After spending two years in a row and leave the other half in mainland China, no, I was with both fear and anticipation that I recently crossed the border in the richest city in South Asia.
Despite its popularity with expatriates single continental require new clothes and a new visa, I really had no idea what to expect in the former crown colony that supposedly makes even the wealthy feel poor. Instead of requiring terrified reverse culture shock, so it saved the English language in Hong Kong and its “one country, two systems” car on the tail of my journey through all 32 Chinese provinces.
And it is here to report that all my prejudices and fears of Hong Kong … true. In the words of American writer Thomas A. underestimated Carter (I) In his brief stay in the Chinese city of legend, “I’ve never felt poorer than when I was in Hong Kong … I’ve never felt more ugly than when I was in Hong Kong.”
DAY 1: Cross the Shenzhen-Hong Kong border Louhu take immaculate KCR railway, immediately impressed that nobody is watching, pushing or spitting. Arrive in Kowloon’s southern peninsula and emerge from underground in the land of lights – Tsim Sha Tsui. Blinded by emotion, I have to ask a resplendent group of Indian women wrapped in saris in the Mirador Mansion. They point the finger up Curly gold. A huge concrete block stained with rust, and one of the rooms only in Hong Kong at affordable prices. The registration of a claustrophobic bedroom (three times the price of a Mainland dorm and three times smaller), then click on Nathan Road. Peering in neon lights, tripping in the bustle of the crowd, I feel like a migrant worker in Beijing.
Day 2: woke up at 6 am by one of my trip bunkmates after a long night. His name is Pat, a young American backpacker with long red hair whose introduction is immediately followed by a full account information on their two-week romps in Hong Kong, including scoring with the mythical “Asian girls love foreign students . ‘When I respond that I have never had much luck, the fast talking but likeable Pat has some advice out of the sleeve (“Dude, lose the beard”) before launching into more useful information. “It’s Sunday, okay, not gonna be like, 120,000 Filipino nannies and served in its day was just – and looking for boyfriends!” I’m a little dubious generalizations “of Pat, but certainly mobile rings constantly with calls from adoring cleaning ladies he met the previous Sunday. An afternoon stroll Statue Square indeed reveals a blanket literally thousands of days field of South Asian Women (Hong Kong, the largest migrant communities) whose speech sounds like a great flock of seagulls. When you try really attractive picture of a young Filipino, shouting “Hey, I click jor ass! “So much for a date.
DAY 3: Fieldtrip to Shek O beach on the south side of the island of Hong Kong, savoring the soft sand and splashing in the subtropical South China Sea. It is assumed that this place is packed on weekends, but that’s what weekdays are, right? And “one of those moments where I’d be unemployed. Chase my fun in the sun with a tram ride up Victoria Peak for a breathtaking view of skyscrapers at night, they seem to be constructed entirely of lights. Dafnit, an Israeli girl clearly in awe of the skyscrapers of Hong Kong, said: “We have no tall buildings in Israel. … Oh, wait that you have!”
DAY 4: Spend the day through Kowloon, the fashion billboards of TST fences become seedy massage as I descend northwest by the Nathan Road side streets, the sun lost behind precipices of neon signs stretching horizontally on roads. The markets of Mong Kok are attacked by uniformed students on lunch break: boys with long hair, white shirt and tie off the loose trousers, and girls dresses packed in a Japanese Kogal / fantasy hentai: socks up Knee short black skirts and a Louis Vuitton bag to carry their pencils and books. They have tattoos, tongue piercings and smoke cigarettes. After commenting that students are more popular in China saw a boy of 15, responds in perfect English: “Yes, cool yes, but so young.”
DAY 5: I want to see how the other half lives and spend the day at Central, Hong Kong Island’s microcosm of capitalism. Victoria Cross, the ancient port of Star Ferry through a miasma of pollution in the morning and follow the crowd of white collar businessmen dealing with mobile phones, wallets and coffee in its skyscrapers . Later observe as many women shopping in designer department stores – to be wives. I realized that all clutch their purses as I walk in, then you will understand why, I am in thoughtful F? Exterior of Bank of China Tower. His head hit me in the self-consciousness, I was about to get the tip of a Rolls (driving on the wrong side of the road, the British damn!), Then almost always a double-decker cable car. Everyone in the center should be against me. My insecurities have arrested the same night in Lan Kwai Fong, a gentrified neighborhood of upscale restaurants and bars on the north side. The steep streets are congested with young, rich, roasted westpats another good day for making money. I can not believe that there are many white people in China who are not English teachers! All rooms are elegantly dressed and well cared for hair, I am wearing military-style pants, low-top fake Converse, a boy of eight years, the shirt I bought was used, nor have I shaved and cut blocks in eight months I’ve been on the road. I want to belong, but not me. And “one of those moments when I regret being unemployed.
DAY 6: I give the island another chance and take the ferry in the evening until the end of the port north of the former nightclub and underworld, the infamous Wan Chai. Remembering is where Richard Mason 1950 he wrote his story of forbidden love, “The World of Suzie Wong”, although much has changed since he wrote “take a minute to walk from downtown and you will not see a European.” The van bars still line the road, yum-yum girls luring passersby into their neon lights holes, but these are the illegitimate daughters of Suzie Wong, not of Chinese dissidents, but in Thailand, do not use cheongsam silk elegant but cheap miniskirts raised to immodest heights. And unlike the kindly ladies of the Nam Kok Hotel, these girls of our work days are vicious, mercenary, cold. When a group of obviously disappointed white boys leave and saying: “In Thailand, remove all the clothes,” brings a dark skinned girl in plastic go-go boots are ready to cry “, then go to Thailand! After Lockhart I keep a couple of older Europeans primed with drink and flirting heavily with a beautiful bouquet of girls looking for generous company. After making their arrangements, one of the men leans on me and confides, “Wy mife, I mean my wife thinks I’m * sob during a conference. “The remaining girls give this poor writer a cursory glance and quickly cross the street away from me.
DAY 7: I wake up feeling sad and classless, expatriates from the center does not want me or the girls in Wan Chai waterfront. Take a stroll around TST, passing knots friendly third-world hustlers hanging out in front of the Chungking Mansions, the immigrant ghetto of Kowloon that serves as temporary housing for migrants in Hong Kong’s financially insolvent. A street corner tout from Kashmir says to me: “The residence is where not wearing pastel shorts or a stay.” I realize this mad cauldron of multiculturalism is truly the only place where I feel at home in Hong Kong. The Africans never quiet front steps always high-five me, the Pakistanis all think I’m Muslim (must be the beard), and the Indians bat their eyelashes at me. The Chungking Mansions are the international meeting place for anyone who is, and I am one of them. Y ‘a peasant’s epiphany – Hong Kong, I’m’ Nongmin. ‘
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