Settling In

What a difference 3 months makes. Such a short space of time, but if I look back to where I was when I published my first blog about moving to Hong Kong, I really appreciate how things have already changed. Both physically and emotionally, I am now a lot more settled and although I think I’m still quite far from feeling at home here, I’ve definitely caught up with the pace of life. Whereas in those first few weeks I was constantly getting frustrated and upset because I wasn’t managing the unfamiliarity, I now walk around feeling like I’m a part the crowd here, rather than a lost stranger.

Shortly after I posted my first blog we left our little hotel room behind and moved into an apartment, where we will live for the next two years. I was so excited about moving, not only to have more space so we didn’t have to stack our shoes in the TV unit anymore, but because I knew that it would make all the difference to feeling settled. Making an empty, unfurnished apartment a home when we only brought four suitcases of belongings with us, 90% of which were clothes, hasn’t been easy, but just in the last couple of weeks it seems to have come together and I’m finally really enjoying where I live.

We’re on the 12^th floor of a 33 story tower block, nestled amongst lots of other tower blocks and on a very busy road. I have never lived anywhere like it and never thought I would, but I’ve quickly got used to it and there’s a lot I love about it. I like the friendly concierge people who say hello and goodbye to me every time I enter or leave the building. Once I’ve managed to cross Tai Hang Road I just have to walk down 140 steps and I’m in our local neighbourhood, with its lovely independent cafes, bars and fantastic array of restaurants. From our living room we are lucky enough to have a fabulous view of Victoria Harbour, which is like having a huge, moving picture with sailing boats and cruise ships going by and the ever changing weather rolling over the mountains in the back drop.

Our flat now feels quite friendly; we’ve picked up some great second hand items and brought back a few pretty things from Thailand and Cambodia when we were away over Christmas. But as with anyone who moves, no matter what your taste is or how much money you have, Ikea is inevitable. Asia loves Ikea as much as Europe does and as with a lot of what I buy now, I have gone from living in the continent of where it’s designed to the continent of where it’s made. This sadly doesn’t seem to make it cheaper, but although the price may be the same, the shopping experience is quite different and definitely a lot more positive.

For people living in Hong Kong, Ikea is a lot more than a place to buy flatpack furniture, tea lights and Swedish meatballs. On my first trip as I walked around the standard staged rooms I saw a young couple in the ‘living room’, sitting on the sofa holding hands, playing with their phones and looking totally relaxed as if they were in their own home. I thought this was quite sweet, if a bit cheeky, but then when I got to ‘home office’ there were three children sitting at different desks, one with a laptop, the others with papers spread out, doing their homework. If this wasn’t entertaining enough, when I reached the bed section the lights were dimmed and there were a number of adults fast asleep. Everyone who was actually in there to buy a bed didn’t seem to be taking any notice of the people napping; they just carried on looking at the prices or attempted to test the mattresses whilst someone was sprawled out and snoring.

I have been back to Ikea many times since and it’s the same each time, people make the most of it. I have heard it’s because many people live in small spaces in Hong Kong, so they use Ikea to hang out in. For me it makes each trip entertaining and demonstrates that even though there are lots of familiar things in Hong Kong, the experience is quite different to the UK.

These familiar things are often used as examples of why moving to Hong Kong is ‘easy’ and the British influences are of course everywhere. The original infrastructure is still very apparent: the road signs look just like those in Britain, they drive on the left, even the number plates look the same (though only in Hong Kong you’ll see DEBORAH on a bright pink Hummer or 2 IPO on a red Ferrari). The lack of language barrier is of course enormously helpful and actually even though Hong Kong is half way across the world, there’s a lot about my sister’s move just across the Channel to France that would’ve been harder because she needed to learn a new language in order to integrate.

I’ve definitely not found the move ‘easy’, but now I’ve settled in a bit more I’m really enjoying what is different about life here. Looking across the skyline at the towering high rises it is unimaginable how many people live in such a small area, but when everyone is out and negotiating the narrow pavements and MTR (the tube) system, there is an amazing calmness. I’ve had to get used to how slowly everyone walks in Hong Kong, not only because all eyes are on smartphones, but because people are just a lot gentler. I’ve not come across any agro since I’ve been here and it’s so refreshing - there’s no narkiness, no tutting, no kissing of teeth. Hong Kongers are very natural, which can make customer service pretty interesting if someone is not in the mood to be friendly, but it also means there’s very little attitude and I like that.

My life is obviously very different now. The way we live, work and what we do in our spare time is such a contrast to our old life in London and although the adjustment has been quite hard, now we’re more settled I’m enjoying living in Hong Kong. I have a 15 minute stroll to work, which is always entertaining. I walk through a lovely park where I see numerous small dogs in a variety of street-wear, including hoodies, shoes and rucksacks. There are groups of older people practising tai chi and other people ballroom dancing whilst playing music through portable speakers. Parallel to this peacefulness, I also walk past noisy building sites and across big roads of traffic, sheltered from sunlight by enormous high rises. But that’s Hong Kong, the land of contrast, which has taken some getting used to but now I’m into, I really quite like it.

Finding my Feet

Eight weeks ago I left the UK feeling upbeat and confident about our move to Asia. I wasn't nervous, I was excited and thought I was ready for it. As ready as I could be, when I had left half of the contents of my flat strewed across the kitchen floor of my parent’s house because I’d run out of time, and had only been able to fit a third of what I thought I was going to be able to take with me into the oh so generous baggage allowance of 37 kilos. Once I’d successfully avoided an emotional goodbye with my parents at the airport, who after putting up with my moving and packing drama the day before would've probably appreciated just a little demonstration that I might miss them, we got through security in good time. However some time later after casually wondering aimlessly around Heathrow Terminal Three (what did we do for two hours?!) we found ourselves running, sprinting to the plane as the man at the empty gate wagged his finger at us and tapped his watch. It wasn't the most organised or relaxing start to the adventure, but those who know me will know all too well that ‘last’ and ‘minute’ are two words that have been associated with me for as long as I can remember.

