In my first 2 weeks in HK, i experienced terrible headaches and was irritable during the day.  Panadol provided little relief and visits to the doctor resulted in a clean bill of health.  Then I started paying attention to what was causing all the headaches and it was all the noise around me.  Noise came in the form of people shouting down their handphones, roadworks going on daily, 10,000 conversations happening at the same time in a restaurant, impatient honking from buses, cars, trams etc.  To add to it all, the cantonese language is spoken quickly, sharply, crudely and staccato-like (imagine a louder version of the morse-code).  It may be capable of being melodious like French (e.g.) but it remains to be heard. 

It baffled me the first time I passed a couple of women shouting at each other.  I got worried that the argument could turn violent until they both suddenly laughed.  Or the time, the guy next to me on the escalator, whipped out his handphone and started shouting into it.  It’s possible that the other person could hear him even without the handphone!  The conversations are often spirited and somewhat aggressive, hence to non-local residents it sounds like an argument.

After 17 months, I’ve adjusted to the noise -level but when I first arrived, it was quite a shock to the system.  To say that I was not used to the noise is an understatement, my ear was buzzing from the high volume and I thought I was losing my hearing.  I dread to think that as part of the adjustment, my speak volume has increased.

Over the weekend, a couple of observations made me think about starting up an entry on what’s typical of HK.  I’ve stayed here for 17 months and it may interest others to know what to expect if they are planning to visit / live in HK, hence this tag.  I’ll keep adding to this list as it strikes me.

First observation of HK is that people rarely give way to others.  In fact they push their way through, expecting others to give way.  Imagine this - standing at a pedestrian crossing, waiting for the lights to change and across the road, is a crowd waiting for the same thing.  The minute the lights change, both sides will come towards each other and it’s a case of the first person to “blink” will give way to the stampeding crowd.  If neither side gives way, there will be a stand-off and each will grumble that the other should given way.  

HK being so small, that the only way it can move forward, literally and figuratively is for its residents to cooperate.   Unfortunately the general observation is that most people behave like their interest is more important than others, expecting others to understand and be considerate to them.

Found this interesting article - Curry spice can kill cancer.  Who knew that there are benefits to to be had by eating loads of curry.  Have you had your daily dose of curry?

Being a jazz lover, one of the first things i did when I arrived in HK was to search out for a good jazz club. The choices are limited and most were concentrated in HK Island.  I did find one New Orleans- type jazz diner cum live band in Tsim Sha Tsui – Ned’s Kelly. I’d written about this place in earlier post.

On Friday, I was at the West Kowloon Waterfront Promenade by chance. It was the opening gala for the HK Wine and Food Festival. There were many stalls showcasing wines and food and loads of people. But my ears picked up the sounds of jazz and was estatic to find it was live. The featured artist on was Hanjin Tan. I stayed for his hour-long show and it was toe-tapping, fingers-drumming enjoyment. I like his brand of improv jazz, putting his own twist to classics.  This for me is the best kind of pure jazz – unplugged version with just the voice, accompanied with bass, guitar and piano.  This way the focus is on the voice, which in Jazz is the key element of the music.  There are very few asian jazz artist, maybe because jazz is very much a western concept.  He hit all the right tones and carried the tunes well. 

Here’s a Youtube video of him in-motion:

A movie succinctly described the difference between Love and Lust – When you’re in-Love, you want to give (to your lover).  But when you’re in-Lust, you want to take (from your lover).

Read this news in today’s The Standard.  In the South China Post, it was mentioned that this woman suffers from mental illness.  Insanity is frequently used as a defence in murders.  This was shocking because of the effort taken to learn how to perform a cesarean and plan the attack and carry it out.  This is premeditated for sure, though not something a normal person would do.

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Fetus attack woman facing life in prison

A woman who faked a pregnancy to befriend an expectant mother and then sliced open her new friend’s stomach with a 20-centimeter knife is facing life in jail, a High Court judge said yesterday.

Nickkita Lau

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

A woman who faked a pregnancy to befriend an expectant mother and then sliced open her new friend’s stomach with a 20-centimeter knife is facing life in jail, a High Court judge said yesterday.

The mother survived but the infant died in March this year.

Leung Sin-ting, 27, admits to manslaughter and intent to cause grievous bodily harm. After her arrest she told police she cut open the woman so she could “see what an unborn infant looked like.”

Leung was due to be sentenced yesterday, but judge Darryl Saw said psychiatric reports from both the prosecution and the defense were inadequate. Although they diagnosed her mental illness, they did not specify its severity, the possibility of repeating the offense and how big a threat she could pose to society.

The judge asked for more reports so he could give an appropriate sentence and treatment for Leung. He adjourned sentencing to November 25.

But Saw said there is no doubt Leung will be facing a custodial sentence or even life in prison.

Leung claimed to have been pregnant but had a miscarriage when she met the 26-year-old victim surnamed Lee on the internet. Lee was eight months’ pregnant at the time.

On September 16, 2008, the women met in Fan Ling so Lee could pick up some baby items Leung had promised her. After they arrived at Leung’s home, Leung complained of a stomach ache and Lee tried to comfort her.

When Lee was not looking, Leung used a cable to strangle her until she lost consciousness.

Leung then made a single vertical incision below Lee’s navel with a fruit knife and opened up her abdomen.

