Through my Eyes: The Umbrella Revolution

I am here to learn about Hong Kong and it's people, but the People have been changing Hong Kong. It's a unique city and culture, and it feels almost suspended between one world and another, unsure of which one it will belong to in the future. It is not a situation I expected when I jumped on the plane to get here. But just days after I arrived, Beijing announced Hong Kong was not to get universal suffrage in 2017. Just a month after I arrived, Occupy Central began and shaped my semester immensely - especially studying journalism.

I've held back from blogging about this as things are constantly changing and you knew there was something coming in the next few days. The Umbrella Revolution is not yet over but things have certainly slowed down, and I feel like it's finally time to touch upon such an important topic. I'm not going to touch on the politics, nor everything that happened to everyone, but wanted to give an insight into the world I've been surrounded by the past few months.

Start of September 2014: The whispers start
Beijing will not give Hong Kong universal suffrage in the 2017 elections - they will have to choose their Chief Executive from a pre-picked selection of candidates from Beijing. In the uproar from the public, and especially students, Benny Tai, a law lecturer at University of Hong Kong, and the other co-founders of Occupy Central with Love and Peace announce they will hold a mass protest and 'occupy' the roads around the Government offices. No date is announced.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere, banner on HKU campus

The streets are filled with whispers. Everyone has their own opinion, and are strong about it. We talk in hushed whispers on the street, and at dinner tables, in the hope someone nearby won't be offended at another's opinions. People wonder when Occupy Central will begin - will it be on October 1st (China's National Day) or will they surprise on another day? Will you attend? Will I attend? What will China do? As a foreigner, should I go? Will I help support the cause, or fuel conspiracies about foreign forces intervening? What will the Government do? How will it end? Nobody knows, but everyone wants to talk. There's fear, excitement, hope and curiosity hanging in the air.

26th September 2014: The students raise their voices
Well, something is happening. The students are no longer in whispers. They are almost at the end of their week-long strike. The Universities have made adjustments for those who strike - nobody will be penalised for missing classes, our lecturers reassure the class. Students turn out in huge numbers and I visit them on the Friday, taking in what they are doing. First, I must walk through the park and the anti-democracy camp - filled mostly with older people, largely wearing matching red caps and yellow shirts. Chinese flags fly high alongside the Hong Kong flag. I'm surprised by the lack of aggression and clashes between the anti-democracy protesters and the hoards of democracy protesters walking through the same park.

The anti-democracy protesters at Tamar Park

Further along the path, I notice a man blocking the way - his eyes search for people wearing a yellow democracy ribbon and directs them down a small side path into Civic square. I follow the teenage schoolchildren coming straight from school to join the University students in their boycott. It's small, but busy and incredibly vibrant - at the centre is a large, cordoned off area with a lecture in Cantonese being given to a few hundred students, but it's the activities around the edges of the square that are most interesting. A number of small gazebos have students huddled under them, out of the sun and listening to various talks. There's even a life-size monopoly board game on the floor, although I couldn't read the Chinese characters but I am sure had some political point, and a drama group doing some impromptu theatre to a few dozen protesters they've managed to gather. There are plenty more students sitting around - some offering out free food and water, others painting t-shirts or simply chatting together. There's a real buzz of achievement and of hope - you can sense the strength of the protesters.

I doubt either the protesters, and especially myself, realised the scale of what was to happen that weekend. The following night, in response to a number of student protesters being arrested, Occupy Central would begin.


28th September 2014: The City stands up
I awoke in the morning to the news that in the middle of the night, the announcement everyone had been waiting for had come. Occupy Central had begun. Thousands of people were already on the streets. Both out of nervousness and a rapidly decreasing public transport service into Central - I made the decision to stay home and follow the progress remotely. I followed live CCTV coverage online, twitter and social media, news agencies, and as we sat in our common room, my floor mates translated the news as we all watched nervously. The police used 87 canisters of tear gas against the non-violent protesters, using only umbrellas to protect themselves. Back in the common room, speaker announcements asked us to take supplies down to the shelter our accommodation had opened in the hall, which we did. Eventually, the police retreated and we went to bed not knowing what would happen tomorrow.


