How did you celebrate Christmas in the past two days? I visited volunteers of the Direction Association for the Handicapped on Christmas Eve last Thursday. Despite their physical disabilities, they embrace the flow of life with perseverance and engage in community affairs actively, supporting self-reliance and encouraging others with their life experiences. I was deeply touched and inspired by their stories......

The progression of civilisation goes hand in hand with innovative thinking. Take a simple example: Can you figure out the functions of stones? They are used to light fire, carve on cave walls, serve as weapons, build houses and lay drainage pipes. They are also added to concrete mixes for the construction of taller and stronger buildings. We human beings use creativity to continue our exploration of new realms and lead society to move forward. Hence the importance of innovation......

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) that has drawn worldwide attention was held in Paris over the past two weeks. More than one hundred countries participated in rounds of negotiations on the new agreement for specific targets for emission reduction, in a bid to hold the increase in the global temperature to below two degrees Celsius. In fact, countries have been engaged in endless debates on reducing emissions over the years, as the crisis of climate change is just around the corner......

We are no stranger to the long queues in female toilets in public places. The problem is particularly serious during intermission at theatres or cultural performances. Sometimes men have to endure the long wait too when their other halves go to washrooms, and I can understand how they feel......

Over the past few years, we have been glad to see that the discussion on housing and land issues in the community has been flourishing. The Government adopts a multi-pronged strategy on land supply to strike a balance among various considerations and aspirations. However, some commentators adopt an either/or attitude, or make sweeping statements on the issues, and their arguments do not help to explore pragmatic solutions to the problems. For instance, there is a view that the current problem is not a shortage of land supply but unfair distribution. Selective and out-of-context data on areas allocated for public and private housing are cited to allege that the Government only allocated a small amount of land for public housing development, and to question why specific private residential sites were used for building “luxurious flats” instead of for public housing......