Hello everyone,
Hope you are all happy and well
At the urging of some of my friends, here is another of my broadcast emails sent to you and many of my other friends to let you know what I have been doing lately. Of course, if you would prefer not to receive this email could you please either just hit your 'delete' button or alternatively drop me a note to let me know and I can take you off the circulation list.
So, here goes......
Two weeks ago I moved into my own apartment. I am living here by myself. The apartment has three bedrooms one of which I use as an office. Another is for sleeping and the other is for all the rubbish I have collected since I have been in Hong Kong! Where do I get this stuff from…………….
My apartment is about three years old and is similar to those that could be found at the Docklands. The building I am in is one of a group of buildings on this site. Underneath this group of buildings is the new Kowloon Station MTR (Mass transit rail) and also another train line, the Airport Express with only one station between here and the new airport at Lantau island on a very fast train.
Kowloon Station is one station from Hong Kong station, the main station, along with Central Station in the central business district of Hong Kong. I am about 1 km from the centre of Hong Kong.
The location that I am living at is where the old Hong Kong airport used to be. I understand that they moved the airport from this location after pilots complained about flying so close to the buildings that they used to fly down people's hallways, through their front door, and out the back window on their landing approaches.
I have included a picture taken through my WebCam that I use to talk with my office. The picture is of the golf range across the road from me and is taken from my 15th floor apartment. As you can see, the golf range is in the foreground and many apartment buildings and commercial buildings are in the distance in a suburb called Jordan. Jordan is a great place, full of shops, street restaurants and also a night market where many of the westerners go at nighttime.
The Chinese refer to westerners as Gwai Loh's that means " White ghost". Sometimes it is said with affection but usually with disdain. Fortunately for me, I have made quite a few friends amongst the local community and they just refer to me as Alan. There is also a lady in one of the restaurants here that I affectionately refer to as "the tummy rubber" because every time I go there for dinner she always comes up to me afterwards and pats me on my tummy and nods her head up and down approvingly. She doesn't speak any English, but I get the general idea of what she is communicating to me.
I am actually typing this message to day because I have stayed home with an upset stomach from some food that I ate last night at her restaurant. I think I have been very fortunate as I have been eating from the local street stalls and markets for the past two months and last night is the first time anything I have eaten has said any ill effect on me. I think the food that she served me was okay, however one of the side dishes was a bit oily and I think that was the culprit.
Last week I went up to Shenzhen, China. It is really simple to get to China from here. It is nearly a choice of catching a taxi (so cheap here!) or walking over to the KCR station (Kowloon China railway) and hopping on a really comfortable train and looking out the window for the next 40 minutes. At the end of the journey it is a fairly straightforward process of going through Hong Kong customs to leave this country and then going through China customs to enter that country and then, well............you are in China............. it's a bit like taking the train from Melbourne to Ferntree Gully and having it difficult ticket inspector at the end of the journey. Really simple (except for the ticket inspector).
Unfortunately my passport photo is six years old. That means it has a picture of me with a different hairstyle and a big bushy moustache. I look like either a detective inspector from the Victoria police, or an army major. You can guess for yourselves the number of times that customs officials stare at my picture, then stare at me, then stare at my picture, then stare at me, then ask another customs official to check me out, then stare at my picture, then stare at me, then stamp my passport and throw it back in my general direction......
Anyway, last week when I went to China I decided not to do what I had done the two previous times I had been there, which was to spend all day in a huge shopping mall. I decided this time to get out into the " suburbs" and see what was going on. So, I jumped on a bus without taking notice of where it was going, paid my money and sat back until the bus driver told me to get off as my money had expired.
I ended up in a place called Dong Men which is actually quite a nice place if you keep your hand on your wallet so that the local pickpockets can't get it. I wandered down some streets in Dong Men and was absolutely taken back by the sheer number of people out in the streets during the Chinese New Year holiday. At one point I was standing at a four-way intersection and I looked around myself and all I could see was tens of thousands of people. I had to wonder to myself " where do they get the food to feed all of these people?" and " where do all of these people live?" I was just so taken aback by the numbers of people there. It's a bit like being at the entry gates of the Telstra dome just before a major event, just that in China, this is normal all day every day.
I did however see some sites that disturbed me. In China, as there is no social welfare system, people have to fend for themselves. This means that there are many beggars. Being a Gwai Loh means that I am an instant target for every beggar within 500 m to target me like a magnet to steel. Sometimes it is a simple case of giving them some money, or, if I feel that they are bogus, politely refusing. There were a couple of cases though that did disturb me. One was of two adults who were obviously blind, begging on an overpass footbridge. The woman was obviously blind, but the guy looked to have been previously blind in one eye but had looked to have plucked out his other good eye so that he was fully blind and therefore a legitimate beggar. Very sad. In the other situation that disturbed me, I was walking in the middle of a crowd in though twilight at night across the footbridge. I came across the dark outline of a young woman sitting on the ground cross-legged with a small baby in her lap eating her dinner out of an upturned rubbish bin. Everybody just walked past her as if she was not there. Very disturbing. She was not begging, merely trying to get something to eat. There are many such sights like this in China.
Whilst I was in Dong Men, I decided to have a haircut. I thought I would walk in to the hairdressers, sit down, have my hair cut and then leave, a process I thought might take about 30 minutes. Little did I realise that I was going to have my hair shampooed, be given a 30 minute back, shoulder and head massage, have my hair cut, and then have my hair shampooed again, then blow dried, all from a very happy staff who proceeded to charge me the equivalent of just less than eight dollars in Australian money. I thought this was simply amazing until I walked off down the road and found out that you could actually get the same thing cheaper!
As I walked off down the road, and as it was dinnertime I started looking at local restaurants to see what I might partake of. One restaurant that I passed by was serving up dog, cat, mouse and I even saw live snakes in the cage out the front of the restaurant for your selection. You merely needed to tell them which animal, fish or reptile you desired and how you would like it cooked and then they happily took that creature and brought it back for you on a plate. I made a comment about the types of food that the Chinese like. I was told " we will eat anything!" While I don't judge anybody on what they eat, I'm happy to say that I kept walking down the road until I found the seafood restaurant.
I must say that whilst I have been up here in the Northern Hemisphere, my sense of direction has been a little bit out. Sometimes I have found myself walking off in a direction that I think is correct only to find out that the place I want to go is in exactly the other direction from where I'm going. I put this down to my internal sense of direction that I know where the equator is. Being up here, the equator is in the other direction that I am used to, so I find myself heading in the wrong direction. These days I am aware of this and just do a little bit of checking before I head off. There was one funny incident that happened a few weeks ago when I came out of the MTR in a suburb called Mongkok. I wasn't sure which direction was which so I asked a local guy " which direction is Hong Kong?" (meaning " where is Hong Kong Island, or where is Central?" as this whole place/State is Hong Kong). Anyway this guy just looked at me as if I was stupid, pointed straight down at the ground and said " here". Of course he was completely right and I walked away with my head hung in shame, shaking my head from side to side and thinking to myself " Alan, you're an idiot!" whilst quietly having a chuckle to myself.
I have made quite a few friends here already, both Asian and Western. A few nights ago one of these friends took me to a floating restaurant at Aberdeen on the other side of Hong Kong Island. Essentially, to get to this restaurant you must take a junk out into the harbour and to the restaurant that is floating but fixed in place. I have included a picture taken from the phone in my camera as I was leaving this restaurant and going back to the jetty after dinner. The sites here are truly amazing.
Recently, I watched the Bruce Lee Story on cable television. More recently, I saw Jackie Chan in a new movie called "The Myth". Whilst watching both of these movies there were many background shots of Hong Kong. Had I watched these movies back in Australia, I would have thought to myself " what a magical and mystical place that Asia is". Having been here for nearly 2 months and then watching these movies, I simply think to myself " Oh, there's the exhibition centre at Wan Chai", or " there's such and such a building, or place" etc.
Musically, I have been playing guitar here most days. Recently, I was asked by a local DVD video magazine to perform two acoustic songs and to do a video interview for their next magazine. I understand that that will happen soon and be on the next DVD magazine that is sold here in Hong Kong. The DVD video magazine is called MomentEye and you can see their web site at
www.momenteye.comI have also been asked to perform two sets of acoustic music at a convention to be held at Stanley at the end of March. So, I am looking forward to these opportunities.
I have also taken an interest in the music of a guy who has had recent chart hits in America, Europe and Australia. His name is Richard Hawley and he writes some really nice songs as well as performing them. Anyway, I was trying to find some of his music and was having no luck. I decided to do an Internet search and I found a web site for this artist. The web site had a forum for people to leave comments or ask questions, so I wrote a few words and made a request for the progressions and arrangements for a particular song. I was completely taken by surprise when Richard Hawley replied to my message and gave me all of the information that I needed. I still remain blown away by the friendly attitudes of most professional musicians but I have come across including Richard Hawley, Bob Spencer (ex Angels, Skyhooks and choirboys), Paul Norton (singer/performer), Wendy Stapleton (singer/performer), Peter Jones (Kate Cerebrano, Renee Geyer, Stovetop), Richard Clapton (singer/songwriter/performer) and Vince Jones (singer/performer). (Apologies to anybody that I left out, or whose credentials I got incorrect). If you would like to see the dialogue from the forum please log on to http://richardhawleyforum.co.uk/viewtopic.php?p=69840#69840 If you would like to hear some really good songs, as Molly Meldrum would say " Do yourselves a favour" and have a listen to some of Richard's music.
I have also kept my involvement in the music association that I was involved in for the past two years, Warriors Victoria. Having spent two years on the committee and one year as the President, I am now helping by maintaining the web site from here in Hong Kong. If you want to see the latest news please log on to
www.warriorsvictoria.piczo.comI also had a birthday in February and, as a treat, Melissa took me to the Oasis concert at the Asia-World Expo near the airport. Great show. Oasis were never really my favourite band and they still aren't but I'm really glad to have gone to see them.
I miss Australia, and I miss my home. I miss my son, my daughter, my cat, my beautiful home, my great friends and my lifestyle. That said, I have decided to stay here and to enjoy this life experience.
Recently, my housesitter Cait was offered a job at a university in America. That means that she will have to leave and I wish her all the best as she is a really nice person and has been really helpful since I left. My good friend Dennis is moving into my house to take over from Cait in a week or so. So, if anyone is going past my house you will now see Dennis there. May I say thank you to both Cait and Dennis.
The people from my office continue to run things there and we are in regular communication which allows me to stay here and enjoy my time in Asia. So, thanks to Bob, Mike, Melissa and Gerald for doing all the things there so that I can stay here.
So, this ends a rather lengthy e-mail but one that I hope you enjoy reading it anyway.
As always, I would love to hear from any of you so please drop me a line if you can. I would appreciate it.
I'll send another instalment in a couple of weeks, hopefully not as long as this one.
Bye for now,
Best wishes,
Alan
