a speech

The following is the speech that I was to give at today's "orientation for non-local postgraduate students". There was a last minute change in format, from speech to talk show-style, but I did manage to cover some of these points:


I wish you all a warm welcome to HKU. I myself was a non-local freshman 4 years ago.

By now, I’m sure you will have heard university officials tell you how excellent HKU is and heard university staff talk about the different services available here. I’m not here to talk about that stuff.

I have little doubt that all of you will succeed in your academic endeavours. I hope you’re all enthusiastic about what lies ahead of you, academically-speaking. But you must realise and remind yourself from time to time that you’re not here just to study. You must realise that you’re here to LIVE here as well. I know a few people who push themselves too hard or who have supervisors or profs who push them too hard and who seem to be prisoners in their labs, offices, or the libraries. While I applaud their dedication to their work, I doubt that it’s a pleasant way to live.

Having friends makes life a lot more pleasant. Ever since coming to HKU, I never stopped making friends. I made loads of friends at Graduate House, in the compulsory Graduate School classes, in language classes, in sports classes, and of course, through the PGSA. Girlfriends too, but I’ll get to that part later. And I got to know friends of friends who have since become pretty good friends of mine. You know what? You’ll never know who you’re going to meet. In the past few years, several of my friends here have gotten married to their classmates. Actually, they weren’t classmates. There’s a Law student who married a Dentistry guy, a girl from Dentistry who married a guy in Chinese Medicine, an Engineering guy who married a girl in Education. I think the lesson here is to avoid limiting your circle of friends to your department-mates. And that you won’t find love in your own department or faculty.

As for me, I’m still single. Hi ladies!

Actually, I loved and lost, and to tell you the truth, that was very rough for me. I thought that I met “the One”, but it just didn’t work out, and when things fell apart, they really fell apart. If it weren’t for the folks at CEDARS, I probably wouldn’t be able to be here. I don’t mean be HERE to talk to you. I mean ALIVE. If things get rough for you, don’t be afraid to seek help. These people know what they’re doing, and they really can help.

Moving on, I’d like to talk a bit more about life outside of the lab, office, and library. I hope you never feel bored at HKU. In fact, there’s lots to do here. Mark “September 4th” on your calendars. That’s when registration opens for courses at the “Institute of Human Performance”. The university has several sports centres where you can swim, play tennis, golf, squash, badminton, basketball, football... you name it. You can also take courses in things like yoga, kung fu, all kinds of dance, and Muay Thai. I’ve been especially fond of Muay Thai, or Thai boxing. I first took this course at the IHP 3.5 years ago and became HOOKED. But for the first 2 years, I only took the courses offered at HKU, which meant that I could only train once a week for 2 months, then stop for 2 months. In the past year and a half, I started to train at DEF Boxing in Sheung Wan once a week, year-round. In the past month, I’ve started to train at DEF 3 times a week. I might even compete sometime in the near future. So boxing, along with the badminton, plus the other sports I play from time to time, have been keeping me relatively sane and have been preventing my belly from getting any bigger than it already is.

If your professors ever tell you they think that you’re spending too much time playing sports, you should tell them that exercise energizes you and that it’s a valuable chance for you to see your friends. That is definitely the case for me now that I’m in my final year. The only time I get to see friends is when I’m playing sports. Almost nothing can keep me from playing badminton with my PGSA friends every Saturday night. You too can join us, if you want.

Ah, this brings me to my next point: challenge your professors. When I was an undergraduate and a Masters student at UBC, I was a straight A student. A, not A+. For years, I worked harder and harder, yet always failed to raise my grades from 85% to 90%, which is what you need to get an A+ over there. I later learned, from the A+ students, that to get an A+, you have to challenge your profs. I got A’s because I always answered the questions asked and did so by writing clearly and concisely. What the A+ students did was to challenge the profs’ interpretations and opinions, which they often give in the lectures, or perhaps in the choice of readings. As postgraduate students, especially PhD students, we should challenge some conventions and perhaps even be somewhat provocative. But it’s best to do it without being a jerk about it.

