Exercise routine

I've been so happy these days! I'm not going to tell you why, at least not yet. Not until things are more.. certain.

In other news, I've been establishing an exercise routine for the rest of the semester. HKU offers some very affordable sports classes, and it would be a shame not to take them. This semester, I will take Badminton for Beginners, Wing Chun Kung Fu, and Swimming (Front Crawl). Yes, I'm finally learning how to swim. As for badminton, I already know most of the rules and regulations, but I want to improve on my technique. I don't think my ass and wrist should hurt so much from playing badminton. As for swimming, no, I still don't know how to swim without the aid of a personal floatation device. Wing Chun should be fun. I'm really looking forward to learning a Chinese martial art that doesn't involve high kicks and jumping.

In addition to taking these classes, I will play badminton and basketball with fellow Graduate House residents. I'll also try to use the fitness and weight rooms, something I haven't done in many many many years. If I've ever had a v-shaped figure, I have since turned into a refrigerator, and will probably soon resemble a Christmas tree if I don't do anything about it. My fitness levels and physique are still salvagable. Once I hit the 300lb-mark, I may be in serious serious trouble.


I think there are two keys to my attempts at maintaining a fitness regime (is this considered appropriate use of the word 'regime'?). First of all, for the first time in my life as a student, I live on campus, the MAIN campus. I can no longer say that I have to rush back home to eat a home-cooked meal or that the gym is out of the way. In fact, I can exercise with the commute time that I'm saving; then again, HKU's closest sports facilities are at least 15-20 minutes walk from the main campus - the farthest facilities are a 20 minute bus ride away!

The second key to maintaining an exercise routine is making exercise a social activity. In junior high, I played basketball at lunch and after school because my friends played basketball at lunch and after school. In high school, I used the weight room because my friends started using the weight room, and we competed to lift heavier and heavier weights. In university, I learned martial arts because I made very good friends in the martial arts club. At HKU, I plan to play badminton and basketball with my new friends regularly, and perhaps go swimming regularly too (if my attempts to learn are successful). Next semester, I plan to take tennis and golf lessons, and eventually, I'll learn how to play racquetball and other sports. There are a lot of one-time dance lessons, as well as regular dance lessons, and as my friend Vince pointed out, these are great places to meet girls. The girl:boy ratio at Tuesday's bellydancing class, for example, was about 5:1. I LIKE THOSE ODDS!


Since the year 2000, I've managed to do less and less exercise as I've made more and more excuses for myself. In Taipei, it was too hot. While doing my Masters, I was too busy. In Beijing, the air was too dirty. I can make excuses for myself now - Hong Kong is too hot, the air is too dirty, and I'm doing my bloody PhD! - but I really don't want to be a fat bastard anymore. The funny thing is that my last few girlfriends really didn't mind me being a bit round on the sides; in fact, every single one of them, as well as other girls, has endearingly described me as bear-like. Hmm.. am I sure that I want to exercise?

Belly dancing and library orientation

I went to a belly-dancing class today, part of a three-part on-campus series of dance demonstrations/lessons that include the flamenco, belly dance, and tango. Yes, there were a lot of pretty girls there. Fortunately, my badminton-related ass strain has disappeared, so I was ready to shake my booty. It was a lot of fun! I even got to wear a fabric with bells and coins sewn into it and got to shake my ass in front of the whole audience! There was a lot of moving my neck, shoulders, waist, hips, knees, and of course, my buttocks. I'll definitely go to the tango demonstration/lesson next Tuesday. It's too bad I missed flamenco last week; I was getting off a plane at the time.

And yes, I did talk to one of the pretty girls. I asked her if she went to the flamenco lesson the week before, and she rudely said, "no," then continued dancing. I think she misunderstood, thinking that I recognised her from last week and mistaking her for someone else. Oh well, you can't win them all.


