Even more Christmas!

I'm feeling Christmas'y. For the moment at least. It's not like Hong Kong is giving me lots of holiday spirit (something that I'd always be bursting with in Norway at this time). The sad fact is that, despite all the cookies and cake they have over here, there's NO gingerbread cookies, they don't have television Christmas calendars, they clearly don't have space or the right type of trees for Christmas trees... One thing I do have access to here, though, is Christmas songs! I'm currently listening to Norwegian ones, and I feel the Christmas feeling right now!

Other than that, I also caught myself in listening to Chinese (both Mandarin/Putonghua and Cantonese) songs yesterday and thinking "Wow, these languages are so pretty..."
I feel this strong urge to learn them even more now, but I just don't know what I'm supposed to use it for back home in Norway...

Today was a very quiet day, I mostly stayed at home and relaxed. It was great, actually, once in a while to slack like that.

Christmaschristmaschristmaschristmas...

HMM

Christmas and exams

Today I'm trying something new. I won't tell you what it is. Just know that I'm doing... it.

Things are becoming slower now... kind of. Well, for me at least. Seeing as exams are next week, the homework load is all but gone, and because I'm not taking the exams (instead, I'll be working on the project or something similar in the school library), I don't feel the stress of exams either. I'll be trying to seize that opportunity to brush up on my practical language skills, allthough I'll probably end up just surfing Facebook on the school computers...
I do have some work to do, but I just can't get myself to do it.

Other than that, Christmas is very different in Hong Kong from Norway, despite me attending a catholic school. I've tried to Christmas it a little up though, so I'm humming Norwegian Christmas songs, and I even made a Christmas calendar for each of my sisters, the type where you have a little present every day. I think they're appreciating it, allthough the gifts are mostly small ones that don't necessarily have any use...

It'll be weird with no Christmas tree and Christmas presents this year, but yaknow, it's all a new experience. I'm so happy that my parents decided to let me come here this year, and I feel like what I've experienced so far is only a fraction of what I'll get to see as the year progresses.

-HMM

Bananas and winter

Long time no... write..
It feels like my Chinese is inching on at a slow pace, so I'd better work harder!
Speaking of Chinese, I have a hard time in my Mandarin classes (aka Putonghua classes). The only thing I really only understand is when the teacher calls out my name ("Wu Chia Wen!"), despite passing my tests and such with a good margin (the passing grade here is 50%).
The classroom today....
Teacher: Wu Chia Wen!
Me: Yes?
Teacher: *Chinese*
Me: .... say what?
Teacher: .... do you talk on MSN with your classmates?
Me: *taken aback*
Hong Kong girls who were just talking to me: *giggle*

It's all good though, I suppose it'll be better.. hopefully.. As a side note, that MSN question probably sprung up because during my oral assessment (which was supposed to be about myself), I ended up writing down my MSN, mail, facebook and phone numbers, by request, in addition to teaching them all macarena. Extracts from that assessment also matches the pattern of the one above, only change the teacher out with classmate no. 1 and change the Chinese to "Can you dance for us???"

