Dorm Life...

  Living in the dormitories have also been a new experience for me. I never had a chance to live in the dorms back in UH, so I can't compare how different it is in Hong Kong. The advantage of living in the halls is commuting is very convenient. From the residence halls, it takes about 10 minutes to walk (5 minutes if you run) to the lecture classes, and about 15 minutes to walk to the MTR station.

  As for activities within the hall, they hold events once in a while. In September, I attended the Orientation Camp within my hall. This is usually intended for Hong Kong local students because the dominant language used is Cantonese. During this Orientation Camp, you work together in teams to compete and make friends with people also living in your hall.

I was part of the Yellow Team!

  Aside from this, there are also Inter-hall Competitions. These competitions are like the Olympics challenged within the Student Residence. Each hall (I am part of Hall 7) chooses their representatives and challenge in sports. This semester, the sports are: swimming, track & field, and table tennis. It was a cool experience seeing all the halls (Halls 1~11) yelling against each other to see which hall would be louder.

My hall won 2nd place!

On a typical day at the dorms, I would eat dinner with friends and go back to my room to shower and watch youtube videos or chat with friends on Skype. On certain days, my roommate and two other friends would go down to the common room to watch a movie. We also did a cooking day where my roommate cooked Mexican food for us. At night, you would see other students sitting outside in the grassy areas or benches, and talk until after midnight.

Top: My Bros; Bottom: Students sitting in the grassy area

School Days...

After being in City University for two months, I have seen many unique lifestyles and activities held on campus as compared to my home university. It feels like everyday there is something going on!

Events

For the top left corner, it was Korean Culture Week. Students were able to try Korean food, play cultural games, and take pictures in Korean clothing. For the top right, there was an anime cosplay day. Students dressed up like anime characters and walked around campus taking pictures. It literally felt like Halloween for asians! They dressed and acted cute in their poses for pictures and there would be professional cameramen taking snapshots of these students! As for the bottom picture, the entire month of October has been voting of clubs. For these clubs to be recognized, students would dress up (there were the Smurfs, Ironman, Toy Story, etc.) and yell different cheers. Everyday I walk towards my lecture classes I would hear different cheers and see different clubs dressed in group outfits; so much more lively than days in UH haha. And they're yelling in Cantonese, which makes it more funny because I have no idea sometimes what they are saying.

Eating

 Festival Walk

Nam Shan Chuen

  If you ever get bored of eating at the canteens (cafeterias) on campus, you can always go to restaurants or the food court in Festival Walk shopping mall. The price range for food may be a little more pricey around 40~50 HKD per meal. On days I want to save money in Festival Walk, I would eat at Yoshinoya (20~30 HKD per meal) or McDonalds.

  Another option to consider would be to visit Nam Shan Chuen, which is right behind the university. In this area, there is a market to buy vegetables or meat if you prefer to cook. There are also small restaurants around this area that sell meals around 20~30 HKD. A lot of Chinese locals come to this area to eat lunch or afternoon tea after classes.

Keeping in Shape

As for my daily routine on school days, I have been going to the gym at least 3 times a week. Although their equipments are limited, you can improvise to get a good workout. They use a booking system in City University where you go online to choose what time you can lift. After you book a time, you head down to the sports center 15 minutes prior to confirm your booking. Even though you have to pay to use the gym, it only costs 3 HKD (~$0.40) for an hour. At the sports center, you can also book times to play Squash, Badminton, Basketball, and Ping Pong.

Group Projects

 Consumer Behavior Group

International Marketing Group

Now for serious business...I have found it very interesting working with Hong Kong locals for group projects. For our group discussions, they would speak to each other first in Cantonese and then translate back to me in English. It was very cool seeing how local students work as compared to my past group projects in Hawaii. In the beginning, we would all exchange numbers and start a group chat in Whatsapp (commonly used mobile-chatting application in HK). I have found that many students in Hong Kong are always very busy. If they are not in school, they are working part-time jobs. One difficulty for group projects is always finding a good day and time for everyone to meet and discuss our topic. Although their english may not be as fluent, working with local students has been a lot of fun. By forming groups with local students: you can improve your Cantonese, learn slang words, and expand your network.

Places To Go To...

For the past two months in Hong Kong, I've gone to:

• Macau
• Ocean Park
• Hong Kong Park
• Tai O

MACAU

On 9/14, I went to Macau with Beldon and his friends from Chinese University to do the Macau Bungee Jump. The experience was AWESOME! Since we were walk-ins to do the jump, we had to wait 2 hours to finally get to do the jump off the Macau Tower. This is currently the world's highest bungee jump where you jump off the 61st floor! The cost was 2,688 HKD and you get a t-shirt as a memoir that you did the jump. The first few seconds when you're in free fall was the best part!
Afterwards, we had dinner at a Portuguese Restaurant (which is always recommended to eat when you're in Macau). To finish off that day, we walked around the Venetian Hotel, Galaxy Hotel and checked out the casinos.

Ocean Park

On 9/15 and 10/19, I went to Hong Kong's Ocean Park! This is like a mixture of Hawaii's Sea Life Park combined with a huge Amusement Park. In Hong Kong, Ocean Park is a must-go at least one time. For the first time going, we went on all the rides we thought would be fun; and then we went through some of the aquariums and dolphin shows. For the second time, Ocean Park was Halloween-themed and had a lot of Haunted Houses to check out.

Tips:

• Go early, because the waiting time in lines get crazy if you go later in the day. The hours of Ocean Park are 10am-10pm, so we went once the gates opened.
• Do the rides you want first! Because the queue times will start increasing from 30 minutes to sometimes 1 hour. Then you can check out the aquariums
• Buy water before going onto the bus towards Ocean Park because food and drinks inside are expensive.
• Catch the cable car up! The view is nice!
• Bring a towel because you may get wet from some of the rides.
• If possible, GO ON WEEKDAYS because the weekends are usually very crowded!
• If you are going on exchange for a year or if you plan to go Ocean park multiple times, get the annual pass because each time you go is 320 HKD.

Hong Kong Park

On 10/13, we went to Hong Kong Park. This is a good place to visit on one of those lazy days where you don't want to do anything too intense and want to just relax. I loved this spot because it was a small, quiet park within a busy city area. You will see buildings and skyscrapers surrounding this nice park. In this park, there is also an atrium to see birds.

Tai O Hike

On 10/20, I went with some friends from City University to Tai O. We left early at 10am that morning and took the MTR to the Tung Chung Station and caught a bus to Tai O. From there, we hiked a trail towards Man Cheung Po. This hike was very long and tiring, but the view from the top was very nice!