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EMAIL 1 - Thursday, August 25th.
How's tricks guys?
This place is nuts, loads to tell -- coming to the end of our training, told everyone my name was 'tommy' which has kept me highly entertained. Amazing how quickly it’s all become so normal, and I’ve just scored a LUSH city apartment living with a textbook hippy, ginger scouser called Danielle! Naturally.
The flight experience was comedy (in a near-death kind of way). I was officially kakking myself after no less than 5 planes went down in the preceding weeks - including the Venezuelan one the day before. After a terrorist alert at Manchester we boarded the most Mickey Mouse sorriest excuse for an aircraft you could imagine - a 40-seater propeller effort to Switzerland. At the super clean and futuristic airport in Zurich we boarded a more reassuring example where a rude Spanish dude sat next to me. Such was his rudeness that I had few qualms about letting out the occasional fart (something that happens often when I fly - probably an air-pressure thing).
The plane was huge and had personal interactive TVs that let you play Millionaire against other passengers and even check out
the camera mounted on the underside and nose of the aircraft. Anyways, to cut a long, scary story short, there was regular panicked screaming on board due to the frankly terrifying amount of turbulence. As we flew over a seemingly large cloud, our bums also became airborne and for a moment and I was convinced of our impending doom. However, after a 15-hour escapade, we landed safely on the most difficult stretch of runway in the world... All good fun...
And so it’s now been a week and a bit. The central city area is a proper metropolis, pretty much every building a skyscraper with up to 88 floors and superfast lifts. It’s consumption central with humid stickiness and pollution by day and sleaze and urban decay by night. I’m yet to check out the beaches, and HK is 40% national park (highest in the world) so there’s lots more to see and learn. The underground system is great but makes London’s tube look spacious and calm. Saw the glistening skyline on the Star Ferry last week; a truly awesome sight and there are light and firework shows each and every evening.
Our abode for 2 weeks is
the YWCA - it's fairly decent, you can have a good meal, do as you feel and hang out with all the... girls. Currently sharing a room with a 7-foot Geordie lad. We're on typhoon warning level Yellow - you wouldn't believe the rain, it only cleared today - ultra depressing, and if it goes to a Red or Black warning school is called off. The constant humidity is also a pain in the ass, it’s more “need-a-shower-and-change-of-clothes” heat, rather than “let’s-get-a-tan” heat. Am getting used to it being around 30c, but it'll cool to around 15-20c in the “winter”. Strange getting used to air-con where you have to keep doors and windows shut to keep the cold in.
So just finishing training, great bunch of recent graduates - mainly girls - from Canada, UK and a few from the US and Australia - all my worries about Chatteris were unfounded, such a professional outfit, so far. They're a charity and we're paid the equivalent of £1000 a month to teach - more than enough to live on... our rent is a couple of hundred per month. Starting work next week at a primary school on Kowloon Island! The
kids we've met so far have been ridiculously cute but naughtier than expected. The ideas and training we've been given have been fantastic and I feel so much more inspired having done a course at Leeds Uni - just wish I'd had all this for India and Africa. Really do.
Handed back from Britain to China in 1997, Hong Kong is actually called the Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (you can see why the old name stuck). Unlike the other ex-colonies I visited, there's little evidence of our presence here aside from perhaps building and area names (Victoria, Aberdeen etc...). It’s still recovering from the menagerie of diseases going around - SARS, chicken flu and dengue fever all sound fun. Scary thought, and the local hospital seems to be on “Yellow Infectious Disease Alert”, but there’s little you can do. Am more worried about the reports on the crap they’re putting in the food. All meat seems dodgy and loads of chemicals are used on the fruit and veg. Food is doing my head in - no-one is especially impressed with what seems to be a pretty uniform and unhealthy range of choices. Loving the
supermarkets at the moment - I’ve packed my vegetable steamer, so glad I did, can’t wait to start cooking!
The language barrier between Cantonese and English is a sturdy one - it’s a tonal language, everything is single syllables and each word can be said in 6-9 different ways. It is indeed highly possible to insult someone’s parentage when you mean to say ‘nine’. It’s so hard; I can't remember anything from our Cantonese lessons last week - apparently almost impossible for a Westerner to perfect.
