New Pictures!

Same place as usual! I've posted about 600 new photos.

My Camera has a 4 gig SD chip so I went a bit power crazy. There are pictures from A trip I took to Lamma Island with some friends. We came across a Brush Fire at one point which was pretty spectacular. I've been keeping busy over break running around Hong Kong with friends!

On a sad note one of my friends has headed home. Jessica from Switzerland was here on a half year not a full year program and went home last night my time. Luckly there was only one student here for a half year, the rest of us are here together till the end!

In the run up to her departure there where many parties (similar to my departure from Seattle). Jessica was a bit different from the rest of the exchange students in that her mother is from Hong Kong and she came her with more than a cursory knowledge of the language. While maybe not completely fluent she was definitely conversational in Cantonese. So at the various parties for her departure there where many of her classmates as well as exchange students.

Her classmates as you can imagin3e are more prone to speaking Cantonese than English, and I've been practicing my Cantonese with them. I have learned a lot in the last few days and it's nice to feel that i can communicate basic ideas at least.

I'm hopeful that i'll be able to speak some by the end of this year though Chinese has proven harder to tackle than I originally anticipated.

Hong Kong is much as it ever was. Full of people rushing this way and that. I'm starting to get very familiar with the different parts of the city. Hong Kong island where I live and go to school is very easy for me to navigate now. I'm still amazed by the efficiency of the public transportation here, being used to the convoluted mess that is Seattle's bus system.

All in all Things are well.

Back to School on Thursday.

More later

Hope you are all doing well

Patrick

PHOTOS!!!

Sorry some of them are sideways you can see them though...

This is the IFC the tallest building in Hong Kong 88 floors.

This one is me and my "first friend" Terry on the balcony at the IFC Mall (not the top) Looking across Victoria Harbor to Kawloon
Me in the Central District in front of "Stair road" literal translation... it's basically a road with no cars and low uneven steps to trip you!
From My Home a blurry picture of Kowloon over Victoria harbor from the window in the living room Cruse ships pass by every day... I will post a picture of that later...
this is Aderial the little devil... he's 4 year's old and my younger brother he wont stop trying to play with the camera... he like to touch everything in sight... and is funny in my opinion but i don't have to be his parents.
This is a group shot of all the Exchange students in hong kong... a few people are. Me on the Far left, Farthest right is a boy from Turkey, First girl on the ground from the left is from Brazil and the Second is from Ecuador, both of them are very nice.

This is a picture of Me, Terry, and Another exchange student from Germany, She is the one on the far left both her parents are Vietnamese her first friend went to Germany and speaks German. the Vietnamese girl speaks Vietnamese, German, English, some Spanish and french and is now going to learn Cantonese... CRAZYNESS
Me at the bottom of the IFC
Friends from Cantonese class, the boy is from Argentina, and the Girl is from Ecuador

This is the Brazilian girl i met in the Airport. The boy who was with her is sick... :( She is very nice and it is fun talking to her, partly because her English isn't so good so there is a lot of gesturing!
The other native English speaker and the only other monolingual person in the class, from Australia

These are a bunch of pictures i took today using my host family's camera I will get my own camera soon. I may have said but my "First Friend" Terry is very cool she spent her year abroad in Austria....

The group of AFS students is diverse... there are kid's from Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, Iceland, turkey, Lot's from Italy and Germany, Switzerland, and Australia...

They are all very nice people and are alot of fun to be around tomorrow night we are all getting together for Italian food... (trust the Italians to want to go get Italian food even in hong kong)

I SAW A MEXICAN RESTRAUNT TODAY!!! only one though... i hope i can find it again if i need mexican food...

The food here is soooooo good... i had Hom bow for breakfast and lunch was curry and chicken and rice UMMMMM!

I went to my school yesterday... I'm kind of worried about it... it seems like all the BS from the us is there and larger than ever... but I made it though 2 years of BS in American HS i can do one year here...

School starts on Monday... Tomorrow I have an interview with a local newspaper... I'll post it here afterwards....

This is such an amazing place I'm loving it here...

It is very hot and humid here all the time you sweat all the time and learn to love Air Con! There are a lot of mall's in Hong kong which is good if only for the AC...

I hope i have a lot of time to explore with the other AFS student's that sound's like it will be amazing....

Life is good i hope you all are well. More later