I went my third library orientation session in a week. Why didn't I go to these when I was at UBC? Though most functions of the library catalogues are quite user-friendly and straightforward, there are a lot of advanced functions available, as well as some potentially confusing terms. Well, I finally know what a "boolean operator" is, and I learned the important skill of "truncation", or typing "immigra*" in order to search for terms such "immigrants" and "immigration" in one search. This type of course should really be required by UBC. I know such courses exist, but no one knows about them, and even fewer people TAKE them. I've found HKU to be better than UBC at disseminating information. Every HKU student is assigned an email address, and receives 10-20 emails per day announcing events, promotions, seminars, and other announcements. Each such event is usually announced at least three times: the first time a month in advance so that students could mark their calendars, and the second and third times as reminders.

Again, I think such library orientation sessions should be mandatory at all universities. When I was a teaching assistant at UBC, I noticed that some of my third and fourth year students didn't know how to use the most basic library catalogue, let alone the advanced journal article search functions. I'm not exaggerating when I say that some students attempted to graduate from university by reading, in four years, the same amount that I would normally read in one semester. Well, I flunked at least one barely literate student. Oops, I'm getting off-topic.

I'd like to start reading for fun again. Perhaps I'll start with some bestsellers. Jared Diamond's "Collapse" sounds interesting, as does Thomas L. Friedman's "The World Is Flat". I read the NY Times book review every weekend, so I'll keep an eye out for interesting new books and will pray that the HKU library will buy them, haha. Does anyone have any interesting fiction to recommend? Geez, I'm still 1/3 through "Les Miserables" and about 30 pages into "Crime and Punishment". Spare me the French and Russian novels, and anything Victorian.

My sore ass

In the last ten years, I've played badminton only twice: once in July 2004, and yesterday. Some very nice fellow residents at Graduate House invited me to play with them. I bought a racquet the day before, knowing that a lot of cute Chinese girls like to play badminton, and that I should get as much exercise as I can in my four years here.

Eight of us set out for the badminton courts, which are a fifteen minute walk from the main campus. I noticed that the Chinese students didn't stretch or do any warmups, apart from hitting shuttlecocks back and forth. Anyway, we played for about two hours. In short, I wasn't ALL bad, but at times, I really stunk. You can say that I had quite a few lucky shots, but I also missed an equal number of easy shots too.

I came back to my dorm to have a short nap, and by the time I woke up, I noticed that my right wrist and forearm were quite sore. When I woke up today, I noticed that my lower back was a bit sore. Perhaps I shouldn't have lowered my body and arched my back to take some of the lower shots that came my way. Oddly, my ass cheeks were also VERY sore, especially when walking up stairs. My buddy Trylon said that the gluteus maximus is a muscle that isn't really normally used during normal walking, but that it can be strained when making sudden starts and stops, which pretty much happens all the time during badminton.

I had no clue I could hurt my ass by playing badminton.

Arrogant Taiwanese bitch reporter

Check out what I read on this past Friday's Taipei Times:

"....meanwhile, musically conservative pop songs imported from China, such as "Mouse Loves Grains" (老鼠愛大米), have curiously become big hits in Taiwan. Aiming at the unexplored market for China's pop music, a local record company has remixed the top 10 online songs in China and grouped them for an album called "The Songs We Love" (我們愛的歌). Professionals in the industry have hailed the move as a new pattern for cross-strait musical exchanges, but local pop music lovers should worry that the influx of outdated melodies and lyrics will set the local music industry back 50 years."

Can you believe this arrogance?? Outdated melodies and lyrics? How cutting-edge can pop music be? I dare ANYONE to listen to any pop music from China and from Taiwan and tell me the difference. It's not a Coca Cola and Pepsi taste test (I can tell the bloody difference); I'm telling you, there's NO difference!

If Taiwan ever wants China to play nice when it comes to cross-Strait relations, making such insults isn't the way to do it. I encountered a lot of this kind of arrogance while living in Taiwan, which is one of the main reasons why I couldn't grow to love the place or the people.