Anyways, will be in touch again - loads more to check out, Disney Land opens half-hour down the road in a couple of weeks!
Cheers ears…
Tom =o) x
EMAIL 2 - Wednesday, September 7th
Hey all,
Our new metropolitan abode in the centre of Hong Kong would be perfect, were it not for the following comedy tribulations...
• The last thing you’d probably check, when an estate agent is showing you around your new pad, is whether the wardrobes double as ‘Narnia’ style portals to the next room. I opened my wardrobe on our first day and discovered my housemate Danielle’s shoes - insisting she hadn’t
been in my room, we found that there is no wall between our adjacent rooms, and that the ‘shared’ wardrobes open at the front and back into each other’s bedrooms. As well as her air-con, I can hear every move Danielle makes in her bed, as I try and get my long ginger body comfortable on the ‘smallest mattress in the world’ (which was custom made with a notch out of the corner to accommodate a portion of wall pillar!). There are a few benefits mind you. For example, I’m able to threaten to pass through the wardrobe and secretly watch Dan sleep, should she continue with the lame indie music. Plus, it’s a good party trick to amaze and confuse visitors with.
• The mickey-mouseability of our flat doesn’t end there. The kitchen is exactly one metre squared and washing up gives you a crick in the neck because it’s designed for midgets!
• The shower is inherently evil, and regularly scolds any who dare relieve themselves from the heat - and the ancient gas cooker was officially certified ‘lethal’ by the gas inspector this morning.
• And the icing on the cake? We asked the landlord to paint
over a manky bit of wall, only for the workmen to paint it in magnolia. They did a good job, however - the rest of the room is white.
Thankfully, all the above hiccups - including the Rothko-esque mess on the wall - are being corrected in what is otherwise a cool city pad!
The landlord did at least sort us out with a TV, including 2 crap English channels which we just use for news. The public service announcements are fantastic - ones warning about the latest infectious disease (SARS, chicken flu, Japanese Encephalitis etc), ones about ‘being nice’, there’s one about the dangers of windows ("Do not lean out of windows") and, my favourite, one on paedophilia ("If someone touches you in a wrong place, shout ‘no!’"). Some of the bill boards are pretty entertaining too, one from the equivalent of the RSPCA has a picture of a sorrowful dog saying "please don’t eat us" (yes, it’s illegal, but some Chinese people do eat Lassie here).
Our area (Tsim Sha Tsui) is arguably the centre of the universe for the entire province. We’re two minutes from a gorgeous indoor and outdoor swimming complex and park.
The supermarket is a one minute walk away, we get our laundry done for a couple of quid practically next door, the night market, the ‘Jackie Chan Gym’ and row upon row of retro clothes shops are both nearby. Plus, all the world-class brand names - if that floats your boat - are gathered at the top of the road - all tax free, as are most things in HK. The best part is that we’re a five-minute walk from the world famous glittering HK harbour, once the worlds’ busiest and probably most magnificent. It’s vulgar and symbolic of all I pretty much despise, but the nightly light and laser shows are still pretty cool.
Being in a high-rise, people watching has become an inevitable pastime. As in ‘Friends’, we have - not one - but two ugly-naked-guys opposite. One prances about in his underwear whilst the other doesn’t seem to have changed out of his tight red pants in days. Outside the building ‘Smiler Stan’ sits miserably in the same chair next to a shop for what appears to be 24-hours a day, 7-days a week, with a look on his face not dissimilar to a bulldog-licking-piss-of-a-thistle-whilst-chewing-a-wasp. However,
perhaps the character most dear to our hearts is ‘Sweatshop Bob’. Bob looks around 60 and works directly opposite my bedroom in what can only be described as a full-on sweatshop - crouched over a sewing machine, he regularly does 13-hour shifts until 1am, and has been known to sleep there. Housemate Danielle and I keep a close eye on Bob and often txt each other ‘Bob updates’ if he takes a break or starts stripping off. Our goal this year is to invite Bob, Smiler and the ugly-naked-dudes to a wild house party. Will keep you informed.
