BA Language Studies Summer Camp Highlights: a Photojournal (click to enlarge)

 Ma Wan Training Camp

Hahaha I got all soaked!!!!!

Hoi Ha Marina Park (protected by WWF)

Fishing for plankton.  Learning about sea life and environmental protection.

Examining plankton through microscope.

Secret Base for Environmental Protection-- :P

Glass bottom boat: a search for corals



Daya Bay Nuclear Plant in Shenzhen (usually a restricted area)

The nuclear plants x2

Nuclear Plant uses sea water for its cooling system:
the white foamy water is dead plankton life and sea water

Jewish Synagogue and Islam Mosque: Local Religious Santuaries



Torahs encased in beautiful cases

Islam Mosque in Tsim Sha Tsui: surprisingly big inside

Must be barefoot to go in!

Brushing Values

The Forbes List of HK Educational Institutions:
http://www.education18.com/index.php

It's all about ranking.

My friend graduated from a non-HKU institution and works in the same tutoring school as an HKU graduate.  Every time the boss tries to persuade a client to send their child to this tutoring school, he mentions that "we have a HKU graduate among our staff.  Here she is."  The HKU graduate is treated with every bit of respect while the non-HKU graduate is treated like trash.  The boss' wife once said something along the lines of "Oh if it's not necessary, you don't have to come out because it doesn't look good to our clients."  However, the boss and the wife overlooked one major problem.  The HKU graduate did not necessarily possess better qualifications.  She was once asked to take over a primary English tutoring class and do a dictation with the kids.  She had to ask the non-HKU graduate how to pronounce very basic words like "basement"...

My other friend went for an interview at a Macys Merchandising Group overseas office in Hong Kong.  The interviewer asked, "Which university did you go to?  Oh... York University.  Well, I went to University of Toronto."  Then she asked, "Have you been to New York?"  My friend answered "yes."  The interviewer asked again, "I see, did you go to Macy's?"  My friend pondered, wondering what to say, because she really hasn't been to Macy's.  She decided to be honest and answered "no."  Here's the interviewer's punch line:  "If you haven't been to Macy's, you haven't been to New York."

Maybe Toronto should consider putting "Toronto" in the beginning of all their post-secondary institution names, like "Toronto York University," or "Toronto Ryerson University," or "Toronto Brock University?"  What about "Ontario?"  That sounds even bigger.  "Ontario Waterloo University," "Ontario Queens University..."  What about "Ontario University of Information Technology?"  What about using "the" to emphasize its uniqueness and singularity?  "THE Toronto / Ontario [fill in the blank] University"?

Many people overlook the important things that actually matter in life.  Then again, what matters depends on the person, situation, and social norms.  How can we transcend such factors and see the essentials of life for what they are?  But then how can we say one value is more important than the other?  Where is the bar or the cut off?  Tolerance is good, but when do we say no? 

My dorm mate got caught in the rain two weeks ago.  I just happened to come by and so I shared an umbrella with her.  She said I was very nice because she wouldn't have shared an umbrella with anyone, "my umbrella is only for UV protection, not for the rain."  She then asked me, "Aren't you concerned about the UV oil protective layer being washed off by such heavy rain?"  I'm thinking "whaaaat, why are you concerned about things that happen in the far far future when you need this apparatus to get through the now?  not to mention that it can be replaced easily..."  So I just replied with "it's okay, I bought this umbrella for the rain."

To be fair... the UV oil protective layer was probably more important than some petty thunderstorm to her.

Canada Day



Sign: the government is useless,
we are in big trouble (big walk is a pun)

Canada Day is coincidentially the transfer of sovereignty from United Kingdom to the PRC in Hong Kong.  In Canada, I would have gotten together with a bunch of friends, had some drinks, and played with some fireworks to celebrate the national holiday.  Maybe buy a Canada Day hat too, who knows. It is a day to be merry. 

July 1st here is a day to be sad, angry, and disappointed.  It is a day to stay indoors if you are not politically active and ready to be arrested.  While I saw banners of "七一遊行" (July 1 march) on every street corner, I did not expect 50,000 people to actually protest.  (I foolishly thought that it was going to be a parade to celebrate the handover.)  People seem to protest whenever some important date comes up because of media exposure. 