A school day in Hong Kong also follows the same pattern, this place is just full of patterns.
Today, this is how it went down.
6.14: Alarm clock rings. I drag myself out of bed and get into my school uniform.
6.21: I eat breakfast, a pineapple bun and a glass of milk.
6.35: I go out and head for the MTR. I'm a bit cold, and I shake my fist at the wind for blowing up my skirt.
6.40: The train arrives and I get on. Yay, it's so early that I get a seat! I almost fall asleep and start leaning on the lady next to me. She inches slowly away.
7.04: Arrival at Causeway Bay. I go to the school.
7.15: Early morning Tai Chi practice. Change this out for some other extra-curricular activity at will.
7.45: Tai Chi practice is done. I meet up with my classmates who're looking extremely cold. They fix up my uniform, apparently I was wearing it totally wrong. Funnily though, I bumped into the principal, and she said nothing about it.
Classmate: Ah what are you doing, you can't wear the uniform like that!
Me: .... wut? Really? omg...
Classmate: Tuck in your shirt!
*tucks in shirt*
Classmate: The school badge goes over the other one.... no place it higher! AND THAT'S NOT A SCHOOL SWEATER!
Me: I can't believe I wore it all wrong... and nobody told me before now D; *lists teachers she met while wearing the uniform inappropriately*
Classmate: Exchange student ><
(I'm very glad I have such awesome classmates who take care of me haha)
8.00: Assembly. We get in line, do morning prayers and all that stuff, listen to messages from various clubs and societies.
8-something: Finally, time for lessons. err... First one is English! Our teacher has to scold us for not doing our homework. We correct our tests.
8.50: My classmates have French/Chinese. I have two free lessons, and I chose to spend them in the library reading a gem of a history book I discovered the other day, about early Japanese history.
10.20: Recess! I tag along with my classmates to a meeting about a song lyric competition school is having. This school does so much stuff.... I'm almost jealous!
10.40: English Litterature lessons! We go through a poem, have some fun.
12.00: Lunch break. A bunch of people (including me) trek to McDonalds for food. I ate abnormally much. Weird.
13.00: Bell rings, we have form period. We spend it doing a test nobody will correct.
1.30: Quick math lesson. I don't understand shit.
2.10: Two Chinese lessons. We learn about talking about our families, and we also got our tests back. We received a writing task, to write about our hao pengyou (good friend).
3.30: School is over and we're free... for now. Two tests tomorrow. I go home and do some slacking.

So yeah, that's a regular school day. Always very eventful, and all our teachers are very great, in their own way.(Note that we don't eat McDonalds every day, I usually stick with beef rice -w-)
*scratches head*
Yeah... I think I should probably do more useful stuff -o-

edit: I notice that my posts are seldom related to the titles. Fuck that, I'll start writing titles last the next time o; I'll let the current one stay though, to remind me of not doing it again. For info, the temperature here (winter temperature) is about 12 degrees celsius, and a Banana is a Chinese person who's "westernized" (yellow on the outside, white on the inside). This expression possibly works with other Asians too.

A little piece of Norway in Hong Kong

So today I decided to make a Norwegian dinner for my host family, and it actually turned out a great success! The dinner in question was meat cakes in brown sauce with potatoes (which isn't strictly a Norwegian dinner, but who cares). Even though the potatoes were monster sized (seriously, monster. I've never seen such a big potato in my entire life), they all ate. I even got some comments that it was good, so I'm happy -w-

Ah, here's a little gem I found on the internet. This is not Chinese though, but it's a good laugh anyway!


HMM

Living the slow life in Hong Kong

For the first time since I came here, life is slow, and I'm loving it. The previous week has been pretty void of homework (of course, there has been some, but not as much as the weeks before that), and the same can be said for this weekend. I only have to finish my RS assessment and I'm free.

It's as quiet as Hong Kong can ever be, I can smell what seems to be smoke from a fire (I know it to be fire from a grill though), I'm relaxed. I'm 100% relaxed.
All though in Norway I would've considered doing homework on a Saturday evening pretty lame, I wouldn't live without it here. The question is; what do I do with my extra time?

I have a feeling that I should be doing something Hong Kong-cultureish or that I should be practicing Cantonese. Do I practice enough Cantonese? No, I don't, but at least I can understand a little. A little. I can catch the numbers and some simple adjectives, I know it when people are talking about a handsome guy, I can recognize it when somebody speaks of foreigners... I NEED TO LEARN MORE! Ah! I know! I'll take out my Mandarin book.. and then have my host sister or someone teach me the Cantonese equivalent of this! I have a feeling that my Mandarin is more structured than my Cantonese anyway. Yes yes, I'll do that.

And about Hong Kong culture... I live and breathe it every day, because the culture of a busy student such as my peers does revolve around school and homework, and being busy with extracurricular activities. Hopefully it will be enough, and hopefully I will learn much much more!

Aaaaaah I'm so relaxed. Ah, here's a picture of my relaxing view of Hong Kong. <3 falling asleep while watching this!


Well, I guess I won't be able to live slow now, even though I have the opportunity. But I'm only gonna be here for a little while, so I should take advantage of this chance!

Tankefulle HMM

The MTR!