After an initial relaxing couple of days spent being generously hosted by Ed’s boss and his family in Singapore, we arrived in Hong Kong still a bit jaded from jet-lag and three days after the Occupy Movement started. With the protest in full swing, getting a cab from the airport wasn't easy and once in the cab, getting to our hotel was even trickier because major roads were completely blocked and resulted in the cab having to do a huge loop around the city so we could be dropped at the door with our massive bags. Turning up in Hong Kong at the beginning and most significant part of the Occupy Movement definitely wasn’t ideal, not just because of the road blocks and other inconveniences, but because Hong Kong wasn’t ‘normal’. Hong Kong is crowded, noisy and hectic at the best of times, but the protest heightened all of that and added another layer. From that first taxi ride in, to then trying to navigate our way around this very different world, it made things much harder. And it would’ve been hard enough! I am behind the students 100% and I understand that there is an extremely important (though sadly impossible) fight to be had, but on a purely selfish level luck was not on our side when our arrival coincided with the Movement.

However even with that aside, our start in Hong Kong was difficult. Neither of us had ever been here before and having left a very comfortable and extremely nice life in Peckham behind, it suddenly dawned on us that oh my God, this is it. I was completely unprepared for how it would feel to turn up somewhere so completely different from the UK and London, knowing that this was now my home. Home is enormously important to me, it’s where I feel safe and happy and comfortable and I couldn’t imagine ever feeling any of those things in this strange, loud, crowed place. Nothing, apart from Ed being by my side, felt right, which made me immediately homesick after being here for about 3 days. It was odd because I hadn’t been away for any time at all so it wasn’t that I was missing anyone or anything, I think it was just the realisation that I was very, very far away and this was it, I was just going to have to get on with it whether I liked it or not. Ed and I have talked about it a lot since and we know that if we’d turned up in Hong Kong for a holiday we would have embraced it immediately and been excited about how different it was, it was the bit about it being our new home that made us shrink away feel sad.

But that didn’t stop us from giving it a go and I can honestly say there wasn’t a moment during those first tough few weeks that I contemplated going back to London, even though I desperately missed it. I knew we’d be alright, I could see the potential, even though I couldn’t yet feel it. So we did our best to do all the right things and kept going, despite the fact that at every corner we turned we seemed be to be making mistake after mistake (call it a series of fuck ups).

They say one should ‘always make new mistakes’, I think it’s meant to be an encouraging and motivating statement. Well. I can tell you that after 8 weeks of mistakes I am getting pretty fed up with making new ones! Up until very recently, we’d get to the end of another weekend of fuck ups and look at each other in mild despair, not needing to say what we were both thinking, instead just quietly laughing, exhausted and emotional, about how many more mistakes we’d added to our list. Whether it was wondering around the busy, three lane and traffic dense roads, desperately trying to find our way to the harbour, knowing it was just there but not being able to see it, only to realise after nearly being taken out by various taxis and buses that everyone else was happily on raised walkways, breezing their way over to the ferry terminals in peace. Or walking up and down a road desperately trying to find a café we’d read about, Google maps helpfully telling us we had reached our destination but not being able to see where the God-damn thing was. Exasperated, we’d eventually look up, discovering that everything is in a building, up high. If you just take a step back you’ll see hundreds of businesses, whether cafes, hairdressers, furniture shops, everything, they’re all there, but they’re UP. These things may sound trivial, but add a load of jetlag, 34 degrees, 80% humidity and two worried people desperately wanting to feel normal and you may be able to picture us. It was a sorry sight!

Things are now finally feeling a lot more normal, we making less mistakes and those we are still making feel like less of a drama. Perhaps we’re just getting used to being a bit hopeless?! We have found somewhere to live, so we’ll be moving out of our serviced apartment in a week or so. I can’t wait to move and make our new flat a home. I felt immediate relief when we found it and signed up. Guided by my new colleague, we found an area that we love called Tai Hang, which is east of Central but just a few tube stops away. It reminds us of ‘Bellenden village’ in Peckham so we felt right at home when we turned up! It’s very unusual for Hong Kong island because it’s a small grid of low rise streets, away from main roads and where amazing little cafes, restaurants and bars have sprung up in the last couple of years. It’s got a cool vibe and is a lot more peaceful than many of the other areas we’ve come across, which suits us just fine! Our flat is lovely, it has high ceilings, big windows and tonnes of space. We’re surprised we’ve found something as big given that all anyone can say about Hong Kong is that everyone lives in shoeboxes, but like London if you push out just a bit you can find little gems. Very unusually for a flat in Hong Kong we have an oven, which makes me very happy and I will be enticing people over for roast chicken as soon as we’re set up – what better way to make friends!

So we’re doing ok. There is so much more to tell you about but I will save some stories and experiences for other posts, which I intend to write regularly now I’ve got going. As I’m writing this the final sites of the Occupy Movement are being removed and the students are going home. On a personal level I feel quite sad about it because for me they are a part of Hong Kong, having been here since I arrived and their determination, amazing spirit and peacefulness has contributed to me experiencing Hong Kong’s soul. More about that next time…