Such a relief to be self-catered again. No-one’s raving about the food, since it’s mostly rank. As unlikely as it sounds, the local cuisine is nothing special and isn’t especially healthy. Everyone’s off the fish at the moment due to a big scare and all of us are pretty grateful to be back on the Western fare. One particularly unusual dinner, recently, was at a cafe/bar, which became less of a cafe and more of a thumping nightclub as the meal progressed. Directly under a UV light, our food glowed in the dark and as I tucked into my neon potato,
I wondered if my fluorescent supper was actually radioactive.
At the end of training last week we all went to a summer camp and hired a karaoke room. Unlike back home, karaoke isn’t a gimmick to attract people to bars but a proper night out with plush seating, a huge TV, 3 mics and a massive database (though mostly ‘canto-pop’ - Cantonese remixes of Western pop hits). The genuine talent in the group was counteracted with my moving and heartfelt rendition of ‘Heal the World’ by Michael Jackson - and yes, we did have everyone circling the room holding hands! A beautiful moment!
And so came Thursday. Two underground stops from my first day at school and I got a call to return to the Chatteris office. My school seemed a little too laid back about my arrival and predictably, our eccentric boss Grace immediately dropped them from the scheme. I’m now teaching in one of the best schools in the province, it’s won hundreds of awards and was one of the few to remain open during the SARS fun-and-games in 2003. The principal is an absolute legend and they’ve been so welcoming. Naturally, I was taken for
a meal with the senior staff - expensive Chinese food that I literally had to force down in the name of politeness. Sesame balls with black goo inside, thick jelly-ish noodles, raw egg yolks and deep fried aubergine made me heave, but I had to follow through as food is a big deal here (though table manners certainly aren’t!) and it’s a very social affair.
My hilarious banter with the staff went down well (the head says I’m ‘very humorous’). Then again, most of my jokes failed to make it past the language barrier, some got through limping and hobbling to a ripple of nervous giggling, but most of the time few were even aware I was dishing out my best material. Formal teaching starts next week, leaving the rest of this week for lesson planning and general fannying around. Despite its success, the school itself is literally very old skool, it lacks a lift for starters which can be a killer in the humidity. . I have a whole classroom exclusively to myself, which is unique, but if I want to use
any technology, I have to wheel it in.
Thanx to all who've emailed, am keeping up with the replies since we've now got access at the school! hint hint
Tom =o) xx
EMAIL 3 - Tuesday, October 4th
Hey-ho folks,
Been almost two months now and feeling pretty settled! Food remains an inevitable pain in the ginger British backside and chopsticks remain tricky. Chicken feet, fish eyes, noodles-every-single-day, miscellaneous meats riddled with random tendons and bones don't really get my taste buds watering. Plus, any fish or animal you fancy ordering will have been alive and kicking either minutes or hours before. Restaurants with live fish in a tank for you to "choose one" are not some posh novelty out here - it's standard, and you can see the condemned sea creatures (of all descriptions) on almost every street corner. Chickens, frogs, octopus, pigeons and whatever else you fancy for lunch are also bought live - as I discovered when I naively peered into a bucket of toads, only for one to leap up to my face, scaring the living kak out of me. Yep - I'm happy keeping to my tuna/pasta medleys, salads, sandwiches and overpriced baked beans thank you! And without sounding like too much like a lame Western bear, I expect my meat to be dead for at least a couple of days, frozen, in plastic and resembling anything but the original beast/bird/fish. I'll travel anywhere but when it comes to grub, I'm content being utterly crap - to quote Peter Kay, "None of that foreign muck."
One way I’ve been staying sane at school here is by logging all the comedy names you come across. Allowing Hong Kong children to choose their own name can have hilarious and sometimes plain unfortunate consequences. In our school we have several Yo-Yos, a Macro, Kaka, Roney, Go-Go, Coco, Pinky, Winky, a plethora of vintage old-folks-home names (Marjorie, Enid, Gladys, Harold, Doris etc...) and get this - Dragon and, my personal favourite, School Bag. It's no joke - often you think you've misheard 'Doris' as 'Dorcas' - but no, when you ask the unlucky kid to spell it, you realise that they are indeed called 'Dorcas'. And what would be an irresistible bullying opportunity back home, doesn't cause anyone here to bat an eyelid.
