Housewarming

There isn't much to report from our housewarming party -- a lot of Chinese came and had interesting American food and drink -- but there are a couple of photos worth sharing.

The first is this piece of "Italian cauliflower" that I found CitySuper, Hong Kong's ritzyest supermarket. It was slightly tougher than the white cauliflower I'm used to, but it had a similar flavor.

The second is this photo that proves that all garbage is edible, especially when it's made from meat. Our little scavengers found the trash bag before it made it to the trash can. You'd think we starved them or something...

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And with that, I'm on my way to Denver. I'll post more photos in the coming days, including some of Hong Kong all decked out for Christmas.

7 Eleven

If you've ever been to Hong Kong, you know that there is a convenience store practically every block. More often than not, there two within a few paces of each other.

Happy Valley is home to Hong Kong's first-ever 7 Eleven, which opened something like 40 years ago. (I took a photo of the plaque commemorating the store's historic significance, but it didn't turn out and, well, I'm in Portland right now, so "something like 40 years ago" will have to suffice.)

The store sits in front of the Happy Valley tram terminus. To the right is a day spa, to the left is a Japan Home store where you can buy cheap housewares.

iPod Culture

My iPod has gotten a work out since moving to Hong Kong.

It's on my head constantly. More than when I was Manila. More than when I was in Maryland. Shelly is not far from correct when she says I am addicted to it.

But so is everybody else in Hong Kong.

It's probably no different than in most cities with good public transportation. In fact, I'm looking forward to conducting a short, very non-scientific analysis of Washington commuters when I'm there this weekend.

iPods are so prevalent in Hong Kong that Shelly even uses one now, after she swore she would never want an iPod. She says, though, that she's not addicted.

I say, just give her a little time.

The Office Has Been Blessed

One of Shelly's first duties has been to set up her company's office. She handled most everything, from furnishing the office to setting up the utilities. That sort of logistical stuff is something she's really good at, so she was probably the perfect person for the job.

One of the elements she did not handle was the office blessing.

As it was explained to me, Chinese believe that someone (or maybe something) owns, or controls, each and every parcel of land. In order to appease the spirits, it's appropriate to make an offering to them when you use a spot of land. The office secretary brought her mother-in-law, who's a practitioner of this sort of thing, in to do the honors. She brought a bunch of apples and oranges, some delicious pork and chicken, a cake designed especially for this purpose, and a variety of sheets of paper representing money and other riches which we burned in the stairwell, directly under the fire sprinkler.

Fortunately, nobody got wet, and the office should be well on its way to success.

It's Autumn!

It's autumn for the first time in two years!

The November weather in Hong Kong was blissfully cool after a year in Manila. We pulled out the blankets -- what we have for blankets, at any rate -- and the long-sleeve shirts. The cats curled up under the blankets with us. And Hong Kong's bakeries rolled out their attractive fall pastry lines. These pumpkins -- which each have a small pretzel stick in the role of the stem -- were on sale throughout the fall at the Das Gout bakeries.

It's deja vu all over again

I'm currently experiencing my second 8:45 a.m. of the day.

That's because I'm in Portland, where it is still early Thursday morning. The thing is, at 8:45 Thursday morning, I was boarding a Northwest Airlines flight in Hong Kong, so it's 8:45 all over again. I'll finally be done traveling sometime after 11:00 p.m. Eastern time tonight, when I'll arrive in Washington after a nice tour of the Denver and Charlotte airports.

This is shaping up to be a long day.

On the bright side, the Portland airport has thoughtfully provided me with free wireless Internet access, so even though my body thinks it's 12:45 a.m. Friday, I am going to attempt to catch this thing up between flights.

The past month has been ridiculously busy. I have a bunch of photos I'll post this morning, but we've done, in no particular order, the following:

• Done loads of Christmas shopping at Hong Kong's famous Stanley Market.

• Found a new church home, the Lutheran Church of All Nations in Repulse Bay.

• Hosted a housewarming party for about 20 guests.

• Prepared for a visit from one of Shelly's colleagues, only to have it postponed a week by a major blizzard in Chicago.

• Spent hours reinstalling all my computer software after a hard drive crash. Replaced the hard hard drive after it crashed again. Spent hours reinstalling all my software again. I use this as my main excuse for not updating the blog often enough.

• Completed three separate freelance projects, two of them with my trusty old computer, which is currently being held together with tape and a binder clip.

• Prepared for a long trip to America, where we will be home for Christmas.

We also had to euthanise one of our kittens. Princess Ernie had never been able to put on any weight in the two months we had her, but she never seemed to be ill. This past Sunday, she was fine. Monday, her hind legs were weakening. On Tuesday, she was diagnosed with FIP, an incurable feline virus. By Wednesday, she could hardly walk, and we euthanised her. Having to put two cats to sleep in the past six months should fulfill our quota for some time.

If you're curious about the past four weeks, read on...