Culture Shock Part I: Some Like It Hot

Wow, has it been a long time - cleared out the cobwebs, now it's time to write some more!
I received a prompt to write about culture shock and, since I've been here for over two months, I think I have enough material.

Firstly, while I can usually make out about 70% of a menu at a restaurant, there's always some anticipation about what will be on the dinner plate when it arrives to the table. This has happened at the cafeteria on campus as well; this can attributed to the fact that 15% of the time the English translation is not quite accurate, or does not account for cultural difference.

Example: 'Saliva Chicken,' which was a direct translation from the Chinese. My stomach did a little flip when I saw it for the first time. I consulted the student standing in line behind me and pointed to the sign, which he laughed at, and assured me that no saliva was involved, and that it was actually good (which was true).

Also, when something on the menu says that it's spicy, take it as a warning. There's a spicy vermicelli set that is always on the menu, and I frequently saw people ordering it, so I took a chance. "What level spice? 1, 2, or 3?" "Whatever is lowest, PLEASE!"

I like spicy foods in the U.S., but Chinese levels of spicy are a lot hotter than what most Westerners are probably accustomed to. On any given menu in Hong Kong there are several items that have the potential to be the undoing of many an exchange student's stomach, so fiery that they can make you dissolve into an uncontrollable fit of choking, tears, and searing mouth and lip pain in a matter of seconds. They are merciless and should be regarded as menaces to the expat community at large.

Since being here I've had several incidents of taking a bite of food, only to end up in a five minute choking fit, tears cascading down my tomato-red face as those around glance at me then, I'm sure, give each other a knowing glance. Ah, the American tried to eat something spicy. I hope that in the thralls of my painful fits of spiciness I've at least made some people chuckle.

As I struggled to even eat a noodle of the spicy vermicelli that day, my friend from Szechuan (an area of China known for spicy foods) eagerly dug into her level 3 bowl. After 15 minutes my lips were on fire from attempting to eat even a few spoonfuls. "You know," she said as she finished the meat and veggies, then went on to slurp the last bit of her soup, "eating too many spicy foods can be bad for your stomach."

Lessons Learned:
* Take small bites and never be without a drink in case of emergency
* For those new to Chinese, beware of THIS character: 辣 and never take a chili pepper icon next to a menu item for granted
* Take culinary recommendations from students from Szechuan with a grain of salt (or a full glass of water, more preferably milk)

Orientation and Student Activity Carnival

Sorry for not writing, this week has been long with four days of orientation! I talked about the first one last time, but the day afterward the local first-year students (including my roommate!) came. These orientations lasted all day, from nearly 8:30am to 7pm or so. Unfortunately, I have to report that most of the orientation lectures were a bit ho-hum, which you could tell by looking around the room at the students with glazed looks in their eyes. Fortunately, during meals we were divided into groups within our hostels, so I had the chance to meet more people living on my floor, which was definitely NOT boring. Also, it was exciting to be in the auditorium with hundreds of students doing their hostel cheers (HALL B O YEAH!!!).

I tried to read it the best I could, haha.

This is when a bit of culture shock came in: this was my first time living in a place where people speak a language I barely understand at all. People are nice and translate what's going on, but I hate making them do that. I hate making them stop enjoying their conversation to cater to me. I'm determined to learn Cantonese; in fact, if you came to my room right now, you'll see all the flashcards I've made this afternoon, haha.

Also, sometimes it's difficult to order at the cafeteria, but I have a plan: I bring a little notepad so I can write down the Chinese names of the dishes! There's another thing, a cultural thing, that took me for surprise: washing your cups and silverware with tea before eating. I was sort of faked out a bit when I saw people pouring their tea, only for them to pour it into their bowl, then placing their cup and chopsticks in it. Afterward, they dumped this used tea into a large container. The look on my face must have been priceless: I never remembered reading anything about that in the guidebooks!!