Okay!
I've been here for over two months now, but it's still as hectic as ever. I would, however, like to take a break from playing with my Tai Chi-fan and preparing for my oral assessment in Mandarin and write a little about my experiences with the MTR.

The MTR (Mass transit railway) is the subway/train thingie that goes across Hong Kong. I get on this baby every morning around 7 am to get to school, and first, I'd like to talk about the MTR personas that I as a foreigner have perceived.
Firstly, you have the hand bag lady. This is the woman who does whatever possible to get a seat. She's usually a middle-aged woman wearing her bag on her belly for quicker seating. If you want a seat on one of the crowded lines, your best chance to get one is to stand in the middle of the seating area between the rows of seats, and the hand bag lady will most definitely push her way here as soon as she gets on. She'll spend her time greedily eyeing the people sitting, searching for signs that they're getting off soon. If someone gets up, you can usually spot a couple of hand bag ladies heading towards the free seat. The fastest person will sit down, while the others will stop and stare at the person sitting. Beware of these!
Secondly, there's the delivery people. Hong Kong is a busy, vibrant place, and a great deal of delivery people travel on the MTR every day to get to their locations. All though they don't usually make a fuss out of themselves, they're still very visible due to their delivery bags/boxes/things.
Thirdly, we have the school kids (aka me). These are pretty much different in their behaviour and such, but are still one big fuzzy group because they're all wearing uniforms. Some of them chat with their friends, some are busy studying for a test or quiz, some students have managed to snag a seat and are sleeping (I'm this kind of student), while others are standing quietly somewhere.

Getting on the MTR has various degrees of difficulty. If your timing is good, you'll be able to get in without much problems. If you're travelling during rush hours, you'll be pushed in. Usually, the hand bag ladies will cut in front of you while you're left thinking "WHAT THE HELL, BITCH, I'M IN A HURRY TOO!". This also happens on queues for the escalators.

Moving onto escalators, they're awesome here in Hong Kong. In less touristy places (which is almost everywhere I go), you will see that everybody will be standing on the right side of the elevator. The left side is for busy people who want to walk. There are posters all over the MTR discouraging walking in escalators, but heck, people never look at those posters anyway. I mean, who spends 30 seconds washing their hands just because the random poster in the bathroom said so?

That's all for now, better continue studying Chinese...
HMM

Random pictures?

The hour is nearing 13, and I'm nearing the end of my homework so I thought I'd take a little time to share some pictures and random thoughts.

This pic is from our trip to Lamma Island. It's pretty much Hong Kong in a nutshell.

It's a monkey. No, really.

Purty view of Causeway Bay from our school.

Need to finish it here, homework awaits! All of these pictures can be found on Picasa by the way, mentioned earlier, together with more.

HMM

argh

those are my true feelings

PICTURES HERE

no not really, but there are lot's of them here.

A Hong Kong weekend!

Yesssss, yet another Friday has come! I'm looking forward to the weekend as always, and I just got a bunch of sweet language books and dictionaries to keep me busy. HOWEVER!
Those will have to wait. A rule I try to live by here (which I just now broke) is work first, play later. I've found that if I don't at least TRY to follow that rule, I will crash and burn once school comes. As always here in Hong Kong, and something that is different from what I had in Norway, I get a larger amount of homework to do during the weekends than in the week itself.
The homework I know I have to do this weekend is as follows (not counting what I don't know about, but that will come and bite me on my ass on Monday):
English -
* Songs and Poems - L1, L2, L3 5, 7, 5 (God knows what this is, I wrote it down a long time ago)
* An essay about Norway (wheee)
* Upstream Workbook p. 4-9 (my English workbook)
* Webboard responses to presentations (Webboard is a kind of forum our school uses to post homework and such, and we're in a period of presentations in English class now, so the teacher'll post a couple of questions on webboard, and we have to answer!)
* Engbuilder (English builder is basically an internet site where you do small question thingies about an audio clip you hear at the start of the excercise. It takes a long time!)