A long and eventful day

Wow, it's been quite an eventful day. HKU's PGSA, the Postgraduate Students Association, organised a joint day-camp with Hong Kong Baptist University. I had to wake up at 730am on a Saturday to get onto the shuttle bus. We proceeded to HKBU, but the event got cancelled at the last minute because the weather bureau hoisted Typhoon Signal 3 (the scale is from 1 lowest to 10 highest), so we returned to HKU. Then, some of us went to Causeway Bay to "sing lunch K", which involves both lunch and karaoke. After that, I went to Ikea, where I had the worst Ikea hotdog ever, where the exact same stuff sells for one third the price in Beijing, and where, unlike all other Ikeas in Asian cities, there aren't very many babes. Then, I went to Wellcome, a supermarket, where I saw oranges on discount, but I didn't buy any since I didn't have a backpack. I did, however, buy a pack of limited edition lychee-flavoured condoms, which will expire in 2010. Wouldn't it be sad if they expire unused? After that, I called up an old classmate from UBC I've been meaning to see. Believe it or not, she was in the same neighbourhood, only 100m away from where I was standing! She's such a sweet and lovely ladylike girl. Unfortunately for her, she heard me rant and complain for a couple of hours, but at least we went to a very cute cafe that is famous for the dozen or so cats that wander around the joint. Before coming back to campus, she brought me to a racquet shop, where I bought an inexpensive badminton racquet for $65 HKD, about $10 CAD. I went back to campus, first to my office, and showed my new racquet to the Malaysian-Chinese guy in the office next door, and since Malaysian-Chinese are the world's best badminton players, I asked him what he thought of the racquet. "Cheap and flimsy," he said. I went back to my dorm to pick up a receipt, then to the Chong Yuet Ming canteen for char siew rice, then went all the way back to Causeway Bay to pick up my laptop computer, after which I went back to Wellcome to buy some of the discounted oranges I saw earlier. I returned to campus fiddled with my laptop and chatted with my friends online for a few hours. At around 2am, I noticed a damsel in distress - my friend, who lives a few floors below me, couldn't sleep, so I offered to lend her some of my pirated DVDs and to show her some of my photos. We ended up chatting until about 4am, which is when I finally went to sleep. Oh, I woke up at noon, and I'm typing this now.

It sucks to be born in 79

Perhaps I was born a year too early. It turns out that by enrolling in HKU this year, I've been screwed out of two things: an extra $500 HKD a month and a student "Octopus card".

Many, if not most (if not all) postgraduate students receive a generous "studentship" of $12,500 HKD a month. To be honest, the prospect of receiving $2000 CAD a month was one of the biggest draws of enrolling at HKU, and why I didn't bother applying for any Canadian universities (I didn't feel like living in the US, and as for Singapore, I don't think I can survive the 12 months of summer. Besides, I hear the scholarships offered to international students is usually less than half as much). Anyway, I've just discovered that the postgraduate studentship was worth $13,000 HKD a month last year, and $14,000 HKD a month three years ago. At this rate, there's a chance I may receive only $11,000 in my final year. I shouldn't complain. Getting $75 CAD less per month isn't going to kill me, and besides, the $12,500 HKD I pocket is more than what the vast majority of Hong Kong people earns.

What is an "Octopus card"? The Octopus is an electronic stored value card that eliminates the need to fumble for change when riding public transportation, buying meals at McDonalds and other fast food joints, and even buying things at convenience stores like 7-11. These cards are cool because you don't have to put them through any slots or even take them out of your purse/wallet - all you have to do is put your purse/wallet against the Octopus reader, then "doot", you've paid! Singapore, Taipei, and even Shanghai use similar cards now, but Hong Kong had it first.

In short, Octopus is GREAT! Well.. what's not great about it is that because you don't have to deal with cash anymore, you don't really get a sense of what you're spending, and can end up pissing a lot of money and not even know it.

