The past 48 hours have been surreal in that I tearfully boarded a plane (give me a break, I've never lived away from home for this long) in LA and de-boarded halfway across the world, ready to embark on an adventure that will take me not only to HK, but mainly to Thailand and other SE Asian countries. I leave for the latter country in a few days.
HK always was, to me, as I was growing up, a humid country to which our family traveled to spend time with grandparents. And to eat and shop. I never liked how muggy it was and was not a fan of what were, in my eyes, unsanitary practices of living. I needn't go into details, but let's just say that I was scarred from the one time as a child when I requested napkins from an HK noodle shop and received instead, much to my disgust, a roll of toilet paper. Used or not, the whole butt-to-mouth correlation did not suit well with my appetite. Ugh. Barf in my mouth (not really). I wish I could say that my opinions have changed, but no. Hong Kong is still considerably less sanitary than my beautiful, pristine, smog-free home of Palos Verdes, but I'm getting used to it here -- and I better, soon, for Bangkok will be 100 times worse. Really, I'm trying hard to enjoy the water from unknown sources that drips on you as you walk on the sidewalk, as I try to dodge killer taxis and un-supervised construction sites that spew iron ore onto pedestrians like it's no biggie. It's quite endearing.
Aside: But don't hold these criticisms against me. I'm all down for cultural oneness but I must admit that I still am subject to ethnocentrism. The only cure for this is travel, so I guess you could say I'm trying to cure myself. Please bear with my carps.
In America, we value personal space. We always say "Oh, sorry!" whenever we make even the slightest body contact with a stranger (or in my case, even friends). After two hours in Hong Kong, though, I quickly learned that "Oh, sorry!" isn't going to get you anywhere. No one cares. By the third hour of walking around in the malls on my first day, I lost all sense of the so-called personal bubble and was rubbing against people, shoving my way through the crowd (perks of being taller than the majority of the population here). By the second day, I was elbowing pesky girls in the clubs...to which I got elbowed back, but that's another story.
I can already say that I miss the diversity of America, or California. Like I said, I've been here before but the sea of black hair always puts me back and makes me think about how fortunate I have been to have grown up around people of all different ethnicities. I used to wonder if people could tell I'm not from HK, but this question was quickly answered as Lauren, my friend, and I have constantly been stared at on the MTR for our clothing - or lack thereof, in their eyes - or the volume of our voices. It's weird -- Americans are notorious for being loud, but have you ever stepped foot into a Chinese restaurant? I swear, you can't hear yourself think, everyone's yelling so loudly. So I see not why we Americans are mad-dogged for speaking in excitable voices when Chinese restaurant-speak is equally comparable. Shrug.
If I may be honest and if you are really curious (this is mostly for my girls back at home), HK has, to the extent of my knowledge, a small pool of attractive men. True, beauty is relatively subjective, but from my standard, look not in HK for a hunkin' heartthrob. You may, however, find many an attractive and particularly wealthy European or American in Hong Kong, many of whom are businessmen. The first night I was here, and also the first night I went out to Lan Kwai Fong (club district) with Lauren, we ended up hanging out with these great guys -- well dressed, clean-cut, well-spoken, international -- who proved their baller-ness via purchases of the liquid matter at their respective table. Turns out they're vp's (or something like it) of XYZ financial institution (think JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, and all the businesses USC Marshall kids dote upon) and were returning from a yachting trip around HK. Etc. Etc. Etc. HK has a very materialistic culture with opportunities to shop nearly everywhere you look, but these guys were humble. Nonetheless, moral of the story is that these businessmen/women are everywhere. Whether they're happy here or not is a question in itself.
More updates to come. Miss you all!
1 comment:
international ballers on yachts!! GET ON THAT ISH WOMAN.
by the way, why are you at the chinese university of hong kong?
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