Hong Kong’s Bright and Sparkling Christmas

For a country that doesn’t really celebrate Christmas, Hong Kong sure likes its Christmas decorations. Despite the fact that it's still around 25 degrees outside, it's not difficult to get into the Christmas spirit with lights strung across every skyscraper and Christmas songs booming from every speaker in Hong Kong since mid November.

Particularly in the many malls around Hong Kong you'll see some of the most amazing Christmas decorations. From amazing trees, to huge wooden puppets and endless lights, preferably multi-coloured and flashing.

As this will be my last post for 2010, I’ll leave you with some pictures of Christmas in Hong Kong. I’ll be back in the new year with more exciting experiences from my life here in Hong Kong.

 Have a great Christmas and a wonderful New Year!

Annelotte

The Merry Maids of Hong Kong

Yesterday morning I went into town to meet a friend for brunch and walking from the station to the restaurant in Soho I almost tripped over some of the thousands of domestic helpers hanging around in town.

This is a regular sight on Sundays (the only days off for the maids) with thousands of maids (also known as domestic helpers) gathering in groups on every available free space around Central. Through heat, sun, wind and cold they sit in small groups on card board boxes sharing food and stories and playing games.

The majority of the approximately 240,000 domestic helpers in Hong Kong are Filipino, leaving behind their lives and families in hope of a better life and income in Hong Kong. Surprisingly, most of the domestic helpers have degrees and speak good English as a higher education degree is required in order to obtain a work visa for Hong Kong.

Most families in Hong Kong have a maid (some even more than one) and the majority of them are live-in maids. Considering that the average house in Hong Kong is the size of a shoebox you can imagine the living conditions of the maid.

I remember being told a story of an expat who was trying to apply for a work visa for his maid but didn’t have room for the maid to live in his home. When applying for the visa the government official refused to give the maid the visa unless she would be provided with living space in the house. When the expat responded that the house was too small, the official suggested that the maid could perhaps sleep in the kitchen!  

It’s quite a sight to see all these women around town and you can’t help but feel a bit sorry for them but when you look at their faces they seem to be enjoying themselves and making the most of the scarce free time they have. Good on them!

See you next time!

A night at the races

To celebrate the end of Simon’s training and my sister’s visit we decided to pay a visit to the famous Happy Valley horse races.

Horse racing is big thing here in Hong Kong with thousands of locals and expats getting together at the Happy Valley racecourse on Wednesday nights to watch the races, gamble and socialize. Set in the middle of Hong Kong with skyscrapers surrounding the brightly lit track, the Happy Valley racecourse must be one of the most impressive racing venues in the world.

I found that racing here is very different from what I was used to in the UK and Sydney, where the atmosphere is sophisticated and the punters dress up, sip on champagne and nibble on canapés. Here, horse racing is very relaxed. You can wear pretty much anything and drinks are served in large plastic cups and jugs. It seems to be more about the beer and gambling than about hats and outfits.





While many of the expats come to the races for a fun and cheap night out, the locals are really into the betting, many of them sitting inside at tables with papers with score results and statistics scattered around them watching the races on tv screens. Betting on horse racing seems to be a national hobby here with the annual betting turnover approximating HK$71billion (7 biljard Euro)

Getting ready for the start

I’ve never been a big gambler but with all the betting going on around me I decided to try my luck and bet on some horses. It all looks very confusing in the beginning with terms like trifecta, quinella and trio on the betting sheets, but with a little help from one of the betting ladies I found out that it’s actually not that complicated. Still, I decided to play it safe and I only bet on single horses to place (in other words, the chosen must end 1^st,2^nd or 3^rd  place) and only betting only small amounts. With little knowledge about any of the horses, I decided to choose the horsed based on their names (how can you not bet on horses called “Dr Win”, “Fun and Fast” and “the Untouchable Lad”?). It probably wasn’t the best betting strategy and I didn’t end up winning any money but I can assure you that the races are much more fun to watch if there’s a bit of money at stake (even if it’s only HK$10) and you join the cheering as the horses near the finish hoping that your horse will magically make its way from last to first in the last 100 meters (not very likely as I found out).