Here's one of the issues they are protesting about: letting mainland Chinese women give birth in HK.  Some protest against because they will be taking away Hong Kongnese benefits.  Some protest against restricting the amount of mainland Chinese women to give birth in HK because their wives are from the mainland.  (The important thing to note here is that there is no "arguing for" beacuse the government is always wrong.  There seems to be an unsaid rule to "protest against"  at all times.)  This means that there are opposing factions within the protest.  Getting your voice heard or making a convincing demand is somewhat difficult...  and it might not be because the government isn't paying attention.

June 4th (Tianamen Square Massacre) was not an exception.  It wasn't just a memoir of the dead in Victoria Park, or reflecting upon what happened and hopefully not repeat the tragic history.  I went to this one, lit a candle for the dead and left.  The rest was propaganda to revolt against the government, all governments-- PRC and HK alike.  Then there was some kind of demonstration and conflict between protesters and police.  Thank goodness I got out of there early for dinner... 

Recommended Readings

I will never underestimate the recommended readings on my course syllabus ever again.  Not only has the professor taken the time to read all of them, but some underling also read all of them to pick out the juicy parts that students may need.  I am doing such work now for a new course that is coming out at the institution called Catering for Learner Diversity in English Language Teaching.  It is a 5-week professional development program for secondary teachers of English.

Hitting Two Birds with One Stone: The definition of beautiful where you are; Something that touched your heart

Normal day at the office today.  I usually don't eat proper breakfasts anymore because work starts early in the morning.  If I am doing field work, I only eat lunch and dinner.  If I'm in the office, I bring a fruit to munch, have lunch, and dinner.  Not really a good idea rationally speaking but it's my little comfort that I'm not eating three fattening meals.  See.  Linda Chung works, and it's not something I can keep myself from thinking about.  The media is powerful and we should be highly critical of it.  With that said, I have totally succumbed to the general concept of beauty portrayed in the media.  It's hard to keep up a healthy image of yourself "as is" if the media denies it, if your peers deny it, if your family denies it, and if the whole society denies it.

The West has influenced the Asian concept of female beauty in very unfortunate ways.  You cannot ever be beautiful until you are pale and tall, or until you have large busts.  I say "or" because large busts can accentuate your waist (but your waist should preferably only have skin wrapped around your bones).  You must be the ultimate human Barbie, if not naturally then artificially. 

There are tons of products to choose from in beauty shops like Sasa, Bonjour, and Colourmix, to help you achieve this notion of beauty.  They are all set up to cater towards female consumption.  Skin too oily?  too dry?  too DARK?  This cream.  Add some powder.  Don't need to test whether it matches your skin tone, just use the lightest one.  Then add some blush.  Now you need to "put your eyes, ears, mouth, and nose back on"  (there's actually a Cantonese phrase for this) with mascara, eye liner, lipstick, eye shadow...  Sometimes I wonder how someone can still make an expression with all this powder caked on their faces.

As Dr. Aaron Koh said to the BA (language studies) students during a summer camp talk, "Ads make us feel like there's something missing in our lives, that our lives are not complete until we buy a particular product."  Most professors at York Fine Arts bring up "purpose and intent of media and art" on a daily basis and I was really glad to hear that people are also looking at what ads do to us in Hong Kong.  If you think you're bombarded by the media in North America, think again.  This is way more intense.  It gets to the point where you can't even have a moment of silence to yourself to reflect upon your day.  It's amazingly hard for me to sit down and blog.  I get a thought and the next second it's gone from my brain because something (usually on a screen) has distracted me.  Can't imagine having to study or research in this environment...

Anyway, I brought two US peaches into the office today for munching.  I really miss the assorted berries, nectarines, peaches, plums sold in Canada during the summer.  Strawberries are like luxury products here.  While I was washing the peach in the pantry, a cleaning lady walked up to me,

"is that a peach?" 
- yes
"did you eat anything before this?"
- no
"you can't eat the peach without something in your stomach, it will give you a stomach ache!"
- really? I didn't know...
"you need to eat something, like biscuits."
- oh... I'll go buy some downstairs then.  Thanks.
"nothing in your office?"
- no
"okay wait, I'll go get some for you"
- thank you!!

She went away and came back quickly with two packets of biscuits :)  So nicee...!  I'm  not entirely sure whether eating a peach on an empty stomach will give me a stomach ache, but I certainly don't want to take that chance. 

My tummy's like a bunny's,
breakable like glass,
can only take grass,
or acid will burn
and blood will return
opening the wound again would really suck.

There was also a man who shared an umbrella with me when I was caught in pouring rain, but I'll tell you that story another time.