Biology -
* Answer a couple of quizes on the e-learning platform (basically a site filled with quizes, in this case about stuff in biology. I'm lagging a bit behind here, so I have to do some extra ones)
* Worksheat about the nervous system

History -
* Answer the questions on the sheet of paper about the Hungarian uprising during the Cold War

Mathematics -
* Excercise 3E 17, 19 and 20 (this is HARD STUFF)
* Finish the old exam questions on the worksheet

Chemistry -
* Download and print out the notes for chapter 25 (FINALLY something in chemistry that I know what is, namely organic chemistry! I even got 100% when we had a test about it in Norway too, but I'm sure these Hong Kong people manage to make that incomprehensible before long...)

Religious studies -
* Do the assignments (three questions about ... stuff)

Chinese as a second language -
* Prepare for the oral test (eep)
* Learn the tongue twister (basically saying four, ten and is in different orders, as the three sound much the same)

In addition to this, I really need to pick up my Hong Kong bank card. I also have two dancing lessons tomorrow, and an oil painting class today, plus, Sunday will be the family day!

I also have a box full of weird stuff to send home to Norway (PRESENTS GALORE!), some letters to write, postcards to write and send and probably something else that I've forgotten too...

So my Japanese books will have to wait ;_;

Other than that, I've been pretty tired lately. Stumbling and such. The other day, I stumbled two times in the MTR, and then once again at school. I even lost all my stuff and scabbed my knee. SADPANDA!

I'm also starting to enjoy school. My class is full of really nice girls, and it's so hard, because I want to go to lunch with every single one of them (but NO restaurant or food place has that much room). Lunch is always enjoyable.
I also had a history test today. I failed very badly, I think, probably left out a lot of important stuff, which is sad... I do like history.

Other than that, I'm slowly understanding more and more Cantonese, and well, I've got people all around me who are nice and will teach me. I do have a problem though, and that is that at the moment, I am learning Cantonese, Mandarin AND Japanese. I'm pretty sure I've bit over more than I can chew, especially if you put all this together with the fact that my days are pretty much filled up with school and other extra activities. Phew. I'm pretty sure that I'll be so surprised about how much time I have when I come back to Norway!

The weather here is getting colder too, so I'm enjoying myself more and more. I've even got a downy! It's not a proper downy (and it's still Norwegian summer temperatures here), but it's pretty close.

That's all I can think of for the moment, back to... whatever I was going to do before I started blogging here..

- HMM

Yawn

Evening, afternoon, all that shiz.

I'm currently relaxing in the school's library during one of my few free lessons. (My other classmates are currently studying either French or Chinese).
I thought I'd give a small, brief, whatchamacallit on what's going on, 'cause doing that is waaay better than studying here (even though I know I should be doing that)!

I have currently started doing several activities after school. Firstly, piano lessons, of course. I'm a real novice, and I very much enjoy playing anyway! The piano teacher comes to our flat every Saturday, though it sometimes gets postponed due to... stuff.
I'm also joining my school's oriental dance team (making me a member of three different clubs here... hmm, I wonder if I should beg the Japanese club to let me join them too..). Anyways, their practices are on Saturdays as well, though they haven't started yet.
My host sister and I have also made a deal; I attend an activity she wants to do with her, and she comes with me to something I want to do, so in the end, we have settled on oil painting and judo. I personally see that as a great thing, since the oil painting classes on Fridays are great (relaxing music and general environment, nice teachers, you get to sit and paint..), and since I do love judo and now get to do it with someone my age, size and level -w-

In addition to these activities, I also try to keep up with the school work (though it's getting increasingly hard!). The problem subjects, as of yet, are chemistry and Chinese as a second language, chemistry because I'm totally ignorant as to what the hell all those letters mean, and Chinese as a second language... because it's way above my Chinese levels, let's just leave it at that. History, on the other hand, is incredibly fun, biology and math are livable, along with geography. (And who can't love art and P.E.?!?). Credit must also be given to all my teachers, who are wonderful and nice, the whole bunch! School here would be so much less bearable without them!

eeeeek piano lesson today <3
judo tomorrow <3 (also pig dissection and quiz, but that's no fun)
nothing cool on thursday...
come friday and there's oil painting, followed by a weekend filled with homework, dancing, more piano and family activites.

aaaaah busy life, I wonder if I'll get used to it?

-HMM

One foot in the West, one helluva large and possibly swollen foot in the East

That's it folks, now I've been here in H.K. for a little over a month, and everything and nothing has happened.

