-bound community of fans from all over the world. It was friendly and extremely active. Friendships blossomed and it was just a great time. People had intelligent and sound discussions. People knew one another and it was just a warm time and place.

It was the #1 source for anything and everything current about TVB. If you wanted to know something, someone at Winglin would be able to tell you. It was that simple.

Deteriorating and scares... it's the end
Starting in 2004, Winglin headed for an inevitable decline.

As the Internet became more widespread, new forums started to pop up everywhere. These new forums allowed people to have their own log-in and they were structured in an orderly way. People could quickly find their threads of interest. However, Winglin stood the test of time and its simplicity retained its loyal visitors. Even though the forum was threaded and lacked order, people still liked it for being easy-to-use and active. It remained a source for TVB information. However, these "other" forums started to attract and appeal to more people once Winglin began to have one huge problem...

The forums were frequently down as a result of a faulty and old server. People panicked and the mayhem that resulted with each "down time" was proof of Winglin's strong hold on the TVB community. However, as down times became more frequent, people started to accept that Winglin was not going to work all of the time. Perhaps its lack of stability turned a lot of visitors away and contributed to the continued degradation of activity at the forums.

In 2005, troublemakers started rumors that Winglin was going to shut down. With the site's already unstable nature, many fans believed the rumor to the true. Although the boardmasters have always been quiet, they never failed to update individual artist's forum banner and background. In 2005, however, forum layouts remained static. It looked like it was true that the boardmasters were bailing. Luckily, they set the record straight and told everyone that the problem with the downtime was because of the old server and that they were looking into upgrading so that the forums would run smoothly and be up at all times. The promise of a "new" Winglin was promising. However, with the atmosphere of the forums at that time, not even an upgrade could have saved it.

Since the "golden years" of Winglin came to a sad and abrupt conclusion, the forums began to change drastically - for the worse. Spams got worse. People got ruder. Familiarity and friendships were lost. People couldn't be civil. Heated arguments became more frequent. People were attacked. It was chaotic and downright scary.

I was holding off on writing a Remember article for Winglin because the boardmasters promised fans a "new" and "improved" Winglin back in 2006. I waited and waited... To my dismay, such a resurrection never came. I realize now that Winglin is truly but a memory and needs to be laid to rest.

Encoded Thoughts
In 2007, as a forum, Winglin is long gone. However, it retains its original purpose as a fanfic site and continues to serve writers and readers alike. The golden age of peaceful and happy discussions about TVB is gone. Left are golden memories of better times. While Winglin lacked the "custom" and "personal" features of current forums and had a problem with people "using other people's names," its simplicity and ease marks its beauty. The Winglin forums were a haven from boredom and a great source of information for many years. However, like everything else, all good things come to an end...

Thank you boardmasters for creating and maintaining such a beautiful home and a great place for so many years. You guys pioneered online English TVB discussions for overseas and non-Chinese literate fans. Winglin will always rightfully have its place in TVB's history and we will remember you for it.

Bonus: TVB Musings' Episodic Memory
Winglin was one of the first TVB sites I discovered after getting into the TVB world a few years ago. I used it as an information source as well as for opinions on series. It was a great place. I eventually become one of the "known" posters at that forum with my frequent postings. Winglin was a pivotal reason for the success of my Virtues of Harmony websites. They even linked my Virtues forums on their main page of forum directories. I used it to shamelessly advertise my site(s). I used to love Winglin in its "golden years." I'd go to it right after school and check out all of the new postings (which would be a lot). It was so fun! I was addicted to Winglin. I met a lot of good friends there (of which, sadly, I only talk to on an infrequent basis or none at all nowadays). There were so many great people at Winglin during the "golden years" that made Winglin such a fun and interesting place to visit.

I want to give a shout-out to nAnCeE ("Wifey"! I miss the way we used to post with our names together; our chats were so fun!), Diana ("Ah Lui"!), Candie, me, and Ray (If it wasn't for your posts praising Virtues so much, I don't know whether or not I would have had the faith to continue it. It's a scary thought to me now if I never had the 4-years Virtues experience.) I met countless of people over the years at Winglin, so if I forgot you and you're reading this... sorry!

In either 2002 or 2003, discussions started to stray from TVB. People began to be more interested in the personal lives of fellow posters. I remember that one time, everyone posted their pictures. It was crazy. Consequently, the boardmasters created a new forum for personal/off-topic discussions. I believe this was the start of the decline of Winglin. The atmosphere in the TVB forums never recovered after the "personal curiosity" explosion. Perhaps the lackluster-ness of TVB is to blame for the deterioration as well.