Wouldn’t dream of doing any other job in HK, but not the biggest fan of my new 9-5 lifestyle - or rather 6:45am - 4:30pm - I'm lazier than I think and am finding my 24 lessons of 35-minutes each somewhat knackering. We get a fair few extra-curricular activities on top of our curriculum lessons, and I'm pretty much in charge of 'enriching' the school's English 'environment'.
Most of the kids at our school are angelic - as the English oral teacher, my classes are about 10 kids strong and usually include a ridiculously fluent kid (often with one Western parent) and a ridiculously naughty kid. Most of the children now know me and often physically hang off my arms during recess. The youngest year group are particularly cute, entering and exiting the staff room whilst bowing to everyone. I've also gained a 10-year-old stalker, who researched me on the internet and bombarded my website and email account with messages. The school are having words! My housemate Danielle has it worse, with her secondary school adolescents getting constant, unprovoked erections.
Meanwhile, during lessons, I've found myself becoming my old teachers and saying things like "You're not wasting my time - you're wasting your own time - I can wait all day" and "Would you like to share what you're talking about with the rest of us?”. With it being a pretty good, fairly famous, middle-class primary, the kids are all quite bright and my work could be a lot harder. However, it's more exhausting than in India or Uganda, probably because we do more work than the actual teachers. Over a two week cycle, my teaching partner Mary and I will teach all the kids in the school - we design fun games, songs, crafts, activities etc... all around the curriculum, with some scope for extra bits and bobs. Halloween, though, is off-limits, with it being a Baptist school!
We're on 'typhoon warning 3' at the moment - logos all over each TV channel tell you how much you need to worry. Typhoons are basically hurricanes and whilst level 3 brings rain and storms of the kind we'd never see in the UK, level 10 or 'direct hit' means stay-at-home-and-panic. Generally the daytime is still really humid - the air feels so thick sometimes, it's as if you can't breathe - and simple tasks like popping to the shop become horrible sweat-producing escapades.
Most of you will know how I feel about my hair - my golden buffont being one of the few features I’m satisfied with. Imagine the ordeal of going to a local salon knowing I’m probably the only ginger person my stylist has ever met. I wasn’t best happy with the work of my transsexual barber (yes, he/she was rather ambiguous on the gender front) and donned a hat for a week. Dreading having my highlights re-done, but what can you do eh?
The sweatshop opposite us is as sweaty as ever - careful monitoring has led us to observe that Bob works any and every day, festival or otherwise. It only takes a glance out the window when you’re feeling low - witnessing Bob slaving away makes you feel grateful, as well as somewhat heartbroken for the old guy. Over in the next block, ‘ugly naked guy number 1’, we’ve noticed, owns nothing but tight red pants. Also got a nasty full-on glimpse of his old naked wife last week, which still haunts me.
Learning a few Cantonese phrases - having heard how the script is formed, Chinese text is actually really cool. For example, the symbol for man is the symbol for ‘plough’ attached to the symbol for ‘strength’ - how cool is that? (and the symbol for woman is the symbol for ‘nagging’ attached to the one for ‘dishwasher’! - just kidding ladies!)
It was only when I visited Asia’s biggest shopping centre (right at the bottom of our street!) that I realised what a truly capitalist funfair I live in. It makes Merry Hill or Bluewater look like Apu’s MiniMart - it’s a maze, and it’s absolutely huge. The brands which advertise over here on TV aren’t loan companies, toothpastes and detergents, it’s things like Mercedes, Rolex, Vivienne Westwood, Bose etc… - and here, they have their own actual stores. There are so many millionaires about and HK has the highest ownership of Rolls Royce and Mercedes in the world - the place is a dodgy, tax-free, consumerist haven! One of the most popular brands is Hello Kitty - and you wouldn’t believe stuff you can buy - not just Hello Kitty dental floss, under-arm sweat absorbers, unbaked potato chips etc… but also Hello Kitty sanitary towels and, although rare, you can purchase a Hello Kitty sex toys. Nice, for a kid’s brand eh?