When Leung’s husband Chau Man-choi returned home, she hid Lee in a kitchen cabinet but ended up confessing to him.

The baby boy was delivered by an emergency cesarean section but suffered from brain damage due to lack of oxygen.

Police discovered Leung had been looking up information on how to perform a cesarean section, how to make someone fall unconscious and the procedure to get a birth certificate.

I found this news interesting and wanted to share it.  With this decision, it sets the precedent for hotels to take all reasonable precautions to ensure the safety of their guest.  All this while, I thought that was expected.  I travel frequently and live half the time in hotels.  Safety within the hotel is something that I’ve taken for granted, expecting that I’d be safe.  Having said that, I always double-lock my doors and never let strangers into the room (except maybe the housekeeper).  The key is to not be paranoid, take care of your own safety and be sensible when visiting dodgy places. 

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MANILA – A Philippine court on Tuesday ordered one of the nation’s most luxurious hotels to pay more than one million dollars in damages over the murder of a Norwegian guest a decade ago.

The murder of Christian Harper could have been prevented if the Makati Shangri-La in Manila had provided adequate security, the Court of Appeals ruled as it upheld a lower court’s judgment against the hotel.

“Unfortunately, records failed to show that it was exercising reasonable care to protect its guests from harm and danger by providing sufficient security commensurate to it being one of the finest hotels in the country,” the appeals court ruling read.

The hotel was ordered to pay 52 million pesos (1.1 million dollars) in damages to the heirs of Harper, an executive of a European power company who was found dead after being bound, gagged and then robbed in his hotel room on November 6, 1999.

He was aged 30 at the time.

The Makati Shangri-La had asked the appellate court to overturn the lower court’s ruling, arguing Harper had been negligent in inviting the two suspected murderers, believed to be foreigners, into his hotel room.

Both suspects, a male and a female, were filmed by the hotel’s security cameras entering the victim’s room.

But the hotel’s security officer testified that the victim’s visitors did not pass through security checks, and that other guests had reporting losing valuables in their rooms, the ruling added.

The court was told one of the suspects later tried to use Harper’s credit card to buy a watch at a jewellery store, but left the shop hurriedly when the clerk tried to verify his identity.

The suspects have never been caught.

The Makati Shangri-La is located in the business district of Metro Manila. It is part of the Hong Kong-based Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts group.

A spokeswoman for the hotel said it was expected to release a comment on the court verdict later on Tuesday.

Just had an idea – how come there are no masculine smelling detergent?  Detergent and softener all smell like flowers or sea-breeze and that smell ‘radiates’ from the person, wearing clothes that have just been washed in it. 

Imagine a manly man smelling like flowers…. hmm, I guess the remedy is to mask the smell of flowers with perfume, like “Musk” or “Cool Waters”.  Now imagine, if detergent smelt like men’s perfume, that way they don’t have to buy perfume.  And an even better benefit is, it may even encourage more men to do laundry (hooray) and do it correctly. 

I know, some of you reading this might be laughing at the ridiculous idea.  But who knows, maybe men will be more domesticated in time to come and that’s when there may be demand for “Musk” detergent.

I watched this movie, on the flight from Singapore to HK.  In case you’re not familiar with the storyline – its about a chance encounter between a journalist and a homeless cellist, which led to an unlikely friendship.  Both of them received something from that friendship, even though you may think that the weaker one was the homeless guy.  His name is Nathaniel, so I’ll address him as such.    Nathaniel was a gifted musician who enrolled into a prestigious music school, only to drop out before graduating.  He had symptoms typical of schizophrenia – hearing voices in his head.  Instead of getting treatment for it, he chose to live in open space and play his instrument.  And this was how the journalist – Steve – met him. 

The movie dealt with issues of homelessness and people living with mental illness.  There’s a severe lack of understanding of mental illness.  Unlike physical illnes, where we show the ‘evidence’ of being physically ill, with mental illness, it is often all in the mind.  With very little ’evidence’ of  suffering, people afflicted with mental illness are easily brushed off as attention-seeking, weird or lazy.  They are misunderstood at best and ignored, at worst. 

I remembered thinking during the movie, “how did life get so complicated and how easy it is to lose our way in life”.  Somehow it’s as-if, there are more people suffering from mental illness now, compared to say 60 years ago.  Maybe then, there was alot less diagnosis and people just carried on with life.  Perhaps now, with increased awareness and discovery of new mental illnesses (and diagnosis),  more people are coming out to seek treatment.  Although there is more awareness but people who’ve never suffered from mental illness find it hard to empathise.  In most parts of asia, there is still a stigma attached to being diagnosed with mental illness. 

I was deeply moved by the movie because it challenged a few of my preconceived notion about the homeless and lost.  It was enlightening to see self-less people (Lamp Community) dedicate their life to helping the homeless and people with psychological problem as they try to manage as best as they can.  One lesson i learnt from watching the movie is that medication isn’t the only way to treat problems.  Just like the journalist in the movie, I’d wrongly assumed that to help means to force medical diagnosis, wrongly believing that a proper diagnosis would lead to proper medication and a better quality of life.   Maybe in some cases, it will help.  But more often, this help is neither requested nor required.

Again and again, I’m reminded that Acceptance and unconditional friendship is what we need.