Tech Universe in HK Science Park

On June 14, 2011, we went to the Tech Universe in the Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks for the first BA (language studies) summer camp outing.  I always pass by this place on the KCR because it's between Tai Po Market Station and University Station, so I was really looking forward to visiting.  Here is what it looks like from inside one of the buildings:

The whole facility is 225 000 square meters or something.  Had to check that stat because I obviously wasn't paying attention to the corporate video they showed us at the time.  It was propaganda overload for the full duration.  Here is the link: http://www.hkstp.org/HKSTPC/en_html/en_corporateVideo.jsp  You have been warned.  I am still unsure of what this facility does..  something about providing scientists with the technology, facility, and space to create new entrepreneurial inventions, so they can sell it and somehow support Hong Kong's development into a technological hub of the world and global prosperity?  Their overuse of buzz words actually confused all of our staffs and students.  Terms are always used too vaguely.  Needless to say, the visit was a disappointment... Our students were so upset they complained to the camp administrators. 

I personally thought the two showroom were quite nice, but our students thought the toys innovations were too childish for university students to play with for 2 hours.  Anyway, below are some of the highlights of the Innonest and Funnest.

Concentration... Are you ready?  If so, let's go!  Zero zero one one, one one zero zero....

Description: Here is a machine that can measure your level of concentration.  You have to wear this headphone-looking headgear and somehow it measures your brainwaves.  When you concetrate hard enough, a dynamite on the screen in front of you will blow up.  The one who makes the dynamite blow up the fastest wins. 

Review:  It doesn't work on everyone.  It didn't work when I put it on.  Does that mean I have no brain... :(  I was seriously concerned for a while there.  The people who could be measured did not exactly know when they are concentrating and when they are not.  Results seem to be random, since nobody was there to explain the science behind the machine.  Some students said it seems to measure brain activity, not concentration.  Not sure how someone can use this in a real life scenario though.  Can you imagine "measuring" some kid's "level of concentration" as a substitute for an exam?

Musical Cubes

Description:  Musical Cubes!  Get the cubes from the white box and place them (strategically or not) on a square on the floor.  A sound will begin to play and loop unti you take the box off the square carpet. 

Review: Awesome fun!! Now even your toddler can be a professional DJ / mixer.  (S)he just has to be able to lift those cubes up.  They are pretty heavy.  This is great for people who just like to chill and sprawl out with some drinks.  Turn the sound level up to dance.  Start kicking blocks if you're throwing a wild party.  You can even sit on the blocks.  I see endless possibilities for this and I'd actually install it in my home if it was available.

"Sustainable" dance floor (?)

Description:  "Sustainable" dance floor.  There's this bar beside it that lights up if you jump on the dance floor long enough.

Review: I'm not really sure how it works, and whether I was doing it right or not.  The bar lit up at random intervals.

3D Image Decoder

Description:  There are boards with these black and white patterns.  The screen in front of the students (not captured in this picture) reflects your image and shows you a 3D image on top of the card.  It's like watching a horror movie when you see a vampire in the mirror but nothing beside you.

Review:  Pretty interesting, but loses its appeal after 3 seconds beacuse our IPhones can already scan codes and download something instantaeously.  Showing it 3D is just half a notch up from our existing technology.


Go again?Yes, to visit the WHOLE park, not just the Innonest and Funnest.  I wish they showed us how they created "innovative designs and technology."  That would be more educational and engaging for both students and staff.

Food, glorious food!

Omgosh I got so fat in the lower abdomen area. 

Not only does the media here keep telling me with their Linda Chung ads that I'm super fat, but binging on the awesome cakes from Italian Tomato, curry fishballs from street vendors, and milktea (with sweatened condensed milk) from the Tai Po Cooked Food Market is not helping.

Muuuust lose weight to eat more!

Anyway back to Italian Tomato.  So far I have tried Mousse au Chocolat, Tiramisu, and Renoir.

Mousse au Chocolat has a rich creamy cocoa taste and fragrance.  The mousse is balanced with three thin layers of chocolate cake.  The rim of the cake is surrounded by a layer of silky chocolate truffle.  Cocoa powder covers the entire surface.  How could anyone resist!?