Delicious fruit dessert after a long and hot day

Finally, we were all rewarded from sitting in the lectures with a student carnival, where we could sign up for clubs! I'm trying to sign up for too many because schoolwork comes first, plus I want time to travel off of campus. I signed up for SSA, which is a group that volunteers in the community with children and the elderly. I also signed up for the choir, and I'd like to find a sport club to join as well.

A DRAGON DANCE club, that's AWESOME!

...there must be over 50 clubs to join here.

Discovering the pleasures of Dim Sum

In other news, I hope to meet my roommate soon, and we had orientation today, where I met lots of Mainland and international exchange students. 

The Office of Mainland and International Programmes (OMIP) took us to the Chinese restaurant on campus, where we had absolutely delicious foods, including dim sum, which are well-known Cantonese dumplings. However, there are a variety of different ones: shrimp, chicken, all sorts of mouth-wateringly delicious things you can imagine can be packed into these succulent dumplings. I originally had dim sum for breakfast and thought it was amazing, so I was excited to find out that we were having it for lunch!


Breakfast

The long one is rice with a kind of gravy wrapped in a rice roll and bamboo leaves(?). There's also a pork ball, and the white one is like a pastry filled with a sweet jam of sorts. 

 Part of lunch

Shrimp and more yummy jam dumplings

In Chinese restaurants, food is served on a lazy susan, so everyone can help themselves

Sweet and sour chicken, some sort of green bean-type veggie, chicken in a sweet corn glaze, and crab and wintermelon soup.


Also learned about a Cantonese(?) custom: when someone pours you tea, you should tap two knuckles on the table twice. This stems from a story about an emperor who was traveling incognito with his followers. When the emperor went to pour tea for his officials, they wondered how they could thank him, as kowtowing would blow his cover. So the two knuckles symbolize legs bowing, from what I understand...more later!

Not all Chinese dialects are created equal...

So yesterday I met some students in my building and we talked in a mix of English and Mandarin, as they were from Mainland China. We all will need to learn to speak Cantonese! It's interesting how I hear some say that Cantonese and Mandarin are 'dialects,' when it seems most of the time the speaker of one can hardly understand the speaker of the other language. Even the writing is different; yes, they even use different Chinese characters!

OK, so some are similar, like the following, which means 'hello' in both C and M ('you good?')
你好
However, they are pronounced differently: C = Néih hóu      M = Nǐ hǎo


Thank you: C = 唔該. M̀h'gōi.   M = 谢谢。 Xièxiè.


To make matters more complicated, Hong Kong (as well as Taiwan) uses traditional characters, while the mainland uses simplified. 


Simplified  会   
 ...and not quite so simple  會
did I mention they are pronounced differently, too?




Well, this should be fun!

Arrived in Hong Kong!

Hello everyone! So, I just arrived yesterday in Hong Kong to study for a semester at Lingnan Univerity. Lingnan is located in western Hong Kong, in a region called the New Territories. As you can see from the map, Hong Kong is not just a city but a Special Administrative Region of China. Lingnan is located in Tuen Men city.

After a 15-hour flight from Toronto, I arrived at the airport and realized that my two pieces of luggage, while under the weight limit, were extremely huge and difficult to move. I met some other exchange students there, then some Lingnan students came to pick us up, then whisked us away on a bus.

There were two things that were very notable on the way there: how beautiful the mountains are, and how many enormously high apartment high rises there are. I tried to look up at one when I was next to it and became a little dizzy...

I've never stayed in a dorm before, so I suppose I found my room a little small. But the Lingnan campus is a LOT bigger than W&J, and very beautiful, too (will post pics!). Lots of trees and shaded walkways, which is fantastic, because the humidity here takes your breath away.

I woke up at 6am today and went for a morning walk to explore the campus. I've met some more exchange students, from Mainland China and elsewhere, along the way. My Chinese professor will be happy to know that I've already been practicing my Mandarin Chinese with some students here, and I'm excited to learn Cantonese!

A view from the dorm...notice the construction into the beautiful hillside. :(