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.