你好 from Hong Kong!
Happy International Yoga Day to All My Relations!
You best believe I was up at sunrise doing my full Hatha yoga routine this morning. A little bit jet-lagged and sleep deprived, yes. Still, I woke up super early, did an hour of yoga, showered, chatted with my roommate, left way early, stopped for a pasty and a coffee, took the metro to work, stopped for a cigarette, and still arrived to work 15 minutes early. Love that for me! In my old life, I was always late for EVERYTHING! Probably because I never wanted to be there in the first place. Now it’s so easy to get to work early. It’s like the whole city is designed that way on purpose.
The only thing I can’t figure out is what the deal is with the trash. The streets are clean, yet there are no trash cans for miles and miles as far as the eye can see. Today, I walked around the metro station for like five minutes in search of a trash can and found nothing. Absolutely nothing! Couldn’t find a single trash can all day. Yet somehow, after it got dark, the trash cans appeared out of nowhere. Suddenly, I saw piles of trash bags being loaded into trucks in random garages. Where did it come from? How did it get there? Why can’t I find a trash can? If there are no trash cans, where is all the trash coming from? I don’t understand what’s going on here. What is the obvious clue to this case I can’t figure out? Somebody get Sherlock Holmes on the case, stat!
Random observations from the fabulous neurodivergent mind of Betsey Horton, Writer Extraordinaire.
Work so far is good. The first three days were really intense, but I have a two day break now. Training has been interesting. I am replacing a teacher whose contract is ending, so I’ve mainly been observing her teaching style. The main goal right now is for me to get to know my new students and learn how to interact with them. It’s always hard when a great teacher leaves and a new one has to take their place, it’s important to give the kids some time to adjust to the new situation.
The kids are so great. I love them. They all have the most unique personalities. I love it. They show up in all sorts of outfits with all sorts of stories and all sorts of opinions about the world. Some of them make observations so astute that they sound like adults. The way some of the younger ones express themselves makes me believe past lives and reincarnation are real. Like, why is this random four-year-old acting like he’s a thousand year-old grandpa? Because that’s just who he is in his soul, obviously. It’s great. I’m learning so much from them already.
My biggest frustration so far has been the mascot issue. As in, I’m “The American.” It is what it is, but it’s a blessing and a curse. Lately it feels like a curse because the only thing anyone wants to ask me about is Trump. Ughhhhhh! I just don’t want to talk about it in general because it makes me angry, and it’s even worse when it comes up at work. I don’t want to talk about it! At all, ever, with anyone, at least not while I’m at work. Maybe at midnight on a Saturday night when I’m lit AF at a random bar and ready to share every opinion I’ve ever had about everything. There’s a time and a place and it is not at work.
It’s a struggle though. Truly. The other teachers want to ask questions, the kids want to ask questions, everyone I meet everywhere wants to ask me questions. This has been my life for the past three weeks. It’s like I’m a zoo animal on display for everyone to poke and prod at their leisure.
Luckily, my trainer sat down with me and helped me figure out a way to set a boundary about this issue so it doesn’t become a problem. It’s definitely A Problem. I was able to divert the teens away from it today by changing the subject to Marvel, but that will only last for so long. I clearly need to have a grab bag of conversation topics to pull from a hat to get the kids talking about something else. Or at least provide them fun facts like, “Did you know the largest population of Cantonese people in the United States is located in San Francisco, California? Has anyone ever heard of San Francisco?” Or something like that. I don’t even know how to divert anymore. Ugh.
Literally anything but Dump. Ugh.
The other major problem I’m up against is the stereotype of the Entitled American Who Cannot Be Pleased Because Nothing is Ever Good Enough. Ugh. Way to ruin everything for the rest of us with your insane nuclear meltdowns over the smallest, dumbest, most insignificant shit. Some people leave the US and they expect everything to be the same and then get mad when it’s not. I saw it in the UK, Costa Rica, France, India, the Gulf States, and now Hong Kong. It’s like… did you even do five minutes of research before you left your comfortable little bubble or did you just go out there thinking our lifestyle is actually normal? Ugh.
