What is Chinese New Year?
(Almost) The end of January- and I have been here now for almost exactly two weeks! It feels like much, much longer- I don’t ever want to leave!
Time has gone really fast especially since there is so much to see and to do in Hong Kong alone- not even mentioning the travel possibilities with most destinations only a short (and cheap) plane flight away. But the intensive program is starting to wear people out- everyone is tired including myself. I haven’t slept for more than a couple of hours for the past days and got a bit ill but am feeling better after some longer sleep last night. And I never understand how tired I am until I really start sleeping, as you all know, the “hyper-mode”* is quite common … I think it is the exhaustion, activities and all the new things together- learning every day- that make me ill- not avian flue (although I did think of it). In connection with “bird” flue I have to confess that after the first time of really feeling like eating chicken, I haven’t thought of it. Everyone here eats chicken and I myself have converted into a dedicated “meat”-eater, since non-meat containing dishes are very hard to come up with (especially since you never know exactly what you get or what is meant by the dish description) and not very nutritional. In general people eat a lot of meat and little fruit and vegetable or dairy products- when I get back to Finland I want some good yoghurt and cheese and fresh milk!!! Sounds bad but I have to say, I don’t want to be picky and there is a lot of delicious food here too; and I don’t care whether the chicken when roasted is served with legs and head on or not! And the best so far are shrimp dumplings bought from the street vendor- I don’t care where or how it is cooked! Best principle: go to the shabbiest place with a lot of locals inside- the food is good and cheap! This is the prime example of how standards change –forced? - quickly: what was dirty is clean and what one would never eat is every-day. I love that!
But back to a quick recap of what has been happening the past couple of days since I last posted some writing… Thursday (26th- and I now always add the date since I hardly remember which weekday/date it is not to mention that I have not read a newspaper or anything alike since getting here) was a quite day on campus. I had bought running shoes (Reebok, 200 HKD only) the day before- the stadium and all sports facilities are really inspiring me and I have now (as a Chinese New Years promise) decided to exercise regularly… and I will try to be honest and post my exercising since (Chinese) girls here do not exercise and motivation is difficult to find…. (well, maybe not?) I played tennis double with some guys for a couple of hours, afterwards ran five laps in the stadium. I met some Canadian exchange students coming back from my run on the village main street- they also had decided to opt for off-campus accommodation. A nice surprise since I do not all the time have to explain to someone why I am the only one not living on campus. It was a bit embarrassing in the beginning but after two weeks people understand the reasoning- especially those living with non-locals (locals usually go home over the weekend). The campus is a whole city of its own and you don’t have to leave it if you don’t want to. And most of the rooms are pretty crappy to be honest: in a PG hall you live in a bunk bed with someone else in a room of 7 square meters. Manageable but not nice in the long-term. Anyway, we had some lizard wine (ordinary wine with either a dead lizard or rats); after finishing the bottle the guys decided to eat the lizard; in addition this deed had to be taped – ugly and completely childish. Typically American I would say (you are not supposed to eat it). I left them and went out with some other girls to Lan Kwai Fong- the party district for the “white” (and rich or Asian and rich or hookers) population of HK. Ladies night= free drinks (and going out is expensive)= a lot of fun.
Friday was orientation – a completely unnecessary procedure of reading to us from a leaflet on how to change our course selection, application deadlines etc. the usual BS. And being slightly hung-over did not really help matters. The only nice thing was that we got our student cards- they have “card machine” which takes your picture and spits out the card with chip (for loading money) 3 minutes later. Amazingly efficient and it looks fancy! And the guys of course are all completely taken by Wendy, our exchange coordinator- she has the typical Asian body and wears high-heeled black leather boots and tight mini-skirts and speaks in a soft and very innocent voice….well, well.
