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Hong Kong!
Ponge
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
There's a slim possibility that my current employer might offer to transfer me to go work in their Hong Kong practice (I currently live in the UK) and I was just wondering if anyone has any advice or tips from any time spent holidaying or living their?
I should hopefully be staying with my girlfriend (hopefully we can sort out some sort of Visa for her) and so what I would be interested in hearing is any information on things such as:
how much money I need a month to afford a decentish flat/apartment,
Cool places to live/visit (I'll be working in the Sheung Wan district of the Island so hopefully staying somewhere not too far from there)
Advice on beginners books to pick up a little chinese
Expat communities
Anything really! I've left this topic a bit broad as I'm just pretty excited at the prospect and just looking to hear of peoples experiences.
I should hopefully be staying with my girlfriend (hopefully we can sort out some sort of Visa for her) and so what I would be interested in hearing is any information on things such as:
how much money I need a month to afford a decentish flat/apartment,
Cool places to live/visit (I'll be working in the Sheung Wan district of the Island so hopefully staying somewhere not too far from there)
Advice on beginners books to pick up a little chinese
Expat communities
Anything really! I've left this topic a bit broad as I'm just pretty excited at the prospect and just looking to hear of peoples experiences.
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I have zero knowledge about living there. I can try and find the name, but there's this area on Hong Kong Island with a lot of strip clubs that also has a few expat bars. Wan Chai, maybe? Also, the Soho area has lots of nice restaurants. It has this ridiculous escalator that passes by all sorts of restaurants and such. The Tsim Sha Tsui area on Kowloon also has lots to eat and see. I think that's where this one Hollywood Walk of Fame sort of thing is, with handprints from famous Hong Kong/Chinese stars like Chow Yun Fat and Jackie Chan.
We took a small trip to Lamma Island, too, which is in between Hong Kong Island and whatever island the airport's on. It's sparsely populated but tall; it's great for hiking, though we did it and got drenched halfway up the mountain (I assume it's a mountain; it goes >1 mile up). The food there is really good, and fresh. Basically, there are all these vendors with all their seafood, still alive, on display. You go there and say what you want and they cook it right away.
Incidentally, the WikiTravel guide, and Wikipedia itself, are really useful. I used that a lot before going. It also helped that my coworker spoke Mandarin. That helped us get around, even though he said he can only understand about 70% of Cantonese. At one place, they showed us the Chinese menu and the English menu. The prices on the English menu were 2-3X the price. This was a small corner cafe, though.
Transportation is very easy and fast. You can take the subway, bus or ferry to the island depending on where you're working. Almost all public transport can be paid with an Octopus card. You can also pay small items with it in some stores such as 7-11.
There are a few interesting places to visit depending on what you like. Foremost, it's probably mandatory to visit the buddha statue on Lantau Island. Tsim Sha Tsui has a couple of cultural institutions if that's your thing. Mong Kok, which is extremely crowded all day, is the place to be for hip youngsters to shop or date. For romantic walks it's got to be Tsim Sha Tsui East in the evening. Anyway, there's a lot to see and experience in Kowloon, especially for your first time.
People of Hong Kong as you know speak Cantonese Chinese, which unfortunately is a lot harder to learn than Mandarin Chinese for a variety of reasons. I would just stick with English to converse with natives, because no matter how hard you try, you're going to sound off. Or pick up some Mandarin as most people will understand it and it's easier to learn, not to mention more useful in general.
Oh, one last thing, Hong Kong is fucking humid this time of the year. There may be an occasional storm too or typhoon if you're unlucky. Also, it'll be unbearably hot coming summer. Just a fair warning.
I'm a tad scared about the heat to be honest. Humidity kills me, i'm just hoping that I acclimatise after a while or i'll be posting here asking how to avoid sweating to death!
Chen I've been reading that properties in the New Territories like you mentioned are a lot cheaper, but could you give me an idea of how long it would take on public transport to get from an area that you mentioned down to Sheung Wan (specifically the Cosco building if you're familiar with it). Also are you able to give me an idea of how much a typical public transportation pass or journey costs? Or if you can buy a month pass or something?
Salary wise I'm currently earning about £24,000 a year, which when put into XE.com translates as 370,000 HKD. Is this a fair amount to live on? I'm not a particularly flash person but I would like to live comfertably and enjoy myself when I'm over there so I don't want to be scraping by every month. If this is a bit low can you suggest a figure that is maybe a bit more suitable?
Cheers again guys, I didn't think I was going to get many answers but the stuff so far is very helpful.
You can also get off in Hung Hom and take the bus to the island, though I have no idea how long it'd take during rush hour. The subway is a safer bet I reckon. Walking from the train station to the subway station takes a while though, but they conveniently do have moving sidewalks if I remember correctly.
You can use the Octopus card for pretty much everything concerning public transport. No application required. Just buy the card from a ticket office and you can use it instantly. All you have to pay is a $50 security deposit and the fees of course. You can add value to your card with machines located throughout the stations.
As for the transportation fees, it gets a bit tricky. It doesn't charge you the distance you travel, but where you go. Obviously this means they charge you a bit more in the busy areas which is mostly Kowloon and Hong Kong Island. From Sheung Shui to Kowloon costs $8, but if you want to go from Sheung Shui to Lo Wu which is a short distance, it costs like $11 just to get to the border to Shenzhen.
Don't worry about it. Unless you plan to spend everything on the island itself, that's plenty of money considering the currency has been dropping lately. Food is generally cheap if you know where to look. Hell, hamburgers cost like $2 or $3 at McDonalds, though this may have changed over the years. Food has been getting more expensive, probably because of the rising Renminbi.
I guess I was more concerned about the price of apartments that I've seen online. The cheapest livable looking apartments seem to be upwards of HKD$18,000 without really depending much on the area's. Are these just inflated internet prices or somewhat typical?
I have no idea about the livability since that's pretty subjective. Generally, living spaces are very small compared to Western countries. Hell, HDTVs are placed like 6 feet from the sitting area. There just isn't room. Even the ceiling can make you feel cramped and I'm not the tallest person around. So, yeah, not the most comfortable city to live in, unless you're filthy, filthy rich. On that note, may I suggest you visit the Hong Kong Jockey club? There's this horse that is amazingly quick which netted me a $100,000 profit. Nah, I'm just joking, I don't gamble. If you like to throw away money though, go to Macau.
- You should pick up some Cantonese.
It's just plain and simple, very useful to know some. Even just basic stuff.
There's places that just won't speak any English beyond things which are very basic and you will find it hard to get your point across in that situation.
I wouldn't get a book though. Get an interactive CD/mp3s/CD or something. Books (I found) don't convey properly the way things are supposed to be said.
With expat communities, I don't know where you would go... But I got work through this: http://hongkong.asiaxpat.com/ . I know you don't need a job, but it has useful links other than job related things.
HK Magazine (a free paper) has reviews and upcoming events/interesting venues which I sometimes found pretty good when I was there.