Ode to the Fragrant Harbour

May 1, 2012 in notes from asia | 2 comments

When we swapped our humidifiers (bone dry Beijing) for dehumidifiers (perpetually soggy Hong Kong) I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. Hong Kong was the antithesis of Beijing in every respect. Beijing dusty and barren, Hong Kong lush and dense and evergreen. Beijing sprawling and confusing, Hong Kong neat and contained and manageable. Beijing perplexing, Hong Kong recognisable and familiar. Spit infested Beijing pavements, spitting punishable by fine in Hong Kong. Starved of English (or any) media in Beijing, bookstores galore in Hong Kong.

We didn’t do Hong Kong justice though; we were too sleep deprived. And when we hightailed it out of there two years later we were still a little weary from the rigours of parenting. A year later, feeling settled in our new life in Blighty and ever so slightly nostalgic for Asia, here’s my take on the Kong – a mishmash of loves, loathes, anecdotes, regrets:

  • It’s a money town. People come for the big bucks – inflated salaries, tax breaks, cushy expat lifestyle. Locals and foreigners unite in their worship of Hong Kong’s gods – career, money, status, labels.
  • It’s a city of extremes. LV clad women (and men), Dior on every corner, people begging on the pavements outside. Old people with backs crippled from years of hard labour hobbling alongside white collar workers in immaculate suits. Central district is a shrine to capitalism yet wandering out to the remote islands feels like stepping back in time, lives untouched by the frenetic pace and consumer madness of Central.
  • It’s a city of contradictions; tradition and modernity clash and blend at every turn. Sleek high-tech buildings that adhere to feng shui principles (think a giant hole in the center of a modern skyscraper to allow a dragon to fly through).
  • It’s an insanely efficient place where things get done so swiftly it makes living anywhere else feel disorganised and very very  slow.
  • It’s a small place but , as photojournalist Tom Carter puts it, ‘Take a stroll around Tsim Sha Tsui…and you can see the entire human race in one square-block radius’. Despite this multi-cultural mix, it feels segregated. There isn’t just an expat/local divide but foreigners from different places colonise their corner of the city. Western expats converge in the highrises of midlevels, Filipina helpers can be seen en-masse in public squares on Sundays (their only day off).  
  • It is, surprisingly, a very green city with awesome hiking trails. I left having spent way too much time in air conditioned malls and far too little time exploring the trails.
  • It’s also smoggy. Horribly smoggy. Cleaner than Beijing but enough to get down in the dumps about the state of your lungs on a regular basis. Combine this with ridiculous humidity levels and it’s little wonder people tend to stay indoors.
  • The escalator is so unique to Hong Kong – an outdoor escalator that takes you from the bottom of a steep hill to the top, dotted all the way  up with cafes and restaurants packed with beautiful young things. Surely one of the best places in the world for people watching.
  • While heavily pregnant, I was queue-jumped in rush hour while trying to hail a cab. It’s one of my pet hates so all sorts of filth poured out my mouth. Witnessing this, an old Chinese man came up to me, lurched into the road, did a spot of queue jumping himself and got me a cab. He gave me an apologetic smile and said ‘I’m sorry about that, it’s just the Hong Kong way, you have to fight’. Too true.
  • We lived in such an expat bubble it’s hard to fathom triad activity anywhere in the city. But apparently these gangstas do exist, I guess way beyond the plushness of Central, in the city’s underbelly?
  • Not quite as sterile as ‘Asia lite’ Singapore and less edgy than Beijing but still with an edge of it’s own, Hong Kong strikes a good balance between being liveable but also fun and culturally rich. (It even made it onto Monocle’s 2011 ‘Top 25 Liveable Cities’, ranked 17th).
  • If I had to do it over: I’d check out Chungking Mansions, the big Buddha (shocking I know), hike more, explore armed with a camera, have at least one debauched night in Lan Kwai Fung…
  • Best bit – as always, the friends we made (and the foot massages!)
So much in life is about timing and for us the timing was a little off. I was immersed in nappies and night feeds and so in a sense could have been in any city. Which is a pity really as Hong Kong is one kick-ass city, with an unrivalled night life, oh-so-glam expat scene, incongruities everywhere that simultaneously frustrate and fascinate. It was a strange time in my life, where nothing and everything happened, like a stop on the way to somewhere else. Yet as the place where I married my love, had a blissful pregnancy and became a mother, it’s forever close to my heart.
   

Easy like Sunday morning

March 31, 2012 in hearth&home, notes from asia | Leave a comment

Having been starved of uncensored English media for those three years in Beijing, I’m in full-on overcompensation mode.