Friday was also the first day of preparations for the Chinese (Lunar) New Year – the most important holiday of the year. Celebration last here from Saturday until Tuesday, with all shops closed from Sunday to Tuesday. People started to decorate streets and doors, altars and shops with little orange trees (orange sounds like fortune), flowers and red banners. People go to temples, which have special opening hours during the holidays. We visited the Man Mo temple in Soho on HK Island- this is one of the oldest temples in HK (see picture). People usually celebrate with their families (little yellow sticks with pumpkins are sold on every corner and they -as I have been told- symbolize families coming together). I should mention that everything and anything here seems to have some symbolic meaning but it is of course never explained but you have to ask the locals, who are generally very eager to explain everything. Another essential part of the new year are the flower markets which we visited on Friday evening (Victoria Park on HK Island) and Saturday evening (at Prince Edward station in Mongkok): they are open until midnight and sell flowers of all kinds (but mostly orange trees, orchids and red lilies), Chinese New Year delicacies (nuts in sugar, all kind of dried fruit and candies, freshly pressed sugar cane juice and bamboo *highly recommended* and new year cakes) and decorations. Since the coming year is the year of the dog decorations include dog balloons, furry dog costumes and dog bones- very kitschy but people go crazy in front of the stands in order to get these items! The markets are packed with people- and the “Hong Kongese” truly know the elbow tactics- although this seems unexpected from such small people who are one head smaller than me. Police/security presence on Victoria Park market which is favored by tourists was high and since people love signs here, all streets in the markets have a direction in which one is supposed to walk- but who cares about the rules? The market in Mongkok was a bit more peaceful and we saw no tourists there.
I continued my exercise program by running 11 laps on Saturday evening- the track was closed and I climbed over the fence. After the 11th lap the usually so friendly guards came with flashlights and threatened to call the security center- or that is what I understood. So there was nothing else to do except to climb again over the fence- this they watched with amazement: a girl disobeying the rules twice (running at night and climbing over a fence).
One component of our new year here was to get to know HK better and the uni had organized some tours for exchange students from all the three schools at UST. Sunday (29th) we started at 9 a.m. (me with an aching butt and back from running) to explore the “ancient culture” in the new territories of HK. When first signing up for the tours I thought it was really cheap and a good way to get to know people- having been here for some time I know that a lot of things offered are a complete rip-off, as was this. A high price to pay for socializing and getting to know people! I was warned from exchange students of previous years but thinking back on the past two days and two tours it was pretty funny. Like again being on one of these high-school trips where people show up late, hung-over and are after calling of names and counting huddles into a bus. Once inside everyone just wants to have peace- look out the window, chat, prolong the inexistent night’s sleep. But no, some clever instructor has planned a program- in this case we were provided with little green pieces of paper with a table of numbers no-one had ever seen before. After awakening from temporary naps and trying to figure out what was going on our guide J-e-r-r-y (the real Cantonese name means something like “American”, the funniest guy ever, but please just stop giggling and shut up for ten seconds once in a while!) explained that we were supposed to play bingo. What? And they (him, his assistant and one student helper who were there to shepherd us) took it really seriously. What enthusiasm! After finishing the game, random numbers (our names were matched with numbers) were drawn and we had to go in front to sign something into the microphone. Or that was what was supposed to happen and I guess Chinese people like it- they want and like to be entertained all the time and by each other. So of course we played bingo being polite and open-minded young people *hear the sarcasm* but the singing was a bit too much. The loud objection of the crowds was silenced by Jerry’s response of: “You’re so LUCKY, you’re so SPECIAL [to come up here and to perform]” * all this in strong Canton accent*, until someone really did sing etc. It was pretty embarrassing and we all tried to disappear in our seats- but I guess he would have taken it as a personal insult not seeing us entertained the whole time while on the bus.
After seeing several small villages with old houses and temples (no clue where, who, hw why due to complex communication difficulties), most of which people lived in and which (thus) resembled more of a dump, we had a nice seafood dinner with a lot of dishes to try. Some of the Americans and –of course also- Canadians had never eaten with chopsticks (and had survived on campus-McDonald’s food since arrival) needed some quick intro lessons. It was sad and fun… We then walked through a fish market nearby and found a grill place near the shore where locals grilled clam on open fire. Bought some for HKD 10- the best I have ever had (with garlic and ginger). Absolute highlight of the day!
In the evening we went to see the New Year’s parade in Wanchai- it is not worth mentioning, since after standing still without room in a crowd waiting for 1 hour we left in the middle because it was so –literally- boring. The parade was organized by Cathay Pacific- the Hong Kong base airline of the year and pride of the city- and completely westernized with Disney figures and the lot. The most interesting part was again the efficiency and system of the public authorities (mainly police and dpt of transportation) here- in this case the logistics of managing the hundreds of thousands of people along the route without causing major bottlenecks in the flow or panic. Being there longer one could follow the system of compartments along the roads filled first and how the flood was controlled and directed. What organization!