And they're off!

All in all, going to the races is definitely a favourite night time activity and the combination of the al-fresco atmosphere, the exhilaration of betting and jugs of cheap beer makes for a perfect night out. And maybe next time I’ll try a different betting strategy and see if its more successful.

Surviving the Smog

Having lived in Sydney for the past few years, where you will generally find the most beautiful bright blue skies, moving to Hong Kong was a bit of a shock.

The first few weeks I was here I didn’t notice how bad the air situation really was as the weather was pretty decent and the pollution level not too bad. I now know that these clear blue days are a rarity here in Hong Kong and most days the skies are pretty hazy, or should I say smoggy? 

The difference in the view from our apartment on a clear and not so clear day is remarkable.

Clear day



Not so clear day

Air pollution in Hong Kong is has become a serious problem affecting residents health and causing some expats to reconsider a relocation to Hong Kong. While the Government of Hong Kong has introduced new regulations and measures to tackle the issue of pollution the problem is still getting worse. In March 2010, Hong Kong’s smog was the worst on record and a research conducted by the Hong Kong University in 2008 found that the pollutants in the Hong Kong air were three times higher than New York and double that of London! According to a survey conducted in 153 countries, Hong Kong people are the unhappiest in the world with their air quality.

Where does the pollution come from? Well, there are two different opinions on this. According to the Government the pollution comes from the Guangdong factories in the Pearl river Delta. According to other sources, these factories are only part of the story. Hong Kong has the world’s highest traffic density as well as coal burning power plants, contributing to an estimated 50% of the total pollution level (source: http://gohongkong.about.com/od/healthandsaftey/a/ong_Kong_Pollution.htm)

But there is hope, you can now buy bottles of fresh air for HK$2 which, according to the commercial will help you with “exciting new skills, like balloon animals and yodelling” and let you “blow out your birthday candles with confidence”. You can check out the video here. 

So while I’m loving the fact that it’s mid November and it’s still 27 degrees, I’m definitely less enthusiastic about the smog and miss the crisp clear Sydney blue skies….

See you next time! 

Hong Kong’s tasty treats

One thing you don’t need to worry about here in Hong Kong is starving. Food is everywhere, from the fresh food markets to the local street stalls, from the amazing variety of restaurants to endless fast food chains. There is literally food everywhere you go.

While you can literally find any type of cuisine here in Hong Kong, the local style of cooking is Cantonese. The Cantonese influence is the result of Hong Kong’s geographical location near the Chinese Guangzhou province (Canton) and the fact that the majority of Hong Kong Chinese are immigrants or descendants of immigrants from Cantonese speaking parts of China.

One of the most well known dishes of Cantonese cuisine is dim sum. Dim sum refers to the dozen of types of small dumplings - whether boiled, fried or steamed - stuffed with vegetables, meat or seafood. Going for dim sum is sometimes also known as yum cha, which literally means going to “drink tea” (飲茶). Dim sum is particularly popular around lunchtime on weekends when families come out to eat and you’ll find long lines in front of the dim sum restaurants.

I recently went for my first real dim sum meal at Maxim’s Palace at city Hall and both the food and atmosphere were amazing. The restaurant was a huge lively and noisy room with waiters pushing trolleys with steaming bamboo baskets around the room. You simply point to what you want and they’ll put it on the table and on the bill. We tried steamed buns, rice noodle rolls, pork dumplings, spring rolls and some other dishes that I couldn’t identify. I can highly recommend the restaurant so if you’re ever here in Hong Kong make sure you include it in your itinerary (and to invite me!).

The large dining hall at the dim sum restaurant

My other new favorite dish is Peking duck, one of the most iconic dishes in China famous for its crisp skin and succulent fles. To achieve this the duck is air-dried, then coated with a syrupy sauce before roasting in an oven. The dish is eaten by wrapping slivers of the skin in thin steamed pancakes with spring onions, sliced cucumber and a variety of delicious sauces.