29th September 2014: The city shouts
Nothing had happened overnight - the resilient students, and scores of the public, remained put on the busiest road in Hong Kong, occupying the Government Offices just as they promised. That evening, with no further violence or clashes, we decided it would be safe to visit the protests. By now, the crowds had swelled massively in response to the previous day's brutality. I must admit that I have never seen anything so powerful, moving or that gives me so much hope for the future and puts my faith back in humanity than this visit.

When we first arrived, I took the first aid supplies I had brought to one of the many stations - where they insisted on giving me goggles and a mask for my protection. The protesters were well looked after - the air was still hot and sticky, and people spritzed us with water, offered us food and drink (although we declined) and I could see a number of first-aid tents well-stocked and on hand.

We climbed up to the pedestrian bridge, and leaning over the edge was spectacular - there was an endless crowd as far as we could see, and that's when people began lifting their phones into the air and a beautiful sea of lights swept over the crowd. People sang songs, held up signs of hope, and stood by the students who had been harmed the day before. The police didn't make a move against them. Over 100,000 people turned out that evening - people got turned away from Central as it became too full, and smaller Occupy Mong Kok and Occupy Causeway Bay protests began as an overflow. Visiting Mong Kok, the roads were still full of buses - trapped from when a wave of people descended, now eerily abandoned and turned into paper-covered monuments of support for Democracy. The city was overcome with a community spirit, respect and hope that is not easily done.

I'm afraid I only have relatively bad photo quality, but it can give at least give an idea of the scale.

 

October 2014: The city keeps talking

Student meeting, deciding to continue the class-boycott

The next time I visited the Occupy Central site was at the one month mark, and many students were still boycotting class. In the media, the protest camp was described as small - but in reality there were still hundreds taking shifts at keeping the camp alive. As unlikely as it seemed, a small community-driven village had developed in the middle of Hong Kong's busiest main road. The floors were brightly coloured with chalk drawings, streams of banners flew from the bridges, and tents claimed 'addresses' such as 26 democracy street.

This community was settled - it was clear there was no plan of giving up. A large 'study centre' had been erected and a community library, kitchen tents, and even a carpenter's workshop making benches. Staircase-bridges had been built for crossing the barriers in the middle of the road - with one way systems to control flow, and the walls at the side of the roads were covered in layer upon layer of post-its, drawings and posters with messages of support from across the world and encouragement to continue. There's even a community garden that's growing flowers. Large art projects also scatter the pavements - mostly centring around the yellow umbrella theme. The protesters are quiet but strong.

Community Garden

December 2014: They still have their voices
I'm about to leave Hong Kong to travel home from Christmas. It's been over two months since Occupy Central, and resentment towards the traffic problems it causes is growing - and the government are slowly taking action. I decide for one last visit before I leave. It's smaller again, though hundreds still remain, and the community spirit of Occupy's village is strong. The study centre is busy with students, as finals draw nearer. Tinsel decorates various tents, and some have Christmas trees, decorated with yellow origami umbrellas, outside their doors. One tent has even created a 'lawn' out front with fake grass. The camp is, as usual, spotlessly clean.

Occupy Central Study Centre

I find a leather workshop making yellow democracy ribbon charms with your name stamped onto the leather. I take up the offer from a student working there, and we get talking. He tells me only a few days ago the police were attacking protesters further down the road. He says he can handle it, that it won't stop him, but he saw them beating up an old lady. However, if you talk to the elderly involved they protest they are there to support the students - that it is the young people who are the most important and the ones they want to protect. Despite my initial worries before this all began that I would be viewed as an unwelcome foreigner, they welcome me with open arms - the more there are, the stronger they will be, they say. They want me to spread their message to the UK.

My emotions are all over the place - I am so proud of their efforts, their hope, yet I'm sad because I have a niggling feeling they won't be here much longer.