Firstly, my school is the best. I attend St. Paul's Convent School, a Catholic girls' school in Causeway Bay. The students are perky and nice, and the teachers are extremely kind too. The lessons are exciting, and whenever I fall asleep in class, it's because I don't sleep enough, or because it's the lesson right after lunch.
According to a classmate, Causeway Bay is one of the most polluted areas in Hong Kong, but that hasn't stopped it from being propped full with small restaurants and eateries. It makes you wonder how they keep from going bankrupt, but go to Causeway Bay a Wednesday afternoon during lunchtime and see how throngs of school children, businessmen and women, and regular people flock EVERY SINGLE EATING PLACE, and you'll understand.

The actual school subjects are rather hard to keep up with, and the workload is so huge that I'm getting more and more sleep-deprived. Unlike Norway, where you usually get a big piece of homework with one week to finish, here in Hong Kong, you get a little homework from every subject, every lesson, and that adds up to quite a bit. The subjects are, as mentioned before, very interesting, though, so I survive, somehow.
I've also errr "joined" some societies at school, mostly to show that I'm involved, or because the people promoting the clubs asked me so nicely. So far, I'm a part of the French Club, and the English Debating Society (oO). I wanted to join the Film Society too, but before I noticed, it was too late. Dawwww.
I've also started Tai Chi in school, as we have a "Diversified Interest Program" every Wednesday, where people pick a cool activity like Tai Chi and learn it. Allthough they call it Tai Chi, it's more like slow dancing with a fan, and I'm really enjoying it.

I would also like to tell you all about my favorite Hong Kong candy, which, for some reason, comes from Japan.
The first one is "Milk Candy", which is basically candy... that tastes like milk. So simple, yet soooooo good!
The second one is Pocky, and well, Pocky is super good. 'Nuff said.

Whatever I do when I don't have homework, aka my spare time, depends. If it's a regular day, I'll hang around the house, watching a movie, surfin the net. If it's a weekend, going to the movies is very great. I've seen more movies since I came to Hong Kong than I did in Norway last year, and there's this new one that just came out that I REALLY wanna see. It's a movie from mainland China, with all the big Chinese stars (allthough I recognize few of them) about the making of the People's Republic of China, one of my favorite parts of history! I would also like to know how the Chinese movie-maker person depicts the characters involved.

I have also started taking piano lessons, and it's a real pleasure every time the teacher comes. My sister and I will also be starting Judo in a little while, and as soon as we do, I'll write a letter to my Judo club back in Norway (as per the request of an extremely nice person who trains there) telling that I'm having fun and that Chinese people are scary.

The Cantonese is going slowly, though I'm picking up new stuff mostly every day. I can even hear the difference between Mandarin and Cantonese now (something that was impossible when I first got here)! Maybe I'll be able to pick up some phrases after all?

That's the update for now, here are some pictures:

Singing... in the RAIN oO

In writing moment, it's raining like hell. Seriously. Got thunder and such too. If the weather stays like this, I get a free day tomorrow!

*cough*, moving on.
School has been very school'y and I'm actually right now taking a break from the mounds of homework I need to finish before tomorrow. Which is sad, really, the 14 and 15-year olds here get more homework then I ever did in Norway.

I would also rather be playing with my new shiny laptop, that I got yesterday, but alas, my homework calls to me. My old laptop was dying in the heat here, so I got myself a new faster one to help meh.

lol just heard a loud bang from outside, sounds like the wind knocked something over oO

Also, just today realized how polluted the air here is, we were driving around in Hong Kong looking for school books, and it was like fog seriously. You could only hardly see the buildings on, say, another island not too far away.

Oki, back to homework again..
HMM

'Norwegian fails at phones, school and life in general'

So yeah, I fail. This is at least the keyword for today's blog!