I definitely feel like I’m being kept at a distance by most of the people I encounter. Not in the usual way. More like… no one really knows what to expect from Americans at this point, so everyone is very stand-offish. I guess I just feel like it’s my responsibility to be an ambassador for goodwill and peace and show that we are not all entitled assholes who bully our way into getting what we want and have a screaming nuclear meltdown when it doesn’t happen.
I’m just out here doing the best I can. Today was a good day for that. I chatted with another teacher who is Cantonese-American and spent many years in the States. We talked about Crazy Rich Asians (one of my Top 10 Fav RomComs), Jimmy O. Yang (love him! Still bitter I couldn’t get a ticket to any of his local shows!), and slurping soup to show respect to the chef. I could tell that he warmed up a little bit more to me after that.
I’m just happy to finally have people I can talk to about this stuff. If I ever mentioned Crazy Rich Asians or Interior Chinatown in Verm, people would look at me like I’m an alien. At least we can find things in common. This is the best I can offer the world at this point. We are not all jerks. Some of us actually do the work and want to engage with other cultures. Please stop lumping me in with the rest of these assholes.
Side note: I really want to go watch Crazy Rich Asians again for about the thousandth time. I love romcoms. I don’t care what language they are in or where in the world they are set. Give me a complicated love story with fabulous fashion and a Happily Ever After and I am there!
I have also learned there are many South African people here. I didn’t really know anything about South Africa until a few days ago. Luckily, my roommate is more than happy to explain it all to me. Tonight I pulled up the map on Google Maps and she pointed out where all the different people we had met so far were from. She explained the difference between local cultures (“this part is conservative farmers, this part is laid-back surfers, this part is politically divisive, etc.”) so I could understand better. Then she took me out with all our new South African friends. Yet again, I learned we have so much in common and that the crazy stuff they show on TV is just that… TV. I’m grateful I am already learning so much about the world. Plus, who doesn’t need a Girls Night Out? If there’s one thing women have in common from all across the world, it’s that men are all ridiculous and insane. Thank god we were all there for each other to block and delete these fuckboys for each other because none of us had the strength to do it on our own.
Overall, I think I’m adjusting to the situation pretty well. I still don’t love that loft bed. I’m actually sitting out in the living room/kitchen right now at the dining room table because I can’t handle being that close to the overhead light when writing. Also, I’m old and I only have the energy to climb up and down those tiny little stairs so many times per day. It is what it is.
Also realizing I’ve been somewhat spoiled by Walmart. You need literally anything? It’s all right there in one place. You need a corkscrew and wine glasses over here? Good luck finding a place that isn’t a fancy wine shop with top-of-the-line crystal. Let’s just say opening this bottle of wine today was a battle that I lost. How do I know? Because I tried the shoe trick, the knife trick, and yet the cork still ended up cracked in half and pushed down into the bottle like a slob. Not my finest moment, I admit. The last time I pushed a cork down into the bottle, I was 22 and lost in France. Now I’m here again, lol. It’s okay. That bottle of wine was cursed from the start. How do I know? Because any bottle of wine vinted in 2020 is automatically cursed by the gods. Unlucky AF. Next time pay more attention to the label on the bottle.
The major recurring theme I’m noticing is that the people who are coming to Hong Kong now from abroad were extremely unhappy in their old lives and wanted a fresh start. It’s like the city wants its international spirit back and it’s calling out to all the lost, unhappy people worldwide to come here and start all over again. It’s a slow recovery, to be sure, but it’s happening. I have hope the city can find its soul again after everything it’s been through. What can I say? I can obviously relate.
I have a break for the next two days. So grateful. I just want to lie in bed and do nothing after the intensity of the last few weeks. I’m in my new home, everything is settled, I’m figuring out my way around, I’m learning how to do my job, and I’m making new friends every day.
Off to climb my ridiculous loft bed and watch some Netflix until I fall asleep for the next 25 hours. Am I exhausted? Yes. Is my brain functioning at full capacity? No. Am I eating enough and staying hydrated to avoid making everything worse? Of course I am.
So grateful to be here in Hong Kong. It’s like a dream I forgot I had a long, long time ago.
Have a good night!