I am getting quite neurotic these days. A friend is staying with me, returning to Hong Kong after a year away in London. We are now looking at Hong Kong with renewed eyes and I have an increasing feeling growing inside of me that I need to leave this city. I am getting quite depressed. Work has become ever more unbearable with how cold people are to each other, how no one cares about me.
I still have my heart hung on the strategist. When I saw his coat on his chair today in the morning after being gone for a long while, I was hoping that I would gather enough courage to say hi to him. Instead, the next thing I know, he walked by without greeting me and I saw him waiting for the elevator with that private equity girl. She looked happy. I was feeling devastated.
Meaningless activities one after another. I think this year I will make a major change. I plan to leave the job altogether by mid-year and meanwhile, I am planning to go to Shanghai and not come back for a while. Meaning, no more half half. It should just be one place.
I need to find peace with my mind and spirit. That is the most important thing. My decade in Hong Kong shall draw to a close in 2014. Happy year of the horse!
Friday, January 24, 2014
Tuesday, January 21, 2014
A new step
Looking back, it had been a year since I started the blog, hoping that I could meet that special someone through methodical determination. A year later, nothing. I am however, spending half of my time in Shanghai and liking the change in environment. Though I am in Hong Kong right now. I like the warmer weather.
Sunday, December 15, 2013
Carpetbaggers and Chinese locusts
I had lunch with an old college friend who moved to Hong Kong in the past year. A young Chinese transplant like myself, she grew up in New York and works in media. A very headstrong girl. Though it can get annoying at times, I am nonetheless interested to see the world from her perspectives.
She is a go-getter and made it a goal to find a boy marry him and have a kid all in the span of one year. She achieved it, along with a few of my other friends. She recommended that Atlantic Monthly article "Marry him!" in 2008 that argued for settling.
When the conversation went to a more practical point, I said that I got what I needed from Hong Kong, that being citizenship and a house. To any financier, that would be practical and correct. My girlfriend cringed however and said that I sounded like a carpetbagger, or exactly like those Chinese locusts.
Do I? Isn't all that true in what I said? Everyone's in some place for something right? Like people move to the States to get a green card and make money, people move to New York to make it, etc, etc. Of course, I won't bring up that I learned a lot and matured through the experience, but aren't we all enslaved in some way in society and striving for that next goal? Am I too jaded or is she too idealistic?
In the evening time, despite the rain, I went to visit a local care group, or Bible Study group in Hong Kong. The couple's home was in Tin Hau and a very good part of it. I arrived all wet from walking uphill in the rain and they were surprised to see me. The woman told me that their yearly sessions were already over but invited me in for tea and gave me an umbrella afterwards. Their big house had five cats roaming about and gave me an instant feeling of home. If I were living like them, of course I'd like Hong Kong! The older guy told me that he was born in Shanghai but grew up in Hong Kong and his son having gone to Deerfield Academy, a premier boarding school in the US, now studies at Yale and is a swimmer there. They are in fact leaving for San Francisco to meet up with him this holiday season. An ideal life in Hong Kong indeed.
She is a go-getter and made it a goal to find a boy marry him and have a kid all in the span of one year. She achieved it, along with a few of my other friends. She recommended that Atlantic Monthly article "Marry him!" in 2008 that argued for settling.
When the conversation went to a more practical point, I said that I got what I needed from Hong Kong, that being citizenship and a house. To any financier, that would be practical and correct. My girlfriend cringed however and said that I sounded like a carpetbagger, or exactly like those Chinese locusts.
Do I? Isn't all that true in what I said? Everyone's in some place for something right? Like people move to the States to get a green card and make money, people move to New York to make it, etc, etc. Of course, I won't bring up that I learned a lot and matured through the experience, but aren't we all enslaved in some way in society and striving for that next goal? Am I too jaded or is she too idealistic?
In the evening time, despite the rain, I went to visit a local care group, or Bible Study group in Hong Kong. The couple's home was in Tin Hau and a very good part of it. I arrived all wet from walking uphill in the rain and they were surprised to see me. The woman told me that their yearly sessions were already over but invited me in for tea and gave me an umbrella afterwards. Their big house had five cats roaming about and gave me an instant feeling of home. If I were living like them, of course I'd like Hong Kong! The older guy told me that he was born in Shanghai but grew up in Hong Kong and his son having gone to Deerfield Academy, a premier boarding school in the US, now studies at Yale and is a swimmer there. They are in fact leaving for San Francisco to meet up with him this holiday season. An ideal life in Hong Kong indeed.
Tuesday, December 10, 2013
The back and forth
I escaped the smog in Shanghai, having experienced a terrible day last Friday in a mostly dreamlike cloud atmosphere, except your throat and your eyes tell you that it is not really that great for you. Back in Hong Kong. I am happy that there is a deadline to it all. I can be here, enjoy the air, enjoy the food, but next Friday I will be off again. I still have the same feeling toward my crush, but I am so happy that I can be leaving it all. I do not want my emotion and actions be restricted by the environment. I know I would not have the will power to fight it, so escaping makes it all so much easier, like a permanent vacation.