Despite my fond memories of Winglin, it hasn't always been so pleasant. The boardmasters know who I am. I bothered them countless of times as a result of "forum drama." Because of my "status" at the forums, people recognized who I was and I inevitably developed haters on Winglin. I don't want to go into details, but let's just say my "forum drama" involved stalkers and a despicable "shim" (inside joke/name).

In 2005, I discovered the joys of Winglin as a fanfic haven. I was very disappointed with Virtues of Harmony II's ending and had lots of ideas on how to continue the storyline, so I started a fanfic. I loved how simple it was to post chapters and the comments page that Winglin had was awesome. It allowed my fanfic to reach out to countless readers. It was great. Sadly, in 2006, I could no longer log in to post more chapters of my story. It turns out that all old users could no longer log into their accounts. However, my fanfic remains on Winglin's server. I probably lost a lot of readers as a result of the move from Winglin over to my own server - such a pity.

As the years went by, my postings on Winglin became less and less. The atmosphere there was no longer the same. Very little people knew anyone else. The "community" factor that was so strong in the early 2000's was lost. The forum became heavy on spam and haters. Its constant downtime was also discouraging. It just wasn't fun anymore. I also avoided posting or posted under a pseudonym because I knew that people still knew who "MetalAZNWarrior" was and I didn't want to leave myself vulnerable for haters to attack nonsensically. Nevertheless, I continued to visit on a daily basis out of habit and to check for news and/or discussions. At this current time, my passion for forums has died. Even if Winglin returned, I'd be indifferent. The feeling is just long gone.

However, I still appreciate and love Winglin for what it was and how much it gave me during the good times.

remember: vhs

In the 90's and early 2000's, everyone would be asking "What TVB tapes came out this week?" Yes, the VHS - video cassette tape - played a prominent role in entertainment for years, especially in the TVB community where we all rent our series. Almost everyone had a VCR and VHS was the preferred video outlet for many years. However, in 1997, something was born. It was the DVD. The future of VHS seemed pretty grim, but it continued to thrive and was remained more popular than DVD's for a while. Sadly, DVD's have since improved and become the main "choice" of the people. In late 2006, VHS has officially died.

Decades of greatness
VHS made home entertainment a cinch. People could now enjoy movies (and television shows) on the "small screen" at their own convenience. They could also easily record home movies and television shows. Video tapes were portable, handy, and easy. Thus, VHS became a staple in every house. It was "the" media outlet and for 30 years, it remained so.

The threat - DVD
With the DVD, gone were the days of rewinders and waiting for what seemed to be "forever" to fast-forward or rewind to certain scenes. The quality of the graphics was obviously far superior and people loved the ease and all of the control they had with DVD's.

However, DVD didn't become an instant breakout. Not many people had DVD players and DVD's were quite costly compared to VHS back then. As a result, VHS continued to be the "preferred" choice. In recent times though, DVD grew to overtake VHS.

The death of VHS
Since DVD's became more affordable and more people had purchased DVD players, the death of VHS was inevitable. This year, studios [Disney, Buena Vista Home Entertainment, etc.] stopped releasing movies in a VHS format. Instead, only DVD's were released. Consequently, the video tape bled even more and faced increasing unpopularity. Recently, retailers announced that they would stop carrying VHS on their shelves [besides some children's series and cheap stores will continue to carry VHS] - thus ending its 30-year run.

TVB and VHS
For years, TVB released series on VHS. There were VCD releases, but for mainstream rentals, VHS was the "choice." In recent times though, they started to release series on DVD with optional Chinese and English subtitles. I don't believe TVB releases official rental tapes anymore. So as you can see, TVB has also abandoned VHS and gone with DVD, further crippling any chance of life it has.

Encoded Thoughts
It's common for outdated technology to "go away," but it's still sad to witness the death of something we all grew up with. VHS was loved for the past 30 years, but now people find them too old fashioned and restricting. They complain about its picture not being very good and find the fast-forwarding and rewinding of video tapes to be tedious. Consistent with modern society's ever-lazy self, people love the DVD for its conveniences. Aside from the compact size and graphics, people now have the options to "select scenes" and "jump around" in their viewing with the simple click of buttons.

Good-bye, VHS - we will remember you for all you've done over the years.