The 'small' protest camp left by December

January 2014: Back to Whispers

I'm back from Christmas, and they're gone. The Police cleared them out in December. The occupation lasted 79 days, but Hong Kong, Harcourt Road and it's pollution levels are back to normal. It's no longer what everyone is talking about, but small signs that hope still hasn't gone can be found - especially on campus, with posters, banners and yellow ribbons hanging off people's bags. It's difficult to know where people's minds are at - and what the future holds. Whilst it's not expected to hold another Occupy any time soon, there are whispers of protests and rallies in the coming weeks.

February 2014: To be continued...

5 reasons HKU is better than Durham University

Study abroad. The clue is in the name, but I only recently remembered the study part - and it has kicked me hard. With the end of semester creeping closer - and 11 tests and assignments coming with it, I haven't done many exciting things...but it's certainly got me thinking about what I do and don't like about the University of Hong Kong. Don't worry Durhamites, there'll be a response post coming soon, but for now - here's why I love HKU:

1. The courses are more interactive/creative. The lecturers have a lot more control and freedom over here in how they teach and test students. For instance, for my journalism course, as well as more traditional assessments such as writing articles and having tests, we're also assessed on our twitter skills - using the hashtag #hKUDOS to inform people about news on campus.

Great time to be studying journalism in Hong Kong

Or for Psychology, in which 20% of our semester marks comes from tutorial attendance and participation - so no awkward, silent tutorials (Psychologists, I'm looking at you) but instead lively debate and discussion.

2. They know how to do food. No more overpriced, disgusting YUM food and nothing else to choose from. We have a noodle restaurant, a vegetarian buffet restaurant, two canteens, a social enterprise cafe, a pizza/kebab takeaway, western restaurant, Subway, Taiwanese food stall, Frozen yoghurt stall, and two Starbucks.

The Starbucks on campus is the pride and joy of HKU, for a pretty good reason...it's THE cheapest Starbucks in the world.

Why? Although I don't understand the details or reasons behind it, HKU subsidises the food outlets on campus - and often by a decent amount. This means a veggie patty sub and cookie from Subway will only cost me $30 (£2.50)

£1.80 for a coffee? Too tempting..

3. The campus and it's facilities

Despite Hong Kong being far more densely populated than Durham, their ability to build upwards, as well as expanding quickly when needed means a large campus with brand-new facilities. It has a massive library and a study centre (Chi Wah Learning Commons), quirky study spaces, pods and beanbags, a free gym, so much food and even a garden with pond.

I have a special love for Chi Wah (although I guess you have to when the workload requires it to absorb your free time) - although it's probably as busy as Durham's library, it's a much nicer space to work in - from mini office cubicle pods, to lovely views over the courtyard, fishtanks and big comfy leather sofas and floor lamps everywhere.

Chi Wah even has rocking chairs

 The only downside to making the campus so homely is that people begin to treat it like home. It's not uncommon on a weekday afternoon to struggle to find somewhere to sit due to students bringing back nap time. In some napping hot-spots of the library, I've honestly found over half the people there napping. Whether it be with a subtle slightly bowed head, or head thrown back with gentle snoring or even sprawled out across an entire sofa - no shame here.

It's nap-time O'Clock

4. Cheap accommodation. Sure, it's not Durham Castle or anything - no plush carpets, ensuite or cleaners every day, but it's decent. Basic but clean. And it costs less than £1000 for the entire year, self-catered. I wish I could rant and rave about the locals holding meetings and screaming down the corridor at 4am, or that there's only a microwave and two hob rings (although 2 large fridges) between the 30 of us on our floor, but I can't. It's less than 20% the cost of College accommodation in Durham. Bloody marvellous.