The second tour day was fortunately limited to one bus ride to the ferry; I was so exhausted from the previous day that I think I could not have taken any more bus-tainment: I couldn’t wake up even after 12 hours of sleep. The weather had over night turned into Finnish mid-July-perfect-summer-day-without-clouds mode and I first noticed the (exotic) birds singing on my way to UST. We took the ferry first to XX- island. I was surprised to see that the vegetation here is pretty scarce with reddish soil and rocks which is why it takes so much effort to even the land for new high rises. Then we went to Lamma island with a private boat where we had dinner and were then transported to Vistoria Harbor (between Kowloon and HK Island) to see the fireworks. Highlight: enjoying the sun and view on HK’s islands on the deck of the boat (keeping in mind that it is January…) as well as eating grilled chicken with head.
I am still moving internally with the waves –although did not get seasick this time. Jussi just arrived from Indonesia and we are briefing him now. It’s pretty funny to recap. And I think he is completely out… we are planning a big party on our rooftop terrace on Thursday if the weather is favorable. We’ll see… tomorrow first another tour- to some jail and British housing complexes – or that is what I have heard (I have read some description ages ago; can’t bother to remember) How interesting!
Some random uncategorizable things I have to mention before going to sleep and curing my throat ache and cold: most of the exchange students are male (3:1 probably) which seems odd (but maybe not so since almost everyone studies finance) and young (avge. age around 21). Both can be good signs; but the ignorance barometer is approaching end-of-scale (have to redefine = downscale expectations). There are rarely pregnant women to be seen on the streets. Where are they? Met some interesting people, e.g. a Swedish economics student who had lived in Saudi-Arabia, on Mallorca, in Barcelona and Madrid and had a previous diploma as a flight stewardess. And what is with the Indy-style of clothing that seems to be so fashionable (and suitable) for Asians? And how do group dynamics really work? Do I play my cards (i.e. conscious choice) or is it just random and coincidence? And why is there no cheese in supermarkets (but they use it in the British bakeries/sandwiches) and you can only buy a dozen or oranges but not one? Why all the noise and entertainment for nothing? Why do Chinese-made converters/adaptors break after one week of usage? *so annoying* And when do people sleep (ok, in Shenzhen they nap all the time on the streets, but inHK?)???
Summarizing: Chinese New Year left me without new sensations but rather a confusion of Western kitsch and commercialized show-biz and dragon dances in the villages. A good experience, but the heritage remains untapped for me. Unfortunately.
* swollen eyes, slow reflexes, hysterical laughter, bad jokes
Time has gone really fast especially since there is so much to see and to do in Hong Kong alone- not even mentioning the travel possibilities with most destinations only a short (and cheap) plane flight away. But the intensive program is starting to wear people out- everyone is tired including myself. I haven’t slept for more than a couple of hours for the past days and got a bit ill but am feeling better after some longer sleep last night. And I never understand how tired I am until I really start sleeping, as you all know, the “hyper-mode”* is quite common … I think it is the exhaustion, activities and all the new things together- learning every day- that make me ill- not avian flue (although I did think of it). In connection with “bird” flue I have to confess that after the first time of really feeling like eating chicken, I haven’t thought of it. Everyone here eats chicken and I myself have converted into a dedicated “meat”-eater, since non-meat containing dishes are very hard to come up with (especially since you never know exactly what you get or what is meant by the dish description) and not very nutritional. In general people eat a lot of meat and little fruit and vegetable or dairy products- when I get back to Finland I want some good yoghurt and cheese and fresh milk!!! Sounds bad but I have to say, I don’t want to be picky and there is a lot of delicious food here too; and I don’t care whether the chicken when roasted is served with legs and head on or not! And the best so far are shrimp dumplings bought from the street vendor- I don’t care where or how it is cooked! Best principle: go to the shabbiest place with a lot of locals inside- the food is good and cheap! This is the prime example of how standards change –forced? - quickly: what was dirty is clean and what one would never eat is every-day. I love that!
