I visited the Happy Valley race track on Wednesday evening with Joe and Jessica (see video and pictures posted), and it was an amazing display of what was extremely "Hong Kong" and yet extremely Western too. It's apparently a huge pastime for Hong Kong locals (their Jockey Club is ridiculously rich, I hear), and every Wednesday night from September to June, you can see businessmen rolling up their sleeves to go to the races at night. Cheap beer, the second-cheapest McDonald's in the world, little slips of paper...all you have to do is circle the horse you're betting on and let the rest happen.
I hadn't seen so many Westerners in one place - a lot of French people, actually. I've been using my Mandarin so much it was odd hearing French. I immediately wanted to jump in their conversations, but of course that would have been wildly inappropriate. The mainlanders were also flooding the place, especially the air-conditioned indoor rooms where people stared intently at the screens. This is serious business.
As for this past weekend, the USC crew had a lot of fun going out. We work long hours during the week, so there's a dire need to blow off steam come Friday night. Lan Kwai Fong is a favorite of ours, even though you can accuse us of being completely touristy and "Western." This is an L-shaped cobblestoned block of clubs and bars, stacked on top of each other and next to each other...the music flows into the streets and people pile out there in the hot air at night. Pictures to show how crowded it gets will be posted soon.
On Saturday, Joe, Jessica, Amanda and I went to Stanley Beach and Repulse Bay. It's quite astounding how fast the city moves from tall skyscrapers to sandy beaches. You take a bus 20 minutes out and you're immediately looking down a cliff-like slope to beautiful waters and green hillsides.
This picture was taken by Joe, who has the fancy camera. Good job.
As for work, things are going pretty well. I'm busy goign out on shoots all the time, mostly for the current story I'm working on about the government's pay rise for foreign domestic workers. People from the Philippines, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Nepal and India come to Hong Kong to be domestic workers for families (like a live-in maid). They get about $3400 Hong Kong dollars per month - that's their minimum wage now - which is about $436 US dollars a month.
It's an interesting story, but it was so difficult getting any one of the maids to talk on camera yesterday. It was a Sunday afternoon with the AP photographer out in the heat, carrying equipment around...there are plenty of maids who spend their day off sitting in Central or Victoria Park, but they're all so camera shy. A large part of that was because they'd be afraid their employers would see their faces on TV.
Other projects right now include getting ready for handover anniversary features. Tonight there'll be a vigil commemorating those who died at Tiananmen. It's supposed to be in Victoria Park, and I think I'll be there to see what happens.
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