Traditional Peking duck

I had my first experience of eating Peking Duck in a local Chinese restaurant just over the Hong Kong border in Shenzhen. As tradition holds it, the chef sliced the duck at our table (see picture below) and we feasted on a table full of duck, pancakes and accompanying dishes. A single can be sliced in up to 120 slices so can therefore imagine that this dish is usually eaten by a group not by just two people as was the case with us! But the food was so delicious we actually managed to eat most of it!

The chef carves the duck at your table

Doesn't it look amazing!

There are still so many other dishes and cuisines to try here and I’m sure this won’t be the last time I’ll be writing about my culinary experiences here.

Bon appétit!

Unlucky fours

A couple weeks after moving into my new building I was standing in the elevator and I noticed that some floors in our building were missing, namely all floors with the number “4” eg, 4, 14, 24, 34, etc. After that I noticed that the absence of the number 4 was much more widespread than only missing floors on buildings. It seemed like the locals did everything they can to avoid this seemingly unlucky number.

Absence of number "4" in our elevator



It turns out that in Chinese culture there is a strong belief that certain numbers are unlucky while others are considered lucky based on the Chinese word that the number name sounds similar to. The number 4 (肆 sì) is the most unlucky number as it is pronounced almost similar to the word ‘death’ (死 sǐ). The number 8 (八 bā) on the other hand is considered to be one of the luckiest numbers as the word sounds similar to the word “prosper” or “wealth” (发财 fā).

As a result of this supposed luckiness or unluckiness of certain numbers, Chinese people will often choose lucky numbers (and avoid the unlucky ones) for their phone numbers, street addresses, bank account numbers etc. Some people go as far as to pay large sums of money for these numbers, for example a telephone number with all digits being eights was sold for USD$270,723 in China (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_in_Chinese_culture#Eight). And another interesting fact: the opening ceremony of the Summer Olympics in Beijing began on 8/8/08 at 8 seconds and 8 minutes past 8pm.



Chinese symbol for "4"


As for the number four, not only do most high-rise buildings in Hong Kong miss floor numbers with “4”,  but apparently also some product lines skip the “4” series. For example it is said that Nokia doesn’t have any product series with the number 4 in respect for their Asian clients. Special care is also taken to avoid occurrences or reminders of the number 4 during festive holidays or when a family member is sick in fear that the person will die. And I’ve heard you can even get a discount at the phone shop if you request a phone number with one or more “4”s. This fear and aversion of the number four is such a common thing in Asia that there is a special word for it: “tetraphobia”.

But there is good news for the Chinese, in 2003, researchers from Chinese University of Hong Kong reported that people are no more likely to die from a heart attack on dates containing the number four than any other dates (http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/default.htm).  At least that’s one less thing to worry about.

See you next time.

Annelotte 

The Hong Kong Wetmarkets

Although modern western supermarkets can be found almost everywhere in Hong Kong the majority of the local Hong Kong population seems to get their food from the so called ‘wet’ markets. These traditional Chinese food markets are quite the experience.

The markets sell a range of different products ranging from fruits and vegetables, poultry, seafood, cooked food and a range of dried foods such as rice, pulses and range of unknown dried products (asking the stall owner what they were didn’t help as most of the stall owners spoke very little English). At most of the stalls you’ll also see old fashioned scales hanging from the ceiling as food here is measured by old fashioned weight measurements, the catty or the boon.

The fruit and vegetable stalls look amazing with their produce stacked up neatly on wooden tables. Particularly popular are the many varieties of green leafy vegetables. Moving on from the vegetable stalls you’ll find the meat stalls. The blood stained tables and butcher and range of hooks with all sorts of unidentifiable meat cuts make for a slightly unappetising sight but it’s amazing to watch locals buy their meat and the butchers just hacking at the cuts with huge knifes.

Personally I found the seafood stalls the most interesting, or should I say confronting. In large aerated tanks there was a huge assortment of live fish, crabs, prawns, lobster and shellfish. Next to the tanks there are also boxes with ice with dead fish displayed on them. Or at least I thought they were dead. While watching the fishmongers for a while I noticed that they would slice open a fish but in such a manner that all the organs would be left in tack so that the fish was actually still breathing.

There’s no two ways about it, the food at the wetmarkets is definitely fresh but it’s also slightly confronting and you’ll need a strong stomach and a bit of gutsiness to actually buy anything there. But it’s also a great experience and it gives you a good insight into they way the locals buy their food.

See you next time. 

Annelotte

Mooncakes and Mid-Autumn Festival

Over the past couple of weeks I kept seeing advertisements for round cake-like treats (these images were literally everywhere: on the back of buses, centrefold spreads in newspapers and posters all over the MTR). I started to get curious and after a bit of research and asking around it turns out that these treats are mooncakes a Chinese delicacy that is typical to the Mid Autumn festival. These mooncakes are offered between friends and family in the lead-up to the festival.

According to Wikipedia the Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Moon Festival, is a popular harvest festival celebrated by Chinese and Vietnamese people, dating back over 3,000 years. The Mid-Autumn Festival is held on the 15^th day of the eight month in the Chinese calendar, which is in September or early October (this year October 22^nd). The Mid-Autumn Festival is one of the few most important holidays in the Chinese calendar, the others being Chinese New Year and Winter Solstice. Traditionally Chinese family members and friends will gather to admire the moon, eat moon cakes and pomelos together. Accompanying the celebrations there are additional cultural customs such as: carrying brightly lit lanterns, burning incense, and fire dragon dances. More information about the festival can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mid-Autumn_Festival.

Mooncakes are generally round or rectangular, about the size of the palm of your hand. The moon cakes have a thin pasty like crust and are usually filled with lotus seed paste. In the centre you will often find a yolk from salted duck eggs (yuck!) to represent the moon. If you want to see how these mooncakses are make check out this link (http://www.sbs.com.au/food/foodart/182/Mooncakes).

Since I don’t have any Chinese friends yet who will buy me one of these pastries, I set out to buy one for myself to see what all the fuss is about. As the label of my mooncake packaging was all in Chinese buying one of these cakes was a bit of a gamble. Back home I cut open the cake to find that mine (thankfully) didn’t contain a yolk but nuts of some sort. It actually tasted quite good but it was awfully sweet and only a small slice of the round cake was enough for me. Probably for the better as I later found out that these traditionally delicacies aren’t really the healthiest of snacks the with some mooncakes containing more than the recommended daily intake of sugar while others are large enough to supply one’s daily fat requirements (thankfully I only had a small slice and didn’t finish the whole thing!).

Having enjoyed the new experience of tasting the mooncakes we got into the Mid-Autumn Festival spirit and ventured out to Causeway Bay to have a look at the Lantern Festival. The lanterns were very impressive with lanterns in all shapes and sizes (see pictures below).

What an amazing festvial. I might leave the moon cake eating up to the locals but the lanterns were definitely a highlight!

Happy mid-Autumn Festival!

Annelotte

Fùnyìhng (welcome) to my life in Hong Kong

So here I am taking the big plunge into the unfamiliar territory of online blogging. Many people have gone down this road before but never before have I thought my life to be interesting enough and my writing skills adequate enough to post anything online to share with the world. So what’s changed?

Well first of all I’ve recently moved to Hong Kong with my partner and, even though I have lived in may different places around the world, this place just has so many weird and wonderful things that I feel the need to write about them and share with friends and family and anyone else interested. Secondly, for the first time in my life I am finding myself in a situation where I have so much free time I have no idea how to fill it and writing useless blogs seems to be an interesting way to fill my time. So as long while I have all of this time off I decided I might as well start writing down some of these things that I have been witnessing around me.

Before I start going into the specifics of my experiences in Hong Kong, I’d like to share some of my overall first impressions of Hong Kong: tall skyscrapers, lots of people, dead animals hanging from shop windows, more skyscrapers, illegible shop signs, hygiene mania, smog, strange unidentifiable objects in pharmacy shops (something that smells that nasty surely can’t be good for you!) and even more skyscrapers.

So far the experience has been absolutely amazing and everyday I am learning new things so dive with me into this journey and enjoy these weird and wonderful experience with me!

As they say in Hong Kong, Baai Baai!

Annelotte