It’s not just the children’s books, it’s the magazines (stacked high all over the house) and, the piece de resistance – the Sunday paper. I never loved Sundays in Beijing, or Hong Kong for that matter. They felt a little vacuous. When you live in a strange faraway land, Sundays are when you feel most adrift. There was always a new corner of the city to explore, a sight to see, or a new expat friend to meet, but I missed the rest and relaxation that comes from flopping down on a friend’s couch or hanging out in a familiar nook  of a city I know.

In our new life on Mud Island, I love Sunday mornings because they mean a solitary walk in the park, stopping off at Tescos en-route home to pick up croissants and the papers.  Rather ordinary, but it’s a ritual I look forward to. It gives a nice rhythm to the week, and a sense of living in a place rather than transiting through. It’s the simple things – being able to read about your world in your own language, something you’d not notice until you can’t do if for a while.

Yay, it’s Saturday night.

Storytime

March 31, 2012 in hearth&home, inspiration | Tags: , , | 1 comment

So a while back I was raving about Dr Seuss, and as much as his books rock, an even wider world of stories has opened up to me. I’ve drifted away from the bestseller and self-help isles in bookstores, much happier browsing the kids section.

Reading to a tot curled up in your arms is one of life’s magical moments. All googly eyed with anticipation and wonderment, imagining so many different worlds, watching them lose themselves in the story is beautiful.  My little man is reminding me to be curious again, pointing to each little thing on each page and asking ‘was dis?’. Hearing him try to finish my sentences as I read to him makes me go all gooey.

I came to reading later in life, post-university, and so have a bit of catching up to do, and best to start at the beginning I reckon.  Winnie the Pooh, Jungle Book, Beatrix Potter, The Giving Tree, so many stories to discover and share. Can’t wait.

Love me do

March 23, 2012 in hearth&home, inspiration | 1 comment

What to do if you and your dearest have very different taste in art? I know, hardly catastrophic with all going on in the world but an everyday trifle worth pondering none the less.

I’m an ignoramus when it comes to art, I just like pretty things to adorn my walls, no matter the artist or period, whether it’s original, or has movement or integrity (what does that mean anyway).

We were at an art fair this weekend and my husband liked what looked like a black dog with a red something in it’s mouth. No way was that sombre mess going on our wall. I liked the uplifting landscapy stuff that he thought was ‘derivative’ (again – what does that mean?). So we left empty handed, except for this whimsical print that’s brightened up a forgotten corner in our hallway. So cute. And he thought so too.

Having it all

March 18, 2012 in hearth&home, world we live in | 1 comment

I’m a stay at home mum.  I’ve been a kept woman for a while now.  There, I said it.

Choosing to stay home – opting out as it seems to be called – is not particularly valued, despite how far we think we’ve come. I recently read some scathing comments by a female politician (one of the Scandi countries I think) who declared it a waste that educated women were staying home with their kids. It was harsh and dismissive, but the notion that staying home is somehow a betrayal of the feminist cause is one I’ve bought into too. I’ve cringed when telling people I’m a stay at home mum and been so transparent about my insecurity in this role (almost but not quite as cringe worthy as admitting to being a trailing spouse). Thoughts of what I should be doing swim round my head – being productive outside the home, helping to pay the bills; worrying that not working I’ll become a diminished version of myself.

I’ve always been drawn to strong women – my girlfriends are outspoken, independent, unconventional, brave. Not angry man-hating types but women who quite fancy men though realise they can, and often do, have full beautiful lives without them. For a time I deluded myself into thinking  I was part of that clan, but, truth be told, I’m way more conventional. I love companionship. I love having someone to share the load with, believe that two is better than one and draw comfort from building a life with somebody.

I’ve morphed into a breed of woman I’d always distanced myself from. In our cosy nuclear, we’ve fallen into traditional roles, him breadwinning, me homemaking. Sometimes it feels as if the division of labour is too rigid and we should mix it up more but mostly, it works. There are pity parties for sure, each of us competing for hardest job award (okay me a little more than him), but fundamentally, I love that his job lets me be home, and he appreciates that being home is demanding in it’s own way.  When push comes to shove, neither of us would really trade places with the other.

To women who’re juggling motherhood and career and getting it right: respect. They’re out there and I bow down in admiration, but I believe they’re in the minority.

