Rabbits, Sparrows, Dogs, Cats, and Horses

The last month has been characterised for us by an abundance of animals. The dominant animal is, of course the rabbit, as this is the Chinese Year of the Rabbit (or Hare, as rabbits are apparently not native to China). Last year was the year of the Tiger, so in contrast Rabbit years are years of rest and quiet. The actual New Year period was not what I expected, though I must say I found it to be an ideal holiday, coming at just the right time. The actual timing of the New Year is determined by the full moon, so the date changes from year to year, but is usually somewhere around the end of January or sometime in February. Before New Year people clean out the old. This can involve quite serious ridding or may only involve changing the red paper fortunes that are on the alters and on doorways. People also get their hair cut in a new style--Ethan, the guy who cuts my hair said he was up until 1 AM the night before new years doing people's hair in anticipation of the holiday. Everywhere is also decorated with Cherry blossom branches, orange trees, and Chrysanthemums.

The primary part of the New Year is three days here (I believe people take longer off on the mainland) and is characterised by visiting family and eating. In Hong Kong, this is THE holiday. While one could get IKEA delivery on Christmas day, one cannot have the same service over the three days of New Year--DHL certainly does not deliver as we discovered when Sheffield tried to send my marking to me. There is a really good food that you buy as a brick and then fry. It comes in both sweet and savoury and is quite lovely (not anywhere as strong or distinctive as moon cakes). At New Years you can buy this food as a dim sum as well. After the first three days have ended, there is then a period of about 10 days when the New Years celebrations continue.

During the main three days and the weekend after Adrian and I certainly made the most of the holiday. One of Adrian's friends invited us to a family BBQ, which was a great honour as this is usually a time spent just with family and not all and asunder. The BBQ was in a lovely spot overlooking the South China Sea, next to an unusually clean beach. When it was revealed that I have an interest in food to the mother of our host, she then took it upon herself to introduce me to a whole range of foods that I would not have considered or known about. Some of these were absolutely lovely--there was a really nice pudding that was sort of like rice pudding, and some sweet thing like butter brickle, that she had made. One thing people here do at BBQ's is, when they cook the meat over the coals, toward the end they paint the food with honey to make it brown and sweet--really nice--you would be surprised what tastes good cooked with honey on it. We also had some steamed fish, which I believe was flat head grouper, that had been wrapped in foil and baked next to the coals. The most unusual item, however was sparrow. This is a great delicacy, and like many delicacies, is so only in the context within which it is considered as such. The preparation process involves taking the feathers off and then putting them on a stick to make something that looks a bit like a kabob. Note that there is NO other apparent cleaning or dissecting. The skewer is then held over the coals for about 25 minutes and occasionally basted until the birds are cooked and brown. You then try to eat them. There are a lot of bones and not much meat and it is quite difficult to avoid the inside. I was able to pass off two of the first three that I was handed to others who had similarly never tried sparrow, but when the second skewer arrived on my plate those people all made themselves quite scarce. I don't believe I am sufficiently naturalised into this environment to fully appreciate the nuances of sparrow meat. It was a difficult moment, because this was a gift and was a show of respect. I have banned Adrian from announcing to people that I have an interest in food.

Eating Sparrow was not the only thing we did to celebrate the coming of the Year of the Rabbit. We also went on a walk around the hills where we live, we went out with some friends to Plover Cove, and to a village called Tai O. The compound where we live is on the top of a hill and adjacent to Shing Mun Country Park, which is huge, in fact 40% of the area of Hong Kong is comprised of country parks. There is a trail that runs through the park near us called the MacLehose Trail. Actually this trail, runs for about 100 kilometres and runs across most of the New Territories. We can access it from just up from where we live. It is actually a quite difficult trail not just because of its length, but also because it is quite hilly and populated with monkeys and abandoned dogs. When you go out on the trail you must take some sort of stick to ward off both. We just did a short circular walk to the next valley and then down the hill into Fo Tan. Adrian then walked back up the hill as he was in training for the 10K run that was part of the Hong Kong marathon (he did it in just 52 minutes and came 52nd in his race, which had 5000 participants). As I do not run in marathons or any other races, I took the bus home, but as penance I had to carry the very large stick that Adrian collected on the way to ward off the dogs. Incidentally the only dog we ran into was a very friendly dog who walked with us part of the way. The wild dogs however are present and are in the park because people abandon them (and cats) when they move to flats that do not allow pets.

The walk with Bernie and Barbara to Plover Cove the next day was very nice and characterised by beautiful views, abandoned villages, and friendly people. The walk was about 6 miles and in the middle there is a restaurant or Da Pai Dong--actually what we ate at was a bit bigger than the usual Da Pai Dong, but it broadly fits the category. Along our way we kept playing leap frog with two young men who were going camping. They had back packs on, but between them they had a bamboo pole with a cooler hanging, which they told us held their beer. We were a bit worried at this news because we thought it might signal that the restaurant was closed. In fact these two men were also going to the restaurant as one of them was good friends with the owner. When we got there he showed us how to get the beer that the restaurant sold out of the fridge and proceeded to wait on us as the person who owned the restaurant was very busy with several large parties as well as a large group of his own family members. Once we finished our meal, we said goodbye to them and proceeded around the cove. We finished the evening off with a lovely meal in Sai Kung, another one of our favourite destinations.

On the weekend we then went to Tai O. Tai O is a marvellous place--I'v put some photo's on my facebook page for those who are interested. It is a fairly large village at the end of Lantau Island (on the map it is probably closer to Macau than Central Hong Kong). What particularly characterises it, though, is the combination of canals and stilt houses, as the people who live there used to live entirely on the water in boats. Another distinguishing feature is the relative absence of evidence of globalisation despite the number of tourists who visit and the proximity to the airport and Disneyland HK. The only sign I saw was from HSBC, nothing else. This does not mean you can't get an excellent cup of coffee, a meal, or buy something; you can, but it will come from a local retailer. You can also take a boat out into the sea and see the white dolphins, though these are threatened and people are not encouraged to do so. We spent nearly the whole day walking around this lovely, thriving village and had a most enjoyable time. I am sure we will go back. I am concerned for it though as I fear it will disappear as within the next few years the building of a bridge from nearby on Lantau to Macau and then on to the mainland is planned. Tai O looks ripe for redevelopment as it will be the geographic centre of this delta. Indeed, the Pearl River delta is the most rapidly industrialising place in the world and contains over 50,000,000 (yes, 50 million) people making it also the most populated region in the world. I just don't see how Tai O can survive the onslaught of industrial capitalism, but we shall see.

While that was the end of New Year holiday for us, it does carry on for about a week and a half further, when people eat out with friends, pass out red packets (lai see) with money in them to children, subordinates, and unmarried people (so I didn't get any). This is also the period when you find the dragon dancers and lion dancers who go around and perform for lai see packets and bring good luck. All in all, Chinese New Year, in the way that is celebrates family and signals the start of spring, is a happy time that comes during a month that usually, for me, seems pretty dreary.

You may be wondering where the cats and the horses fit in? We are adopting two cats this weekend who were going to be taken to be put down just before the new year. We are very much looking forward to their addition to our family. I'll tell you about the horses another time...