Life « Barbara Leung « The Life of an NYU Student

Skip to navigation
Skip to main content
Skip to secondary content
Skip to footer

‘Life’ Category

Hong Kong: Cheung Chau

February 20, 2012 by Barb

Cheung Chau

It may have been a month since I came back from Hong Kong, but I still have two more days worth to lay out before approaching the trip to Brazil (coincidentally, we met for our mini “reunion” this past). Sharing and synthesizing my traveling experiences has been quite the task because of how much I saw in such a short period of time, along with the fast-paced life that I have, meaning that I don’t have a lot of downtime to sit and actually reflect.

For my second last day, a friend of mine told me about a small island that had a cave that belonged to a pirate. Although the cave was a small aspect of Cheung Chau (長洲, lit. “Long Island”), it was enough for me to warrant a day’s visit.

Since the island is not accessible by the MTR, I had to take the ferry from Central. There are two options to get to the island – the Fast Ferry or the Regular. As the names suggest, one cuts the travel time in half from one hour to approximately thirty minutes. The price difference isn’t that much, so it boils down more so to the schedule. The Fast Ferry arrived first, so I hopped on board and took a nap for the duration of the ride.

Upon arriving on the island, the first thing that strikes you is the absence of motor vehicles. The only modes of transportation is either bicycle or foot. Walking through the narrow streets, it becomes clear as to why there are no cars or anything of the sort (apart from emergency vehicles).

Since Cheung Chau is known as a fishing village/island, my first mission was to get some curry fish balls. I stopped by a local food stand of sorts, and paid the equivalent of less than a dollar for two of the freshest curry fish balls I’ve ever tasted.

After gobbling my snack, I set out to look for Cheung Po Tsai’s cave. The entrance is a nondescript, as I came across with a rock wall and a narrow entrance by my feet. Sliding down, I entered a small cave that is a pretty short pathway and leads out to a fantastic view of the ocean. That said, it is a pretty fun experience, using my phone as a flashlight and feeling the rocks as a pathway.

Although the walk to the cave took a good hour, I decided to take advantage of the “ferry point,” which was just one of the small motor boats for hire (~10HKD) that traveled back and forth between the ends of the island. Not having to make the long trek, I stopped by a small café, with locals talking to the husband/wife owners and a sleepy cat, for a bowl of fishballs and noodles. The slow-paced afternoon came to an end when I took the ferry back to the main island so as to get ready for dinnr with relatives at 8 Happiness (for whom I brought fresh fish balls from Cheung Chau), where we dined on my favourite dishes (including sea cucumber, fish maw, and chicken feet).

8 Happiness
2/F, W Square,
314 Hennessy Rd,
Wan Chai, Hong Kong
http://www.maxims.com.hk
Phone: 2838-6998

Cheung Chau

Fishing on Cheung Chau

Fish drying outside

Fresh curry fish balls

Boats

Boats

Cheung Chau

Going up the hill

En route to Cheung Po Tsai cave

Cheung Po Tsai cave

Cheung Po Tsai cave

Cheung Chau

Cheung Chau

Fishing at Wan Chai ferry pier

At 8 Happiness with grandparents
How Do You Like Them Apples?

January 30, 2012 by Barb
It was the first time in a while where I recognized, I, too, could capture beauty in the world.

I’ve put off writing a reflection of the last year and writing of any goals that I might have or want to see accomplished for no particular reason. Instead, there are many reasons as to why I haven’t been able to sit down and hammer this out – away in Hong Kong, busy with presentation, away in Brazil, having school start, etc. But I suppose the reason that resonates most clearly is that I wasn’t sure about the scope of what I would be reflecting upon.

At first, I thought about discussing the past year in terms of recovery for my elongated depressive episode. When thinking about it, though, I realized that this recovery process that I was wanting touch upon, not only rooted itself in the initial signs of the major episode years ago (April 2009, to be most correct), but also in the poor management of my medication prescriptions that had incurred during sophomore year. And it was in realizing this added complication that, at this point, in particular, it was the repercussions that I was still working through – the general inefficacy of and mishandling of me as a patient and person. It goes to say that there was this topped-off layer to my bundle of issues that should never have been added in the first place. In layman’s terms: for someone who’s not too keen on desserts, an added layer of frosting can most certainly deter one from finishing the cake.

Granted, there were the “bad days” in the past year, but they were not the core of my problems. I didn’t see myself struggle out of bed or stare mundanely at the wall; instead, I saw myself questioning what had happened to me, and justifying why I didn’t deserve the circumstances that were imposed upon me. I recanted the stories from the vivid memories that would not leave me so as to re-assess and make sure that I wasn’t living in a world of my own creation. And I re-integrated myself into the university community that I had never truly known so as to find a baseline to all of this. “This” is vague, and I can’t find a particular noun to affix it to, and I suppose it is best left that way.