I have a friend who seemed to have the career and motherhood thing sussed – the quintessential modern women – until she told me things in her family are a little messy, with both partners trying to do both.  She wishes things were simpler, her focusing on the domestic stuff and him paying the bills.  Or vice versa. It’s not about who does what, it’s about being realistic about what one person can do. Another friend recently told me that (quote unquote) women having it all is a bloody myth and trying to do it all is the modern woman’s recipe for disaster.

Opting out – of either the workplace or motherhood – is an emotive issue for women, and I’ve seldom met one who isn’t conflicted, at least some of the time, about her choice.  Whichever way we go, we get wracked and riddled with guilt about so many ‘shoulds’.  Being home and fantasising about a life ‘out there’, sitting at our desks yearning for our kids.  Maybe it is just the modern woman’s dilemma.

Being pregnant, birthing, mothering has been life-affirming and grounded me in ways I long yearned for.  It’s an awesome priviledge, but a terrifying responsibility too and I’ve already blundered so many times.  But when I feel hemmed in or worry that I’ll disappear into some void, I listen to the wise ones, the women who’ve done it already and learnt the lessons.  Savour it they say.  It goes so fast and you never get this time back. The daily grind can be dreary and Lord knows I crave whipping on a pretty frock and joining the workforce. But I also haven’t missed a thing; I’ve been there for every first in my little man’s life.

Life is amazing the way it always restores balance and sends us little reminders. Whenever I’m a phone call away from a recruitment agency, I have one of those big moments where I realise I’m okay, I’m where I need to be.  Just recently, on a particularly grey day, feeling blah about a mountain of laundry and fatigued by the prospect of keeping a toddler entertained for a day, I went in search of a caffeine fix as a distraction.  Walking to the park with coffee in one hand and my little man’s hand in the other, he looked up at me and beamed the most beautiful and contented smile. In that moment I thought I would explode with love.  So many adventures to have together, so much to teach eachother.  How very very lucky and grateful I felt.

Play that funky music

January 6, 2012 in hearth&home | Leave a comment

It seems such an obvious thing but I’ve realised what’s been missing from my life. Music.

For the past nearly two years, crying, cooing, babbling and now my son’s first words have been the soundtrack to my life and what beautiful sounds they’ve been. But curled up on the back seat on our drive back to London after Christmas, I tuned out with my ipod, dreaming a thousand daydreams, and realised how much I miss listening to actual music.

More than anything, music transports me elsewhere and alters my mood. I can’t listen to a song I love without re-living a conversation, a moment, a place or seeing someone’s face.  I love nostalgia and this is the best way to get me there.

So in celebration of this epiphanous moment, the music system has been relocated to the kitchen, where we usually hang out (and out of reach of my gadget-obsessed toddler). It’s breathed new energy into our household.  I’ve been known to cuss resentfully when scrubbing the kitchen but have discovered something women through the ages have surely known: domestic chores are that much more bearable and (gasp) sometimes even fun accompanied by sweet blaring music.

The endless renditions of yummy yummy yummy I’ve got love in my tummy and other catchy rhymes continue unabated all day, but my gorgeous husband has made playlists that include all my girls –  Sinead and Sarah and Heather –  and other sappy music he teases me about, and they’ve been great company.

Let there be lots of music and dancing in your life this year.

He who sings scares away his woes. Cervantes

Music washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life. Berthold Auerbach

Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent. Victor Hugo

Noel noel

December 22, 2011 in hearth&home | Leave a comment

I’ve always had Christmas envy (my mom is not a Christian so Christmas in our house was a non-event). This year I’m getting all Christmasey, and London is a good place to get into the spirit of things. It’s cosy and snug and festive and I love peeping into people’s living rooms to see their pretty lights.

I have friends my age who’re over Christmas with it’s rampant consumerism and family obligations. Not me. This is the first year I’ve decorated a tree! I shouldn’t be piggybacking on someone else’s religious holiday, but I love the feeling of togetherness and good times of course those little boxes under the tree;-)

Merry merry!

Together alone

December 10, 2011 in hearth&home, notes from asia, world we live in | 2 comments

I love being part of the mad tangle of cities. But fantasise about a solitary existence somewhere remote. It’s an ongoing push and pull.

Early last Sunday, I was out for a walk in the biting cold. Misty with not a soul in sight, I loved having the deserted park to myself, but felt comforted that there were thousands of people not too far away. It’s possibly a hang-up from growing up in boarding school, but I love knowing there are people – lots of people – around me. I don’t always want to talk to them or know their stories.  I just like knowing they’re there. It’s something I miss about Beijing – walking the streets and feeling safe and contained in a huge mass of people who knew nothing about me.  Being together alone (or is it alone together?).  It might just be a bit lazy, feeding off the energy of strangers without having to engage, but it’s probably what I love most about cities.

