Having fled Vietnam just in time I found myself in Hong Kong with a few days to kill. Since I didn't know anybody I headed over to the local Jewish organization. When they turned out to be arrogant and unhelpful I realized I was going to have to take care of things myself.
Out of necessity I ended up staying in Chungking Mansion, where a tiny little room with a fan could be had for the bargain price of only 80 Hong Kong dollars a night. Imagine if Phamn Ngu Lao, De Tham and Bui Vien streets were crammed into a single shabby high-rise and the Vietnamese replaced with Indians and Africans, and you have a pretty good idea of what Chungking Mansions is like. Decent curry though.
Hong Kong isn't much of a city to look at - just endless skyscrapers housing offices, apartments and shopping malls, with elevated walkways between them to avoid the drudgery of having to descend to the lowly earth. On street level, Hong Kong resembles nothing so much as simply a Chinese New York with British street names.
It is notoriously short on sights. There's the harbor and the Big Buddha and some decent parks and even a Disneyland but didn't appreciate them.
You see, I was in a lather because NOT ONLY did the French people decide to go to Paris without telling me or leaving a forwarding address, leaving me stranded, but my backup plan - teahcing summer camp in Zhuhai, China - was canceled due to swine flu. At my wit's end I stormed into the office of the Education Company (I'd rather storm into Jean-Marc Merlin's office, but he's out of reach) and demanded they give me money or, failing that, employment. Eventually the agreed to give me a do-nothing job in Huizhou, a city near Canton.
So now I'm in Huizhou, which I suspect was devised by some clever Ministry of Tourism initiative to make every other place in China - maybe every other place on earth - look fun and exciting. My teaching starts next week but it looks like my classes will have less than 5 students each.
China is strange. It pretends to be Western with it's high-rises and straight streets and Macdonald's, but just under the surface it is far more bewildering than anything I encountered in Vietnam. Also the censorship si really bad; i can't get on Youtube or Facebook, and I can only update my blog now because I got a 'proxy server' to get past the firewall.
Wish I were in gay Paris, but that'll have to wait. I'll still be back in Vietnam come September.
2 comments:
Sorry to hear about the French family decamping like that -- not particularly honorable of them. Don't take your disappointment out on your students, as they may be able to help you with finding the positive in Huizhou. If nothing else, they may just be nice people and teaching has got to be more interesting than what you're doing now. Hope things get better soon.
I understand your disappointment, but you are in China afterall. Try to make the most of it. Few Americans here have ever been there or will ever go. Try to see some things and meet some people. You can make it into a positive experience.
Post a Comment