Okay, let’s change gears here and talk about Hong Kong for a bit. I encourage you all to get off campus once in a while. And I don’t mean to do grocery shopping. It’s easy to isolate yourself on campus. You can live in a dorm, eat at the canteens, spend most of your time at the library or your office or lab, and to occasionally go to the sports centres to play sports. But why would you deny yourself the chance to explore this wonderful city? I know.. this city can give you awful first impressions. For me, I was pretty damned impressed when I took the Airport Express from the airport to Central. But I was less than impressed when I stepped outdoors and entered the furnace. I wasn’t impressed when I stepped into a noodle shop and got yelled at.. by the server! I wasn’t impressed when I asked an old lady for directions.. and she SHOOK HER HEAD AND KEPT WALKING! Yeah, it can be discouraging. But you know what? When the weather gets cooler, after you learn a few phrases of Cantonese, after you’ve met some local friends who’ll recommend what to eat and where to eat it, you can have a great time exploring the city. It’s a very clean and extremely safe city and there’s so much to see. And not just the touristy stuff. Just 3 days ago, I decided to go on a jog late at night. I ended up exploring an area just 2 km from this very spot and saw some pretty cool things I never even knew about. Like a cemetery. A big one.

Another thing about Hong Kong is that you can get by with relative ease by speaking either English or Mandarin. Why learn Cantonese? Well, you may not NEED to learn Cantonese, and you may not WANT to learn Cantonese, but here’s why you SHOULD: do you REALLY want to tell people that you’ve lived in Hong Kong for 1-4 years and you can’t even speak a single phrase of Cantonese? Believe me, it’d reflect very badly on you. Don’t worry about how bad you might sound. Worry more about how sincere or insincere you’d appear.

One final thing before I shut up: I hope that whether you’re only here at HKU for 1 year or if you’re here for 4 years or more, that you will leave HKU a richer person. I don’t mean financially. That’d be impossible. I mean I hope that being a student at HKU will be an enriching experience for you, and that you will graduate a better person.

Thank you, and do have a wonderful time at this lovely university and this wonderful city.

A "satisfying" jog

Last night, I decided to go for a jog. Though I’m not fond of jogging, it was surprisingly fun and satisfying.

I only intended to run for around 20-30 minutes, from St. John’s College to Queen Mary Hospital (1.6 km away) and back, but things didn’t go as planned. As I reached the hospital, I found myself running down Bisney Rd., all the way down to Victoria Rd. Before long, I discovered that I was all alone, running along a road that cuts through the Chinese Christian Cemetery – needless to say, I ran a bit faster. I started to worry when I saw road signs that said “Cyberport” and “Aberdeen”, places that are considerable distances away from home. I didn’t bring anything, not my phone, cash, or even my Octopus card, so I would’ve been in serious trouble if I were to have cramped up or gotten lost and needed to take a bus or taxi home. After running along Victoria Rd., I passed the West Island School, giving me some idea of where I was. I also passed ritzy waterfront condos as I rounded the base of Mt. Davis before being greeted, with great relief, by the familiar sights of Kennedy Town. It was the first time I ever passed through Kennedy Town with absolutely no cash, which meant that I couldn’t buy any tasty snacks or drinks, so I took a leisurely-but-tantalizing stroll down Victoria Rd./Belcher’s Street and up Smithfield Rd. and Pokfield Rd. back to St. John’s. According to Google Maps, I ran 7 km, and it took me 1 hr.

The run was surprisingly pleasant and relatively pain-free. I didn’t expect it to go as smoothly as it did, since I used to get shin splints after 20-30 minutes and used to feel soreness in my knees after 30-40 minutes. And this was 5-10 years ago, when I weighed 20-40 lbs less than I weigh these days. Even at midnight, it was damned hot, probably around 30 degrees Celsius, so as expected, I sweated A LOT. I sweated so much that I stopped, took off my t-shirt, and wrung out a huge puddle of sweat, probably more than 1 litre of it. That felt surprisingly satisfying, to tell you the truth.

