The trees are budding, the butterflies are out, but where is the sunshine?

Jeff says I should stop complaining about the weather, so I will give it one last "kvetch" and not mention it again (until the next blog!).  We haven't seen the sun in HK in weeks (thankfully we had a sunny week in Cambodia to replenish the vitamin D).  The temperature hovers around 18 degrees, and most of the time there's a fine drizzle.  On Thursday, I lunched with the YWCA girls (we met in January taking a "welcome to HK" course) for three hours, trying to wait out the heavy downpour!  Jeff often wonders what we women chat about for hours on end!

Shopping in Shenzhen:  I think I'm hooked!  A few weeks ago, my friend, Ursula, initiated me into the intricacies of shopping in Shenzhen.  Shenzhen is just across the border from the New Territories (the northernmost part of Hong Kong).  It's an easy train ride from Central, and the trip takes about an hour, door-to-door.  Ursula has the system down pat - we left early, arrived at the border with our immigration forms already written out (no time to waste!), and crossed into the "real" China.  There is an enormous shopping mall right across the terrace from the train station.  It is called Lo Wu Commercial Centre.  There are literally thousands of tiny shops scrunched together on five gigantic floors of commercial space.  The aisles are narrow, and smoking is permitted!  This is not Hazelton Lanes or Westmount Square.  The minute you step inside, young people rush at you aggressively asking if you want to buy handbags, dvds, manicures, electronics, etc.  They often follow you up and down the escalators and corridors.  I have learned the art of tuning them out unless I really do want to buy dvds!  The first stop in Lo Wu is to Calvin the Tailor.  The Shenzhen tailors are great at copying clothes, so it's always good to bring along a shirt, pants, skirt, or dress that you like and have them make it up in another fabric or colour.  My initial reason for going to Shenzhen was to order a "party dress" for David Sax's wedding in May.  Working from a photo in a fashion magazine, Calvin made me a cute "flapper" dress in green chiffon.  And while I was there I also ordered a few other dresses and a pair of jeans.  The prices are so incredibly cheap!  The other bargains at Lo Wu are watches (copies of all the name brands), handbags,  fake jewelry and tea.  I found this video on Youtube - it'll make you slightly dizzy, but you will get the gist of what the experience is like: shopping in Shenzhen

As a follow up to the wonderful Passover Seder we attended a few weeks ago, we decided to join the UJC (United Jewish Congregation).  They are a most welcoming organization.  On Thursday evening, Rabbi Martha hosted an interesting session.  We watched the short movie "The Tribe", which was about Barbie (the doll) and Jewish identity (I think it's available on Youtube).  Did you know that Barbie, the ultimate blonde, was invented by a Jewish lady?  The film provoked a lively discussion (and the wine and sweets were delicious, too!).

In addition to the UJC event and shopping, our week was filled with lots of local culture.  The Asia Society presented a program about the Chinese in America.  Nancy Tong, a documentary filmmaker, showed several short videos highlighting early Chinese American immigrant life.  These films are installed in the newly-opened MOCA (Museum of the Chinese in America) in New York http://www.mocanyc.org/.  I'm sure the museum will be as interesting as the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, which Andrew and I visited in 2008.

On Friday, I joined one of Jason Wordie's outings. (Jason Wordie) We visited a few Hakka (minority group) walled villages, ancestral halls and study halls in the New Territories.  The NT are the part of Hong Kong between Kowloon and the China border.  This area was largely villages and farmland until recently. The entrance in the left-hand photo is to the village of San Wai.  The fortifications are well preserved in this village, unlike many of the other places, where the stones have been dismantled and reused as foundations for newer buildings.  Within the walls are crowded, modern, 3-storey apartments.  The descendants of the original Hakka clans are the only people entitled to own the land in these villages.  We noticed lots of older people playing cards or gardening.  In one village, the very oldest women always dress up for visitors.  They bargain with the tour leader for a few dollars, although Jason assured us they are quite wealthy, and only do this for fun!

Jeff was scheduled to attend a conference in Bangkok this week, so the plan was for me to join him there for the weekend.  Unfortunately, the "red shirts" foiled our plans.  The conference was moved to Singapore, and there were no good flights available for the weekend.  As it turns out, Jeff just cancelled his plans to attend the conference:  the venue is a resort that is a 1-hour ferry ride from the Singapore airport.  Jeff's flight was due to land at 8 p.m., and the last ferry to the island is at 8 p.m.  So we are staying put in HK this week.

By the way, we've been watching some of the dvds that I bought in Shenzhen.  Aside from a few pauses now and then (when the illegal cameraman had to adjust the camera), the quality is good.  We watched Julie and Julia yesterday.  It got me thinking about our blog - is anyone "out there" reading it?  The movie also inspired me to get better acquainted with our little kitchen, so I walked into the kitchen today and looked around, ate a banana, and walked out again.

Thank you to Bonnie and Richard for sending us the links to two recent articles about Hong Kong:
Toronto Star article
National Post article
We hope they encourage you all to come and visit us!