My second day of school today, and it was quite okay. Well, once the school actually started..
The day, you see, started off awesomely bad. My host mother, you see ("Auntie"), comes into our room early in the morning with a worried expression, and asks if I'm not going to school soon. I tell her that it's fine, I'm not starting before 8, so I have put on an alarm that will go off at 6.30. The train ride to the school takes about 45-60 mins, so I need to get up early!
However, her concern worried me a bit, and so I couldn't sleep again. I reach out and grab my cell phone. According to it, the clock was 7.36.... lolwait, 7.36? EEEEEEEEEEK

I hurriedly grab my stuff and school uniform, muttering oh shit oh shit under my breath. My host sister (who doesn't have to get up as early) then tells me that it's not 7.30, it's 6.30.
o_o
I then checked my cell phone again, and it read 7.37.... pm.
Apparently, when my alarm went during school assembly yesterday (eep), and I quickly took out the battery to prevent further... alarming, it reset the time on my cell. I'm so glad Auntie came to check if I wasn't going soon lol ><

Okay, so I get dressed at the proper time, get on the train and get there in time. Our school is very cautious with the Swine Flu here, so we have to write down our temperatures and such every day. Before leaving that day, we took my temperature the regular way (hand on the forehead, yaknow). My temperature was nothing out of the ordinary, so I wrote down what I thought was an ordinary temperature on the sheet.
At school, I line up with the other students, but wooops, apparently a temperature of 37.3 up from 36.9 is scary, so I had to go sit in a corner with a face mask while the teachers ran back and forward trying to figure out what to do D;
I missed the assembly, even missed the start of my lesson, but after a few temperature checks, they found out that my temperature was regular.
Quote Hilde "There must be something wrong with the thermometer at home.."
*cough*

When I finally came into my classroom, I was oddly enough greeted by most of my class with a cheery and most perky hi. The classroom was chaotic as it has been every time I've been there. We had chemistry, math, english (mostly just handed in forms), history, mandarin and french (I got a free period), before I could go home at 12.50. I also had a nice chat with my class' teacher, Miss Lee, about midnight sun and classes.
What surprised me the most during the school day was
1. The girls seemed not to like the chemistry teacher, which I could not understand. He seemed like a very nice guy. Apparently, it's just because it was the first lesson of the year, and my classmates assured me that he'd start yelling at us asking where we left our brains soon. Reminds me of a certain someone who I have very much respect for, so yelling is fine(I think o_O)
2. Hong Kong school is SCARY
Except for the history class (which I thoroughly enjoyed), the level was amazingly high (considering that I'm in school with 14-15-year olds), and most of the teachers even randomly picked students to answer questions or solve stuff in front of everyone. I was sitting "don't pick me, don't pick me" through the entire chemistry and math class D;
I hope I get used to that.

After school, I went to meet my host sisters Angel and Winnie, plus Tracy, for lunch. We were going for Japanese food, so we went into a sushi place (eek).
I ordered a very safe dish of rice and pork, but as that took so long time to prepare, I got to taste the things that the other people ordered, like miso soup, sushi and other weird stuff.

And now I'm at home. I'm pooped. Really pooped. Getting my school uniform off is so nice that I forget to take a picture of it. Every. Single. Day.
You won't believe how hot it is.

HMM

Also, best article EVER at Dagbladet (you may need a translator tool): http://www.dagbladet.no/2009/09/02/nyheter/innenriks/rus/vold/7917580/

Sooooo much on my mind now, but this will probably turn out to be a piss poor and short blog anyway :<

Firstly, I'd like to point out a couple of interesting stuff about Hong Kong and it's inhabitants.
Here, caps and umbrellas aren't only for gangstas and rainy days. They are also used for hiding from the sun (to avoid getting a tan)
Cleaning teeth with a tooth pick and tying your shoe laces are things that must be hidden.
Whistling is a no-no at night, it makes ghosts appear D;
Also, have you noticed Chinese doing the v sign on pictures? All though I in Norway have grown up believeing it meant "peace", this is not what Hong Kongers do, apparently. Yall know the "guy with sunglasses"-smiley on MSN, I bet. Imagine him saying "Yeah", and you know what the v sign means here!