5. The lecturers. From my ex-CNN anchor teacher for Journalism, and the monk for my Buddhist Studies course, to my lovely Psychology lecturer and my Mandarin teacher who makes us laugh every lesson (including our lesson in a local dim sum restaurant). I have to give each of them separate credit for teaching such brilliant classes:

Buddhism
Since I'm taking a class in Buddhist teachings this semester, the course is taught by a local monk. Aside from being a brilliant source of knowledge, he is a fantastic teacher with an open mind and good understanding of how young people see the world (His first degree was BSc International Business and Computer Science from Oregon!). Unlike what I expected from this course, he has talked about things I never would have expected. Here are some of his best gems:

• Cheesecake (I'm pretty sure it's his most favourite thing ever) - all buddhist teachings can be related to eating cheesecake supposedly.
• Love, sex, and courtship - he's incredibly open about this and it's also kind of funny when he tries matchmaking students in class to explain Buddhist teachings about love.
• Meditation - it must have been incredibly awkward for the latecomer who walked in to find an entire lecture theatre chanting quietly with their eyes closed
• Quantum physics - I have to admit I zoned out a little, but he did to try to help us understand how Buddhism explains quantum physics, among other scientific concepts.
• Occupy Central - an incredibly interesting conversation about what the Buddha would think of it all.

Ven. Sik Hin Hung

Psychology
My Psychology lecturer is also just as cool. He is incredibly friendly, always with a smile, and told us that we're always welcome to eat lunch with him as he often eats in the student canteen. He works hard to make his lectures interactive and relevant to real life (unlike Durham which tends to focus on the dry, academic side of Psychology). Here were his lecture rules he laid out at the beginning of the semester:

1. Have a nap if you need to, I will never wake you up - you'll feel better after a little sleep!
2. Sometimes, what your friend is saying to you is more important than what I'm saying - if you want to talk, you can (as long as you don't distract others around you).
3. Sometimes, there's something interesting on Facebook, and if you want to look at your phone, you can (as long as you don't distract others around you).

I can't think of any lecturers in Durham who have given me explicit permission to sleep in lectures! 

The lovely Dr Harry Hui

Mandarin
Coming from Mainland China, but living in Hong Kong for 10 years, our Chinese teacher is very open-minded and honest about life in China (even when compared to other Mandarin teachers in the department). As well as answering all of our many questions for her, both on Hong Kong politics and life in the mainland, she also makes an effort during our class break to show us snippets of Chinese pop songs (including the weirder "Chick, Chick" - see below!) and TV shows - including their version of Take Me Out.

She's also keen to get us to experience Chinese culture - she's given us ideas for Chinese films and TV to watch, and even taken us out for dim sum and finding vegetarian options for me one lesson! Although she said it was impractical for a field trip when we suggested a class visit to Shenzen, she promised she would come along if we were going and invited her.

I have never met someone who is so open-minded to different cultures, and it is refreshing to have a class in which we can joke about China's own silly traditions or her inability to say certain words (such as the ll at the end of 'hall') as well as telling us the parts of Chinese culture she truly believes would benefit us, or how we will always be ripped off even though we've learnt to bargain because we have "a foreign face".

Chick, Chick (NB: most Chinese music isn't this odd)

Thanks for an awesome 1st semester, HKU! 

A night at the (Cantonese) Opera

Attending a Cantonese opera, like any opera in fact, is not for the faint-hearted. It requires focus, an open-mind, intelligent thinking and a long attention span. With 'The Warrior's Marriage' having a mammoth 6 acts and lasting well over 3 hours, it's no wonder we started with four people, but only two of us managed to make it through to the end. If you think you can survive though, it is well worth the effort.

Picking up your tickets
Psshh, you're thinking - just pick them up at the theatre's box office. Nope. Buy them online, then pick them up from any number of ticket outlets - just not the theatre because it won't have a box office.

Reading your english guide
With the opera being sung and spoken in Canto, I cannot understate the importance of picking up the English synopsis when you enter. It was difficult to follow even with those, so you will be at a loss for words if you don't have this or a local to translate for you.

There's a short paragraph for each of the acts, which isn't much when each act lasts around 40mins and you don't know which character is which. Therefore, it makes a brilliant mystery game for discussing what actually happened during the short intervals between the acts.