Riding the MTR (subway) isn't that cheap in Hong Kong (when compared to Asian cities outside of Japan and Korea), especially if you cross Victoria Harbour. Fortunately for students, there is a student Octopus card that entitles users to a 50% discount on MTR fares. Unfortunately for me, I don't qualify for the student Octopus. Why? According to MTR and Octopus Cards Ltd. policy, students born before 1980 do not qualify. Why? I have no bloody clue.

Hey law students, lawyers, and judge(s), can I sue? Isn't this unfair? Isn't this considered age discrimination? Or are these corporations allowed to bargain and set such conditions? In any case, I'm PISSED!

No laptop for two weeks

The warranty for the laptop I bought 51 weeks ago will expire next week, so I figured it'd be a good idea for me to bring it in for some free servicing. There isn't really anything wrong with it, but I told them that it runs a bit more slowly than it used to, and that not all of the keys work anymore. Let's just hope that the grease monkeys at the service centre don't mess up my computer deliberately knowing that the next time I bring my computer in, I'll have to pay big bucks for repairs. I didn't really want to bring it in for that reason (and because I didn't want to give up my computer for 7-10 working days), but a friend of mine urged me to.

Not having a laptop means that I'm unable to use my computer in my bedroom. The first thing I do when I wake up is to turn on my computer, as is the last thing I do when I go to sleep. Well, the second, if you include me putting on and taking off my glasses. Fortunately, I have my own computer in my office. Unfortunately, HKU recently introduced energy saving policies in which air conditioning is shut off at 7pm Monday to Friday, at 12pm Saturdays, and is off on Sundays. If I turn on the air conditioning full-blast at 6pm, I can get the room cool enough to be comfortable until 8pm. I don't want to stay any later than that, at least not at this time of the year. I have to leave the office just before 11pm anyway; that's when the elevators and escalators on the way to my building are shut off.

Not having a computer in my room for just one day has revealed how much I have come to depend on instant messengers like MSN and ICQ. I feel like I depend on instant messengers to communicate with my friends. On the other hand, I consider this a good opportunity to do other things, e.g. exercise.

Oh yeah, there are four crappy public computers at my residence hall, but MSN Messenger isn't installed, so I assume we're not allowed to install it. Well, I'm trying now...

First the Straits Times, and now the New York Times..

Just yesterday, as I was browsing my daily NY Times news alert email, I clicked on an article by Op-Ed columnist Paul Krugman and was shocked to discover that the NY Times recently began to charge for columns by its top columnists. You may recall my grief in February when the Straits Times of Singapore began charging for online access; the South China Morning Post pulled this stunt four years ago. I fear that soon, I'll be stuck reading rags like the People's Daily and the National Post.

For the last few years, I've enjoyed and have been educated by fabulous columnists with names like Paul Krugman, Thomas L. Friedman, and Maureen Dowd. I'll especially miss Paul Krugman, whose ability to make extremely complicated economic matters sound so simple has inspired me to do the same in every academic paper I've ever written. I'll even miss Tommy Friedman, especially when he's not going on about how The World Is Round and talking about Lexuses and Olive Trees. Even though the guy is a bit too Jerry Maguire in trying to make up new catchphrases, I do like how he puts ideas together. Earlier this year, I nearly bust a gut laughing when I read a slate.com writer poke fun at Friedman's habit of peddling his books in his columns. As for Maureen Dowd, her criticism of W in the past five years has always been entertaining. Nicolas Kristof is good, especially when he writes about Africa and lately, Pakistan and Burma, but he seems less than partial when he writes about China. And even though I rarely agree with the likes of William Safire and Phillip Bowring (who's actually a contributor to the NY Times-owned International Herald Tribune), it's nice to hear their opinions, which not only influences a large portion of the American public and intellectual community, but also represents them.

Hmm.. I suppose I can find these columns through journal searches. Ah... that's the beauty of being a student again. I love school-subsidised suscriber services...