TVB Musings' Episodic Memory
Call me out-dated, but I'm still more comfortable with video tapes. The only DVD's I truly own are the Season 1 and 2 collections of Desperate Housewives. For the most part, I still watch everything else on VHS and/or live on television. I haven't bought an American movie in years and you guys are going to find it shocking to hear this, but I don't follow the American movie scene either. The last movie I watched in theaters was Rugrats The Movie or maybe it was Mulan... I don't know for sure, but I was in sixth grade at that time. I do enjoy watching movies when they air [for free] on cable or something, but I wouldn't go out and buy the DVD.

I still watch TVB series on VHS. My rental shop takes the DVD's that TVB sends it and copies them onto video tapes for rental. I'm not sure if this is the case with other TVB shops though. I have around a hundred or so video tapes of recorded TVB series. The bulk of my video tape collection is the entire Virtues of Harmony saga - all 770 episodes. I used to record almost every series that I rented, but for the past 2 years, only one or two series have really been "memorable" enough to record and keep for my collection.

I do love the ease and quality of DVD, but because I don't use it that often, I can't say I'm as "crazy" about it as the mainstream market. I find it sad that VHS has died though. What will underprivileged households who don't have DVD players do? I guess the market only sees the "big" dollars. TiVo is also making blank video tapes to record shows unfashionable. I think it's safe to say that within ten years, there will not be any new video tapes produced at all.

How many of you guys still use VHS or have you all converted DVD?

remember: tvseriesfans forum

TVSF. For some, this acronym strikes fond memories of a thriving TVB community. For others, these four letters are meaningless. TVSF is the acronym for TVSeriesFans - one of the biggest and most successful of all TVB online forums because it was more than just a forum.

Forums are nothing new and before TVSF came onto the scene, there were other forums (which will be discussed in another article). What set TVSF apart when it emerged was the fact that its main service was for Vietnamese TVB fans. For the first time, there was a place made especially for Viet fans. Because series have to be dubbed for Viets, they would get lost and feel out of place in other forums since the series of discussion hadn't been released yet for them. With TVSF, Viets could discuss current Viet released series with others and not feel behind. It was also a place where Viets could get news on series and find out what the newest released series in Viet were.

TVSF was launched by DCN - who remains the true and only administrator in the hearts of the forum's veterans. While I'm not sure of the exact date the forum was launched, I believe it was in late 2001. Like all new websites, TVSF started out very small. Nevertheless, it was still able to attract its own group of followers at the beginning (mostly Viets). In early 2002, TVSF went on hiatus for around three months. With its comeback, TVSF grew to new heights, attracting more visitors and members each month.

The golden years
From mid-2002 to mid-2004, TVSF was thriving. It attracted thousands of visitors and members and was a bustling community. Almost every thread was active, members had fun, and TVSF just had a lot of great things to offer with many options and features that other forums didn't have. While TVSF was still mainly targeted towards Viets, it became more universal and could service the entire TVB community.

2003 was TVSF's prime. It was a year of change with many exciting new things. With detailed series information, Viet releases updated weekly on the main page, and with series downloads on BT, TVSF became huge. TVSF was arguably the first forum to introduce BT downloading of TVB series to a mass English-speaking audience. Viets now visited it more than ever to get the latest updates on series and TVSF attracted more non-Viet members as well with the series information and downloads it had to offer. It was the place to be for TVB 411 and discussions.

Shut downs and scares
DCN lost interest in running the forum during winter 2003. He announced plans to close the forum in early 2004. It was because of this that AsianFanatics was born. Everyone from TVSF rushed over to AF because AF was going to serve as the "new" TVSF. Luckily, DCN decided not to shut down the forum and handed the job of administering the forum over to someone else. Thus, TVSF's life was carried through to 2004 and members happily returned to TVSF. Even though DCN "retired" from the forum, he still stuck around.

The happiness didn't last long. In summer 2004, DCN announced that TVB had sent him a letter and was forcing him to shut down the site. Apparently, TVB was not happy with the forum posting pictures and information from and about their series and they were angered with the downloading section (which had grown tremendously since it was introduced to TVSF in summer '03). TVB threatened to take legal actions if the forum continued to run. Sadly, TVSF had to shut down. The final days of TVSF were spent with members in shock, sadness, and bitterness at TVB. There was a whole "hate" thread for TVB in which members sent e-mails to them to vent their frustration (of course, the e-mails would never be read, but it was still a way for everyone to vent).