I must say that the Tiramisu was a total disappointment (it's usually a hit).  It didn't have enough moisture and tasted like any other ordinary cake.  It had no character of its own and was lacking the key element of a Tiramisu: sweet coffee!  The bottom cake level should have been soaked in sweet coffee to give it a complex texture and taste.  Yes the cake cannot be soaked for too long, and yes it is a challenge to keep it in the fridge to sell for the whole day (because the cake will collapse if you soak it too much), but that is the challenge and the highlight of a Tiramisu!!

The Renoir wasn't bad.  Renoir is just a fancy name for cappuccino cake.  I think it was generally a good piece of work, but it must be eaten first.  Everything just falls flat after Mousse au Chocolat.  To be honest I don't remember much of what it tasted like...  I just love the little walnut they put on the top though.

Language Partner

Going to backtrack a little.  Okay, a lot.  This isn't part of the internship... but it's making me see how many things in the world are connected.

On May 28, Trish came to HKIEd to do an orientation for students going to York University in the fall term of 2012.  It is part of their teaching program to do an exchange and they get a choice between going to Canada and England (lucky!).  I was a language partner for the last cohort in the winter term of 2011, and I was coincidentally in HK, so I joined the orientation and talked about the experience a little bit.  Not much of an expressive person unless I'm angry (and I definitely wasn't angry) so not sure if I actually helped any.  Hopefully just being there, smiling, helped to reinforce how Canadians are welcoming and friendly.  The best part of the day was going to a Shanghainese dinner at Tsim Sha Tsui with Trish and the HKIEd students I met last term! 

The reunion was interesting.  I was used to being the one doing the show-and-tell in Canada, but our roles had instantaneously reversed in Hong Kong.  All of a sudden, they were telling me about things I must do and places I must go to.  It was all very exciting.  Being a language partner at York, I had to speak to them in English to increase their language proficiency.  Since I'm off the job now, I spoke to them in the language they preferred (that being Cantonese).  Many of them found it both funny and strange to hear their own language coming out of my mouth even though they know fully well that I can speak Cantonese.


All of us at dinner!

Trish, IEd students and me at the MTR station before saying goodbye

Something I Now Appreciate that I Didn't Before

Went to do some shopping in Mongkok and Dong Men (mainland) in the weekend.  There were so many people and everyone was in a rush.  It was borderline chaotic.  I had to become a total jerk just to make my way through the crowd.  Tricks include: acting like a crab and jutting your elbows out, put your fists in front of your chest to prevent someone from shoving their bodies/accessories/other items onto your sensitive parts.  I would've grown some quills or needles if I could but this is all I could do...

There's an incredible work culture that propels people to get to work Monday-Friday.  It really doesn't help that everyone's financial burdens are piling up because of the currency rate.  The price of goods and services are going up rapidly, but pay is staying the same.  Inflation is bound to happen.  We must thank the US for this.  The hours are long (imagine a primary school teacher working until 7pm), work is tedious, and locals only get to relax on weekends.  People usually go to malls because they are air conditioned.  It's too hot to go anywhere else!  Malls are mostly empty on weekdays and crammed with people on weekends.  On Sundays, Filipino domestic workers get a break and hang around the busiest locations like Admiralty, Central, Shatin, and Tsim Sha Tsui. The approx. 6 million people swarming together makes me panic even though I'm not claustrophobic and I get a really bad acid burn in my stomach thinking about it.  I miss the large open spaces in Toronto where I can keep people at a 1m distance from me simply by stepping backwards. 

I find it really strange that  (generally speaking) nobody enjoys their work because it is not meaningful to them.  Most find it a drag and hope to score big bucks at the Jockey Club, which, by the way, funds a lot of education, art, and recreation-related projects in Hong Kong: Jockey Club Primary School ($92.74 million, HKIEd),  Jockey Club Creative Arts Centre ($94.4 million, Shek Kip Mei), Jockey Club Government Secondary School (Kowloon Tong), Jockey Club Auditorium ($66.26 million, HK Polytechnic University), Jockey Club Ti-I College ($84 million, Shatin) and Jockey Club Amphitheatre ($56 million, HK Academy for Performing Arts).  This is one of the only places I actually would say, "KEEP GAMBLING, FOLKS."

note: more info about Jockey Club here.

Rainy Day

I woke up at 2am last night.  Thought my eyes weren't adjusting properly to the dark because something was flashing.  I looked out the window and the sky was grey instead of black. 

"Strange," I thought, "a light show at HKIEd?" 

"Nope," roared the thunderstorm in a booming rumble.

I could've been dreaming. 