Haircut disaster

In my eleven days in Beijing, I got two haircuts. The haircut I got on the day I arrived was possibly the best haircut I ever got. If I ever get e-copies of the wedding photos, I'll let you see for yourself. Perfect length, perfectly even, great angles, and great texture. The haircut I got the day before I left, however, ranks up there as one of my worst haircuts ever (a friend took pictures, which I'll post as soon as I get them). The clown who cut my hair cut too much, making my hair look like a pyramid! Because he took too much off the sides, my head looks much bigger than it is.

I wonder why I still go to that hair salon. There are four hair stylists (all married heterosexual males) and six to ten attendants (all but two of them female) who wash and dry hair and give upper body massages. A haircut costs 15 yuan, but you can have your hair washed before and after the haircut AND a 30 minute upper body massage for only 5 yuan extra. Oh yeah, I tried tipping them, but they wouldn't take it! Anyway, of the four hair stylists, one is excellent, two are competent, and the other is mediocre. Guess who I got the day before I left. Since I got my hair cut every 2-3 weeks, every single hair stylist and attendant has touched my hair. As for the attendants, two of them give wonderful massages, while two others are TERRIBLE! I didn't know they were that capable of giving me pain. I guess some guys like it that way, though.

I suppose I don't have to worry too much about this terrible haircut. My hair grows extremely fast, so by the time my courses start in two weeks, my hair will be back to normal.

Joe, upload those damned photos, will you?

Back

Hey folks, I'm back from Beijing, a.k.a. Peking, Peiping, Yanjing, and Yuan Dadu. It's very cool up there now, chilly enough to need a light jacket at night. I understand I won't need to wear a light jacket until January in Hong Kong.

I think I miss Beijing less and less. It was very difficult for me to leave Beijing in June since I really enjoyed living there. Although Beijing can be considered a hostile and inhospitable environment to most, I quickly found some pleasures that made life in Beijing a bit more tolerable. I especially enjoyed riding my bike and buying very very cheap popsicles and pirated DVD's. Unfortunately, I have yet to find their equivalent(s) in Hong Kong, where most things are quite costly and where any mention of cycling is met with puzzled stares.

Anyway, my last three visits to Beijing in the last three months were not as enjoyable as the year I spent there. Compared to Hong Kong, Beijing is dirty, messy, crowded, congested, and noisy. There seems to be disagreement on the concept of the 'queue'; budging seems to be a national pastime. Even simple everyday events can be quite uncomfortable. Take riding public transit, for example. I'm almost never able to get a seat on buses in Beijing, whereas I've always been able to find seats on buses in Hong Kong. Most buses in Beijing are not air conditioned (and to make things worse, not everybody in northern China bathes daily!), whereas the vast majority of buses in Hong Kong ARE air-conditioned. Even short bus rides in Beijing can be quite exhausting. Well, at least I could still enjoy the bargains in Beijing - unfortunately, I have to take buses to FIND these bargains.

In a way, I'm a bit glad that I haven't been re-living the joy I've had during my year of living in Beijing - that way, I won't miss it as much, and I'll be forced to love Hong Kong by default.


As for the wedding, I didn't have to be best man after all. My friend asked his brother to be his best man. I'm so glad I didn't have to do any work or prepare a speech. I did give a brief speech, though. Anyway, the couple had an elaborate Chinese ceremony that few people in China have these days. I think this was done for the benefit of the caucasian groom and his family. The bride was carried in a covered sedan chair around the outer western wall of the Forbidden City, followed by a procession of family, relatives, and friends. The groom had to go through some rituals (there were too many spectators - NOT GUESTS - standing in front of me, so I can't actually describe any of them) before the bride got out of the sedan, and again before she uncovered her face. Nope, I don't have any pictures. I don't have a camera, remember? Anyway, this type of wedding is so rare these days that many local bystanders were wondering what the ceremony was all about.