It was with this that the TVSF community had to bid farewell to their beloved forum - which had brought everyone together. It was more than just a place to discuss TVB. It had become a home to many where friendships were spun. Everyone visited it every day and some even became addicted to it. TVSF had started small in 2001, but by its shutdown in summer 2004 - it was one of the biggest TVB-related sites around.

Poor substitutes and a final goodbye
It was natural that replacement forums popped up after TVSF's death. Each one tried to model after TVSF, but being on free servers and not having as much options as TVSF turned people off. Thus, some ventured into AF. In the fall of 2004, however, a group of TVSF members got together to bring back the forum. TVSeries Sensation was the "spin off" to TVSF and premiered in October 2004. It had a rough start and while it was on a paid server, people felt that it didn't give the TVSF "feel."

A member was able to contact DCN and he gave TVSS the scripts of TVSF. Thus, TVSF was restored for one final time. With the look, members, and threads back - TVSF (now in the name of TVSS) was back in business. Sadly, poor management, chaos, and in-fights among the "tops" made the "new" TVSF not so enjoyable. Even though the exterior was TVSF - the interior was not. TVSF was warm and fun, but TVSS was messy and strict. However, it was still a place to go to, so people still went there.

Nearing the summer of 2005, TVSS kept going off-line randomly. People thought it was server glitches at first, but when the administrators (who foot the bill) couldn't be reached, people started to suspect that the forum might shut down again. Indeed - that was the case. Without any warning, the administrators had abandoned the forum. Without anyone paying the bills, the server was terminated and TVSF was gone. While people were upset by the abrupt departure, it wasn't as great as the outpour that happened the previous summer when the true TVSF shut down.

Encoded Thoughts
Recently, a group of old TVSF members have built a new forum called TvSeriesForum. While they've done a great job and the forum looks nice and partially reminds of TVSF, sadly, the special, warm feeling is not there. To me and others, the true TVSF faded away two summers ago. What's left are just memories of golden days of happiness. Unless DCN returns (which is unlikely), TVSF will be no more. You just had to be around and experience personally what TVSF was to understand why so many people love the forum.

TVSF will be remembered for the good times and all that it gave to the TVB community.

Bonus: TVB Musings' Episodic Memory
My first encounter with TVSF was in early 2002. I believe I was searching for Virtues of Harmony. In any case, what attracted me to the forum was that it had a lot of information and opinions and the people were friendly. It shut down shortly after I arrived, however. I was thrilled when it came back and even more ecstatic when I saw the forum continue to grow and become more popular. I loved being a Super Moderator there and DCN was a genius for creating so many wonderful codes and scripts for the forum - the Viet Released updates, first posts, easy deletes, and so on. The forum just had everything and I went on whenever I could.

Many people remember me as an S-Mod over at TVSF, but the story of how I became one is funny. I actually had no intention of being one and didn't even apply for the position! In fact, I was an S-Mod for several weeks before I even used any of "power" that I was entitled to. What happened was that I was friends with Hazel (I call her "Hazeli"), who was friends with DCN, so she asked me if I wanted to be an S-Mod. I didn't really understand what that was, but I said, "Sure, why not?" So, DCN promoted me to S-Mod without ever contacting me or anything. I guess he saw that was a good active member, so he knew I wouldn't abuse my power. But yes, it's true - I climbed my way to power through corruption. Haha. I did no work to get to my position, but I think many will agree that I did a great job as an S-Mod. As cocky as this may sound, I do believe that without me, TVSF just isn't TVSF.

The big thing that I contributed to TVSF was the format of the first posts in the series forums. After DCN installed the script so that the first posts of all threads would appear in subsequent pages, I re-did all of the series threads' first posts. My format had the series's poster, titles, synopsis, useful links, frequently asked questions, and ratings all in the first post. Therefore, all crucial information were included right there at the top of every page in threads for people to read. It made the series threads so organized, easy to read, and attractive. It's partially because of this that many people were attracted to TVSF for series information since everything was so neat and accessible in the first post. I was pleased when new threads followed my format and I was very happy to see that TvSeriesForum kept my format when they made their forum.

What I love most about TVSF is that it's like a home. It's warm, friendly, and fun. The majority of the TVSF community was like a big family. Everyone knew a lot of people and many friendships were made. I felt comfortable there and could say whatever I wanted. I felt free to talk about series and other things. I was never bored online when TVSF was up. It was always so active and there was always something to post or reply to. The replacement forums just didn't do it for me.

