Modern AND Primitive

Down the street from our apartment.

We love Hong Kong! It is endlessly fascinating, and we feel it a genuine privilege to live here while we serve the Lord. Observing the city as we walk to and from the Church Administration building, we marvel at the complex surroundings. There are approximately 7 million people here in an area of 382 square miles (much of which is mountains where no one lives), making the population density 18,000 per square mile! Compare that with the League City/Kemah area of 2,000 people per square mile. As mentioned before, the people are all polite as they travel along the sidewalks, so there is no bumping or pushing, even though we are almost always surrounded by thousands of people. In fact, probably because for the most part they all live in small dwellings, and have not known anything different, rather than stay home in those small rooms, people look on getting out and walking as an enjoyable pastime, as evidenced by the crowds out on weekends.  

Hong Kong garbage truck.

Early-morning vegetable delivery.

Though this is a modern, cutting-edge place, we have noticed some primitive practices, such as the way garbage is collected. One-person crews push metal carts around to residential buildings and businesses and haul out the trash, heaping it on those carts--no trash trucks here. Deliveries to restaurants are often done in large wicker baskets in the early morning before the businesses open. The same electric streetcars that were in service when Craig was here 35 years ago still carry thousands of passengers daily, in open, un-airconditioned cars, known as "ding-dings" in both Cantonese and English, for the bell that sounds when they near a stop. 

Our own personal version of primitive is the way we dry our laundry, as you can see below. We run a dehumidifier (and the air conditioner) constantly and just have to empty the collector bucket more often when there's wet laundry hanging--about twice a day. There is a laundry room with "real" dryers up on the 18th floor (we live on the 12th floor) where I have taken Craig's shirts so they come out nice and wrinkle-free, since ironing those removes the wrinkle-resistant finish (it even says that on the inside of the shirts). These differences, along with many more, just make Hong Kong more endearing and fascinating to us!

Our dryer : )