So many things going on around us in the macro economic environment, and I have lost on the Rmb appreciation in addition to the scary property price appreciation. I want to capture it. I would very much like to buy that apartment, even if it means stretching it a bit. A million USD. That's how much a half decent two bedroom apartment would cost. I am scrambling to gather the 300k down payment. I want a base there. It gives me purpose. I am doing something... rather than being trapped by a job, by people, by place.
Ten days...
So many things going on around us in the macro economic environment, and I have lost on the Rmb appreciation in addition to the scary property price appreciation. I want to capture it. I would very much like to buy that apartment, even if it means stretching it a bit. A million USD. That's how much a half decent two bedroom apartment would cost. I am scrambling to gather the 300k down payment. I want a base there. It gives me purpose. I am doing something... rather than being trapped by a job, by people, by place.
Ten days...
Grandma and girlfriends
Two separate topics:
First, my grandmother passed away today. She was 88 or so. I think the end of a life can involve quite a lot of suffering, and you can slowly wither away. I hope she went smoothly and is now without suffering.
Girlfriends. One of the local girls was quite aggressive in meeting my guy friends and we all went out for corporate lunch today. I do feel threatened around these younger girls, though she may be a friend. Especially in China when I feel like they know they have more power and can be using it.
First, my grandmother passed away today. She was 88 or so. I think the end of a life can involve quite a lot of suffering, and you can slowly wither away. I hope she went smoothly and is now without suffering.
Girlfriends. One of the local girls was quite aggressive in meeting my guy friends and we all went out for corporate lunch today. I do feel threatened around these younger girls, though she may be a friend. Especially in China when I feel like they know they have more power and can be using it.
Sunday, November 17, 2013
Resting in Maldives
I am resting in Maldives as we speak, trying to work on a few things for work. The resort island is beautiful but also quite expensive. Getting here on speedboat from the capital Male cost almost 200 US alone. Add to that the meal plan etc. I do need a break though. For almost half a year, I have been shuttling between Hong Kong and Shanghai and lying next to the beach of a neutral place is a good break. Come Monday I am off to Shanghai again. The morning I get into Hong Kong and in the evening I am off.
I think it will be a good change. Somehow my experience in Hong Kong has been deteriorating. After all these years, it is a pity that it is still not home. I don't know what I can find elsewhere but we shall see. The one thing I need to find to do is running a profitable business so I do not need to rely on work for all my attention span and all my possibilities in life. "Man is born free but everywhere he is in chains," that's the age old philosophy that still rings true. I want to be free from my chains and really live a spectacular life, a creative one, and a truthful one. I hope I can.
Sunday, November 10, 2013
The art of speaking and communicating
I think these days I am now back to my original goal of thinking before speaking. After I came back to Hong Kong, I again was truthful in communicating my dissatisfaction of the place to those I meet. It is a nice and convenient place but I feel it is not home. Friends come and go but they are never that rooted. A friend who tapped into my network has been meeting all my friends on my behalf annoyed me a bit. Not only that, he has been talking negatively about me with my friends. Oh, so and so also agreed with me, that you can be quite negative sometimes. Oh, you could be like so and so. Oh you are not really that social and interested in meeting people. He says. I tell you this because I know you can take it.
I think I need to filter my thoughts and what I say. As we grow older, I find that everyone has an agenda to further his or her interest. There is no pure interest in another person, even within a family. People are all self-interested, especially when we roll out capitalism in the midst. Words are like swords, they can spread love and hurt. Though they are invisible, they have lasting effects. I see some less sophisticated friends that speak and ramble on with no clear purpose. It shows one's intelligence and emotional intelligence to be able to send targeted messages to select people. The art of conversation..
Met up with a lot of people and watched "Blue Jasmine" with an ex-colleague of mine. It was a little depressing despite the great performance. The top of the world to the bottom. Hopefully in my climb through accumulated efforts I would never have to face that..
I think I need to filter my thoughts and what I say. As we grow older, I find that everyone has an agenda to further his or her interest. There is no pure interest in another person, even within a family. People are all self-interested, especially when we roll out capitalism in the midst. Words are like swords, they can spread love and hurt. Though they are invisible, they have lasting effects. I see some less sophisticated friends that speak and ramble on with no clear purpose. It shows one's intelligence and emotional intelligence to be able to send targeted messages to select people. The art of conversation..
Met up with a lot of people and watched "Blue Jasmine" with an ex-colleague of mine. It was a little depressing despite the great performance. The top of the world to the bottom. Hopefully in my climb through accumulated efforts I would never have to face that..
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