Jan 13
Days before Bama and I were due to leave for our much-awaited year-end trip, my dad sent me a screenshot of the latest weather forecast for Hong Kong and urged us to pack warm clothes. He was right to worry. It turned out to be the coldest Christmas I had probably experienced back home, with temperatures in the city falling to 8 or 9°C (about 46–48°F) at first — downright chilly compared to equatorial Indonesia. Read more
Nov 30
“Doesn’t it feel like you’ve come home?”
My tablemate posed me the question over lunch at Man Wah, a refined Cantonese restaurant on the 25th floor of Mandarin Oriental, Hong Kong. Before polishing off a small platter of the best dim sum I’d eaten all year, I couldn’t help revealing my personal connection to the storied five-star hotel dubbed the MO. More than a decade ago, when this blog was still in its relative infancy, I worked at the bustling Mandarin Cake Shop for two months. Now, I had returned as an invited guest. It felt as though life had come full circle. Read more
Jan 14
There are two sides to Hong Kong: a vertical city of frenetic streets and heaving metro stations where commuters run between platforms to catch the next train, and an astonishing wonderland of hiking trails, secluded beaches, and more than 250 outlying islands. One of the highlights of my recent trip back was a half-day excursion with my father to Tung Lung Chau. Literally “East Dragon Island,” the 242-hectare outcrop of volcanic rock – about 70 percent the size of New York’s Central Park – guards the eastern approaches to Victoria Harbour. Read more
Dec 18
I don’t recall the last time I saw the waters of Victoria Harbour gleaming in such a radiant blue-green hue. The summery conditions and flawless blue skies are wholly unexpected on this late October morning. Several days into my first trip back to Hong Kong after almost three years of Covid-induced separation from my parents and extended family, I’ve boarded a ferry to eastern Kowloon for an 8:15 appointment to renew my local ID card. I’m more than a little envious of the dozen or so other passengers on the ship – no commute in traffic-clogged Jakarta is as scenic and relaxing as this. Read more
Apr 12
A brisk 45-minute walk each weekday down flat city roads is a poor substitute for exercise. I’m realizing this as I sit gasping for breath on a large rock somewhere in the mountains of Hong Kong’s Lantau island, hopelessly exposed to the midday sun and delirious with nausea. If only there was a patch of shade to lie down in, I silently lament. It is much too hot for Christmas Eve. Read more
Jan 25
“What does your revolution look like?” The words jump out, bright and clear, from the frosted glass façade of a multistory shopping arcade on a busy Kowloon intersection. In ordinary times, such a tongue-in-cheek question might be an innocuous reminder to strive for positive change, but this is Hong Kong at the tail end of 2019, more than six months into what has been termed an uprising, a rebellion, and the greatest challenge to Communist rule in China since 1989. Read more
Jan 1
When I moved to Indonesia last May, I promised my parents I would be back for Christmas. But it was a strange feeling to return to a place where I’d lived for nearly 20 years. Apart from a high-rise hotel taking shape on the Kowloon waterfront, and a handful of other construction sites, it appeared that my hometown had barely changed at all. Read more
Jan 15
Running along a windswept ridge on the southeast arm of Hong Kong Island, Dragon’s Back might just be the most famous hiking trail in the territory. In recent years it has also become a major draw for tourists, especially since TIME magazine named it the ‘Best Urban Hike in Asia’ back in 2004. I had long known of its existence, but it took Bama’s third trip to Hong Kong, and a sudden spell of clear weather, for me to revisit the trail after a hiatus of six or seven years.
May 25
A poem for Hong Kong, inspired by Maya Angelou’s “On the Pulse of Morning”. Read more
Jan 26
There is an old Chinese idiom which expresses a person’s unbreakable ties to their family, hometown, and ancestral land: “Falling leaves return to their roots”. Read more
Plus Ultra 