It is the little suprises

It is the little things that make living in Hong Kong so great. Here are just a few:

1. Bread. The bread products are absolutely wonderful here. Not really what I expected. Today's selection is a wonderful crusty loaf that is pretty much dripping with butter, a walnut, hazelnut bun, a fruit loaf that is similar to the crusty loaf but with fruit bits in it, and something referred to as a Mexican bun (though we saw nothing like this in Mexico--it has some sort of custard in the centre).

2. Juice. I have taken to buying the Wheat Grass drink. I prefer this to the stuff with Aloe in it as well as when one drinks the Aloe version you end up with bits of Aloe pulp, which is a bit off putting. The plain wheat grass drink, however is really yummy in its vivid greenness.

3. Octopus cards. I have mentioned these before, but they are worth including in the list. You can go anywhere with them and quite often use them to buy things as well. Starbucks, for instance, has a card reader to you can pay for your drinks with the card. Simon has one with his picture on it and will use it to sign in to school.

4. Transportation system. The trains go most places, the buses make up for what the trains won't do, and there are Taxi's everywhere and they are very cheap. it is HK$18* for the first couple of Kilometres and then HK$2 for every Kilometre after that. Then there is an army of delivery people. When I purchased the plants for the flat at the market, the woman who sold them to me made a call to a man with a van who showed up in about 10 minutes, loaded up my plants and transported both them and me to the flat--all for $HK82. We can then add in all the public escalators, elevators, trolleys, cable cars, and ferries. And what is more, they are really frequent. I have yet to wait more than 5 minutes for anything.

5. Variety. It seems that whatever you want you can get here, and if it is not readily available it can be made for you.

6. Friendliness. We have found most people to be both friendly and helpful. It is really wonderful. People explain things to you to make sure you understand but in a way that is not patronising. I really appreciate this. M-Goy and Jo Sun are key phrases (M-Goy is thank you/please and Jo Sun is good morning--I've not learned good afternoon yet). At times this helpfulness can be a bit overwhelming--for instance in shops where shop assistants follow you around suggesting things that would be more suitable for you than what you have selected or if you have not selected anything. But overall, and in most other situations the friendliness is really nice. Some of the younger people want to try out their English with you, which can lead to some strange conversations at times. We find that the people at the front gate to where we live are particularly friendly and each of us has our favourite. Mine is the woman who opens the car barrier for me so I don't have to walk around. I was quite sad to learn from one of our friends here that a number of the residents just ignore the gate people. Don't really understand that behaviour.

7. Weather. I think the weather is wonderful here and we are supposed to be in the season that has the worst weather. It is hot, but what we find is that there is one day a week or so when it rains all day. Most days start warm and sunny and then mid morning a storm will go through and then the sun will return in the afternoon. I might sing a much different tune when I live through my first real storm, but so far nothing to drastic yet. Simon is getting quite tan from all his swimming. I love being able to wear all my summer clothes that I have not had opportunity to wear since I think I lived in New Orleans--I only wish I looked as good in them now as I did when I lived in New Orleans...

8. Opening hours. We still do not have a TV--though Simon has one for his XBox (complete with XBox live). Instead we can choose to go out in the evening and do things because everything is open quite late. In fact, while the Starbucks opens at 7 in the morning, most things do not open until 10 or 11 but they stay open until 10:30 or so at night. This means that we can meet somewhere for dinner and then do errands after--including visiting the dentist or doctor, getting one's hair done, going to the bank, etc. etc. And this is 7 days a week more or less. There is none of that mad dash to get everything done during what would be called "working hours" in the UK. Mind you these are "working hours" for some other poor person who has to stay up late serving in a shop or looking at people's teeth.

9. Scenery. It is beautiful here. Every day when I go to bed and when I get up and look out the window I am reminded of how lovely it is. We are, of course, lucky that we live where we do and can see nature as well as city. I think that might be different in some of the High rises in Hong Kong and on Kowloon. Particularly on Hong Kong Island where there are so many very tall buildings that one could find oneself looking at the wall of the next building over and never seeing the sun. But, no matter where one lives, there are opportunities for finding nice views very easily. There are so many parks and beaches that one can visit.

10. English. While a lot of people do not speak English, many do and all the signs, labels, etc are in English so it is fairly easy to work out what it is that you are getting and how to work it. There are also English films at the cinema and several English bookstores. There is one bookstore called PageOne in the Festival Walk mall that has probably the largest selection of cook books I have seen in one place as well as a huge selection of architecture and design books, as well as the usual popular books. The bookstore in our mall appears to have academic press and education books, so I will have to check that out soon.

This is just a short list, there is much more that I could add...

* Broadly the exchange rate is 1£=HK$12 or US$1= HK$7.