Thursday, January 8, 2015

New Year Fireworks

Ryan came back to Hong Kong for New Year's Eve. The impressive part is that he was just here for Christmas, even if it was only for two days, and New Year's Eve is one of his biggest days in China, other than traditional Chinese holidays.

Ryan's band has been playing in the same club for over two years, which is pretty remarkable when you consider that most of the bands there only last about six months. When he first left Hong Kong, I thought he would not be able to adjust to living there and would be back by the end of the year. Longevity has given him some clout, and now he can take the days off that he wants more than he could before.

He was only in Hong Kong for four days this time, but that is still better than nothing. Combined with the two days at Christmas and that is almost a full week. That's pretty good for us. We mostly only see each other two or three days at a time, once a month.

On New Year's Eve, we went with Lily and Kevin for a fancy dinner at the InterContinental on the Promenade. They do a big New Year's Eve dinner every year and you have to reserve a table well in advance. We did not know if Ryan would be able to make it a few months ago, or even if Lily and I would both get the day off, but we went ahead and booked it for all of us.

One of the reasons the InterContinental is so popular on New Year's Eve is that they have excellent views of Victoria Harbour and, of course, New Year's Eve is one of the harbour's biggest fireworks shows. There are a million places to watch it, but sitting at a table with a drink is a nice change of pace from standing in a crowd of a few million people all spitting on the ground and pushing each other to get the best views.

People who have never been to China sometimes think the spitting is exaggerated, but last year the government had to bring in crews with industrial hoses to wash down the Avenue of Stars. If you go there on New Year's Eve, your shoes are going to get wet. And not just from saliva. The less said about that, the better. Being in a 5 star restaurant at a 5 star hotel alleviates that problem, but you have to pay to stay dry.

2 comments:

  1. Are you actively trying to learn Chinese (Cantonese or Mandarin)? If so, how is it going and what impact does it have on you finding acting work in Hong Kong?

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  2. I'm learning bits and pieces here and there. I know a lot more than I did when I came here, but no one's going to mistake me for a local. I don't know if it makes any difference with acting work because I'm not really concentrating on that right now. When they hire white people, they don't necessarily want Chinese speakers anyway.

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