But I'm pretty sure it happened because I woke up this morning to a war zone.  HKIEd is on a mountain and the sound of thunder reverberates like crazy.  The mountains were smoking because of the rain.  Imagine Spirited Away, then imagine a mountain god in a spa smoking a pipe... That's what it looked like.  Simply breathtaking.

Assigned Blog Topics

So I actually have blogging assignments to complete once every two weeks (pretty behind on those).  There is a list of topics we need to choose from.  For my easy access and for your information, I have decided to post it up here.

1) Something that touched your heart
2) Something you now appreciate that you didn't before
3) A lesson learned
4) What you value
5) The definition of beautiful where you are
6) A moment you will always remember
7) See yourself through someone else's eyes
8) Best meal of the summer
9) Movement
10) Turning point

Making Connections

I didn't really blog about my internship at all so I thought it would be important to mention what I have been doing for a month.  Wow it's already been a month!!  Time sure flies.

As Natasha and Larissa mentioned to me before, it is indeed a dynamic internship.  I basically do anything associated with English.  It involves a huge range of things that I never thought would be related to what I already know how to do.  The exposure has opened up many new possibilities for me.  So far, I have transcribed English interviews and organized research material for my host contact.  I have given talks about Canadian culture (really hard to define us by the way) and the Canadian education system in a local secondary school.  I am currently helping a NET (Native English Teacher) in a primary school with language instruction, reading, writing, and preparing for an English drama for multicultural day.   I am also helping with the BA language studies summer camp at IEd, where I have to converse with students in English to train their language proficiency.  These duties will probably take me up to the beginning of July.  Not sure what mid-late July and August will be all about yet, but probably more exciting and hard work. 

I'm really enjoying it so far: meeting lots of people, gaining new experiences, getting together with old friends and family, seeing what they are up to... It's funny how it doesn't feel like I am learning much new material though.  It probably sounds like I am wasting my time here but do let me clarify before you get ahead of me.  I went through my life basically picking up bits and pieces of knowledge, experiences, and ideas that virtually made no sense.  Everything seemed to be "just the way it is" just because.  This internship is helping me to bridge the gaps, make connections, and finally give me a sense of clarity of these disjointed segments.  It's giving me a similar feeling to the one described in The Five People You Meet in Heaven.

Although it's probably not something someone pays you to do ($3000 CAD from York), and not a target learning objective of an internship, I learned a lot about my family and why they behave the way they do.  Here is an example.  I was always puzzled at why my dad dumps a huge meal into his stomach and "finishes" within five minutes.  He rushes me and conflict ensues until disastrous ending results.  It's just typical.  But now I am seeing the reasons behind it. 

He grew up in Hong Kong.

Yes.

that is the reason.  the end.

I am working at the primary school now, and I get about 45 minutes for lunch from 12:30-1:15.  After tidying up the classroom, following the NET around for preparations, lesson follow-ups, and discussions, I get about 30 minutes.  Since the primary school has 7 floors, by the time you get to G, out to the canteen, you get about 25 minutes.  Wonderful.  Line up to order at the canteen, line up to get your food, 15 minutes left. 

Prett much feels like this every lunch.  It's the Dragon Boat Festival in Tai O on June 6.

Ready?  Set?  Go!  Eat!! eAT!! EAT!!!  Yum.  Not really.  Didn't taste much at all.  Whatever, get out now.  Love to be there 5 minutes before class starts, but no can do.  Walking up the stairs take longer too.  1:15-- huff huff puff....

I knew my dad was from Hong Kong, and I knew he dumped food into his stomach.  Now I know why.

Octopus Card

I love the Octopus card.  It makes everything easily accessible.  You can pay your transit fares with it or even pay for your meals with it.  It’s basically a card that you can put money in and pay for anything with one convenient touch.  Sounds great right?  Did you know the system/concept was designed/invented by a Canadian?  Ironically, we don’t reap the benefits of our creation at all.

Before I left Toronto, I saw Rogers proudly advertising their great advancement in phone technology.  You can now use the phone underground on the TTC.  Wow, big deal.  Is this seriously your idea of a new technology?  Most countries build their transit systems with the problem of reception in mind and put a receiver inside the tunnel.  I get so frustrated talking about this.  How far behind are we?  I keep complaining when I am taking the TTC, “back in the day, we already had the octopus card in HK, blah blah.”  Ten or so years later, I am still complaining.  In my current trip, I am seeing such a quick growth spurt in the Hong Kong landscape and transit lines.  They have built about five new transit lines in the past five years.  TTC is trying to build one in five years, and we are not sure if they can finish on schedule.

