Leave Your Body At the Door

Yu Lan Jie is not a public holiday in Hong Kong. I don't think it is anywhere in China. But it is a day of eating and drinking, so we had a party at the big house. If you are staying in someone else's house during a holiday, you have to throw a party. Especially if that house has an outdoor terrace that faces the ocean. That's just a basic rule.

Ghost Day was actually Friday, but our party was on Saturday. That has nothing to do with the ghosts. It was simply a more convenient day to throw a party. Unfortunately, I had to work Saturday night. Fortunately, the party was still going when I got home.

Our original plan was to have a Halloween party. Everyone could come in costumes and we could play up the ghost angle. As it turns out, that's considered kind of disrespectful. These ghosts are not to be trifled with or mocked. It is also a lot harder to get people to dress up when there are not costume ideas splashed all over the place like there will be next month. Halloween is pretty popular in Hong Kong, but not so much during other months.

My idea was to have a pool party. After all, we had the use of a swimming pool and any party was always going to be on the outdoor terrace right next to it. But it is surprisingly hard to get people to go swimming at night around here. I don't really know why. It might be because of the ghosts, but I doubt it. It is definitely not the weather. Winter is nowhere close to being here and none of the typhoons hit Hong Kong. Saturday turned out to be a nice night for a swim.

After most of the guests left, I had my own pool party. That actually worked out better anyway. I probably would have felt self-conscious if I was the only person in the pool with everyone else on the terrace. Being in a bathing suit surrounded by other people in bathing suits is one thing. But even if we had a pool party, most of our Chinese guests would not have dressed accordingly. Being the only one not fully clothed would make it impossible to enjoy all that beautiful water. In China, even if you have a party on the beach, everyone is fully dressed.