Off to Beijing... again

Hola! Since my classes won't start until Oct. 15, I've decided to go to Beijing for a couple of weeks. Actually, I have to attend a classmate's wedding.. as best man. I'm not that anxious to go because this will be my third trip to Beijing in the three months since I left for good in June - why not go somewhere I've never visited before? Also, I've had a lot of expenses this month (e.g. rental deposit) and anticipate more settling-related expenditures (e.g. buying a refrigerator) and some one-time costs (e.g. signing up for swimming and tennis lessons).

I didn't expect my friend to ask me to be best man at his wedding. Actually, he chose me by default since he couldn't manage to get any of his friends from Canada to attend his Beijing ceremony. Actually, he asked me while I was still living in Beijing, and before I made the decision to come to Hong Kong. My friend Helen told me that I should only be best man three times in my life; any more than three times and I may be condemned to a lifetime of bachelorhood. I'd hate to tell some of my closest friends that I can't be their best man because I've filled my quota. Don't worry, Keith, I'll save one for you, but that's if you want me for the job. Still, this is the sort of request I can't bring myself to refuse. Besides, this guy and his fiancee were both very good to me during my year in Beijing, e.g. she invited me to her parents' home to celebrate Chinese New Year. But to be honest, the reason I don't feel too close to this couple, both of them former classmates, is because our friendship seems to be one with courtesy, but no sincerity. In other words, they say all the right things and do all the right things, but I still don't feel comfortable with them. I tell them what I think and how I feel 100% of the time, but they only seem to reveal their thoughts and feelings 25% of the time. Should I blame him for trying to be a gentleman and her for trying to be a lady? It goes without saying that they don't know about my blog and they don't receive my ranting emails. Hmm.. I guess I don't tell them 100% after all.

By the way, every single one of my friends in China has been unable to access this site there. I guess this means I won't be updating this site until I get back on the 20th. Don't click on links from anonymous comments; do a quick mouseover to see the URL, or right-click and look at "properties" first, if you choose to do so.

(8) ding ding! (8) Hong Kong's Tram - an inexpensive way to travel, if you're not in a hurry

One of the best transportation bargains you can still enjoy in Hong Kong is the Tram. The 101 year old tramway system, which runs along what was the northern shore of Hong Kong Island before land reclamation, costs only $2 HKD (30 cents CAD) to ride, regardless of distance travelled. A ride from west to east on the MTR costs $7.50 HKD, but takes only 25 minutes. An end-to-end ride on the Tram from Kennedy Town to Shau Kei Wan costs only $2, but takes 80 minutes.

The Tram, by the way, is a double-decker car that runs along a dual-track, and which runs on electricity. Passengers enter through two turnstiles at the back, and pay and leave at the front.

The Tram is quite an anachronistic sight in Hong Kong, arguably the most fast-paced and ultra-modern city in the world. After all, most people in Hong Kong always seem to be in a hurry, and many things in Hong Kong, from the design of MTR platforms at transfer stations to the construction of elevated walkways, and even the uniquely Hong Kong Cafe de Coral/Maxim's/Fairwood fast food reverse-cafeteria-style restaurants, facilitates this fast pace. The Tram, however, clicks and clacks along Asia's financial capital at its own pace.

Most passengers I see on the Tram are elderly Hong Kong residents and Filipino maids. These people really know how to pinch their pennies, and the elderly have the time to spare. People of all ages and socio-economic backgrounds do ride the Tram for short-distance rides, e.g. from Wan Chai to Causeway Bay. Occasionally, I even see people wearing suits ride the Tram.

In addition to being slow, the Tram is, unlike all of Hong Kong's buses, minibuses, and subway trains (but also like the Star Ferries), not air-conditioned. When stuck in traffic on a hot and humid day, this is not fun. And yes, Tram cars can get stuck in traffic. Although Tram cars have dedicated lanes, there can be heavy congestion at some intersections during rush hour. Also, I find it unfortunate that Kowloon does not have its Tram system. Then again, Hong Kong Island is a much more significant political, social, and commercial area than the Kowloon side.

Do ride the Tram if you visit Hong Kong. It's a slow ride, but a charming one. Make sure you go upstairs, and try to sit at the very front or very back.