The Costumes
These are absolutely fantastic, and were probably my favourite part of the show. They are loud, extravagant and over-the-top. My favourite were the hats with two really long feathers coming out from each side, bobbing around and swaying around mesmerisingly each time they moved or talked. At first, it can be difficult to establish who is male and female as the make-up is the same, and the costumes can look quite similar but you get used to this and looking closely at the costumes you can normally begin to distinguish.

Totally going to be able to fend off the enemy with these costumes on...

The Music
If you manage to nab a seat near the front, prepare for noise. The orchestra sit directly in front of the stage so if, like us, you're in the first few rows, and especially if you're towards the left of the stage then your ears are going to hurt from the cymbals pretty quickly as they tend to use them after each sentence. Two of our group were lucky enough to have brought ear plugs, but promptly (somehow) fell asleep with these in during the second act.

However, it's interesting to hear a Chinese Orchestra, and it's supposedly a bit softer, with more strings, than in Beijing Opera. Something I also noted was that their sheet music is not written in the traditional western way, but rather using gongche notation (i.e. using Chinese characters to mean notes) so it looks something like this:

I would love to learn to read music this way

The Fighting
I must say, we chose a fun performance to watch - being centred around a warrior meant we got an act playing out a battle - this meant not only sword or bamboo-stick fighting each other, but soldiers doing flips and cartwheels, the kings wearing even more extravagant costumes and solo sword-playing.

One-handed cartwheels from a soldier

The Story (Warning: Spoiler alert)
What did make me laugh was how an entire 40 minutes would be spent on slow, emotional scenes, such as the couple having a cup of tea in the back garden, with the warrior convincing his wife that her Father should join the war.
But the climax to the entire show lasted around 5 minutes in which a cloth letter written in blood is brought to the princess and she finds out that her 'Father' had actually killed her biological Father when she was a baby and pretended to be her Father, so was her enemy all along. Therefore she can forgive her husband for killing him as her 'Father' now means nothing to her. And they all lived happily ever after.

The star performers

Despite the 3 1/2 hour long performance requiring a lot of energy to keep up with the plot and dealing with the loud cymbals, it was a fascinating show in which I loved seeing the beautiful costumes, together with the Chinese music, and having great fun deciphering who was who. I would highly recommend it for anyone with a little perseverance.

The Haunted toilet of HKU

HKU is generally a very new campus compared to the old buildings we have in the UK. Only a handful of buildings can claim 100 years, but ghost stories are not reserved to the ancient. One recent evening, I found myself walking along the Chong Yuet Ming building on campus with a group of locals. Soon enough, the conversation and nervous giggling were translated for for me and I was told the story of Hong Kong University's haunted toilet.

Only a few decades ago, if not less, Hong Kong businessman and billionaire, Li Ka-Shing made a large donation to HKU, and an amenities centre was built and named in honour of his late wife, Chong Yuet Ming. She was also wheelchair-bound (this is important).

Left: Chong Yuet Ming. Right: Li Ka-Shing

Since then, claims have been made that the building, especially regarding the 3rd floor girls toilet, is haunted. Why? It was all designed to keep Chong Yuet Ming's spirit at rest.

Chong Yuet Ming Amenities Centre

At the minute a lot of the building is being renovated and so the toilet cannot be accessed - I've also heard that it might have been demolished. But there are supposed to be a number of features that have freaked people out.

So let's start with the door to the bathroom. On the front I am told is the usual symbol of a woman, but with one strange addition - large shoulder pads, a staple feature of Chong Yuet Ming's wardrobe. None of the other bathrooms in the building have this design. Inside the bathroom, there are 3 water pipes that run along the ceiling - seen to be signifying the 3 incense sticks used to show respects the dead.

I'm guessing it looks something like this?

