More.....Living in Hong Kong

Yes, I have been travelling quite a bit. I have not found any meaningful work as yet, and spend my days doing the 'house husband' thing. Although this is very different here because of the plenitude of labour and a servant mentality. But i manage to squeeze in chauffeur, cook and maid duties, together with being a father to the two kids, the 'son' cat, gizzmo, who is 15 years old and the 'daughter' cat, zoa (4). Gizzmo is aging well as can be given the medication and bills. They are, seriously, two of the family.....lol.......

Work is not easy to come by here because of a surplus of smart people, my lack of chinese and in-area experience. Hong Kong is truly a cosmopolitan place and like they said about New York.... if u can make it here, u can make it anywhere.......

Golf is $100 to $150 a pop... that's US...lol.... about HK$800 a round, so I play infrequently. Think I played three times since coming back. There is only one public course, run by the Jockey Club in conjunction with the HK govt. They have 3x18 holes. (HK has mostly privately funded public organizations (beneficent corporations? smile)...... it's the 'laisser faire' of the Brits... and lowers taxes...lol...). Then i played at the old Royal Hong Kong, which is in Fanling..... Think it's called the Fanling course now. Very pretty 3x18 again. Played the 'old' course. Pretty but murdered by mosquitoes... and dengue fever is prevalent here......lol.... and japanese encephalitis..... anyway, i survived.... As well, the temp in HK is hot and humid.... 30C plus.... and wet... even when it's not raining....lol..... so that makes the value even more expensive..... Then I played 'Discovery Bay', which is a private course accessible only by hydrofoil. They also have 3x18... costs me almost as much to take a cab, boat, bus on an island and then all the way back..... That was my first experience and i think i wrote about it on Cholly Chee...... spent more time eating and running between meals than playing.....hahahhahaha..

and all courses are anal about keeping time..... the official excuse is that there is a shortage of courses. I have not played enough to judge. But they have a 13x18 course in Shenzhen, China, called Mission Hills, on the other side of the past border..... and very difficult to get to.... I wonder if they are as strict on time....? I mean they have 13 courses.... and face is very important here, so apparently the rich guys get away with everything, and it's the 'regular members', who pay $1m or two to join and then the standard meal charges...... I suppose if its $1k a game, and if u play 5 times a week, then $1m ain't so much.......

Anyway, the days of $30 a round, grassy, 'links type farmers' fields' are over for me... all courses here are perfectly manicured and coiffured, liked the ladies that play on them.....lol..... and no more extra bacon and runny eggs for eats... they have the very best in chinese food and the players actually eat..... before , after the 9th and then again after the 18th... no drinking though, minuscule amounts of it are an offense here if one drives ... and if u have driven here, you'll see why... roads are tight and narrow, signs are obscure... u get the idea..... one basically takes one air conditioned room in the house, puts wheels and a motor in it... and commute.....lol....

Daily ablutions? I basically do my duties as mentioned above, squeezing in a walk and gym in the mornings.... gym is very popular because of the pollution here... it's air conditioned.... BTW did i say i gave up the convertible idea....lol.....; and walks have to be judiciously picked.... I basically walk up Mount Butler (read not the Peak) and down the south side of the island.... the trails there are much 'fresher' because of the airflow, which comes off the china sea and then up the south side and then down the north side into happy valley.... think i wrote about the 'dragons'...... in my cholly chee..... Kowloon, which is the peninsula that juts southwards into HK island is 'nine dragons'.....

(and I still haven't been to Vietnam......so cannot confirm that viet means peace..... but i remember our discussion..... googled it and it means 'south of the southern chinese peoples'.... the viet is the name given to 'southern chinese'... like generically all of the people that live in southern china and the chinese they speak is the viet language... and the nam is 'south of'....)

anyway, the story is that there are holes in the center of buildings, to 'let the dragons run up and down the south side of the island... leaving their nest ... that is Kowloon....' sort of like that building in downtown Montreal with the hole in the middle..... and I thought they had the idea in Canada first... oh... that's 'red rose tea'... lol......

Afternoons, I try to catch up on mail, nap and generally prep for the return of my dragon.......lol...... dragon lady is a generic term here...lol.... People work very long hours here... but like i said of HK.... it is very efficient.... but i am not so sure of its effectiveness....

My pet project.. I got braces for my teeth and am trying to find a solution to my cholesterol problem... because of the many extra stressors in HK, the medical community is much more concerned with marginally high levels of cholesterol... and i think half the population is on lipitol and the other half is on some other non chemical, read 'natural', remedy for clogging of the pipes......lol....

I should correct that... half the people of 'our generation' ....lol...... and trust me... i start CPP in 2013.....lol.... (the rest? they're dead....lol....)

well... u asked........ oh,.... and I am shooting 150, so that's about par... for the course....lol....