*photo used WITHOUT permission

In pursuit of clean toilets

Oh wow! It's so exciting to read your comments! Come on! Don't be shy! Say hello! Tell me how crazy I am! Or agree with me and acknowledge how crazy the world really is!

It just occurred to me that after living here for more than one week, I still haven't done the most important thing that I have to do on campus. Well, I guess it's the most important thing if you don't count course registration, getting my student ID, and the REAL relevant stuff. What I'm getting at is finding clean places to take care of business, to pinch a loaf, to do a #2, etc.

I pride myself on being able to find the cleanest washrooms wherever I go. During my six years at UBC, I found the cleanest toilets on campus, including handicapped toilets in the Scarfe Building, Buchanan Block D, and the Liu Centre, as well as the toilet that the president of UBC uses at the Old Administration Building. While living in and travelling to Hong Kong, Taipei, and Beijing, I compiled a list of the more exceptional washrooms at Hong Kong's many five-star hotels, as well as some in Beijing and Taipei. I must say that Hong Kong in particular, especially in Admiralty, Central, and Tsimshatsui, has no shortage of clean toilets. In fact, some of the most ornate and decadent toilets I've ever used are in Hong Kong. I highly recommend the toilets on the first floor of The Peninsula, and also anywhere at the Island Shangri-La. I hear that there is even a toilet made of solid gold somewhere in Hong Kong. I wonder if my ass will ever touch that porcelain... er... gold.

Finding clean toilets involves a lot of hard work, and knowing when to use them takes brains. Would you, for example, want to use a toilet only to have to tip an attendant afterwards? You have to figure out whether or not there will be an attendant or cleaner there, or you have to figure out how to occupy the attendant so that you don't have to tip him/her. Some toilets are cleaned quite frequently, and it's a good idea to check the cleaning timesheet to see exactly when the toilets are cleaned. On the other hand, there are some isolated toilets that barely anyone knows about, let alone uses; however, less frequently used toilets are usually less frequently cleaned!

Perhaps the main reason why I haven't bothered to find clean toilets is because I live on campus and I can use the toilet in my dorm any time. However, once I start attending classes and spending more time in other areas on campus, I will want to know where the clean toilets are. Furthermore, I will definitely be reluctant to climb the hill back up to my dorm just to use the toilet. In any case, when or if I finally do figure out the best places to "take care of business" on campus, I certainly won't be telling YOU GUYS about them, at least not until after I graduate; after all, I don't want to find that these clean toilets are occupied at the times I need them the most!

My clothes hangers dilemma

There is still so much stuff I have to buy! I bought the most important necessity, toilet paper, but I do not dare spend on anything else. I find things to be quite expensive in Hong Kong, especially after living in Beijing. Actually, things aren't that expensive here compared to Canada, but I really can't bring myself to buy something that is exactly the same as in China (and in some cases, inferior to the stuff in China) but that costs double, triple, or even more here! Let's take laundry detergent, for example. The last time I was up there, I bought a 600 gram bag of Tide, which is pretty premium stuff, for 4.2 yuan. Down here, the no-name variety costs about $40 HKD a kilogram! Sigh.. Oh, and in case you don't know, the yuan and the HKD are worth more or less the same: $1 CAD = $6.5 HKD, and $1 CAD = 6.8 yuan.

There's a lot of stuff I still needs, such as a coffee mug, foot towel, paperclips, book ends, and clothes hangers. As for clothes hangers, they're not that expensive, but I just can't bring myself to pay $10 HKD for 5 plastic hangers. I've found some for $8 HKD, but I STILL don't want to pay up. It's not that they're that much cheaper in Beijing, but the thing is that I bought 20 hangers in Beijing and I find it silly that I have to buy them again a mere year later.
I just realised that this is the fourth time I've moved in the past five years. In each of my two stints in Taipei and my year in Beijing, I had to start from scratch and buy bedsheets, pillows, coffee mugs, kitchen utensils, etc. Unfortunately, I never had room in my suitcases to bring this stuff back, and therefore had to buy this stuff again the next time I moved. Every time I move, I find it painful to buy something I just bought the year before. It makes it harder when I realise that I have most of this stuff in Canada too.

