Ni Hao, ni hao ma?

Hello everybody!

It's been indeed a long time since I wrote here. Life is busy, that sums it up pretty well. Assignments are coming in, only 5 weeks left for the 1st semester! It's amazing how time is flying so fast ! Been here already for two months now! Law school is really great, after 4 years of economic theories, it is really refreshing to be doing something that has real life, day-to-day, application! Also I've started to learn mandarin, it's a bit easier (at least for now) than I had expected, I guess trying to learn cantonese two years ago scared me off a bit, but now I have more interest (personal and profesional) to learn. Hong Kong is still warm around 30C even though we are almost at the end of October! Hopefully we'll get to see drop in temperature sometime soon, I'm getting tired of sweating around in HK.

Today I went to Shenzhen in mainland China! It's really amazing how much everything has improved in less than 2 years! It's becoming very modern, you could have sworn that your werent in the PRC anymore, which is quite an amazing feat in itself! It's really strange how different it still is from Hong Kong, you get a very different feeling even though most shops are similar and the language is most of the time the same. I've posted a small video and some pictures of the Dongmen area, which is the shopping district of Shenzhen!

That's all for me for today!

Francis

Back in Hong Kong

Hello Everybody!

I know, I know, it's been a really long time since I wrote on my blog! Been back in Hong Kong for ever just a month now! Everything has been going to an incredible pace: friends, law school, and daily life are all taking huge chunks of time which I must say are not easy to manage yet... but I'm slowly getting there! I finally found my apartment after 3-4 weeks of intense research in the most expensive city on earth for the housing market (at least according to last month's Time magazine). So now, I'm enjoying my amazing 1 and 1/2 in the middle of a district known as Prince Edward which is really great considering the apartment market in HK. I feel like I have finally arrived, hard to describe the feeling but I just feel I've been adrift in the past few weeks, now things are looking up so HK is starting to be more exciting! The weather is pretty bad though, it's very very very very humid and warm... on most day the temperature can reach 35-36C (up to 48C if you count the humidity index!!!) So it's pretty intense and it's draining most of my energy each time I go outside. Autumn has started which mean that the weather will get colder (well by colder I mean similar to early June in Canada). Law school is really interesting, way more interesting than I would have imagined, hopefully my motivation will remain the same :o) I'll try to post some more pictures as soon as I can. For now, I got to go to bed... Tomorrow another crazy week is starting !

35C today, not bad for September 28th!!!

Repulse Bay Beach

Chicago Pictures

Chicago Theatre

Millenium Park

The Last Domino

Hey guys!

Long time since I've posted anything new on my blog.... 2 weeks and half remaining... everything seems to be so unreal... I'm slowly getting prepared. I'm still fighting with the loan and bursuary bureau and I have yet to have a definite answer regarding the whole thing. Luckily my friend Laurence got me to think about taking a student loan at a Bank and now I feel a whole lot safer money wise. I'm really wondering how everything is going to be... if my program will suit me, if HK will be as great as I remember it. It's hard to explain that I dont want it to be the same but human mind is always using memories to build up the anticipation. So yes, I dunno how it's gonna be, everything is coming really fast and I have yet to realize the new challenge i'm undertaking. Let's see how the Honky in Hong Kong will do for this new year, shall we? It's all confusing, frightning, exciting at the same time, and the only thing I can do is to try not to freak out by overthinking everything. There's a great deal of uncertainty in everything, the more you are willing to risk, the higher the yield. Of course this is a bit dramatic, HK isn't another planet, or a definitive path that must lead to sucess but rather just a chapter, not necessarily an important one. I need closure with HK, with last year and I need to start a life for myself in HK... If I'm not able to do so, I might as well come back to Montreal.

So ready or not, Hong Kong, here I come... I dunno where it's gonna take me, but at the end of the day I'm sure I will have made the right choice.

So to all my HK friends who are reading this, be ready, because I'm ready to attack everything that will be thrown at me :o)

-F

Summer in Montreal

Hello everybody!