A Bright Future

So I had the pleasure of meeting a doctor last Wednesday.  Not as a student, but as a patient.  When I got to the clinic, there was already a long line up.  I had to wait over 1 hour to see my source of relief.  My sore throat was killing me and my dripping nose was like a leaking faucet threatening to flood the country.  Anyway I finally got to see the doc.  He and I had the usual conversation that most people engage in when they make this trip. 

Hello, what's wrong?
-Sore throat, dripping nose, no headache, a little cough.
When did it start?
-Today.
I see, say "aah."
-Aah.
It's really swollen.  I'll give you some antibiotics.  What about that nose?
-When I tilt forward, it drips.
Hm.  Okay, antibiotics.
-Thank you.

Common scenario, except for the antibiotics.  While Canadians stress over taking antibiotics, this Hong Kongese doctor had no problem dishing them out by the dozens, probably to every patient.  I thought antibiotics were for serious cases, but it seems to be quite common to take them here. 

After the visit to the doctor, you proceed to the pharmacy, which is located right inside the clinic! The setup is quite ingenious.  The walk is about two second, unlike the great distance that we Canadians have to travel after we see a professional for our ailments just to get one bottle of cough syrup.  The fee of $205 includes:

The doc really listened to all my "this this hurts help," and gave me pills for EACH individual problem. There are meds of all kinds: cough syrup, lozenges (cough drops, yes they provide cough drops can you believe it? yay!), pills labeled "nose, at bedtime," pills that says "nose, may feel drowsy," pills "for pain and fever," and "Bright future" pills-- I mean antibiotics.

As the local saying goes (with my poor translation), "I have time to die but no time to get sick."  Everyone wants to get better quicker, but it seems that Hong Kongeses takes this concept extremely seriously, kicking it up a few notches in its practical implications.  This means antibiotics.  Whatever happened to taking a day off?  Well although you are totally allowed to take sick days, most people don’t.  There are too much to do, too much pressure to do them all, and too little time to do them.  Taking a day off means lagging behind.  And nobody wants to lag behind, because you would then have to make up for that by working double the pace the next day.  Your life revolves around your work, and your work is your life.  I am not sure if it’s a meaningful existence or simply a struggle to stay afloat.

Hostel

After completing towering piles of paperwork and going through arduous administrative processes, my contact has secured the hostel accommodation for me right at HKIEd! Hurrah! I have been living there from May 25. I have not posted anything yet because I did not have a camera for a picture until now, and I believe it is imperative that you actually see it to understand the relief that I am feeling right now. I have been living in my uncle/aunt/cousin's apartment suite from May 17 (the day I arrived). There are about 8 people living in this incredibly small space.

This above was my room and it is just slightly bigger than Harry Potter's closet space in the Dudley house. Don't get me wrong--they have been very generous to take me in. The concept of space is simply extremely different from the one we have in Canada. 

I spy a TV right above my bed tilted at just the right angle.  I miss it now that I'm gone.

Everything seems temporary and in-transition. After you used something, you have to clean it right up, prop it back up, put it in the best-space-conserving order, or something to that effect.  The look of the flat can change any moment depending on what activity is going on at the time.  To accomodate this lifestyle in the amount of space available, their home contains many gadgets with ingenious designs to save space. The highlights of these are in the bathroom.

When you go into the bathroom, you are immediately met with a toilet. The seat has been propped up because the door won't close with it down. After you closed the door, you can prop it back down to use the toilet. To shower, you need to pull down this rack attached to the door so it becomes a right angle (up position I, down position L). Put your clothes there so they won't get wet. The rack needs to go back up into the I position or the door won't open. Get into this showering corner and do your thing. Get out, the floor will be flooded. Panic now. NO wait. It's okay! Get out-- wait prop the toilet seat back up, prop the rack back up, and then get out. Don't slip now. Wipe your feet with the towel outside. Then mop the floor and squeeze the mop water into the toilet. Close the door to exit your daily nightmare adventure. <-- just kidding. It's not as bad as it sounds once you get used to the routine. The next difficult thing was to switch to another set of routine at the HKIEd hostel, but I am okay now!