Further to these signs, the door handle is placed unusually high - too high for a wheelchair-user to reach, and there are a few steps leading up the girl's bathroom, again making it impossible for say, a ghost in a wheelchair, to leave the bathroom. Supposedly none of these features are replicated elsewhere in the building.

The last reason to believe the building is designed to keep Chong Yuet Ming at rest here? The building, from certain angles, looks like a tomb. Certainly, sightings of a ghost matching Chong Yuet Ming's description have been reported by many.

CYM amenities centre....or tomb?

Whether these are simply creepy coincidences or there is truth behind the stories,I don't know. But certainly while the HKU campus may not be built on an ancient indian burial ground with a long history, it definitely has some stories to tell.

4 things Europe could learn from Korea, and 1 thing we shouldn't.

I went to Korea for the futuristic, high-tech world of Seoul, the glitz and glamour of K-Pop and K-Drama, and to see what everyone tells me is the "new Japan" - the cool-kid country of Asia. I would agree it is the new cool-kid country of Asia, but it was so much more than anything I could have imagined.

It is my absolute favourite country I have ever visited. There were so many things I fell in love with, and I've come to the conclusion that if Europe implemented my four favourite things about Korea then we would be a much better place.

1. 24-hour saunas are literally the best thing ever, and we need them (Scandinavians excused because they already have an awesome sauna culture). 'Jimjilbangs' as they are everywhere, especially in Seoul, and are often large multi-story spas offering everything from themed restaurants and hairdressers to karaoke rooms, game arcades and a PC room to play League of Legends. It may sound like a strange place to relax, but it's incredibly popular for couples, friends and families to stay overnight in a jimjilbang on the weekend (especially when it costs less than a tenner). 

Games arcade at Dragonhill Spa

The ground floor will have nude, gender-segregated baths such as jade, charcoal, mugwort, and massage baths at around 40c, as well as a cold bath. There was also a sauna, with a big bucket of salt in the middle you use to rub on your skin - and you normally help each other to rub salt on each other's backs where you can't reach yourself. Something a little odd, but you get used to quickly.

Next to the baths was where I made the brave decision to have an infamous 'Korean Scrub'. Lying completely naked on a plastic bed, a lady using what I can only describe as 'sandpaper mitts' will vigorously scrub almost every inch of your skin to get rid of all the dead skin. It was incredibly awkward and although not painful, certainly uncomfortable. I was skeptical of how soft it could make my skin, but it turned out to be COMPLETELY worth it and I would recommend it to anyone. I don't think I have ever felt that squeaky clean and my skin turned out as soft as a baby's bottom, as the saying goes.

When you're done in the baths, you throw on your t-shirt and shorts given by the sauna and head  on upstairs to the mixed areas. As well as singing karaoke or watching some Korean drama on TV, there are more clothed, mixed-gender treatment rooms available - including ice, oxygen, charcoal, jade, yellow soil and salt rooms. The latter being my favourite, where you get to bury yourself in layers of hot salt crystals. When you're done for the night, you can either crash out in the large common areas, or head to the sleeping rooms, where you can conk out in one of the many bunk beds.

The salt room at Siloam Spa

The most popular snacks from the restaurant I found to be surprising good - Sikhye, a sweet icy drink with grains of rice floating in it, and tea-boiled eggs with a sprinkling of salt. No idea why one is black, but it was good so can't complain.

Sauna snacks

NB - I'm hoping this blog has reached a wealthy investor in Britain by now, and I will come home to a chain of jimjilbangs around the country ready and waiting for me to enjoy....don't tell me you don't want jimjilbangs Europe, I won't believe you.

2. Talking to strangers is not a bad thing (Londoners, I'm looking at you). I never once felt alone or shunned by the Koreans during my trip. My favourite experience was probably when I got adopted by a family in Seoraksan National Park, when they saw I was alone and let me join their hike, and insisted on feeding me a lunch of ramen and homemade kimchi at the top of the mountain. Old ladies gave me sweets when I rested at the mountain viewpoints, everybody greeted me, and people were always offering to take photos for me. In Busan, I had a shop owner come out and join me as I rested to look at my map. After explaining that the UK was "England" and not short for Ukraine, we ended up having a broken conversation about how he thought countries like Scotland and the rest of the UK, or North and South Korea were better off together and his hopes for the future of Korea. 