Of course, what attracted me most to TVSF was that it had the most Virtues of Harmony fans and/or watchers out of all TVB's online forums. In fact, I believe that TVSF rose with VOH. TVSF's prime (2002-2004) was also Virtues's best years. Virtues was arguably one of the hottest series at TVSF - having the most viewed and replied series thread(s). I remember the endless hours of Virtues discussions, games, and of course - spamming... it was all so great. When "TVSF" (well, TVSS) died again in the summer of 2005, Virtues had also completed its run for Viet viewers. It's almost as if TVSF and VOH had some weird fate! It's largely due to Virtues that TVSF was so enjoyable for me. I just loved our VOH community @ TVSF and I enjoyed posting my thoughts on the tapes every week, providing all of the information, reading others' thoughts, and laughing and joking in the threads.

I was crushed both times when TVSF announced that it was going to close. I didn't know what I'd do online without it! It was a place where I belonged... a place to go, everyday, any time. I was really angry at TVB for making the forum close because we did nothing wrong but promote their series. Okay, the downloading I could understand, but pictures and information?! How were we supposed to discuss their series without it? That was just ridiculous. While I didn't write "hate e-mails" to TVB, I still stayed up late into the night to post and vent with other TVSF members as we waited until the forum was gone...

After TVSF's shutdown in summer '04, I started TVSF Corner at my Virtues site to assist Viets in the weekly series releases. My small corner was quite successful and I really have to thank the people who contributed the non-TVB releases for me. Shortly after the opening of my TVSF "page," Jess (my "grandma") and I decided to open our own forum - called HKSF Café. Our forum wasn't very popular and had little members, but it was a nice place for us to go and post our opinions. Thank you to those of you who joined and supported us! Naturally, my TVSF Corner and our small forum closed when TVSS opened.

I was skeptical about TVSS all along because I had had a bit of a "misunderstanding" with the future administrator back when she was a member at TVSF. However, I won't dwell into what happened because it doesn't really matter. When TVSS was unveiled, I was horrified with how unattractive it looked and how little options it had, but, because of Virtues, I had to make it a home to continue to discuss and promote it. I was overly thrilled when I was told that DCN had given them the scripts of TVSF and that the forum was going to look and have all of TVSF's members, threads, and so on, back.

It was such a nice feeling to see "TVSF" back. It was like seeing an old friend, or rather, an old home. TVSS thus became a better place to visit, but it paled compared to the true TVSF. The management sucked and the atmosphere changed. There were more "troublemakers," "idiots," and "spammers." I realized that I began to visit TVSS more so for VOH and for the sake of remembering TVSF than for the actual forum itself. With TVSF, I was always excited to visit to see what was new, but with TVSS, I didn't care too much about it besides for the VOH thread. I was a little "upset" that the administrators just abandoned TVSS without any word, but I wasn't sad.

Through TVSS's many shortcomings, I was able to close the TVSF chapter in my life. I didn't miss it so badly anymore and while it would be nice to still have TVSF to visit, I think it's better that it ended. I don't need to be so addicted to such an online community because I'm not a high school student anymore. Nevertheless, when it's boring online with nothing to do and I have nowhere to go, I miss TVSF.

Thank you TVSF for giving me a home for so many great years!

remember: translators

TVB series are filmed in Cantonese, but they are dubbed into several languages. Thus, the TVB audience is not limited to only Cantonese speakers. However, the TVB world is not so universal. Series are translated, but everything else isn't. Entertainment news and gossip will always be in just Chinese because, after all, TVB is based in Hong Kong. This alienates all the fans who cannot read Chinese. Luckily, over the years - this is becoming less of a problem. Now, news is more accessible for the TVB community than ever before. It is all thanks to Em - who has pioneered the news translating movement so that Chinese illiterates can read and enjoy daily TVB news.

The Pre-Em Era
So what did the TVB community do before Em came onto the scene in 2003? Well - not all that much.

HK Box Office was probably the first news translation site on the Internet. They started out as a newsgroup and later formed a website. While they translated some TVB news, their focus was primarily on the HK movie scene. Hong Kong Entertainment News In Review spun from HK Box Office and was again one of earliest TVB-related websites on the Internet. Like its predecessor, it too translated blurbs of TVB news, but focused more on movies. These two sites started HK news translations and I applaud their hard work in the late '90's to early 2000's. Unfortunately for us TVB fans - their focus was not on series.

Once in awhile, a very kind hearted soul would also translate some news (mainly new series productions). The name that comes to mind for me is roadrunner - who translated news for many months for TV Series Fans Forum. There were others - but their names have been lost from my long term memory because I didn't have personal encounters with them. In short, before Em came along, translated TVB news was an infrequent and somewhat "rare" thing.