Admittedly the shopping is fantastic, but it’s not all big brand stores - there’s hundreds of markets and little hippy retro shops. It’s weird because I feel like my wages are like free money (and it even looks like monopoly money), so I’ll be getting kitted out on the clothes and gadget front. With it being China, and no tax, things are really cheap - if you work in schools and summer camps during the summer holidays, you could easily pay off your 5-figure student debt!
Been to a couple of festivals now. The mid-autumn festival was a big one, but a total wash-out and a bit disappointing. Lanterns everywhere, traditional music/dancing, big kahuna long dragons made from incense sticks, hundreds of people burning wax and eating ‘mooncakes’ in the rain. The Chinese National Day was on Saturday (which kicks off a week-long holiday for mainlanders) and there was a huge fireworks display across the famous harbour. Despite some truly ingenious dodging of police blockades, we made it to the front but couldn’t see because 400,000 people had the same idea - it was so sweaty!
Our flat fell apart last month, with the sink, shower and boiler all dying on us within 2 days. However, our landlord is an absolute legend. In addition to resembling Paul Daniels (complete with younger gold-digging wife, who I mistook for his daughter), he had it all fixed within a day!
There’s quite a big clubbing scene here - a lot of it is pretentious posing at over-priced ‘member’s only’ bars, but there are also lots of nights where it’s a totally free bar for £10 entry. Naturally I’ve got my self in a state a couple of times, though I’m sticking with huge bottles of San Miguel (45p each!). Many of the ex-pat bars are in the sleazy old red-light district of Wan Chai, where going from bar-to-bar involves a Krypton-Factor/Crystal-Maze style assault course of dodging/avoiding all manner of vagabonds, degenerates, tramps, prostitutes etc… (and the latter have no qualms about grabbing your genitals - the trick is to walk with a girl posing as your girlfriend - or, get a girlfriend).
Hope some of you got my postcards. I’ve met up with my bud Emily out here recently which was cool - and the invite remains open to any who want to follow suit and fancy crashing for a few days/week or two - plenty to see including Disneyland! My Uni mate/ex-radio co-host Phil will be moving out here next month, which is a Brucey Bonus! For chimbo, seems Bali is off limits with bird flu and bombings, so I’m off to Thailand in December for 10 days in the hope of catching Bali sometime next summer. They reckon it’ll be pretty quiet as tourists will somehow be working out that another tsunami will hit on the same date. Anyways… Loving it here, but already quite miss things like Radio 1 and 2, Leeds Market, Gangsta’s Pizza, The Independent, table manners (don’t get me started!), my student union - how I miss uni., Discovery Channels, windchill factor, tap water, the sky, air (have resorted to wearing a mask for the pollution!) etc… Oh and you lot too - so show me some love and hit reply! …And I’ll sign off with that cheesy ending… Catch u all soon… x
tom x =o)
EMAIL 4 - Sunday, October 23rd
hi folks,
As the attached photo illustrates, I've finally purchased a chicken suit for a quarter of the price of back home. Why? Because I feel every wardrobe should contain an animal suit - and the rooster is the classic option, the classic-M&S-basic-shirt of the comedy costume world, if you will. Locals found it hard to understand why I've been walking the streets randomly chickened-up, but here are some of the benefits:
*You get the best prices when you go to the touristy markets in Mong Kok.
*You can scare children and adults alike by creeping up on them and loudly imitating a cockerel.
*Answering "why-are-you-dressed-in-a-chicken-suit?" questions with "why-are-you-dressed-in-a-man-suit?" is worth the purchase alone.
*Running into KFC, then running out making horrified chicken-esque noises is a priceless opportunity to embarrass friends.
*Freaking out your housemate by donning it randomly at home often enough for them to stop questioning it. And turning up to meetings and riding the underground all add up to keeping me highly amused.
Yes, I've achieved all of the above and yes, I'll have video evidence - Trigger Happy TV style - soon. I feel it's the next step from running riot in a monkey mask around Egypt's Luxor Temple which got me a police warning! Also, it's a requirement for my 'hitch-hike around the world in a chicken suit' project, which is in its infancy but planned for 2007, watch this space.