And as I say all of this, it begs the question about my academics. The story of my major episode began at the tail-end of freshman year and continued on through the summer with me struggling to leave my apartment. But somehow, I was still averaging an 3.7 GPA. And the decent grades continued on throughout my continued therapy sessions in New York, with A’s and A-’s for the most part. I say this with no mal-intent, but it was the ease in grading that had allowed me to skirt by in the second semester of sophomore year. As much as I would like to give myself credit for being a genius of sorts, I really can’t. Taking medication that I never adjusted to, I slept most of the day – nine to ten hours of sleep was topped off with naps and droopy eyelids in class and at my desk at both work and home. There was no real opportune time for me to churn out essays except for the few hours that I could be awake enough to read material and type. There was no working ahead because there is no concept of “future” when you’re in this haze of being medicated. In which case, it was easy to catch errors and flawed arguments in my summer courses when I had less time to “recuperate” between assignments.

When asked about Paris (which was where my average took a big hit), I often tell those that ask that I was enduring the rigour of a whole major in two semesters, when students would take at least three years. In which case, I was confronted with a large learning curve, and hence my grades and their dramatic improvement. And for the most part, that was true. But there was always this aspect that i never touched upon, and that was I was distracted. I wasn’t distracted in the average sense of being on Facebook too much, or anything of that sort. Rather, I was pre-occupied with what what I mentioned above, asking the questions of what had happened in the year before and why. Nothing in that first semester back in Paris had my full attention. So it was as I wrote the stories, I began to possess more clarity, though there were tendencies in which I would fall back into a past of sorts – lost in memories of who I was and what had happened in past years.

With all that said, I’ve come to these three realizations about the past year that I sum up here:
1. Grown-ups make mistakes too. Part of the reason as to why I clung on the mistreatment of my depression was that I had put my faith in what I believed to be an “authority.” It was the disappointment that the go-to figures can make mistakes and not realize it. And while I had attributed the calamity of it all to one central person, I realized that, in flipping through the pages of my records, it was a system, created to prevent all that had happened, that had failed me when no one had remarked upon the inaccurate remarks made about me. Nothing is perfect, even in the most minute of communities.
2. Forgiveness doesn’t come easily – for either party. The common saying that we learn as children is “forgive and forget,” but as we grow older, we realize that life isn’t as easy as wiping away a day’s worth of scribbles off a chalk board. To want to propose forgiveness is easy; the actual process of forgiving someone that has done wrong unto you is one that has no defined beginning or end. That said, forgiveness is also not simply a matter of it being “earned” by a person; the parameters for it are so many, yet so few. For the most part, I’ve moved on, but I cannot forgive the poor administration of medication that took myself away from me – at least not yet. The words are ready to leap out of my mouth but I want to be able to give the words actual meaning and weight.
3. I’ve put my life back together. I’ve spent the last decade watching myself fall apart countless times, only to find myself patching band-aids on the wounds and function again for some time before steering myself toward another meltdown. It was only in college that someone hit the stop button on this pattern and directed me towards a more constructive path. In between, there were ups and downs – some of my own doing and some not – but during all of it, I was never at my best. My accomplishments were still good on all accounts but they were not my representative of me at my best. I’ve caught glimpses in all of this time of what is the best of me, but it’s really only been in these past few months that I’ve been able to better recognize myself and see more than just a snapshot.
  
  If we look at grades, this is the most consistent I’ve been. If we look at community, I’ve found myself happily working with different departments at the university. If we look at me, professionally, I may not have a financial-sector job lined up after graduation, but I have plans and don’t mind the detours on the road map. And if we look at me as a whole, this is the most I’ve ever enjoyed anything. I’ve taken back my life.
Everyday won’t be peachy. Not everyone will be kind. Not every remark will be positive. That said, my one overarching goal for 2012 is to remember is that it does and will get better.
Hong Kong: Cultural Miscellany

January 29, 2012 by Barb

Riding the Peak tram

When I first went to Victoria Peak, I had the idea that I would take the bus up and take the tram down so as to experience the “best” of both. But my little detour and pressing need to head to lunch previously made it a little impossible for me to take the tram, as well as in take in the view that was offered. So the Monday morning after New Year’s Day, I left the hotel a tad earlier than usual so as to incur as minimal a wait (read: half an hour) as possible for the tram to take me up and down.

Even though you can purchase separate rides and opt out of Sky Terrace 428 (it’s just a deck where you can overlook the city), it only makes sense to get everything together, since it is, after all, the meager equivalent of $10 USD. The highlight of the tram ride isn’t necessarily the view, but rather, the intense feeling of defying gravity, being slowly pulled up the hill by the tram’s grip on the rails. The experience is all the more amplified if you have the fortunate or unfortunate – depending on how you see it – opportunity of standing for the duration of the ride (about 5 or so minutes).

