Picture taken on 8/8 at noon at Tsim Tsai Tsui, Hong Kong. This was a non-rainy, “sunny” day.
I never felt Hong Kong was THAT polluted until recently. I used to see blue skies quite frequently, but for the past couple of weeks there were none. Combine the smog with the sweltering heat, I have to force myself to leave my apartment every day.
The past Saturday was so bad that I could see the smog in the air. It made everything fuzzy. It came as no surprise when I read in the newspapers that with the exception of the sandstorm that hit Hong Kong in 2010, pollution has not been so bad since 1999 when pollution recording first began. The government urges everyone, especially the sick and elderly to stay indoors as the pollution reached record levels.
After a year of never opening my windows and having the air purifier run 24/7, I am fed up. I am more aware than ever that I need not suffer this horrible air quality. I can just pack up and leave. Right now I am craving the scent of clean, crisp, and fresh air.
Ahh, this post reminds me so much of my time living in Beijing — your photo takes me right back there! Bon courage!
I always took good air quality for granted. Never will do so again.
I was too dazzled by the Beijingers’ personalities to care that I never left campus or that the air was always dusty to the point of coming back to a dusty room.
Beijingers – omg – Jet Li’s teenage smile was not a fluke – that place makes good people.
My mother thought her old schoolmate was strange when she moved to NEW TERRITORIES when she couldn’t take the rough talk from local shopkeepers on Hong Kong side. They detected and resented her returnee status. I think I would just ignore every one and try to learn Cantonese if I were there but people do miss the easygoing-ness of NYC/USA.
I can imagine how you feel about open windows. When I see apartments with water views, they are also in front of the highways so what is the point?
Is retail not interesting anymore? I don’t mean the luxury stores – just retail in general which I DO find interesting about being in Hong Kong – more so than in Taiwan which I find logical and understandable in a natural progression way.
HK retail strikes me as something else like it is an organized hydra.
I don’t shop much just groceries mainly. I favor a minimalist look and dislike clutter. With my apt being quite small I cannot buy anything without throwing something I already own out.
I have so many books especially on Japan that I don’t know whether to send to the “Books for China” or the American veterans organization. I think the latter because they are more convenient, to give thanks to the soldiers and because I don’t think Chinese students learning English should be reading my Japanese books. They wouldn’t be reading it from my position.
I would never do this precisely because of the air quality concerns you have cited:
http://www.boweryboogie.com/2012/08/45-canal-street-to-become-single-family-residence/
When I saw the Singapore and HK supermarket shelves, I saw opportunity. An American businessman is developing the warehousing industry near Shanghai.
German appliance makers are definitely making money with smaller sized models and the cachet of Europeanness.
But I think Americans can take ‘em out. Look what Apple did to Japanese handheld devices. Sudoku who?
As Michael Jackson would sing, “Heee Heee!”
Oh, yeah and NY1 keeps showing this news piece about a German guy doing what was attempted in Shanghai a few years ago BUT he is too greedy because he wants to charge penny pinching NY cabbies MONTHLY for an app that will allow prospective passengers to alert subscribing cabs that a ride is needed at such and such an address.
You know how human nature works and how NYC works – are we really going to wait while the designated cab is stuck in traffic eight blocks away when a nonsubscribing cab stops right in front of us?
And are we really going to pass up a hail if we have a passenger POSSIBLY waiting for us a few blocks away?
It’s not true love, it’s a CAB/FARE.
It’s just like the Haubs forcing my local Pathmark to lock up the shopping carts with quarters – which is considered a clever deterrent in Germany. It is a PITA. My local Target uses the French innovation of making the carts lock if they go beyond the perimeter of the parking lot.
Speaking of living in the midst of bad air, Sky View Parc is next to an asphalt plant and on the outskirts of a superfund site:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/04/realestate/a-new-start-for-an-ambitious-queens-condo-complex.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss
One of the things we said before we left HK for NYC on the weekend was “I can’t wait to escape from the bad air”. I can’t imagine there are many places you can say that with respect to NYC. I’m glad we’re missing the worst of it (most especially because of my son’s asthma – he’s not even 4!), but sorry that everyone back home still has to endure it. I avoid going outdoors when the haze is present – which is not easy because I’m such an outdoorsy person. I put up a photo comparison on my blog a few weeks ago, of HK hazy vs clear, and the difference is quite incredible:
http://expatgourmand.blogspot.com/2012/07/hazy-in-hong-kong.html
Nice pictures, the difference is incredible.
I never imagined that HK’s air would be so bad. In my previous 4 visits, I have never seen haze so I thought it was much ado about nothing. But it is very severe, almost as bad as Shanghai’s.
I remember my friend was telling me that Sky View Parc’s feng shui was very bad and that the apartments are very small. But I know very little about feng shui and never been inside Sky View Parc.