Hong Hong Kong Kong
As some of you may know, I have just switched jobs and this new job, unfortunately, can get a little bit technical. And so they sent me to Hong Kong for TRAINING. Note that the meaning of the word “TRAINING” differs from, and indeed is rather the opposite of, the word “HOLIDAY”. This vocabulary lesson is for the benefit of those who have repeatedly been telling me how lucky I am.
Just to reinforce my point, over the five days that I was in Hong Kong, I arrived at work at the usual time and left at the usual time. I woke up at 7.30am, as usual. I walked to the train station, as usual. I popped pimples to stay awake at work, as usual. The only difference is that I lived out of hotel room 1711.
Hong Kong seems like the type of place I’d enjoy. It’s like having Bugis Village IN Bugis Junction, if you know what I mean. There’s a kind of structured chaos to the whole place that I find irresistible. Take Mongkok for example. Thousands of people literally swarm the place every night and yet there’re no human traffic jams. You’ll find roadside stalls all over the place hawking their finger foods alongside gigantic shopping malls. Public transport is never far away, giving you an outlet from the confusion any time you want.
Most large cities have this quality. Singapore isn’t one of them. We’re overloaded on the structured side much like our government. There’s no charm to the place anymore. The closest we have here to what London, Kuala Lumpur, Taipei or Hong Kong have is probably Geylang and even it pales in comparison. We seriously need a sprinkling of disorder.
Courier Boy
The next time I go abroad, I will keep my mouth shut. In my excitement, I announced the good news to quite a few friends only to be saddled with requests both to bring stuff back and to bring stuff THERE. Being Mr. Congeniality at heart, I naturally acceded. Hence, on departure day, this humble blogger stumbled into the airport laden with 11 packs of instant noodles, a photo frame, 3 bottles of balm and a small library of documents. I quickly found that, unlike FEDEX, I don’t live to deliver which meant that I was soon wishing that I was dead but that’s another story.
Plane Rides
Remember when you were a kid and plane rides were the coolest things around? At departure, you’d plaster your nose onto the glass at the viewing gallery staring at YOUR plane - that huge hunk of gleaming metal that could somehow carry you across continents and over oceans. You’d dream of playing those super cool SNES games or drinking endless glasses of Coke. You’d salivate at the thought of the in-flight lunches (only applicable to problem kids). The point is, plane rides don’t seem to fly with me anymore. Gah.
Shopping
The thing about Hong Kong is that there doesn’t seem to be much else to do there. On the 2nd night, I went to Causeway Bay and proceeded to shop my ass off. The very next night, I picked it right off the floor and went at it again, this time at Tsim Sha Tsui. And the night after, despite leg cramps and a nagging desire to get to know my bed better, I found myself stalking the streets of Mong Kok for a decent buy.
How women can actually enjoy such expeditions is beyond explanation. In fact, some proponents of Intelligent Design have claimed this phenomenon as proof of God’s existence.
Requests
As mentioned above, I was beseeched (I use this word in jest. In truth, various parts of my anatomy were threatened.) to bring a few items back from Hong Kong.
#1
Eunice wanted 5 (preferably 10) tubes of some snow thingie handcream from Sasa. She even gave me a picture of the tube and bribed me with MP3s to boot. Thus compelled, I boldly stepped into the first Sasa I spied, showed the printout to the salesgirl (who greeted me in Cantonese and was rewarded with a stare so blank you could paint on it) and was promptly informed that they were out of stock (this time, thankfully, in sign language). Undeterred, I persevered.
Four Sasas later, I only had two tubes. I was seriously starting to believe that this cream did indeed possess magical qualities. Anyway, it wasn’t till the sixth Sasa that I got my, by now, grubby paws onto the remaining eight tubes. This particular outlet had a whole basket of the stuff. I profaned.
An aside: You know those little shopping baskets that Sasa has? Have you ever seen a guy holding one of those? Did you think he was gay? Mine was filled with eight freaking tubes of bleeding anti-wrinkle cream. Never mind.
