Living in HK...

My husband and I are Singaporeans. We were married for a year, before he had a job posting in HK. So, we packed our bags and moved to HK about 1.5 years ago. When we first came, I was jobless and had a lot of free time to explore how to cook and do housework.

I can’t even fry an egg, can’t even iron a single cloth, etc. However, after 3 months, I was able to do all these and much more… My daily routine as a housewife (not Tai Tai! Tai Tai doesn’t need to perform any household chores) was to wake up early, prepare breakfast for my hubby. Then, clean up the whole house – Clean furniture, vacuum and mop the floor. I will then go explore HK supermarkets, shopping centers and wet markets. After that, I will prepare dinner. Sometimes, I will try out the dinner dishes by preparing them for lunch.

After some time, I grew bored and became very obsessed in maintaining a clean home. I can’t stand a single strand of hair or even a speck of dust. It got so bad that my hubby says I got 洁癖. Finally, I found a project and it doesn’t matter now if my house has 100 strands of hair :p

At first glance, HK is actually quite similar to Singapore… Same tall buildings, same shopping centers, same workaholics. However, after some time, you will notice some distinct differences. The language is mainly Cantonese. However, they are more proficient in Mandarin recently.

The maids in HK have defined working hours and they have their own free time on Sundays and public holidays. The rich/poor gap is larger in HK. And HK is really a shopping haven! There are so many varieties of brands and they are so much cheaper in HK. There are some things that you can’t even buy in Singapore, even when you have money, as the brands are not available in Singapore.

As for food, the quality in HK is much better. However, I still miss Singapore local fare – Laksa, Roti Prata, Curry, Hokkien Mee etc…