Back to clothes hangers. Despite passing shops that sell clothes hangers on a daily basis, I've still resisted the temptation to buy them. I've told my friends in Hong Kong about my predicament, and one has agreed to help out. Agnes has a friend who works in a clothing shop that has recently switched from plastic clothes hangers to wooden ones. She has agreed to help me obtain about twenty clothes hangers, but I'll have to go to Yuen Long to get them. For those of you who don't know Hong Kong, HKU is at the southern extreme of Hong Kong, while Yuen Long is at the northern extreme of the New Territories. It costs approximately $50 HKD for me to get there and back, all to get about $40 HKD worth of clothes hangers. What's next? Will I spend $2000 HKD on airfare to Beijing to save a few dozen dollars on laundry detergent?

Possible disappointment

I'm afraid this site will not live up to its billing if I write posts like this one. Actually, most things have been going quite smoothly in Hong Kong.

I moved into my single room at Graduate House a week ago today. The room itself is on the 7th floor and has a sea view. I share my bathroom with my neighbour, a Canadian-born Chinese guy from Calgary who's doing a Masters degree in Journalism. So far, he seems okay. I was very worried about whether or not I'd get a neighbour who can aim for the bowl, and since he moved in two days ago, the bowl is still clean. It doesn't really matter anyway, since our rooms and the bathrooms are cleaned weekly.



Of course, I do have complaints about my dorm. First of all, it's at the very top of the HKU campus, which means that I have to climb about 150 steps from either gate of the main campus, IN ADDITION TO two elevator rides of four-storeys each. It goes without saying that I drip with sweat every time I come back up here. My other complaint about this dorm is that they have a "no visitors after 11pm" policy. We're grown adults, for Chrissakes! Fortunately, this policy isn't exactly strictly enforced. What boils my blood is that this is supposedly the only postgraduate dorm that has nightshift security guards. While I CAN have overnight guests, I can't let these guards see them. My third complaint is about some of my fellow residents: the majority of the 180 residents here are from China, and a lot of them are quite shy. Actually, I've always said that after people turn a certain age, there's no such thing as "shy"; it's called "rudeness". So far, about half of the Mainland Chinese residents I bump into the elevator and in the hallways totally ignore me. I know it's not because of B.O., at least not MY B.O., since I brought industrial-strength deodorant from Vancouver. Oh, one last complaint: there's a smoker on my floor, and I'm determined to find him/her and rat him/her out.

I've also been assigned an office at my department, the Centre of Asian Studies, which is located in one of the older buildings on campus. I share my office with a Masters student, a nice guy from Hong Kong. We each have a medium-sized desk; mine is a nice wooden one. My department even splurged and bought me a new desktop computer! I'm told that few other departments have such money. Oh, I met my supervisor for the first time today. What a sweet sweet guy.

The administrative staff at HKU have very professional attitudes and usually get things done in a very timely manner. My housing, student visa, student ID, library, and other issues were all resolved with minimal hassle and even rather friendly service. Sadly, I hear this standard of service is becoming increasingly rare in Hong Kong. Pay a visit to any bank, to the Immigration Department, and virtually any restaurant and you will see what I mean.

Okay, I guess I'll have to save my many complaints and criticisms for future posts. Maybe I shouldn't have put the words "krazy" or "kranky" in my post. Sigh...


Ken

At last, a blog!

Hello friends! I've finally decided to start a blog after years of making excuses for myself. My entries won't be as long as my epic emails. It's quite tiring to write such long emails, and I can't really fit some of my more minor complaints and shorter stories in them.

My blog will feature EVEN MORE complaining and critical observations. As in my emails, nothing will be beyond criticism, and nothing will be considered sacred. Hope I can keep you entertained!