But back to a quick recap of what has been happening the past couple of days since I last posted some writing… Thursday (26th- and I now always add the date since I hardly remember which weekday/date it is not to mention that I have not read a newspaper or anything alike since getting here) was a quite day on campus. I had bought running shoes (Reebok, 200 HKD only) the day before- the stadium and all sports facilities are really inspiring me and I have now (as a Chinese New Years promise) decided to exercise regularly… and I will try to be honest and post my exercising since (Chinese) girls here do not exercise and motivation is difficult to find…. (well, maybe not?) I played tennis double with some guys for a couple of hours, afterwards ran five laps in the stadium. I met some Canadian exchange students coming back from my run on the village main street- they also had decided to opt for off-campus accommodation. A nice surprise since I do not all the time have to explain to someone why I am the only one not living on campus. It was a bit embarrassing in the beginning but after two weeks people understand the reasoning- especially those living with non-locals (locals usually go home over the weekend). The campus is a whole city of its own and you don’t have to leave it if you don’t want to. And most of the rooms are pretty crappy to be honest: in a PG hall you live in a bunk bed with someone else in a room of 7 square meters. Manageable but not nice in the long-term. Anyway, we had some lizard wine (ordinary wine with either a dead lizard or rats); after finishing the bottle the guys decided to eat the lizard; in addition this deed had to be taped – ugly and completely childish. Typically American I would say (you are not supposed to eat it). I left them and went out with some other girls to Lan Kwai Fong- the party district for the “white” (and rich or Asian and rich or hookers) population of HK. Ladies night= free drinks (and going out is expensive)= a lot of fun.
Friday was orientation – a completely unnecessary procedure of reading to us from a leaflet on how to change our course selection, application deadlines etc. the usual BS. And being slightly hung-over did not really help matters. The only nice thing was that we got our student cards- they have “card machine” which takes your picture and spits out the card with chip (for loading money) 3 minutes later. Amazingly efficient and it looks fancy! And the guys of course are all completely taken by Wendy, our exchange coordinator- she has the typical Asian body and wears high-heeled black leather boots and tight mini-skirts and speaks in a soft and very innocent voice….well, well.
Friday was also the first day of preparations for the Chinese (Lunar) New Year – the most important holiday of the year. Celebration last here from Saturday until Tuesday, with all shops closed from Sunday to Tuesday. People started to decorate streets and doors, altars and shops with little orange trees (orange sounds like fortune), flowers and red banners. People go to temples, which have special opening hours during the holidays. We visited the Man Mo temple in Soho on HK Island- this is one of the oldest temples in HK (see picture). People usually celebrate with their families (little yellow sticks with pumpkins are sold on every corner and they -as I have been told- symbolize families coming together). I should mention that everything and anything here seems to have some symbolic meaning but it is of course never explained but you have to ask the locals, who are generally very eager to explain everything. Another essential part of the new year are the flower markets which we visited on Friday evening (Victoria Park on HK Island) and Saturday evening (at Prince Edward station in Mongkok): they are open until midnight and sell flowers of all kinds (but mostly orange trees, orchids and red lilies), Chinese New Year delicacies (nuts in sugar, all kind of dried fruit and candies, freshly pressed sugar cane juice and bamboo *highly recommended* and new year cakes) and decorations. Since the coming year is the year of the dog decorations include dog balloons, furry dog costumes and dog bones- very kitschy but people go crazy in front of the stands in order to get these items! The markets are packed with people- and the “Hong Kongese” truly know the elbow tactics- although this seems unexpected from such small people who are one head smaller than me. Police/security presence on Victoria Park market which is favored by tourists was high and since people love signs here, all streets in the markets have a direction in which one is supposed to walk- but who cares about the rules? The market in Mongkok was a bit more peaceful and we saw no tourists there.
I continued my exercise program by running 11 laps on Saturday evening- the track was closed and I climbed over the fence. After the 11th lap the usually so friendly guards came with flashlights and threatened to call the security center- or that is what I understood. So there was nothing else to do except to climb again over the fence- this they watched with amazement: a girl disobeying the rules twice (running at night and climbing over a fence).
One component of our new year here was to get to know HK better and the uni had organized some tours for exchange students from all the three schools at UST. Sunday (29th) we started at 9 a.m. (me with an aching butt and back from running) to explore the “ancient culture” in the new territories of HK. When first signing up for the tours I thought it was really cheap and a good way to get to know people- having been here for some time I know that a lot of things offered are a complete rip-off, as was this. A high price to pay for socializing and getting to know people! I was warned from exchange students of previous years but thinking back on the past two days and two tours it was pretty funny. Like again being on one of these high-school trips where people show up late, hung-over and are after calling of names and counting huddles into a bus. Once inside everyone just wants to have peace- look out the window, chat, prolong the inexistent night’s sleep. But no, some clever instructor has planned a program- in this case we were provided with little green pieces of paper with a table of numbers no-one had ever seen before. After awakening from temporary naps and trying to figure out what was going on our guide J-e-r-r-y (the real Cantonese name means something like “American”, the funniest guy ever, but please just stop giggling and shut up for ten seconds once in a while!) explained that we were supposed to play bingo. What? And they (him, his assistant and one student helper who were there to shepherd us) took it really seriously. What enthusiasm! After finishing the game, random numbers (our names were matched with numbers) were drawn and we had to go in front to sign something into the microphone. Or that was what was supposed to happen and I guess Chinese people like it- they want and like to be entertained all the time and by each other. So of course we played bingo being polite and open-minded young people *hear the sarcasm* but the singing was a bit too much. The loud objection of the crowds was silenced by Jerry’s response of: “You’re so LUCKY, you’re so SPECIAL [to come up here and to perform]” * all this in strong Canton accent*, until someone really did sing etc. It was pretty embarrassing and we all tried to disappear in our seats- but I guess he would have taken it as a personal insult not seeing us entertained the whole time while on the bus.
