After living in Hong Kong, I know what Tide tastes like.  There are a couple of stores in Hong Kong which import US products from warehouse stores.  They specialize in bulk items from Cosco or BJs – Frosted Miniwheats in a two-box value pack, 72 oz sacks of Chocolate Chips, gargantuan bottles of BBQ sauce and maple syrup, that 5 pack of deodorant you feel compelled to buy but will never use up – that type of stuff. These shops are great for a taste of home, until you realize that many of the items will not fit in your HK size fridge. Once opened, crackers, cereal, or cashews in giant containers will become instantly stale in the high humidity.  Charmin is a nice lift from home, until those giant rolls get slightly damp from the high humidity (most rolls for sale in HK are individually wrapped in plastic, for good reason).

Anyway, both of these shops have proved a great place for us to buy Swiss Miss, Cheezits, the aforementioned chocolate chips, and soap that smells like home (Irish Spring, Cascade, Tide). After a recent shopping trip, Tommy and I each purchased a bottled water (not labeled for individual sale, but sold that way anyway).  As we were walking home and drinking the water, Tommy noted that it tasted like something familiar, but couldn’t quite discern what. That’s because he was tasting Tide.  When you ship scented Tide, Gain or Bounce in a container along with other items like cereal and bottled water, the fresh scent permeates everything. The stores don’t really acknowledge this; one used to have signs near the cereal warning that Americans like their cereal to taste a bit like soap. If you are one of those blessed with a sensitive palate, they advise, think twice about buying, since goods are not returnable. Even when your Cheerios practically suds up.

While most of our friends and relatives in the US have been gripped in a winter so epic it will go down in history, you should be aware that Hong Kong has been suffering through a similar cold snap.  At least you would think so, given the complaints and cold weather warnings here.

Cold ahead! Good thing it will only be “rather cool” on Saturday morning.

It has been “cold” in Hong Kong, when you understand that HK is subtropical and unused to anything even approaching freezing.  Cold Weather Warnings abounded last week and this week.  With night time temps hovering around 9 degrees Celsius (for all my fellow Americans – double and add 30 to convert to Fahrenheit), it feels pretty chilly for a city used to complaining about punishing heat. It does not feel chilly enough, mind you, for my kids to switch to long sleeves or ditch their shorts in favor of pants.

However, many others here embrace the “cold” as an opportunity to wear winter fashions best suited to those in the middle of a polar vortex.  Boots, furs, puffy down jackets, mittens, trapper hats – I’ve seen more winter sartorial statements here than I have in Truckee. If you don’t know Truckee, it’s a town famous for its proximity to Donner pass, where the Donner Party resorted to cannibalism after getting trapped in the snow.

Better still are the Cold Weather Warnings, issued by the Hong Kong Observatory and earnestly reminding residents to protect themselves from the elements.

50 degrees above or 50 degrees below – it’s all relative.

I know it’s been a lousy winter for you all, but consider us here in HK.  Do you know how cold 46 degrees can feel?  Oh wait, you probably do.  Just remember, if you must go out “please avoid prolonged exposure to wintry winds”. Because for most of you this winter, that’s actually good advice.

Most leases in Hong Kong run for 2 years. When we moved here, we were aware that the boys’ school was moving from the city to the New Territories – off Hong Kong Island and over to the mainland, past Kowloon.  We fully expected we would enjoy a year in the city and then move ourselves out to Clearwater Bay or Sai Kung.  It didn’t happen. We like being in the city too much. We arrived at the last month of our lease and dove back into the HK rental market.

If you are an expat living in Hong Kong, you know there is nothing quite so demoralizing as looking at 1500 square foot apartments that cost upwards of US$10,000 a month and are most accurately described as decrepit, rundown, moldy, or filthy.  If you are not an expat living in Hong Kong, I am sure you can’t imagine how on earth something that costs so much could be so bad. The Hong Kong property market is like an industrial-strength bubble. Even when it is “soft” there is no budging many landlords on price. They are much more willing to let an apartment sit empty than negotiate a lower price on a lease. Less money would be losing face.

When searching for apartments, I encountered dead cockroaches, mold-spattered kitchens and closets, warped parquet floors, peeling laminate, naked wiring, creative plumbing, and in one memorable apartment, elaborate swooping maple and frosted glass built-ins that seemed to have dropped in the middle of the floor. We finally asked if we could renovate that kitchen ourselves in one apartment – to be met with the sage advice that it couldn’t be changed because it was “too old”.

After fruitlessly negotiating on two “finalists”, we decided to stay put. Although we did feel lucky – our building had been renovating and ousting residents by raising the rent to ridiculous levels (even for Hong Kong), we were lucky enough to get a flat extension of our lease. We fell back on the real estate adage “location, location, location”. From our current apartment, the commute is a dream for Tommy, the boys don’t mind the relatively direct 50 minute bus ride to school, and we all like being able to walk into the city.  So, we are staying put.

Sometimes, this is the view. But at other times, it’s pretty spectacular!

And when the fog lifts, you get this – just a few hours later.