I can not believe that there are STILL OVER 22 days left before I graduate.

I really just want to get the fuck out

No, I really don't care about your lambo & rolex watches

I've come to the realization that many of the ex-pats who live in Hong Kong have little to no respect for the local women here. How did I come to this realization? Through three very unnerving situations that all occurred throughout the course of one night.

Incident #1

While I was walking to Mes Amis a man approached me and asked me if I would come with him to meet his boss. He proceeded to explain that he needed to find a woman for his boss as if this situation was totally normal.

Incident #2

Later on that night, I was speaking to a man from the San Diego area who'd been living in Hong Kong for quite some time. I asked him if he enjoyed his time here, expecting him to start raving about the excitement of city life. Instead, he told me that Asia was the best place in the world for a white male. Only in Asia do the local women fall to their knees chasing older white men and this in turn makes white women jealous so they also join in the fight.

I just don't understand. He wasn't even attractive

Incident #3

In addition, while my date briefly went to the bathroom, a rather drunken man approached me to dance. What did he do when I adamantly refused? WELL he told me that he flew Boeing 747s and he could take me on his plane if I danced with him as if that would change my mind. WTF. I am not a gold digger. I find it really quite sad that Hong Kong is a place where financial success is the only necessary qualifications for a man to be appealing.

I will be happy to go back to the US where the men are at least a little bit more respectful of women & money is not thrown in your face constantly.

Lunchtime Conversations

Everyday during lunch I have the same conversation with my co-worker:

Her: Do you watch Sex and the City?

Me: Yes, I just started watching this summer.

Her: Is that really what the US is like? Are all the women in the city single? Do they really date that many men?

Me: I guess for some people, but it's really just an exaggeration.

Sometimes Sex and the City is replaced with some other popular US television show like Desperate Housewives, but you get the gist of it.

Or sometimes she'll change the conversation up a little bit:

Her: Do you and your friends eat a lot of McDonalds?

Me: No, not really. I don't like McDonalds

Her: Are most of your friends really fat?

Me: No, actually I don't have any fat friends.

Her: Oh, I thought most Americans loved McDonalds and were extremely fat.

So everyday I spend my lunch trying to explain to my co-worker that Americans are not really like the people in movies/ TV shows & that we are not really all obese.

On another note, I'm going to Norway Aug 9! It's incredible! 2010 has probably been the most exciting & epic year of my life. I've always wanted to travel, but I never thought I'd be able to do it while in college! This year I have been to Hong Kong, Shenzhen, Shanghai, Beijing, Thailand, Vietnam, Taiwan, Singapore, & now Norway! In Norway, I'm visiting Bergen & Oslo. I'm also attending this super hipster music festival. I'm so excited to be surrounded by all the beautiful blonde blue-eyed Scandinavians! :D

P.S In addition to giving up cheetos, I've also decided to give up fried dumplings.

Office Etiquette

There's a few things I've noticed about workplace dynamics in HK that are a bit unnerving. First, and worst of all, the men here find it perfectly acceptable to burp & cough up their phlegm while working. I'll be sitting in my little cubicle, trying to translate some financial transaction statement, and I'll hear a loud string of burps in the background. GROSS

Also, it's perfectly acceptable for the secretaries to dress in mini skirts. The secretary here wears clothes that I might go clubbing in. Her skirts are definitely never below the knees. tsk tsk.

Thankfully, none of my co-workers actually know English. This makes surfing the web & spending hours on facebook/gchat so much easier.

I am, however, really worried about gaining weight. Beyond typing, I don't do anything that could possibly help burn calories & I definitely already feel fatter. What's worse is that the fat always goes straight to my stomach. It's really disgusting. I can only eat fruit from now on.

So what does the future promise me? A beige cubicle & indefinite weight gain? I really hope not.

I'm thinking of skipping out on work a week early & hitting up Sanya in Hai Nan province. It's a beach resort area off the coast of China that Chairman Mao & the CCP liked to party at. They'd have pretty elaborate dance parties there on the reg. But anyway, it's this gorgeous beach area with coconut trees everywhere. They also produce this really tasty coconut drink that is extremely popular on the mainland. http://pic.ccn.mofcom.gov.cn/duomeiti/12296054/0011.jpg

It seems like an amazing place to spend a week. I just need to find the financial resources to pay for this trip.

When it rains it pours

It's fucking raining men right now.

I am suprisingly unenthusiastic about this situation.


I miss my girlfriends!

Interning aka Being Everyone's Bitch

According to my daily countdown, I'm on day 6 of interning at Dongying. If only it were day 20. The work here is worse than being mediocre at best. I either waste my time gchatting & reading the NYTimes or I spend hours on google translate trying to translate dense legal documents into Chinese. Sometimes I fill out some simple applications about real estate firms. The latter would be a simple task if my Chinese were any good, but the supposedly mindless job of discovering a company's underwriter/CEO is pretty damn hard sometimes. If I were actually getting paid things would be much better. The promise of a paycheck by the end of the week would give me the strength to complete any job.

Every morning I wake up at exactly 7:08, get ready, take the 46X to the Wan Chai Exhibition & Convention Center, order a small iced latte at Pacific Coffee, and read the paper for 40 minutes. That's probably the highlight of my day right there.
I then proceed to go to my little beige cubicle & spend the next 7 or so hours sitting on my ass. My ass is probably growing as I type & the jalepeno cheddar cheetos I keep snacking on definitely don't help. What I don't understand is why I'm always hungry by 4 pm. Lunch, which is paid for by the company, is always a substantial bowl of rice & some vegetables/ meat. & given the fact that I don't really do anything to burn off the calories I should not be so hungry all the time. But right now I'm starving and I've already finished my cheetos.

I make sure to leave this lifeless soul sucking office by 6 pm on the dot. The remainder of my day is spent finding dinner. It can be quite difficult to find a good place to have dinner especially since my dorm is located in the middle of nowhere (I also refuse to eat at the canteen-it's just too gross). For the past two days I've had wonton noodle soup. Today I'm planning on going to Mong Kok, doing some shopping, getting some bubble tea, and then eating some street food (but probably in reverse order).

The end of my day has also become routine. I get home, blast the AC because it's so hot here, watch some Sex & the City, smoke some cigarettes & drink a beer, all while gchatting people.

So my weekday life can be summed up with: coffee, work, gchat, food, gchat.

Countdown

There are only 33 more days before I return to Boston! :)

And I like to think that the last week that I'm here will just fly by so in reality it's only 26 more days! :)