Secondly, about turning Chinese...
I get a lot of sideway glances and the occasional stare here and there, but I pretend not to notice n__n
I actually do understand it, because I'm having a hard time not staring at foreigners here myself, because you hardly ever see one :o It's like "WAAAA, A FOREIGNER"
*cough*

Also, visited Disneyland today. It was super fun, though I kinda regret not buying the picture of us from Space Mountain. It was less scary than I thought it would be, but my mouth was still wide open in a silent scream o_o
It was also suuuuuuuuper hot, so if you happen to look at Facebook photos from Disneyland, you might see that I'm pink as a pig on some of them ^^;

eeep
HMM

About this heat...

... seriously, I love it, but I just can't seem to shake the feeling that I've pissed myself o_o
I'm hoping it goes away soonish. *cough*

Enough strange talk, let's see what's new... Well, today the Cantonese lessons started, it was very interesting, of course. After those, Angel (my host sister), Marco (my "first friend", an AFS returnee who is helping out with stuff here) + Angel's friend Tracy, a Swiss AFSer (Raphael), his first friend and some other AFS people went for a nice lunch at a Tea House (茶餐廳 ;3). I got beef and tomato and rice, + iced chocolate milk, everything for 34 Hong Kong dollars hihi. This tea house was an interesting experience. Firstly, everything was in Chinese, so whoever says that you don't need to know it to live in Hong Kong is lying. Secondly, you get glasses with liquid to clean your eating cutlery stuff with (chopsticks and such), and I'll give you a sec to guess what liquid it is....
oki enough guessing, it's tea actually o_O
I got some tourist photos and such, before we left (see them on facebook <3) style="text-align: center;">I think I saw someone drink out of one of these actually

wut?

After the tea house, we took the MTR (google it!) to (I think it was) Mong Kok to set up a bank account for me and Raphael, a Swiss AFSer. We had to wait before we could do that though, so in the meanwhile we went to a gaming place. We're not talking handheld gaming, we are not talking gambling gaming. We're talking "hit the punching ball thing as hard as you can", which we did. We also threw basket hoops, and we rounded everything up with taking some purikura photos (yes, lots of Japanese stuff here in Hong Kong). I swear the booth made me look even whiter than I am. You can't even see the difference between my skin and the white in my eyes o: We were, of course, a little late back to the bank, but no trouble there. We finished up the account business quickly (I even got a children's account haha), and then we took a taxi to a biiiiiiig shopping mall full of expensive stores, to watch a movie :>

The movie was G.I. Joe, and we bought some Salt and Vinegar potato chips from a supermarket (lovely vinegar'y), popcorn (very sweet :o) and soft drinks (THEY HAD FANTA). The movie was very adequate, with a lovely amount of action and pew pews.

Sweet popcorn; literally

*yawn*
I'm tired now, so I'm going to bed
muhuh

gnight

<3 Hong Kong

Ya srlsy.

Today has been a super eventful day! All though i didn't take any pictures (cry), it was a great day hihi.

All the students were woken up at around 7-7.15, and we had to pack our shiz. After that, we all got down for breakfast (cereal, salad, ham, funny bread and a fish thing o_o). At 9 and 10, we were meeting our host families (group A at 9, group B at 10, I was group B D;). I was really really nervous, but some of the nice AFS volunteers comforted me and my First Friend (who has been in Norway) was there to help.

My host family is really awesome, and really nice too :3
I managed to fall while we were walking to the car (of course -_-') and I scratched my feet, and they came with tissues and water to clean it, and when we got home, they even found disinfectant and band-aids :o

After unpacking, we all sat down and they gave me some rules and regulations, what to call them, if I could bring friends home and so on. When we were done with that, we all went to eat at a pizza hut, and I was surprised to see how cheap everything was. We live above a shopping mall, so I got to see lots of things. And yeah, Hong Kong is surprisingly cheap ^^;

I know a certain person who would -love- HK burger kings; there was olives on everything ;3
One thing I also noticed was that stuff with "Norwegian Salmon" was popular in restaurants, Norwegian Salmon Pizza, Norwegian Salmon Salad etc. We also went and took my picture (eep!) and cut me a key (yay).

When we were done with pizza, we went back home and I took a sweet nap. It'll be weird going to bed soon without a downy, but I think I'll manage hihi n__n

We still had stuff to do after my nap; we went out again to Tsim Sha Tsui, the famous shopping place. Here we found me a camera, and went to dinner with one of Uncle's business associates. After that we just hung around in the mall.