The view from the terrace is an impressive one. But what makes it “impressive,” at least for me, isn’t the fact that I can see so far, but that I can look and begin to point out buildings that I have familiarized myself with in the past several days. It’s not that I’ve been into each of these buildings, but rather, it is my recognizing of certain constructions and noting them as more remarkable than others. The adjacent mall’s rooftop does not boast the same view, since it is blocked in part by the terrace, but it does have its green space and own air of escape in the modern cityscape.

From there, I embarked on a ridiculous three-transfer trip to the Hong Kong Heritage Museum with an interlude of what would be a time-saving shortcut, which ended up only leading me more astray. With a student ID, the fee was only 5HKD for entry, and it came with what seemed to be a laminated promotional “trading” card for one of the other exhibits, along with a magnet for another. The main intention in coming to the museum was to see the “Fashion Visionaries” exhibit, which I did, and I must say that while I was impressed with the amount of content, I wasn’t particularly enthralled by the talent (or not as much as I had expected to be). That said, that is most certainly a review for another day. Walking through the other exhibits, it becomes quite apparent that the Heritage Museum takes great pride in its strides to bring the cultural history – both recent and past – of Hong Kong to the public, what its diverse themes and well-curated displays.

Hong Kong Heritage Museum
1 Man Lam Road
Sha Tin, Hong Kong
http://www.heritagemuseum.gov.hk

On a side note, the museum finds itself in the much more residential side of Kowloon (in stark comparison to the bustling streets of Tsim Sha Tsui). And I suppose I say this because I noticed a quieter part to Hong Kong. There were no hordes crossing the street or crowded sidewalks. Instead, there was room to stroll and bicycles passing alongside me.

After spending some hours in the museum, I decided to head to the Wong Tai Sin Temple, since I was so close to it. The temple is regarded as one of the most famous in Hong Kong, and it seemed quite so with many at the Temple burning incense and praying at sunset. Not knowing the procedure for praying, I merely watched for some time, before leaving and heading to dinner in the Wanchai district.

Having had my fill of local fare, I opted for Thai cuisine at Chili Club Restaurant. I must say that it was most certainly different from what I’ve tasted before. The Tom Yum Po Tak – spicy and sour seafood soup – was hot on account of the chillies, but was at the same time refreshing with its heat. While sipping my soup, I also had my share of gPoo Phad Phong Ka-Ri – fried crab with curry. The crab was followed by another dish – Pla Ma-Now Pa Sa (steamed fish served on stove tray with lime juice, chili and garlic). In writing my account of what I ate, I’ve noticed that during my stay in Hong Kong is that the food isn’t necessarily always made with better technique, but the seafood’s freshness is the one line of consistency that each restaurant has brought thus far.

Chili Club Restaurant
88 Lockhart Rd., 1/F
Wanchai, Hong Kong
Tel: 2527 2872
Menu: http://www.fbw.hk/restaurant/order/1077/

Myself at Sky Terrace 428, overlooking the Peak

Hong Kong Heritage Museum

Hong Kong Heritage Museum; 'Fashion Visionaries' exhibit

Hong Kong Heritage Museum; 'Fashion Visionaries' exhibit

Hong Kong Heritage Museum; 'Fashion Visionaries' exhibit

Statue at Wong Tai Sin Temple

Wong Tai Sin Temple

Wong Tai Sin Temple

Wong Tai Sin Temple

Wong Tai Sin Temple

On the Social Prowl
To learn more and connect with Barb, be sure to catch her on these social networks.
Subscribe via Email
Twitter: barb_leung
- RT @WarbyParker: Excited to be there! RT @LinleighHawk: First Ogilvy Office Hours kicks off! @fab @warbyparker @birchbox @havetohave htt ... about 2 hours ago
- RT @StGermainDrinks: Happy National Margarita Day! The St-Rita is the perfect way to celebrate. #BienSur http://t.co/4nZ7gDen about 2 hours ago
- RT @WarbyParker: Our co-founders chat with @cdixon on @techcrunch: "Why should a pair of glasses cost more than an iPhone?" http://t.co/ ... about 2 hours ago
- RT @SaladKingTO: Thank you! Viva Yonge Street! RT @DowntownYonge: Happy 1 Year Anniversary of your re-opening @SaladKingTO!! about 2 hours ago
- RT @TorontoStar: Ontario not alone in stopping funding for OxyContin: http://t.co/MPgCTS67 about 2 hours ago
Recent Posts
Blogroll
Search for: