Mar 28, 2009

Visiting an elementary school in Kentucky


Last Tuesday, my friend Kim invited me to do a presentation about Hong Kong and Seattle at the elementary school where she teaches in Kentucky. We did the presentation in three different classrooms, and they were all 1st graders and 2nd graders. It was interesting to see how the kids' knowledges about another country varies even within the same grade.

I also found it strange to see that the kids had not seen seafood before as I showed them a photo of seafood taken at the Pike Place Market. Moreover, I had a hard time understanding some kids' questions as some of them had strong Southern accents. The most interesting one was that if there are semis over in Hong Kong. One kid was surprised that Chinese people wear the same clothing.

I also showed them a photo of Chinatown that I took in Seattle. Not many of them knew about Chinatown and thought that it was taken in Hong Kong.

It was overall a great experience. I taught the kids how to say and write their favorite animals in Chinese. They were all very excited.

At the end, one of the teachers asked me to teach them the Chinese alphabet. But the thing is, there is no such a thing! Every word is a different character, and as a kid, I needed to memorize the writing of every character by heart.

Mar 24, 2009

Not on my bed!

I was blessed to have two strong men to help me move into my new house on Friday. Without them, I can't image how I alone could have moved four 70 pounds suitcases and several heavy boxes to the second floor. But as they were moving the boxes into my room, it started to irritate me. They put the dirty boxes on my bed!

It is safe to say that most of the people in Hong Kong see their bed as a very private area. They want it to be clean. That is why people usually take their shower at night before they go to bed.
As my friends are helping me to move, one of them left my purse on the floor. That is another "no no" that make me feel strange. For some reason, the floor is the last place that one would put somebody's stuff on in Hong Kong. It can even offend some people for putting their stuff on the floor because it shows that one does not respect the other enough and sees them as trash.

An extreme example would be that Japanese people I met did not even want to leave their backpacks on the floor!

As I can only speak for the culture of Hong Kong, I would like to know what your culture is like on this subject. Please leave a comment!