I actually like the sensation of soreness after any kind of workout. It’s actually very satisfying, even when slightly painful. But I’m a bit worried about tonight’s Muay Thai class. The Wednesday night crowd is usually a lot more serious than the Sunday afternoon crowd, and I’m often paired with gung ho white guys who like to go all out, so it’d be quite embarrassing if I’m upstaged by a newcomer or an inferior fighter. Even though I’ll probably suffer such consequences in the short-term, I’m going to try to make it a habit to jog so that I can shed some weight, burn some fat, and improve my stamina. Perhaps I’ll even be able to participate in next year’s St. John’s College “Round the Island” event, which is an overnight 38 km run around Hong Kong Island.

PS: I think it’s about time I invest in a thesaurus. I read over what I just wrote and noticed that I used the word “satisfying” way too many times.

The hottest day of the year (so far)

It turns out that last Sunday was the hottest day in Hong Kong (so far). Unfortunately, the air conditioning in my dorm room wasn't working very well, and my room was sweltering at 28 degrees C even though the a/c was set to the coolest setting. I sweat a lot, and my t-shirts get soaked very easily. If my t-shirts become more than 80% soaked, my shorts and underwear will get wet too, and wet underwear makes me want to piss my pants. Sunday was not a pleasant day. Here's a quick rundown of the day:

1:30pm, dorm room, St. John's College - I put on a blue HKU PGSA polo shirt

1:40pm, laundry room, St. John's College - the polo shirt got 70% soaked after only 6 minutes in the un-air conditioned laundry room. I took it off and hung it on the back of my chair for about 45 minutes, then put it on again when I put my clothes in the dryer

2:45pm, dorm room, St. John's College - I put on a light brown polo shirt with blue horizontal stripes, then entertained a visitor, feeding her bananas, coffee, wasabi peas, and cookies. It was surprisingly fun to watch a cute, skinny girl eat

3:00pm, dorm room, St. John's College - after fetching my laundry and baking in my room, the second polo shirt was 80% soaked. My visitor was very nice - even if she DID mind that my t-shirt was soaking wet, she didn't show it, and therefore didn't make me feel any more uncomfortable than I already was

3:10pm, dorm room, St. John's College - I put on a black "Jack Wolfskin" t-shirt and soaked it 20% or so while fetching my laundry

3:20pm, Pokfulam Road - sent off my guest and waited for a bus to Sheung Wan; the black t-shirt got 50% soaked during the 6 minutes of waiting

3:55pm, DEF Boxing, Sheung Wan - I changed into my Muay Thai shorts and t-shirt #1, a navy blue t-shirt from Giordano. The black Jack Wolfskin t-shirt was 70% wet when I changed out of it. Pre-workout weight: 225 lbs

4:30pm, DEF Boxing, Sheung Wan - after warming up, skipping rope, jumping around, and some warm-up drills, my t-shirt got 80% soaked. I changed into t-shirt #2, my "Pacman" t-shirt

4:50pm, DEF Boxing, Sheung Wan - after 20 minutes of bag-work and pad-work, it was time to change into t-shirt #3, my "fast food" t-shirt

5:30pm, DEF Boxing, Sheung Wan - after some one-on-one striking and blocking drills, it was time to change into t-shirt #4, a black t-shirt from Giordano

6:10pm, DEF Boxing, Sheung Wan - after soaking t-shirt #4 with a few rounds of sparring, I hit the showers and changed into a navy blue polo shirt. I soaked this polo shirt 30% during the 10 minute walk in 35 degrees C weather (and this was after sunset) to the barber shop. Oh yes, post-workout weight: 218 lbs

9:00pm, dorm room, St. John's College - I got back home after my haircut and some grocery shopping. The blue polo shirt was 80% wet when I took it off. Carrying a dozen pounds of groceries, as well as 5 wet t-shirts in my backpack, uphill from the bus terminal to St. John's didn't help. After taking another shower, I changed into a tan polo shirt with blue horizontal stripes right before heading out for an interview for my thesis work

11:45pm, dorm room, St. John's College - got back from my interview and took a third shower


So there you have it. One hot day, 8 different shirts, and 3 showers. At least I didn't piss my pants. I can't wait till the 4-6 week long winter arrives, even though it feels like Vancouver in late October, only drier. Today (Wednesday) wasn't quite as hot, but I still went through 7 t-shirts after 2 separate boxing workouts and a thunderstorm.