Escapism or: More tales from the bubble
“I can see my f****** breath in my apartment!“
This sentence seemed fun at the time but it is last week’s fashion, i.e. the weather has improved drastically. When getting back from Oslo, I expected a HK in spring but the whole last week was actually freezing here. Freezing as in temperatures around 9-12C during the day, which does not seem very little compared to home, but add the humidity, damp clothes and the fact that buildings do not have any heating nor isolation, and soon you find yourself cold. I slept in jogging pants and two shirts, woolen socks; the guys hat gloves and hats as well. When waking up in the morning, the humidity and warmth of our breathing had turned into condensed water on the inside of the window glass and was slowly dripping along the wall. Getting up was a pain… and I felt that all my energy also in class went into keeping warm; not focusing on anything else. Erkki compared our state of being to that of being in the army; I can’t really say whether it was as bad. I felt stiff, as if I hadn’t slept, ill, shivering. And I think everyone else had the same problem since most people got either sick during the week or on the weekend. So much for warm and sunny HK!
Consequence: leave (somewhere warm). The funniest explanations came from Charlotte (from Sweden) who said something like “I don’t have any winter clothes. I should go to Thailand for the weekend.” And this is along the lines of how people (exchange students) think here think or have gotten to re-think - not “I should buy (winter) clothes” but “Let’s go to Thailand- it’s warm”, since it is sooo cheap. Or well, cheap once you get there but only relatively cheap to get there. A general sense of escapism- an urge to see as much as possible as fast as possible, always looking for the next “hot spot”, where nobody else has been yet, has spread like an “epidemic”- everybody has it but with slightly different symptoms and few know it. It does not make any sense, I dare say: It’s madness! Who (except Americans) does seriously think a country and a culture can be explored and experienced in a long weekend (4 days minus travel time)? You must be kidding me?
Ok, ok, a lot of people have jobs/graduate in the summer, so they go back home right after the final exams, which will be in the end of May/beginning of June. I wish I had a job! Some because graduating have taken even more extreme measures- one guy from California left for Thailand last week and will stay on some island there until the semester ends; had enough of HK- I’d say that is courageous!
Seeing a country in one weekend is unrealistic, expensive and a lot of stress, but apparently worth it. My own travel plans- tossed and twisted around numerous times- have now come down to seeing the islands (Hainan, Taiwan, Philippines) and places in mainland China which are not along the main “travel routes”, or at least not close to anything else I really want to see. I would like to do one bigger trip during spring break and the leave in the beginning of June for either first the mainland or then the South to Vietnam (where else?). That of course depends on whether I will be able to get a job anywhere (which seems still unlikely).
Anyways, I left for the weekend too but that trip was long planned and just happened to help me escape from the cold in HK. I went to Singapore, where I visited a friend studying at NUS. We met at CBS last year and have since kept in touch more or less regularly, so one might say it was a bit of a crazy idea to just fly over… But: I had an amazing weekend! And felt very at home there. Why? Maybe because the society s so “colorful” with Chinese, Indian/Sri Lankan, Malay, Indonesian, Western all living on a tiny island off the southern tip of the Malay peninsula… everyone in a chaotic mix, but at the same time equal. Western and HK people are not equal; or that is how I feel. I live here and am at “home”, but remain still a visitor in some aspects. Singapore is easy- everything is clean, everything works. It’s organized, functioning, safe. Some may say government regulation makes it boring- it is like a European city except for the heat and the humidity- some may say this is essential to forge a nation out of so many distinct pieces, generating a national pride and spirit (which they have succeeded at). It’s an interesting society I think- especially when looking at what is happening in the countries around.
