Hong Kong

On my way back from Thailand, I stopped for a few days in Hong Kong. Again, this blog entry is over half a year late. Life's been keeping me busy in the past few months.

Hong Kong is a bit like Asia's New York: lots of people, lots of capital, lots of skyscrapers. People in Hong Kong are colder than in New York: even those who are supposed to be courteous to you (e.g., clerks in commerces where you buy things) don't give a shit about you. That impression might partially be due to the language barrier. Also, people in Hong Kong don't seem to have the same level of cultural, fashion and educational sophistication that you would find in Manhattan.

In Hong Kong, I saw long line-ups to get in stores such as Louis Vuitton and Gucci. I'd personally go in one of the street markets and buy rip-offs if I wanted such items. One nice thing I saw were Wi-Fi enabled phone booths. Another thing I'd never seen before was currency bills printed by private corporations. The first time I withdrew money from an (HSBC) ATM, I got HSBC bills. At first, I was wondering what kind of funny money I got. It turns out that money issued by private banks is common here. I wonder how the monetary policies work at a macro-economic level in Hong Kong.

In Hong Kong, there are tons of people from the Philippines and Indonesia. They come to work as maids and nannies. They get way better salaries this way than degree-bearing professionals would in their home countries.

During my second night, I met up with Alex (a guy I went to college with). We went out to a couple of pubs. This is where I noticed another phenomenon that was new to me. In pubs and bars, Filipinas are hired to dance and socialize with patrons. The logic is that if patrons are having fun, they'll stay longer and buy more drinks. The ladies will be all friendly with you and subtly make you buy drinks. They'll then drink some, flirt with you and might give some of their drinks to the more sober men in order to get them to become better customers. Some women even go in bars where they don't work, start talking to men and tell them they want to go with them to this super cool place (which happens to be where they are working) in order to get more commissions. I found the whole thing very interesting. It's a bit reminiscent of hostesses in Japanese hostess bars.

After drinking a bit, Alex and I went to his apartment to sleep. His place was basically a single room, not bigger or nicer than what's you'd get in, say, a Holiday Inn. Yet, the place went for roughly 3000$ a month! That's way more expensive than Vancouver or even New York. One funny thing about apartments in Hong Kong: they don't have heating. Since their winters are short and mild, they simply don't bother with the expense of putting in heating systems. I was sleeping on the floor in a sleeping bag that night and I found it pretty cold, though!