Blog around the world

Even though there were only two classes, I was really worried about how the dialogue for my Chinese would go but it turned out pretty well! We had a skit where two brothers meet up, one from Beijing, and then they go buy an electronic device and later go out to eat. However, what really amazed me was one group which seemed to talk really naturally, as if they were local people. They spoke really fast and quite well.

After taking analytical chem, I went back home and then got some rest shortly after.

Considering it was my day off from classes, I did not really do much for the most part; however, I prepared my dialogue with my classmate for tomorrow’s assignment and later went out to eat Thai food after trying on a custom-sized suit. The food there had some really strong flavors, to say the least. One dish was extremely spicy, while another was really salty. It was definitely a good meal nonetheless.

November 11

Two classes that day. As the semester draws to a close soon enough, professors are going through the material rather quickly now. Looks like there will be a lot of studying to handle.

November 12

As per usual for a Tuesday here, many classes to take as well as volunteer work. One of the highlights was tutoring students Cantonese (specifically MTR stations), so that was an amusing yet interesting challenge for me.

After a church-filled morning, I went home to rest for a bit before heading out to meet up with my relatives in 元朗. There, we had a lot of eating and celebrated the birthdays for each member of the individual families, with me being one of them.

Something that I have noticed was the amount of seafood that I get to eat each meal. It’s really different from what I’m used to in the States where we only have seafood on occasion.

Due to miscommunication, I thought that I was going hiking with my friends since we were going to the same place as the last time we went hiking. It turned out that we were going to have fun at the beach! And I was definitely not properly dressed for the occasion… in spite of that, I managed to have a great time! I was buried in the sand and enjoyed the cool (though extremely salty) water.

Afterwards, we went to Kowloon Bay to have 飲茶. I never felt so challenged to know so much Chinese before since the other members of the group at most spoke in Mandarin which meant I served as the main speaker.

After heading out to Kowloon Bay, I went to Tsim Tsa Tsui to meet up with my friend to have dinner with my parent’s friends from many years ago – the story is quite complex but that is how my friend and I met. In any case, it was a great experience seeing some old faces and meeting some new ones.

Today, after class, I hung out with another old family friend. He introduced me to the school he’s attending as well as some of the students and faculty. Later in the day, I attended its show choir. I thought it was quite impressive!

One of the show choir’s performances

I’m combining November 6 and 7 together since during both days, nothing significant really occurred. The sixth, I spent my day off studying, while on the 7th, I spent the day going to class and taking my exam. It was actually quite nerve-wracking… really glad that I recovered from my sickness; it wasn’t severe.

Another event-filled day with classes and volunteer work! I was quite tired to say the least… and I didn’t feel too well as the day progressed… perhaps it is the lack of sleep finally taking its toll.

I had a chance to go to Ocean Park (an amusement park) with two of my friends for much of the day. The travel was quite lengthy and the place itself had quite expensive things: for instance, a decent meal cost me nearly $100… however, we were able to see many animals, including penguins, some foxes, seals, walruses, pandas, and some fish. We also got to ride the cable car and ride the roller coaster. I considered playing the games there, but since the place itself has so many expensive things, I decided against it. Since it was raining, the waiting time was short for the most part, save for waiting for the cable car. It was quite amazing how we were tired after spending time there for six hours. The final event we did there was watch a fountain show. It was unique in that there was a clip that played on the water “screen” and there were actual flames that appeared via a machine.

While the place itself was quite pricy, I do hope to go there again some time because of the great experience I had.

I went to church early in the morning, and afterwards, I went home to rest for a bit before going on a late afternoon to night hiking trip close by. It was a really nice experience seeing fireflies, a lot of caterpillars, scorpions, some rare butterflies, as well as a snail and Hong Kong newts. Since the place is so close to where I am currently living, I hope to visit there again.