HKIEd Robert Black Hostel Room

My home now is right next to the office and it is incredibly convenient to go to work and back. There are Chinese characters all around the residence about exciting events, student life, hostel histories...etc. Being surrounded by them is quite overwhelming. I can read them, but it takes time. People in Hong Kong use many trendy expressions (like our puns and rhymes) that make the phrases interesting. They usually contain double or even triple entendre. For a person unfamiliar with the local culture, peoples, and histories, trying to understand the full meaning behind these words is somewhat futile. Looking at a whole bunch of them makes me tired. I feel like an ESL student all over again, except is should be CSL now. One of my goals for this trip is to be able to converse in Chinese for a whole day without being mentally strained and exhausted.

Tada, only bite marks left.

For those of you who followed my previous post. My bed bug bites have healed. Thank God they have not travelled with me and infested any other places. They are most probably biting some other unsuspecting traveller at the moment halfway across the globe, who, unlike me, will actually complain to the airline about their poor hygiene.

Don't Let the Bed Bugs Bite-- too late.

God must have heard me.  My internship is a go! 

But I am now concerned with another thing.  There are 8 bites on my face and I am not sure what it is.  I thought they were mosquito bites at first.  I am using two mosquito repellent stickers every day, and there does not seem to be bugs flying around me for the longest time.  After doing some research, I am convinced that they are bed bug bites.  Now I have to go back to my cousin's place and see if they are in the bed.  Or a more likely place is the airline pillow.  The bites are mostly in a line, and are only on the two sides of my face.  There was a lag time of 3-4 days between the time I got bitten and the time my face showed the irritating and itchy welts.  I am getting more and more paranoid as I type.  If it was the airline pillow, I hope I didn't bring an infestation of bed bugs to my cousin's flat...





The Night Before

Hopping on a plane and heading off to HK is a maneuver that has been replayed in my mind some countless hundreds of times, but it really isn't the same now that I am experiencing the whole process in real time.  I am currently starving myself of sleep so I can actually catch some Z's on the plane, or it's the anxiety not letting me sleep, or both.

Not going to lie and be bubbly about it all, but I'm more nervous than anything right now because the internship agreement still hasn't been signed.  I am wondering if I should be concerned at this point or be happy that I am going to finally see my relatives for the first time in five years, some of whom are newly added members to the family.  Five baby cousins!-- well a few not-so-baby cousins now.  It's making me realize how much I have already grown.  Anyway, cousins are great!  I remember being the youngest in my family: an only child, spoiled with attention, drowned in toys, but nobody to play with.  Then one day when I was three, a baby cousin was suddenly plopped down in front of me, and we have been buddies since.

Well, I really hope to hear a big "YES IT'S A GO" from the host organization soon...  I will be in HK the next time I blog!

First Ride of the Season

Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.  Not my picture but-- gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Okay.  It's hitting me now.  I am going far far away for three months.  It feels like the first ride of the season.  Your pre-ride chat with your friends to cover for each others' nervousness is over.  Before you know it, it's your turn.  You get on the ride, and you're on your own.  Every man for himself.  You get strapped in and hear the gears start to turn.  Can't look back now.  You have no control over your physical body as it gets transported up that steel structure, but your mind is already flying, imagining the utter terror of the drop.  Don't look down, you tell yourself.  But you inadvertently look anyway and it only serves to reinforce your fears.  Suddenly, the gears stop-- you think, "thank God the suspense is over."

But wait.  




That means you're at the top, the pinnacle, the apex, the summit, the zenith.  Breathe.  You risk your sanity and look again.

"Oo, beautiful scenerrr--eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee..."

C o u n t d o w n :  1 1  d a y s

Destination

This is where I will be from May 16th! The sparkly dot on a world map with an approximate population of 7,055,071: Hong Kong.  I am doing an internship this summer with HKIEd through the York International Internship Program (YIIP).  From May to August, I will be blogging about my exciting adventures there. 

Looking at this picture brings back childhood memories because I was born in this wonderfully vibrant and ever-changing steel jungle.  It reminds me of a passage in Dionne Brand's What We All Long For, a book I had read for my Modern Canadian Fiction course.  In the story, the dissonance of Ornette Coleman's "The Jungle is a Skyscraper" is compared with the clash of cultures, peoples, histories, stories in the city.  Hong Kong had been colonized by Britain and Japan until 1997 when China regained sovereignty.  Technically I am British, but also Chinese, and now I am a Canadian too.  In the piece, "every horn is alone, but they're together, crashing."  This seems particularly applicable to this special space that functions under the "one country, two systems" principle.  It also describes the complex identity of its citizens like me!

Check it out: