At the Airport
Hong Kong! Where to start from?
Maybe from the start then. This is a story that begins to be repetitive but once again I should first say that my original plan did not include Hong Kong for 2009-2010! Sabrina and I wanted to go in exchange to the American University in Cairo for a year, but we got to go only for one semester; so we had to chose another destination – anywhere – to spend the fall 2009 semester. And Hong Kong was our choice. Our ‘exchange manager’, Pauliina Rouleau (now in maternity leave), suggested Hong Kong, as there was spots available, so we said: “why not?” And here am I.
I was never really interested in discovering HK. I always though that it was much more interesting to go to rural China, which I would lamely but truly say is ‘more Chinese’. I also always said that cities did not interest me, specially the huge ones. But Hong Kong is just amazing, crazy, crowded, busy, shiny, big, traditional, western and eastern in the same time.
Hong Kong Harbour
The harbour, for example. It was the busiest in the World for some time, and it is definitely the busiest I’ve ever seen. It’s immense. It also constitutes the ‘introduction to HK’ as one kind of has to go through when coming from the airport to go downtown. And the view in the background of the forest of skyscrapers is almost surreal. Wowowiwow.
The view from my dorm...
Talking about skyscrapers, I could also go on with the superlatives, but I won’t, because it’s getting boring. Just look at the view I have from the roof of my student residence at City University. Luckily we are situated in one of the most expansive neighborhood in HK, so I pay 500 US$ rent for an entire semester instead of billions per month. Good. On the picture above, in the very center, you can see some fierce light. That’s Mongkok, the busiest area in the world (I have personally compared every square inches). On the right of the center the Bank of China building can be seen, and even more on the right is the tallest building in HK, still in construction, the ICC tower (International Commerce Center, for the ignorant ones). Sweet stuff.
A
And then that’s what I do on Friday evenings: floor dinner party (7th floor, hall 9), with KFC buckets and Pizza Hut delicatessen.