Controversial, maybe. Death penalty on drug possession/trafficking. The government controls most property and housing. No bubble gums (that’s the cliché), no littering (fine SGD 500) and other minor details. But: Diversity, great food, great clubs, a booming city, which is however conservative in values: we had some interesting conversations about marriage (no living together without being married in Singapore) and the importance of the family (even if not needed children support their parents financially after they start working, a gesture?). Of course I did some of the tourist-stuff as well: went to the Botanical Gardens and the Orchid Gardens (amazing!), the Jurong bird park, Little India, Chinatown, Orchards Street (shopping), the Arab quarter… not to forget the Ministry of sound- the biggest club I have ever seen! It had one huge dance floor and six adjunct rooms on two floors, each in a different color and with a different theme and each about the size of e.g. Birdie in Helsinki. One room was completely white, with white glass floors, chandeliers, long white curtains and couches. One room was more 70-s style pink and shrill. Te hip-hop room was dark with cages and very crowded.
And of course I had really good food- a thing that Singapore is famous for… My favorite was Prata (which I guess is Malay), which is (sort of) pancakes filled with mushrooms, cheese, tomato etc. served with curry sauce. The Indian and Thai food, basically everything I tasted, was very, very good and cost the same as food in HK.
After a great weekend I was back in HK on Monday. I had to catch up on my schoolwork and am still trying to extract motivation for studying from some unknown reservoir of it which should exist in my mind. I overslept today and on Tuesday for my first class. Don’t know why, but it really should not happen. It is actually embarrassing, since it is not at all my way of doing things. Have to get a grip on this; am afraid that I don’t. It is like a rosy bubble that is so nice to be in. No sense for reality, just party, socialize, have fun. Once you try to exit it will burst. And then?
This sentence seemed fun at the time but it is last week’s fashion, i.e. the weather has improved drastically. When getting back from Oslo, I expected a HK in spring but the whole last week was actually freezing here. Freezing as in temperatures around 9-12C during the day, which does not seem very little compared to home, but add the humidity, damp clothes and the fact that buildings do not have any heating nor isolation, and soon you find yourself cold. I slept in jogging pants and two shirts, woolen socks; the guys hat gloves and hats as well. When waking up in the morning, the humidity and warmth of our breathing had turned into condensed water on the inside of the window glass and was slowly dripping along the wall. Getting up was a pain… and I felt that all my energy also in class went into keeping warm; not focusing on anything else. Erkki compared our state of being to that of being in the army; I can’t really say whether it was as bad. I felt stiff, as if I hadn’t slept, ill, shivering. And I think everyone else had the same problem since most people got either sick during the week or on the weekend. So much for warm and sunny HK!
Consequence: leave (somewhere warm). The funniest explanations came from Charlotte (from Sweden) who said something like “I don’t have any winter clothes. I should go to Thailand for the weekend.” And this is along the lines of how people (exchange students) think here think or have gotten to re-think - not “I should buy (winter) clothes” but “Let’s go to Thailand- it’s warm”, since it is sooo cheap. Or well, cheap once you get there but only relatively cheap to get there. A general sense of escapism- an urge to see as much as possible as fast as possible, always looking for the next “hot spot”, where nobody else has been yet, has spread like an “epidemic”- everybody has it but with slightly different symptoms and few know it. It does not make any sense, I dare say: It’s madness! Who (except Americans) does seriously think a country and a culture can be explored and experienced in a long weekend (4 days minus travel time)? You must be kidding me?
Ok, ok, a lot of people have jobs/graduate in the summer, so they go back home right after the final exams, which will be in the end of May/beginning of June. I wish I had a job! Some because graduating have taken even more extreme measures- one guy from California left for Thailand last week and will stay on some island there until the semester ends; had enough of HK- I’d say that is courageous!
Seeing a country in one weekend is unrealistic, expensive and a lot of stress, but apparently worth it. My own travel plans- tossed and twisted around numerous times- have now come down to seeing the islands (Hainan, Taiwan, Philippines) and places in mainland China which are not along the main “travel routes”, or at least not close to anything else I really want to see. I would like to do one bigger trip during spring break and the leave in the beginning of June for either first the mainland or then the South to Vietnam (where else?). That of course depends on whether I will be able to get a job anywhere (which seems still unlikely).
Anyways, I left for the weekend too but that trip was long planned and just happened to help me escape from the cold in HK. I went to Singapore, where I visited a friend studying at NUS. We met at CBS last year and have since kept in touch more or less regularly, so one might say it was a bit of a crazy idea to just fly over… But: I had an amazing weekend! And felt very at home there. Why? Maybe because the society s so “colorful” with Chinese, Indian/Sri Lankan, Malay, Indonesian, Western all living on a tiny island off the southern tip of the Malay peninsula… everyone in a chaotic mix, but at the same time equal. Western and HK people are not equal; or that is how I feel. I live here and am at “home”, but remain still a visitor in some aspects. Singapore is easy- everything is clean, everything works. It’s organized, functioning, safe. Some may say government regulation makes it boring- it is like a European city except for the heat and the humidity- some may say this is essential to forge a nation out of so many distinct pieces, generating a national pride and spirit (which they have succeeded at). It’s an interesting society I think- especially when looking at what is happening in the countries around.
Controversial, maybe. Death penalty on drug possession/trafficking. The government controls most property and housing. No bubble gums (that’s the cliché), no littering (fine SGD 500) and other minor details. But: Diversity, great food, great clubs, a booming city, which is however conservative in values: we had some interesting conversations about marriage (no living together without being married in Singapore) and the importance of the family (even if not needed children support their parents financially after they start working, a gesture?). Of course I did some of the tourist-stuff as well: went to the Botanical Gardens and the Orchid Gardens (amazing!), the Jurong bird park, Little India, Chinatown, Orchards Street (shopping), the Arab quarter… not to forget the Ministry of sound- the biggest club I have ever seen! It had one huge dance floor and six adjunct rooms on two floors, each in a different color and with a different theme and each about the size of e.g. Birdie in Helsinki. One room was completely white, with white glass floors, chandeliers, long white curtains and couches. One room was more 70-s style pink and shrill. Te hip-hop room was dark with cages and very crowded.
And of course I had really good food- a thing that Singapore is famous for… My favorite was Prata (which I guess is Malay), which is (sort of) pancakes filled with mushrooms, cheese, tomato etc. served with curry sauce. The Indian and Thai food, basically everything I tasted, was very, very good and cost the same as food in HK.
After a great weekend I was back in HK on Monday. I had to catch up on my schoolwork and am still trying to extract motivation for studying from some unknown reservoir of it which should exist in my mind. I overslept today and on Tuesday for my first class. Don’t know why, but it really should not happen. It is actually embarrassing, since it is not at all my way of doing things. Have to get a grip on this; am afraid that I don’t. It is like a rosy bubble that is so nice to be in. No sense for reality, just party, socialize, have fun. Once you try to exit it will burst. And then?
Orchids is what I associate with Singapore, since the first hybrids leading the way into the mass-cut-flower industry were created. The Botanical Gardens in Singapore have a huge collection of wild and hybrid species but only part is open to the public. Still an amazing experience!
Above: The financial centre of the sity, left the cricket club, a colonial leftover from the 18somethings. Taking this picture I am actually standing in the middle of a football field right in the center of the city. Singapore is -unlike HK- very green with lots of parks and trees everywhere.
This is the financial centre from the other side, just to contrast the size of the regular buildings with the towers. Along the water there a lots of restaurants and bars. I think the ministry of sound was also somewhere along there.
Above: Temple in Little India, below: Arab quarter. Singapore has a lot of colonial era uildings- or houses bult in that style. There are whole blocks and quarters with tiny 2-3 floor houses, which makes for a special atmosphere.
Above: Temple in Little India, below: Arab quarter. Singapore has a lot of colonial era uildings- or houses bult in that style. There are whole blocks and quarters with tiny 2-3 floor houses, which makes for a special atmosphere.
posted by Crazy Night Rider at 3:05 AM
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