Our road is a row of terraced houses – structurally all the same but each tweaked and personalised, a paint job here, a funky letterbox there, reflecting in some small way the inhabitants inside.  We’re packed together like sardines (I can hear my neighbours up and down the stairs, and abluting) yet so many lives are being lived out on this little street alone.  The yummy mummy with her brood a few doors down who makes me feel a little dishevelled, the Italian grandfather who’s impatient with his granddaughter, the couple across the way who don’t mind a PDA, and quite possibly a drug dealer at the end of our road (yes I do spy on my neighbours).

Hong Kong – now there’s  a city where you can feel lonely in a crowd (and spy on your neighbours). Living high in the sky you often look directly into the living rooms of your neighbours.

Feeding my baby through the night, I’d stare sleepy eyed at the lights of the city below and wonder about the goings-on. At 7pm (first feed) the block opposite us was lit up like a crystal palace, people having their supper, the little girl by the window practicing the piano night after night; at midnight (second feed) people began calling it quits and lights flickered off; at 2am (third feed) a few night owls were doing their thing, at 5am the lights of the early risers flickered on.

Before we moved out of this apartment, prospective tenants came to have a look, one of whom said he’d been to a party there before; he remembered the spot where the previous tenant had his telescope for star gazing.  My husband and I burst out laughing.  You can’t see stars in Hong Kong.  You can see your neighbours though.

Cities can be grimy and confronting and stressful, but I love them. I love that we’re all thrown together, a random jumble of people, and we just have to make do.

Hong Kong high rise - we lived somewhere in the far left corner of the pink building

C’mon Mswati

November 30, 2011 in hearth&home | Leave a comment

Well I was wrong about not much happening in the sleepy Kingdom of Swaziland. Turns out the King’s been busy, making savage cuts in spending on schools and Aids orphans, trying to get a totally unnecessary airport built – despite the country being on the brink of bankruptcy. Sigh. There was an article on this in the Sunday Times too (whopper edition – there was another interesting article on how we should be eating more insects instead of meat – just about convinced me!).

To Dye For

November 30, 2011 in bodymind, notes from asia | 1 comment

This was the title of a fascinating article in last weekend’s Sunday Times Magazine, about the lengths women go to to get their desired skin colour. Whether it’s white people injecting themselves with Melanotan 2 (illegal in the UK but can be obtained online) or black and Asian people using lightening products (some containing compounds as strong as paint stripper), women seem unstoppable in their quest to find the perfect shade.

Me, I love a good tan. I just look and feel better. A few weeks without sunshine and I go a greyish yellowish tinge, no dewy peaches-and-cream for me. When I’d return to Beijing sun-kissed (okay, scorched) after a sunshiney holiday, I could see the repulsion in my colleagues’s eyes when they looked at my bare dark arms. Chinese people are the opposite of sun worshipers; my colleagues would walk the few steps to the outside toilet under cover of an umbrella for fear of catching a ray. Unless you want to lighten your skin, you cannot buy cosmetics in China as everything has whitening agent in it – even deodorants (bleached armpits anyone?).  In that corner of the world (I think it’s the same in other parts of Asia?) dark skin is associated with peasant life, long hard days toiling in the fields, skin burnt by the oppressive sun. Paler skin by contrast represents an upwardly mobile aspirational urban lifestyle.

Across the sea, the opposite is true. In my teenage years friends smeared baby oil on themselves then lay on a corrugated iron roof in the midday sun, sans sunscreen to, quite literally, fry themselves. Having a touch of the tar brush I never had to resort to such extremes, but I did try a tanning bed once, which made me so claustrophobic I jumped straight out. Tanned skin represents the good life – vacationing in the sun, beating the grind of 9 to 5.

Girls will be girls – those with with curly hair want straight hair, etc etc. As a kid I wanted to look like Annie (I still adore red hair and freckles), I also tried to make myself pigeon toed.  The article drills deeper though and looks at the quest for the perfect shade from a sociological perspective –  bleaching as buying into the (imperialist, colonialist) belief that white is superior. It also concludes that it’s no longer as simple as desiring black or white hues. Women these days covet a shade in-between ‘a lush coffee colour, right in the middle’ – think Beyonce and Jennifer Lopez – indicative of the ever increasing higgledy piggledyness of our world where we’re all melding together…poor Hitler squirming in his grave.

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