05.16.10

"…to catch her attention swift and quick, or morrow the marrow of her bones be thick." – Smashing Pumpkins; 'Cupid de Locke'

When in foreign countries, I am apparently wont to daydream about the girls I have associated with in the past. I am unsure what that makes of me. Is it that my mind wanders aimlessly or that those girls had nudged closer to my brain and heart and nearer to my unconscious than i had known?

I am sitting in the Hung Hom train station. It is the main station on the Kowloon side of Hong Kong (HK). A great big, square place, with great big windows all about on 3 of the 4 sides, the station is rife with a number of people, foreigners and HKers, milling about to wherever. There are a number of captive birds flitting to and fro in this modern aviary. I felt sorry for the little critters at first. Now, I see that these birds, stolen from their freer skies, are actually feasting on what-have-you's that we, people, have dropped. The birds escape through a minute design flaw in the riveted ceiling.

The buildings outside are HK buildings. They are all really big and broad, dominating whole fields of vision. One edifice after another make up the HK landscape (secret: I don't know how to use 'edifice' and am too lazy to look it up...or actually, my computer is running out of the batt'ries :P.) There are buildings, and there is Victoria Harbor. So many buildings – the fog or smog or steam obscure them further down on the horizon. Outside, taxes have lined up on the wrong side of the street (the left side that is, something that I will probably never get used to), all red and capable of seating up to 5 passengers. I know these fun facts because 1) I have my contacts in and 2) because every taxi has a little green sign on the front and back which blare their transport capacity. I feel that I would feel bad about asking a taxi driver to transport only myself somewhere. I imagine the tout/driver, dressed in his pristine blue uniform, looking down his nose up at me condescendingly…upwards (I am not a tall American, but I am larger than practically everyone here).

HK signs are in both Chinese and English. I am glad, for if they didn't, I would have never successfully navigated the metro. That would mean, I would not be typing but would be crying somewhere in the bowls of Kowloon.

"Hello, white girl dressed in all black eating a croissant and drinking some herbal tea" (I am sure it's herbal, cos that's what chicks drink for some reason). A long time ago, I wrote a song about what just walked past me without looking (enter objectification of women). How in the hell do people meet other people in big cities? In smaller towns, it's easy, as there is literally no one else around. Imagine standing in an elevator all day, of how awkward it is when the 'lift' is packed and also dead silent. People residing within cities lack any attention span because they see so many other people. Unless I go to a shop or store where someone must go to work everyday, I do not see the same person twice here. Although there is something refreshing about seeing new faces, but how does a body take any hold in this place? Truly, I enjoy HK, though I do not quite connect with this city. Then again, I don't connect anywhere. :} Okay, enough fretting, my train's here and I can stop babbling.