In other news, I've bought a lush new Dell super-laptop, complete with all geek mod-cons like wireless t'internet, dvd burner, TV out etc... - it does everything, even the washing up. I'm getting a webcam so I can give any you guys a live tour of the flat, show you Sweatshop Bob and physically take you through our wardrobe Narnia portal. Until then, I'm often on MSN until about 5pm British time. We got broadband TV with the package, which you can't even get yet in the UK (well barely), complete with HBO.
The teaching is going well, still knackering but am getting used to the pace now the weather is cooling off. Also doing 2 one-hour lessons on Saturdays now, a 'puppet workshop' - however my boss is a moron. She has a total OCD in telling me where to leave the projector wire when I'm done. 10 times she told me in a day - I got the message on about the 3rd, and by the sixth my answers became increasingly sarcastic . Meanwhile, Fanny and Kinky are two new comical kids’ names to add to the list, the latter is a worryingly popular one.
Our flat is behaving, although every two weeks I spot a cockroach. They're increasing by approximately 100%!i(MISSING)n size each time, meaning in a couple of months they may actually be head-sized. I freakin hate them, they’re too fast. Although we keep a tight house, ants seem also to be a problem - from random ones in the cupboard to a menagerie of the little sods in my stash of raisins. As for our city, Tsim Sha Tsui, I've found that I can navigate my way home using purely odours - the smells coming from the sewers, un-refrigerated hanging meat, traffic and restaurants acting as a sort of olfactory map. We've a supermarket opened directly opposite us, which will save us the trouble of visiting one of the two in the next street, 2 minutes away.
Went to the beach the other week, the fresh air, space and quiet were all quite a novelty - a little too hot perhaps for my freckly ginger self but am giving it another shot next week after I see the Big Buddha! Also re-discovered the swimming baths, there's a great state-run pool at the end of our street, literally haven't been swimming since I was about 10 yet was still shocked to discover my swimming is surprisingly crap. There was a lot of undignified flapping about when I tried to do the breast stroke. I've also visited a very 1980s Space Museum, the 'interactive' exhibits included a clear pipe which a plastic rocket shoots up when you press a button and a large baby bouncer harness which can you have a go in to 'simulate zero gravity'. Bless it - it’s trying but it was painfully old skool and probably hadn't been updated since opening.
On the way home from the baths, I passed some drummers in the park - I asked one of them what their bongo-like instruments were called, in the vain hope of joining in. A frenzied 5-minute effort to find someone to translate ensued. Someone finally got back to me, triumphantly informing me that the said device was what the Chinese call a "drum". Well, every day's a school day (no, really). To cut a long story short, they were practicing for a protest/rally in celebration of 5 million people leaving the Chinese Communist Party. I joined the protest yesterday, didn't get arrested, but being a sore-thumb white-guy I attracted enough attention. I wondered if my presence was making a mockery of the event or whether I was representing other Westerners/expats and helping it raise more awareness. No mainstream press covered the march as censorship also exists in 'democratic' Hong Kong (where, actually, the people only get a third of the say in the vote). See bottom for links and more on the CCP.
And for those who thought I hadn't packed my high-horse and soapbox, I'm getting involved in the People's Alliance Against the WTO, hopefully in their international media centre. They're an umbrella organisation for NGOs protesting in December. They're also showing lots of political films which I'm dragging the group along to! =o) Suddenly feeling back in my element again, and it kinda reminded me what I want to do with my life...
It won't have escaped you that I've little to report now. Fact is, I'm pretty domesticated, have a full-time job, things are just normal and the travel bug is feeling somewhat ripped off. Though I'm of course happy to be here, HK is very Westernised and I often sit at home listening to Radio 2 online, eating imported food watching English TV. Because it's like back home here, you somehow want and expect things to be the same and get frustrated if little things aren't (e.g. over-priced crap chocolate, having to take a shit side-wards in our tiny bathroom etc…etc..). In say Uganda, India etc.. you don't expect to live to the same standard, so you somehow never loose the sense of adventure and travel... Anyways, I’m off to make my packed lunch - drop me a line guys...
Tom x =o) - authentic expat trash
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Hugh
non-member comment
Nice blog
Came across your story through a riduculously roundabout route, but really enjoying your fresh and honest account of HK. Ta.