Please note that this entire strip is a figment of my imagination: none of the “dreams” have come true, nor have any of the anxieties. Perhaps I’m a wee bit anxious about my re-entry into expat life after a long summer break. While I’m not a new expat, I am new to Hong Kong. In the few months we’ve lived there I’ve had extreme culture shock over the weird neighborhood we live in, have received threatening letters in Chinese from loan sharks, and have faced the roughest “homesickness” in seven years (It’s actually possible to be homesick for mainland China, England and America all at once).
It will all be fine… but it sure feels good to “write” a strip about it.
A few notes:
If you’re a student of Mandarin, please have a look at the very well done site, Chinese Reading Practice. My vulgar Mandarin in the cartoon was lifted directly from this entry. (And yes, I realize that Cantonese is spoken in Hong Kong; being understood in Mandarin in Hong Kong is another one of my fantasies.)
Also, if you like comics, please check out the talented artist C.C. Yi (釋拾一) at the blog Macau ’41. The blog features a very cool (work in progress) graphic novel based in Macau. As C.C. Yi puts it:
“Macau ’41″ is my graphic novel project about a story in 1940′s Macau. It starts as a parody or insinuation to the 1942 classic movie “Casablanca”, but it goes much further. It’s a story about movie, Colonialism, WW II, China, and the contemporary vintage culture in general. It’s Noir + romance + adventure + a slight of nostalgic indulgence.
Welcome back to Asia! I’m sure everything will work out.
Thanks very much!
People can be very unpleasant in crowded spaces. Don’t read too much into it and everything will be fine. The Chinese Reading Practice entry is a good laugh. Of course the Macau ’41 is another useful lead :-). Thanks so much for your tag!
I thought of Macau ’41 on the long flight back to Hong Kong yesterday, as I had the chance to re-watch the first part of Casablanca on the plane. Cheers!
Macau ’41 is very cool Thanks for the tip. Welcome back to reality land…..
Yes, back to reality: the internet is at a crawl, my favorite tree was torn out by typhoon Vicente, and I was up with jet lag at 4 am. On a bright note: my husband set the coffee pot to auto-brew at 5 am. Small victories!
Good luck with your dreams and the homesickness! Love the telling off of the taxi driver, I have learned something today : D
Happily my homesickness has abated and I have had no cause to tell off a taxi driver (yet). Nice to see new drawings/paintings popping up on your blog again!