This week was exceptional to say beyond the least! Even after all of my trips to HK, this has to be the best one yet! This first week of this program came with expected and unexpected turns. I expected everyone to be students who want to work hard, yet have fun in the process of making the project. The most unexpected, I never would have guessed that this would be so hard! Although it is a simple assignment that the professors have given to us last week, there was so much thought put into the process that we simply did not have enough time to do what we wanted for the first project!
But let me start off with the beginning of the week where we got to meet the students of HKU for the first time. We started with a physical activity that was creative beyond words and had hidden depth and imagination to it. During this activity, I basically met half of the HKU students in 10 minutes! In the afternoon, we went to basically walk from mountain to seaside of Hong Kong and it was breath taking to say the least… literally! It was hot that day and we were all sweating crazily where I couldn’t feel that I was drenched. The next day, we were introduced to our assignment for the first time and I was put into a group that had the wonderful and beautiful Bernice from HK, and hilarious Edward from Guangzhou area! Luckily, all of us can speak Cantonese so that it is easier for us to communicate each second we’re together! Although I have to say, they were extremely surprised to know I could speak Canto. It’s a wonderful feeling to work with fellow students who can speak in the native tongue that you were brought up in. Although I wish sometimes that we had a fellow student who could only speak Mandarin and English, that would have been fun to be talking in three different languages all at once!
Andrew and Austin hiding from the sun
My site visit was at Ma Wan Island, which is only a twenty-minute ferry ride from Central. This island, in the past, was for fishing villagers only and they lived a content life until the British decided to make it into their land and buy it off from the villagers to create a more peaceful and better environment for Hong Kong people. My group has to study the well-off residents of Ma Wan Island, also called Park Island (for them). We quickly took pictures, sketched a couple drawings, and walked around until I had to leave for the UO alumni dinner, which was great because we all got to meet successful architects who graduated from UO!
Panorama of Park Island, view from the ferry entrance/exit
Delicious, rich and creamy tiramisu. Complimented with white wine, which was an excellent pair
The rest of the week was basically doing the project, which, I think, turned out splendid. My group had a simpler approach towards the project that is both fascinating and unique from all the other groups. After the presentation time, all of us went to celebrate a HKU student’s birthday with a wonderful seafood dinner and a visit to Lam Kui Fong. The weekend was packed with a personal afternoon tea session with my guardian, Clare, on Saturday and dinner with my other family friend. On Sunday, we all went to Macau where we had the most unusual entrance! But afterwards, we each had fun. The most hilarious thing is, I got to split open a coconut with my hands! And meeting with some family afterwards was also great, I haven’t seen them in 12 years!
Delicious Portuguese sausage 🙂 it goes great with bread
Cheers,
Bella