I'm glad to be finally back on the web !! The past four weeks have been pretty hectic in general, moving out to my mum's place, spending time dealing with bureaucracy and worrying a lot about whether I would get the student loan for Hong Kong. Anyway things are starting to look better now, my student visa application has just been approuved and the waiting period is almost over to see if my program will be indeed recognized by the Quebec government... So, I'll keep my fingers crossed and hope that everything will be fine... maybe that's too optemistic but I have no other choice than wait and wonder. I'm thinking about going to NYC really soon to meet with one the great girl I have come to know in the past year! If she can't make it, I don't mind going there on my own and go sightseeing for a weekend... It's funny that New York is 8 hours away from Montreal and before this year I never actually consider going because I never stopped to think that this city had anything worthwhile to see... Outside of thinking about school, and slowly preparing myself to leave Montreal, there isn't much going on for me this summer.

I've included here some pictures I took last week when a friend of mine from NYC came to visit Montreal with her boyfriend. These are pictures from "Festival International de Jazz de Montreal" which is one of the biggest outdoor music festival in the world. Each years I go there when I can, I just like to walk around and see the crowds... It's really a well planned festival which is growing in popularity each years.

I guess this is one of the official mascots of the festival. Meow!

Kung Fu/Chinese Tale/Breakdancing/Comedy

Colourful grafiti wall

I hope that by next time I post on that blog, I will have positive news about the whole process

Meanwhile, everybody please take care :o)
-F

When I'm 24

Hello everybody!

Thanks a lot for all the birthday wishes! Especially to those I took the extra time to send me elaborate emails! This birthday has been quite simple but probably the best one that I can remember in recent years.



Merci a tous !
-F

Les Douzes Travaux de Francis

Greetings everybody!

The past week has been an emotional roller coaster. First finding out after 1 year of planning (and 8 weeks from departure) that my program is not recognized by the Quebec government was a bit difficult to digest. Luckily, even though it looked a bit bad in the beginning, it's supposed to be a very straight forward procedure since the university is already recognized and that I'm the first Quebecois to go there.


Between that and fighting with clueless clerk at the faculty of Law in HK, I'm trying not to go crazy over all the stuff I have to finish before I leave. It really feels like Les Douzes Travaux d'Asterix, I guess most of you guys don't know what I'm refering to. Basically, its mock-up version of the twelve extraordinary tasks that Hercules needed to complete in order to prove that he was worthy of being a god. I feel that I somehow need to prove that I'm worthy to go back and that the whole ordeal is just a test to see if I measure up to the challenges up ahead. Tonight is also my last night in my apartment, it would maybe be a sad moment except that I have no special memory about this place. There's only 60 days left before I go back to HK, I don't know what kind of challenges still lie up ahead but I feel I've been through the most frustrating part, so everything should be smooth from now on... i hope...

-F

PS: This video is a good showcase of how nice HK can be, and also how Westerners are always portrayed.

Motion in the Ocean

I decided to call this post "Motion in the Ocean" because I feel that my life has suddenly switched from being extremely calm to extremely busy. I guess it has to be expected, especially when you are moving (litterally) to the other side of the world...

A lot has happened during the last month. Me finally graduating is major change, has I'm no longer bound to live in Montreal just so I can finish my education; the world is now mine to play with. Seems I've spent all my life thinking and working toward being an adult and now that I'm there staring at the choices and possibilities that this world is offering me, I'm finding myself to be at a crossroad in my life. Seems as we get older the main difference is in the question we ask ourselves. I guess it's true when they say it's more in the questions than the answers themselves.

Also, I had to say goodbye to Raissa AKA the Mexican girl. I have been a bit sad over her departure. Dont get me wrong, I have had to say goodbye to a lot of people in my life so I'm pretty much used to it... but I guess some people are harder to forget than others. Without sounding like a cliche, I feel it's hard to explains what she meant to me. It's not that we had such a close relationship or that she had such a big impact but rather because the relationship was so simple in its own twisted way. I feel that she's larger than life in her own way, she has a great inner strengh and I guess that's what attracted to me to her at first. I will miss our discussions, our ackwardness, but mostly her boldness and her amazing smile. Saying "adios" to her felt like my days in Montreal were finally over and that I needed to move on to the next chapter of my life.

On the work side, everything is going great. I guess the secret to happiness at the workplace is mostly dependable on the people you work with. Some people just make the working day seems
less like a chore but rather like an interesting project where everybody has their part to play. Ubisoft and it's people have taugh me many things over the year, and I guess the irony is that I'm realizing it 2 months before my definitive departure.

