A pleasant Chinese couple were waiting for me at the airport with my name on a piece of cardboard. They were in their twenties, married (as is the Chinese custom), and relatively fluent in English (at least the wife was - the husband, Leslie, mostly grinned and nodded). They brought me to the hospital where I would be working - and apparently living. We rode on a double-decker bus, and I got my first good look at my new home. What's particularly surprising about the Hong Kong area is how green it is. Our bus snaked its way through a mountainous terrain, teeming with the jungle-like vegetation of the nearly tropical Hong Kong climate.
When we'd arrived at our destination, Leslie showed me my room and gave me the key, took me to the local grocery store, and then, with his wife, promptly disappeared. And so here I was, alone, lost somewhere in the Hong Kong suburbs. Leslie had given me the phone number of my new boss, and told me to call him - on monday. It was saturday afternoon.
I grabbed something to eat at the hospital's 7/11. Despite it being an American chain, there were only a few things I recognized; I grabbed one of those (I was too tired to be adventurous). I then climbed into bed.
I woke up at 3:00pm, Montreal time. That's 3:00am Hong Kong time. Since there was no way I was going to get back to sleep (it being, as far as I was concerned, the middle of the afternoon), I decided to go exploring. As soon as I left the building where I lived, the door locked behind me. After a moment of panic, I realized that a scrap of paper Leslie had given me had written on it the security code to get back in. Good. Perfect. So I started walking, trying very hard to keep track of every turn I made so that I could find my way back. Sha Tin, the city where I live, was deserted. I was all alone in a new world.
Now, as anyone who has met a person from a foreign coutry can attest, recalling names in a foreign language is nearly impossible. The same goes for street names. It was not long before I was hopelessly lost. I finally found an open depanneur, and bought a map. Proud of myself for my ingenuity, I opened it up and tried to locate myself on it. After squinting at the Chinese characters on the map for a while (for some reason, I seem to think that if I concentrate enough, I'll understand Chinese...), I finally flagged down some drunken revellers who had just stumbled off of a night bus, hoping for a little help. In fact, they WERE very helpful - they told me that my map was of another city entirely. They were pretty cool, though, and sort of helped me to find my way (they had an approximate idea of where my hospital was). They even gave me their phone numbers. I had made my first Chinese friends. In case you're wondering, after about two hours of walking around, I DID eventually find my way back. Tired again (my poor internal clock had clearly gone haywire), I climbed back into bed, as if the whole thing had been a strange dream.
When we'd arrived at our destination, Leslie showed me my room and gave me the key, took me to the local grocery store, and then, with his wife, promptly disappeared. And so here I was, alone, lost somewhere in the Hong Kong suburbs. Leslie had given me the phone number of my new boss, and told me to call him - on monday. It was saturday afternoon.
I grabbed something to eat at the hospital's 7/11. Despite it being an American chain, there were only a few things I recognized; I grabbed one of those (I was too tired to be adventurous). I then climbed into bed.
I woke up at 3:00pm, Montreal time. That's 3:00am Hong Kong time. Since there was no way I was going to get back to sleep (it being, as far as I was concerned, the middle of the afternoon), I decided to go exploring. As soon as I left the building where I lived, the door locked behind me. After a moment of panic, I realized that a scrap of paper Leslie had given me had written on it the security code to get back in. Good. Perfect. So I started walking, trying very hard to keep track of every turn I made so that I could find my way back. Sha Tin, the city where I live, was deserted. I was all alone in a new world.
Now, as anyone who has met a person from a foreign coutry can attest, recalling names in a foreign language is nearly impossible. The same goes for street names. It was not long before I was hopelessly lost. I finally found an open depanneur, and bought a map. Proud of myself for my ingenuity, I opened it up and tried to locate myself on it. After squinting at the Chinese characters on the map for a while (for some reason, I seem to think that if I concentrate enough, I'll understand Chinese...), I finally flagged down some drunken revellers who had just stumbled off of a night bus, hoping for a little help. In fact, they WERE very helpful - they told me that my map was of another city entirely. They were pretty cool, though, and sort of helped me to find my way (they had an approximate idea of where my hospital was). They even gave me their phone numbers. I had made my first Chinese friends. In case you're wondering, after about two hours of walking around, I DID eventually find my way back. Tired again (my poor internal clock had clearly gone haywire), I climbed back into bed, as if the whole thing had been a strange dream.