My adoptive hiking family

Even on the metro in Seoul (population: over 9 million), I had somebody sitting next to me who started up a conversation in very broken english just to try and chat, even if we had to resort to google translate to understand each other. I have never felt so welcomed in a country before, and to top that - I never once had any unwanted attention, nor was I ever hassled or ripped off. 

So dear Londoners, I implore you to reach out and use your GCSE French and German to chat to a tourist instead of fiddling with your phone on the tube. Go forth and make a tourist's day.

3. The food can be spicy and difficult to eat with their flat chopsticks, but is above all else, fun. Admittedly I knew little about Korean food when I arrived, and was surprised when I ordered ice-cold noodles in a spicy sauce, to have my dish presented with a pair of large scissors to cut the really-really long noodles tightly wrapped together. The only difficulty is sitting cross-legged on the floor for the whole meal.

Traditional Korean restaurant in the lively Hongik Uni area

Next, I moved onto a new favourite dish - bibimbap. A large, sizzling-hot stone pot filled with rice, veggies, a spicy sauce and an egg in the middle is brought to your table for you to 'cook' and quickly stir around before the rice sticks and burns to the bottom. When you can finally start eating, it's fantastic. Here's to hoping Korean the next big food thing back in Blighty.

A delicious £3.50 bibimbap with all it's side dishes

4. Making mountains. Ok, this isn't something we could necessarily learn, but I had to find a way of squeezing in how beautiful Seoraksan National Park is - it was the highlight of my trip. I don't know where to begin - the crystal clear waterfalls, colourfully painted buddhist temples, the sharp craggy mountains, or the amber forests of Autumn. It was all so beautiful, and it is one of those places where photos can never do it justice - but it's the closest you're going to get. Unless you listen to my succinct advice and get on the next plane to Seoul. 

Too many beautiful pictures to choose from: 

And the 1 thing we shouldn't learn from Korea?

Beauty standards. The western world has got nothing on Korea. Within a day of visiting Seoul, you instantly pick up that this is a glamorous city, a city to be beautiful and fashionable in. It's only when you discover statistics like a reported 20% of women in Seoul age 19-49 have had cosmetic surgery that you see the darker side of Korea's beauty. Then it's everywhere - there are surgery clinics on every block (even opposite the late-night bars in Gangnam!) and if you can't see one, then there will be an advert somewhere telling you how you could be even more beautiful.

Surprise! You had plastic surgery.

Vanity comes with this too, and it was normal for the only sound on a train to be the shutter sound from a phone, or to see a woman standing on a busy shopping street, or the centre of a metro station with her hand held high in selfie-pride as she undergoes her own photoshoot. And don't think that they would rather somebody take a photo of them and their friends instead, they will politely decline and choose the selfie-stick above a real person. For me, the vanity and beauty standards is something I really hope Europe doesn't learn.

Dragon boat racing on Cheung Chau

The group of us gathered at the ferry terminal, all freshers curious to try out the traditional, yet fiercely popular sport of dragon boat racing as part of the University society's orientation camp on Cheung Chau. After the hour-long ferry, costing only $13 (£1), we alighted still sleepy-eyed yet amused by the polar opposite of busy, urban HK island, this little island full of wandering locals on narrow, car-less paths - only bikes ringing their bells to squeeze past us. The sun was already relentless, although luckily this time I managed to avoid getting sunburnt (especially as I've only just recovered from my last sunburn).

Cheung Chau beach

As the team walked us along the promenade to the harbour, we walked past a long line of beautiful, clean white dragon boats, with their dragon heads and tails, and big ceremonial drums. Our excitement subsided as we reached the harbour and found that our boats were much less, uh, polished. 2 old wooden dragon boats with flaking paint and no dragon head nor tail nor drum sat waiting for us. As it turns out, the fancy decoration is reserved only for competitions. So there we go.