It feels strange to think that in 2 months and 1 week I'll be back in Hong Kong. It seems that I have spent so much thinking about it that it doesnt seems like it's real anymore. Sometime I try to remember certain things about it but wonder if I'm making it all up in my mind. Everybody seems to want to meet me once I'm back in HK, I understand that it's quite normal but I dont feel like being rushed back into these relationships. People there sometime have a hard time to understand that moving from one continent to another is a great ordeal physically and mentally. I think I will bring some deception to some people but they will have to understand that I have to sort out my own life before going back into this hectic chaos.

That's all for me for today, I need to call CUHK once again to get them to sign a !&#@$^ of paper! Ahhh red tape bureaucracy in HK, how I missed you!

-F

East Asia Skyline

Beijing (from the top of the Summer Palace)

Shanghai (from the top of the Oriental Pearl Tower)

Tokyo (from the top of the Tokyo Tower)

Seoul (from of the top of Building 63)

South East Asia Skyline

Macau (from the top of Ruins of St. Paul's)

Bangkok (from the top of the Golden Mount)

Kuala Lumpur (from the top of the Petronas Twin Towers)

Kuala Lumpur (from the top of the KL Tower)

Rise and Fall, Rage And Grace

Long time since I wrote on this blog. Usually I wouldnt write anything because I don't think I'm living such an interesting life that needs to be utterly detailled on this blog. But seems Cat seems to think that I should write more, so I'm giving it a go...

Three months 'til i'm coming back to HK... it feels so strange to have been thinking about it for a whole year and starting to see the end of it coming so close. I still have some much to do, and so much uncertainties surrounding it that it's a bit hard for me to enjoy it a lot... Spend half of my time worrying about money and getting all the papers done on time for departure. Something wondering whether or not if I should stay and fight this moribund life with more strenght... but I guess if my heart isn't there at all there's no point in staying here, even if at time I feel a bit regretful that I can't do better with this life... Fortunetely, I always put myself in situation that I have no way of backing down, so my mood variations have no chances of make me change my decisions. I guess that's good, always to be going forward with projects but most of the time never living in present tense.

Music is something really important for me, as it defines the mood, the atmosphere of my life... So i'm always grateful when somebody introduces me to something new, something I like and that makes me feel different about life. Recently I started to listen to a band called McFly, quite upbeat songs, reminiscent of the beatles maybe with some over tone of the beach boys... Very pop but feels good to listen to simple melodies during summer time. I'm also waiting for the new Offspring album, Rise And Fall, Rage and Grace... The title sounds too much like my life, I'm really eager to listen to it!


Outside of that, not much is happening really. Spend my time on msn, dreaming of better days that are coming soon... The most funny thing is that people are prone to think that I'm coming back for a girl, or for the friends I have left behind... of course I miss them a lot but there's no girl or friend that would make me want to go back that much... At the same time I really enjoyed my time in HK, but I feel I have grown up since I left and want different stuff for myself. A different life, different priorities... It's hard to explain to people, because most of the time they feel as they know you... At time it's true, but I think rather that we get to know people in certain period of their life but it rarely give us a true insight on what really goes on in their mind...

What a shame, I have this really long weekend for myself, and I spend it watching some old movies and playing games on my roomate' xbox360... What a life... But still could be worst I guess... But HK is coming soon, only 3 months away! So better start doing something with this summer because time unfortunetely isn't going to comeback...

Haha, I hope you are glad cat, I finally wrote my first post in a long long time... feels strange to be pouring my thoughts on this blog... I guess if thousands of people are doing it each day, it must be normal...

That's all for me for today!
F.

Moving Back To Hong Kong!

Hello Everybody!

It's official, I got my offer from CUHK's law school! I'm quite happy about the whole thing, and the people who know me, know that I have been waiting for this for quite sometimes! There's still so much to do before I go back there, but at least there's a tangible goal ahead which makes everything seemingly so much easier! All new adventures starting on August 26th... stay tuned for upcoming updates !

Francis

Downtown Montreal

Picture from Place Ville-Marie

Cathedral of Marie-Reine-du-Monde

Park near the church

McGill University Campus (Montreal)

Our Amazing Ice Rink :o)

Entrance of the Campus

McGill's Main Buildings

View Of Downtown Montreal