Sunday 2/23/03 Arrival in Hong Kong

I can’t believe how short that flight is. All they have time to do is serve us a drink and before you know it the captain who just said “Welcome aboard Singapore Airlines,” is saying “We are now preparing for our descent.” The plane interior is all purple and orange, the stewardesses wear long Southeast-Asian looking traditional dresses in purple and orangey tropical shades. I tried the longest time to discreetly get a picture of one walking by my seat, and when I finally got a clear shot, the flash went off—I’d forgotten to reset it to No Flash. So much for discreet.

Was immediately impressed with HK organization—no problem finding ticket machines and the way to the shuttle train (Airport Express), which as I’d been told, was superclean, modern and fast, with an electronic diagram near the ceiling showing you as a little dot traveling bit by bit to the next stop. The city zoomed by and I couldn’t take pictures because of the reflection. Saw lots of impressive high rises. When I got out to take a cab, there was a woman directing us to cabs that would stop at the next available cab stand.

There was only some confusion after I showed the cabbie the NTT address—our letter had said the fare would only be 15HKD, but as we kept going the meter kept climbing and I asked him how far, since they’d said 15. He stopped in front of it and fare was 50. Wondering if I’d gotten gypped, I asked him to wait while I ran in to check with someone. But inside was totally dead so I just gave him 50 and figured I’d find out later. Turned out I was at the conference center, not the NTT house, and the security woman pointed me down the right way.

Saw a bunch of whities speaking English outside figuring this must be it. I wondered if I should ask if they were Fulbrighters and introduce myself, but figured we’d meet this week eventually. I lugged my heavy Europe backpack (but I’d packed as lightly as possible, I don’t get it) and asked the receptionist about that cab fare. She confirmed it’s 50 and when I said, smiling, that they’d written 15 in our letter, and that maybe she could call and tell them, since many people would be coming in the next couple days and I didn’t want them to come across the same problem. She just smiled and said, “Hm,” in that way that means she won’t. Communication was difficult, her English sucked ass, I could tell she was speaking English words, but they didn’t make any sense, especially when I asked her to explain the telephone charges. The instructions for phone calls were written on a tiny card and I gave up trying to understand her and decided to figure it out later. The lobby was rather dead and quiet and I worried about sneaking Ginger in—they’d see her with her luggage, only Jon would check in, and surely they’d ask who she was.

As I took the elevator up I could tell right away this was NOT the same as a hotel—was old, rather musty smelling. It was was HK Baptist Univ’s “dorm” building for visiting international students. The room wasn’t so roomy or nice and the bathroom was a tiny shower stall, the blankets rather old and grimy-feeling, but it was overall clean. And two twin beds which was good. Hot water maker. And she’d given me internet connection instructions, it was free. But I looked down and realized the outlets were different! Doh!

Found a binder full of NTT rules and regulations, one was that visitors weren’t allowed after 11PM. Doh. I went downstairs to look casually and figure out if I could wait outside for them. I started planning—would hang outside and meet them before they came in, tell Ginger my room number and have her wait outside, I’d come in with Jon, and she’d come up casually 15 minutes later. But when I went out to wait, the place was deserted and dark with no benches or any kind of remotely interesting scenery that would give anyone in their right mind an excuse to be hanging out outside. Plus, there was an actual uniformed security guard standing right between the elevator and front desk. We were screwed!

I went back up into the elevator with a white dude who’d seen me outside. He asked if it was my first day here and I said Yes. He asked, “Were you just outside checking out the place to see what there was to do around here?” I nodded and he said, “There’s not much, eh?” Got that right. This was the kind of area where the sound of crickets was louder than that of passing cars.

Back in the room I got to watching an amateur documentary on an English channel called Pearl TV. It was done by a young guy visiting Iraq and entitled, “Holiday in the Axis of Evil.” He was part of an organized tour group, the only American in the bunch, and had his own Iraqi tour guide assistant assigned to stick to him and make sure he wasn’t photographing anything suspicious. They weren’t allowed to say Saddam’s name so he whispered to the camera, “If I ever have to say his name, I’ll call him ‘Ted’.” He started out in the south where the Shi’ites were, the sites of the past massacres when they made their annual pilgrimage. The last time was six months ago, thousands were killed, and now there were Saddam posters everywhere, for his unopposed “presidential campaign”.

Up north there were HUGE Saddam murals everywhere, and every evening on Iraqi TV (the only thing on TV) was a music video, a love song praising him. The subtitles read, “More than an election it’s the passion between us and you. It’s the ballot papers that will show the love of Iraq.” His slogan was, “Say Yes Yes Yes to our great leader.” Of course, in the election that followed, not one person voted No.

They walked into a building where on the floor was a mural of George W. Bush and words “Bush is Criminal.” They showed children walking in and rubbing their feet into his face.

The guy held up a huge wad of Iraqi bills, explaining before the Gulf War this was worth US$170,000, and now it was worth about US$25. He read the newspaper which said to please stand for 1 minute of silence for the victims of 9/11. Then, please also stand for the civilian victims killed in Iraq because of the inhumane sanctions the US has imposed since the Gulf War. The victims from that numbered 100x those of 9/11, so “please stand for 100 minutes,” it said.

They then moved on to Syria, where everywhere were signs saying, “Boycott U.S. goods” because money to the U.S. meant money to help Israelis that kill Palestinians. A poster showed an American hamburger and the “meat” inside was a dead Palestinian baby, killed by an Israeli attack.

I dozed off and woke to the sound of voices outside my door; opened it and it was Jon and Gin. She hadn’t had any problem getting in, just stood by Jon as he checked in and they never asked who she was. They spent awhile planning how to get their China visas tomorrow while I went through brochures and maps to plan “doing Hong Kong.”