After seeing several small villages with old houses and temples (no clue where, who, hw why due to complex communication difficulties), most of which people lived in and which (thus) resembled more of a dump, we had a nice seafood dinner with a lot of dishes to try. Some of the Americans and –of course also- Canadians had never eaten with chopsticks (and had survived on campus-McDonald’s food since arrival) needed some quick intro lessons. It was sad and fun… We then walked through a fish market nearby and found a grill place near the shore where locals grilled clam on open fire. Bought some for HKD 10- the best I have ever had (with garlic and ginger). Absolute highlight of the day!
In the evening we went to see the New Year’s parade in Wanchai- it is not worth mentioning, since after standing still without room in a crowd waiting for 1 hour we left in the middle because it was so –literally- boring. The parade was organized by Cathay Pacific- the Hong Kong base airline of the year and pride of the city- and completely westernized with Disney figures and the lot. The most interesting part was again the efficiency and system of the public authorities (mainly police and dpt of transportation) here- in this case the logistics of managing the hundreds of thousands of people along the route without causing major bottlenecks in the flow or panic. Being there longer one could follow the system of compartments along the roads filled first and how the flood was controlled and directed. What organization!
The second tour day was fortunately limited to one bus ride to the ferry; I was so exhausted from the previous day that I think I could not have taken any more bus-tainment: I couldn’t wake up even after 12 hours of sleep. The weather had over night turned into Finnish mid-July-perfect-summer-day-without-clouds mode and I first noticed the (exotic) birds singing on my way to UST. We took the ferry first to XX- island. I was surprised to see that the vegetation here is pretty scarce with reddish soil and rocks which is why it takes so much effort to even the land for new high rises. Then we went to Lamma island with a private boat where we had dinner and were then transported to Vistoria Harbor (between Kowloon and HK Island) to see the fireworks. Highlight: enjoying the sun and view on HK’s islands on the deck of the boat (keeping in mind that it is January…) as well as eating grilled chicken with head.
I am still moving internally with the waves –although did not get seasick this time. Jussi just arrived from Indonesia and we are briefing him now. It’s pretty funny to recap. And I think he is completely out… we are planning a big party on our rooftop terrace on Thursday if the weather is favorable. We’ll see… tomorrow first another tour- to some jail and British housing complexes – or that is what I have heard (I have read some description ages ago; can’t bother to remember) How interesting!
Some random uncategorizable things I have to mention before going to sleep and curing my throat ache and cold: most of the exchange students are male (3:1 probably) which seems odd (but maybe not so since almost everyone studies finance) and young (avge. age around 21). Both can be good signs; but the ignorance barometer is approaching end-of-scale (have to redefine = downscale expectations). There are rarely pregnant women to be seen on the streets. Where are they? Met some interesting people, e.g. a Swedish economics student who had lived in Saudi-Arabia, on Mallorca, in Barcelona and Madrid and had a previous diploma as a flight stewardess. And what is with the Indy-style of clothing that seems to be so fashionable (and suitable) for Asians? And how do group dynamics really work? Do I play my cards (i.e. conscious choice) or is it just random and coincidence? And why is there no cheese in supermarkets (but they use it in the British bakeries/sandwiches) and you can only buy a dozen or oranges but not one? Why all the noise and entertainment for nothing? Why do Chinese-made converters/adaptors break after one week of usage? *so annoying* And when do people sleep (ok, in Shenzhen they nap all the time on the streets, but inHK?)???
Summarizing: Chinese New Year left me without new sensations but rather a confusion of Western kitsch and commercialized show-biz and dragon dances in the villages. A good experience, but the heritage remains untapped for me. Unfortunately.
* swollen eyes, slow reflexes, hysterical laughter, bad jokes
posted by Crazy Night Rider at 6:21 PM
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