#2
John (Mr. I-don’t-speak-like-a-honkie-ar!) Chan wanted, of all things, a roasted goose. Now, of all the various poultry available, my considerate friend had to choose what is undoubtedly one of the largest birds that humankind has tried to devour. Unfortunately for me, I too wanted a taste of this fowl. And so with help from my Hong Kong colleagues, four of whom accosted an innocent poultry chopper, pelted him with Cantonese of which the only words I understood were siu ngor, or something like that, and demanded that my goose be nice packed in a nice box, I finally got my bird. (Despite first appearances, the previous sentence is grammatical.)
As compensation for my troubles, John, you will post a picture of yourself in those ultra-cool sports goggles on this blog.
Cantonese
After 5 days of living in a Cantonese country, I’ve gotten used to the language. It’s beautiful really; almost as appealing as Japanese but in a different way. Cantonese has roughly 450 million words by my rather modest estimation which explains why I haven’t been able to learn it while its melodiousness comes from its 8 tones, as compared to 4 for Mandarin and 1 for English.
Unfortunately, Cantonese speakers don’t sound quite as musical when it comes to English. Like when I was arranging the transfer from the airport to the hotel – “Mr. Ken (Kang)! We tiao (tell) you when your bus rare-dee (ready).” By sheer strength of will, I managed to keep a straight face though I could do nothing about the involuntary twitches around my lips.
It seems that Cantonese speakers also can’t pronounce the “dle” sound. “Middle” becomes “meedoh” and “poodle” is “poodoh”. “R” sounds are often mutilated as well. “Production” is “poh-duction” and “product” somehow becomes “porduck”. The list goes on but I’ll stop here.
Training
I almost forgot about this. Over the past 5 days, my job scope has become clearer. It’s more than just copywriting. I’ve become familiar with the procedures we have to follow and the consequences that will follow if we don’t. The production briefing is a good example. The production manager started by impressing upon us how important his job was e.g. “The peenting (printing) will not be done at all without us.” This was followed by a rant about how complicated the production process is e.g. “We have to coordinate with many many parties.” (no, there were no pronunciation errors, much to my dismay.) He then finished off by singling out the creative department as the one which always screws up his schedule and hence weekends. By the end of this tirade, I was ready to fling myself out the nearest window.
Still, it was a fruitful trip. Part of the purpose was to enable us to put a face behind the voices or… well… email addresses that we’re so used to. It worked in a sort of expensive way.
I’m lazy to end this properly. Heck.
Just to reinforce my point, over the five days that I was in Hong Kong, I arrived at work at the usual time and left at the usual time. I woke up at 7.30am, as usual. I walked to the train station, as usual. I popped pimples to stay awake at work, as usual. The only difference is that I lived out of hotel room 1711.
Hong Kong seems like the type of place I’d enjoy. It’s like having Bugis Village IN Bugis Junction, if you know what I mean. There’s a kind of structured chaos to the whole place that I find irresistible. Take Mongkok for example. Thousands of people literally swarm the place every night and yet there’re no human traffic jams. You’ll find roadside stalls all over the place hawking their finger foods alongside gigantic shopping malls. Public transport is never far away, giving you an outlet from the confusion any time you want.
Most large cities have this quality. Singapore isn’t one of them. We’re overloaded on the structured side much like our government. There’s no charm to the place anymore. The closest we have here to what London, Kuala Lumpur, Taipei or Hong Kong have is probably Geylang and even it pales in comparison. We seriously need a sprinkling of disorder.
Courier Boy
The next time I go abroad, I will keep my mouth shut. In my excitement, I announced the good news to quite a few friends only to be saddled with requests both to bring stuff back and to bring stuff THERE. Being Mr. Congeniality at heart, I naturally acceded. Hence, on departure day, this humble blogger stumbled into the airport laden with 11 packs of instant noodles, a photo frame, 3 bottles of balm and a small library of documents. I quickly found that, unlike FEDEX, I don’t live to deliver which meant that I was soon wishing that I was dead but that’s another story.
Plane Rides
Remember when you were a kid and plane rides were the coolest things around? At departure, you’d plaster your nose onto the glass at the viewing gallery staring at YOUR plane - that huge hunk of gleaming metal that could somehow carry you across continents and over oceans. You’d dream of playing those super cool SNES games or drinking endless glasses of Coke. You’d salivate at the thought of the in-flight lunches (only applicable to problem kids). The point is, plane rides don’t seem to fly with me anymore. Gah.
