Welcome to my new home in Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong. This is one of the student residences of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, about 15 minutes walk away from the school, and a 5-minute walk away from the closest McDonald's.
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| My hoods: Hung Hom halls is the red/brown building on the background |
First of all, this building is
huge. There are 21 floors and our room is on the 6th. In the wing where we are there's only 3 elevators, one of them stopping only on the odd floors, one stopping on the even floors, and the third one stopping every floor, and if you have a bad timing, you might have to wait for the elevator for 5 or so minutes. Every time you enter or leave the building you have to scan your student card so that the staff always knows who's in the building and that there are no outside visitors. You are not allowed to drink alcohol or smoke cigarettes anywhere in the building. Pretty much the whole campus area is smoke-free and you can get a 5,000 HKD fee if you smoke on an area where it's not allowed.
One thing I found a bit funny and weird in here is how there is a fee for almost everything you do. We got a welcome package and there is a list of the things you should not do and what is the maximum penalty. There are such things as drying your clothes in your room (200 HKD), littering, leaving your key in the room, cooking in your room etc. In the underground (MTR) there are signs saying that if you try to enter the train after the doors are already closing you might get a 1,000 HKD fee.
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| The view from our window |
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| If we have a male visiting our room, he's not allowed to use our toilet. Old school. |
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| Nerd corner |
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| 4 months sleeping in the same room with Kathi, should be interesting :D |
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| Just in case there's someone living who has no common sense. |
I like our student residence, since my standards are not too high, I mean what do you expect when your rent is around 100 euros a month? The bathroom which we share is not maybe the cleanest one on earth, and the water from the shower is always too cold or too hot, and if you don't have the air-con on, our room is boiling hot. But all in all this is a nice residence, with a gym, pingpong tables, a pool, 24/7 grocery shop next to the residence, and nice people of course ;D
And about the heat. I'm actually surprised how OK +34 degrees celsius and extremely humid air feels, I was prepared to be dead and sweaty and tired all the time, but it's very tolerable haha. All buildings, MTR and trains are air-conditioned well - actually a bit too well, you should always have a cardigan with you because for example the classrooms at school are cold, and as soon as you step out of the building, it's hot again, so you just have to be prepared for everything. And always have water or some other drink with you, it's so easy to forget to drink enough. In October the weather should get colder so now all we can do is to enjoy the heat :)
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| Robert, Nadja, Kathi, Fu Chi Tit and Sandra |
And one more thing: so far the Hong Kong nightlife does not seem to be my cup of tea. All the bars we've seen or been to are clubs, loud and expensive and just not my type. In a city as big as this I'm sure it's possible to find some easy-going places as well, but still alcohol is super expensive, a small beer can easily be 6 - 8 euros... So I shall concentrate on food.
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| A Finnish penaattori having a Korean meal in Hong Kong. |