Not for us...

Our team of ten climbed into our boat and our two instructors taught us first individually to learn to paddle - a much different technique to rowing or kayaking back home, before learning to paddle together, including who we should be watching (i.e. not the person directly in front of you, but diagonally opposite), the different commands and the rhythm.

Dragon boat racing tends to have short, intense races which meant practicing for say "60 paddles" before taking a few minutes to relax and chat, and throw some banter between us and the other boat. The switching between head-down, intense racing and chill-out time with the boat made for a good laugh of a session. Our instructors, Erin and Yukiko were both fantastic and really helped us work together and improve our technique individually, as well as teaching us lots about the sport in general. Concluding with a few races, things got pretty serious quickly and despite how quickly your arms tire with such a fast pace and the intensity you paddle with, we pushed through, and won two of the three races.

The winning team!

Aside from some time in the boats, the rest of the day was spent playing beach games, and exploring the island - including a very, very narrow little cave, which legend says was used as a pirate's hiding place for his treasure.

With the DBC members showing us around, we were lucky for them to translate the street cafe menus and recommend some mid-afternoon snacks for us. We started off with mango glutinous rice dumplings, which we watched being made through the window. The mango was sweet and juicy, whilst the surrounding dough was sticky and reminded me of mochi.

Mango glutinous rice dumpling

The other, unexpected afternoon snack which I was just TOO curious not to try was 'Deep fried ice-cream balls'. A scoop of soft, purple taro ice-cream covered in hot crispy batter. Honestly, I still don't know quite what to make of it. I think it was nice, but I don't really want to admit that something as insane and unhealthy as deep-fried ice-cream could taste very nice.

Deep fried ice-cream ball

The night finished off with eating some tasty, homemade food at the family restaurant of one of the team members and a final wander through the streets to explore the shops and street cafes at night before catching the ferry home after a long day of new experiences.

Kalmaegi, the little typhoon

After several days of whispering rumours that the first typhoon of the year was coming (although September is the end of the season - particularly known for the worst typhoons), yesterday Tropical Cyclone Kalmaegi hit Hong Kong.

During the day, the Hong Kong Observatory issued a T3 (Out of 10) warning - an eminent sign of incoming bad weather. Hourly updates informed the city to the current and forecasted position of Kalmaegi, the wind speeds in Hong Kong and precautions we should start taking. For the first time in three weeks, I felt more than a mini gust of wind.

By the afternoon, what the heavy cool breezes were already telling us, the Observatory confirmed. A level 8 typhoon would be with us in the coming hours. Although the current signal warning was still at T3, people were waiting for the T8 signal to be raised. When the T8 signal is hoisted, the city becomes a ghost town with schools and workplaces are closed, doors and windows locked and everybody waiting calmly inside for the storm to pass.

And so, after an evening of wind and rain, excitement and curiosity, the level 8 signal was given at 10pm. I looked outside my window. No wind, no rain, no thunder or lightening. I could even see the lights on the other side of the bay - usually a sign of good weather. By the time I went to bed, the rain had come with occasional gusts of wind but nothing worse than earlier in the day.

I regret to say, either the weather didn't get much worse, or I'm a deep sleeper, but I heard nothing much worse than a british rainstorm that night. Although, the fog in the morning was like nothing I've seen - only a wall of white was visible outside my window.

Come the morning, the T8 warning was still active which meant 'Typhoon day!' (No snow days here in HK), but with the warning downgraded back to T3 by 11am, afternoon classes were back on and a trek to University in the rain was necessary.

However, whilst I say how anti-climatic the whole event was, the newspapers reported hundreds of delayed and cancelled flights from the airport, 128 fallen trees, flooding in some areas, and a landslide. I guess we must have been nicely sheltered, or I really am a deep sleeper.

And that was little Typhoon Kalmaegi, and she's already left without causing too much drama...