The Em Era
Em (short for Emma) launched her infamous TVBspace News Roundup in summer 2003. While translating sites were not a "new" thing - the format and mission of her site was a radical thing. She translated daily - diligently posting the day's news from the HK newspapers. People easily and quickly fell in love with her blog. It soon became a huge hit. Everyone went there for news, but Em didn't stop at just news! She also translated articles from TVB Weekly as well as series synopses (before TVB did their own) and other goodies. For the first time, the whole TVB community had a chance to read news, articles, and so on - and every day too!

Em's blog grew to become massive and she herself became renowned. Her TVBspace website (which she started in 2002) also became a hit as it included song translations of lyrics from beloved TVB themesongs and subsongs, unique artist spotlights, and episodic summaries. Since 2003, the TVB community has turned to Em for the latest news and information on TVB.

The Post-Em Era
Em inspired several people to take over what she started after she decided to take a break in late 2005.

TVB... On The Spot, Ellie, Jayne, BES, and Sidney are honorable mentions who took over the reign of translating news after Em's hiatus from the TVB community.

TVB... On The Spot followed Em's daily translations format and did a very efficient job until the webmaster disappeared after the TVB Anniversary. His blog has since been sadly hacked, erasing all of his hard work. Ellie's Hong Kong Buzz again followed Em's format and also did a great job until work and reality kept her from continuing with her blog in March 2006. Jayne's Jayne Stars came onto the scene in early 2006. Initially, Jayne did translations of magazine articles of her favorite stars. As she continued, her site progressed and took on Em's daily news update format and included many fun, creative, and original features as well. BES started her Entertaining You blog in February 2006. She featured daily news translation as well as episodic summaries of her favorite series. Sidney's TVB Sidsation started in March 2006 and while her blog isn't focused on news translation, she still does her fair share of translations.

Thus, even though Em was greatly missed, the TVB community was not deprived of news translations during her break. Em has recently returned in late May 2006, so visit her revised site to support her long-awaited comeback!

Encoded Thoughts
During the Em Era (summer '03 - fall '05), it was just Em who did most of the TVB news translation. Since then, there are now a handful of people translating for us. Without Em and all the other people who have taken their time out to translate for us every single day of the week, the TVB community wouldn't be so up-to-date on what's going on in Hong Kong. They deserve our endless thanks because translating is not an easy feat. These wonderful writers, translators - and above all - people - are just great. TVB Musings salute them all for their hard work and contributions.

The TVB community will always remember you guys.

Bonus: TVB Musings' Episodic Memory
The first time I met my "ah jeh" (big sister) Em was in May of 2003 on MSN. Virtues of Harmony II had just released and I was trying to translate the episode titles from TVB's site. Back then, my Chinese literacy was almost none, so I had a lot of trouble. I asked someone what the words I was trying to translate meant, but they didn't know - so they asked Em. It was with this tiny translation request that sparked a friendship and ultimately she "adopted" me as her "sai lo" (little brother). Thus, I've always called her "ah jeh" since.

In regards to her TVBspace News Roundup - I have several fun memories. There was a period when slimming was the craze in HK, so Em joked that she should rename her blog Slimming News Roundup. There was also a period when Steven Ma dominated the news - which we joked about too. My "inside" thing with her news blog was that I'd ask almost every day before I visited (or before she posted) if there were any "surprises" for me in the news. What surprises? Virtues of Harmony-related news of course! Haha. I was so happy when she'd say there was a "surprise." One day in July 2005, before she posted, she messaged me and told me that there was a surprise - but not exactly good. It was news that Virtues was ending. I was crushed, but I was glad to have received the news from her than somewhere else. While Virtues has thus concluded, I'm still hopeful and praying that one day Em will have "surprises" for me again.

I owe a lot of my knowledge of Cantonese to her. First, it was random words. Then, she gave me several Chinese lessons. Whenever I had questions about Cantonese, I would ask her and she'd thoroughly explain it to me - not just a simple translation. This helped me to learn a lot of words and it is through reading that I was able to understand Cantonese more proficiently. This explains why I can comprehend Cantonese better when I have Chinese subtitles/words (because so many words sound similar). Em started me on the road towards learning Cantonese three years ago and without her, I don't think I'd have been able to learn so much.

Thank you "ah jeh" - for everything. I really appreciate you!