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.