Okiiiiii, need to go to bed now
-- HMM

yawn

After a looooooong flight (with surprisingly good food) I am in Hong Kong, whee. Well, I've been here for a little while actually.

Pictures from the flight


Nom <3


Soy :o

The camp is interesting and full of nice people, though I can't wait to meet my host family and start going to school, lol.

My first thoughts when entering HK was something like wheeee tall buildings, my second, gosh it's hot. At the moment it's something like 30 degrees celsius and super humid, so it doesn't really feel like you're breathing when outside.



-distilled- water



View from the airport



Tall buildings <3



Plenty of stray cats here



eep

I've also gotten a taste of how the Chinese handle the Swine Flu; I had to fill out several forms describing symptoms and where I've been the past week, and the AFS staff takes our temperatures several timesa day. We also had to wear masks, but only the short stretch from the bus to the camp o_O

That's all fer now
-- HMM

Testing

There is no spoon


-- HMM

Hyssing og skrekkfilmer // Twine and horror movies

I disse dager da første skoledag nærmer seg fort og jeg snart drar er det masse og ingenting som skjer her hjemme, alt på en gang o_O
Folk utnytter seg av de siste dagene til å stoppe innom og si hei, og etter et besøk der vi endte opp med å se på skrekkfilmer har jeg gjennoppdaget Juon (The Grudge). Jeg elsker denne filmen!
Se på den igjen og igjen.... muhuh

Ellers har jeg begynt å pakke (endelig)! Det er ikke bare bare og pakke for ett år, men jeg har kommet ganske godt i gang synes jeg da.

HMM

---///---

The first day of school is getting closer, as well as my departure from Norway, and there's lots of stuff and nothing at all happening here at home, all at the same time o_O
People use these final days before stuff starts happening to stop by and say hi, and after a particular visit where we ended up watching horror movies, I've re-discovered Juon (The Grudge). I simply love this movie!
Watch it again and again... muhuh

Other than that, I've started packing (finally)! It's not easy packing for a year, but I've gotten a good start, or so I think.

HMM

Må pakke! // Gotta pack!

Eeek, det er 16nde august, og jeg drar om noen få dager ;_;
Jeg har ikke begynt å pakke egentlig, men jeg har fått vite mer om hvor og hos hvem jeg skal bo, hihi. Jeg skal bo i et område som heter Lai Chi Kok i Hong Kong, sammen med en familie på fire. De virker veldig hyggelige og åpne, så det blir skikkelig kult n__n

Ellers skal jeg gå på noe som wikipedia beskriver som en katolsk jenteskole, og heldigvis snakker de engelsk der. Det betyr at hvis jeg jobber hardt kan jeg komme tilbake til Norge og ta tredjeåret mitt her, yipee! Skolen ligger visstnok en time unna der jeg bor (om det er med bil eller til fots vet jeg ikke), så det er mulig jeg må stå tiiiiiiidlig opp.

Annet enn det så har planene om å lære seg kinesisk i ferien gått rett i dass, hihi. Jeg fant ut at jeg bare skulle nyte ferien jeg, så fikk jeg se hva jeg får til når jeg kommer frem.

zuum zuum,
legger ut bilder når jeg tar dem,
HMM

---///---

Eeek, it's the 16th of August, and I'm leaving in a couple of days ;_;
I haven't really begun packing, but I've learnt more about where and who I'll live with, hihi. I'm going to live in an area called Lai Chi Kok in Hong Kong, with a family of four. They seem really nice and open, so it's going to be really fun n__n

Other than that, I will be attending something wikipedia describes as an all-girls catholic school, and luckily, it's an English-speaking school. That means that if I work hard, I can come back to Norway and do my third year of videregående (as opposed to doing the second year over), yipee! The school is presumably one hour away from the place I'll be living (if this is by car or walking, I don't know), so I might have to get up reaaaaaal early.

In addition to this, my plans of learning Chinese during the vacation have uh well, let's just say it just didn't work out, hihi. I found out that I'd just enjoy the vacation and see what I could learn when I get there.

zuum zuum,
getting some pictures out when I take them,
HMM

Ponk ponk

Yes, really.