Shopping
The thing about Hong Kong is that there doesn’t seem to be much else to do there. On the 2nd night, I went to Causeway Bay and proceeded to shop my ass off. The very next night, I picked it right off the floor and went at it again, this time at Tsim Sha Tsui. And the night after, despite leg cramps and a nagging desire to get to know my bed better, I found myself stalking the streets of Mong Kok for a decent buy.
How women can actually enjoy such expeditions is beyond explanation. In fact, some proponents of Intelligent Design have claimed this phenomenon as proof of God’s existence.
Requests
As mentioned above, I was beseeched (I use this word in jest. In truth, various parts of my anatomy were threatened.) to bring a few items back from Hong Kong.
#1
Eunice wanted 5 (preferably 10) tubes of some snow thingie handcream from Sasa. She even gave me a picture of the tube and bribed me with MP3s to boot. Thus compelled, I boldly stepped into the first Sasa I spied, showed the printout to the salesgirl (who greeted me in Cantonese and was rewarded with a stare so blank you could paint on it) and was promptly informed that they were out of stock (this time, thankfully, in sign language). Undeterred, I persevered.
Four Sasas later, I only had two tubes. I was seriously starting to believe that this cream did indeed possess magical qualities. Anyway, it wasn’t till the sixth Sasa that I got my, by now, grubby paws onto the remaining eight tubes. This particular outlet had a whole basket of the stuff. I profaned.
An aside: You know those little shopping baskets that Sasa has? Have you ever seen a guy holding one of those? Did you think he was gay? Mine was filled with eight freaking tubes of bleeding anti-wrinkle cream. Never mind.
#2
John (Mr. I-don’t-speak-like-a-honkie-ar!) Chan wanted, of all things, a roasted goose. Now, of all the various poultry available, my considerate friend had to choose what is undoubtedly one of the largest birds that humankind has tried to devour. Unfortunately for me, I too wanted a taste of this fowl. And so with help from my Hong Kong colleagues, four of whom accosted an innocent poultry chopper, pelted him with Cantonese of which the only words I understood were siu ngor, or something like that, and demanded that my goose be nice packed in a nice box, I finally got my bird. (Despite first appearances, the previous sentence is grammatical.)
As compensation for my troubles, John, you will post a picture of yourself in those ultra-cool sports goggles on this blog.
Cantonese
After 5 days of living in a Cantonese country, I’ve gotten used to the language. It’s beautiful really; almost as appealing as Japanese but in a different way. Cantonese has roughly 450 million words by my rather modest estimation which explains why I haven’t been able to learn it while its melodiousness comes from its 8 tones, as compared to 4 for Mandarin and 1 for English.
Unfortunately, Cantonese speakers don’t sound quite as musical when it comes to English. Like when I was arranging the transfer from the airport to the hotel – “Mr. Ken (Kang)! We tiao (tell) you when your bus rare-dee (ready).” By sheer strength of will, I managed to keep a straight face though I could do nothing about the involuntary twitches around my lips.
It seems that Cantonese speakers also can’t pronounce the “dle” sound. “Middle” becomes “meedoh” and “poodle” is “poodoh”. “R” sounds are often mutilated as well. “Production” is “poh-duction” and “product” somehow becomes “porduck”. The list goes on but I’ll stop here.
Training
I almost forgot about this. Over the past 5 days, my job scope has become clearer. It’s more than just copywriting. I’ve become familiar with the procedures we have to follow and the consequences that will follow if we don’t. The production briefing is a good example. The production manager started by impressing upon us how important his job was e.g. “The peenting (printing) will not be done at all without us.” This was followed by a rant about how complicated the production process is e.g. “We have to coordinate with many many parties.” (no, there were no pronunciation errors, much to my dismay.) He then finished off by singling out the creative department as the one which always screws up his schedule and hence weekends. By the end of this tirade, I was ready to fling myself out the nearest window.
Still, it was a fruitful trip. Part of the purpose was to enable us to put a face behind the voices or… well… email addresses that we’re so used to. It worked in a sort of expensive way.
I’m lazy to end this properly. Heck.
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