So I’ve been in HK for about 7 months now and putting aside the issues I’ve written about previously, the country is a great place to live – full of excitement, colour, vibrancy and creative people.
However there’s a few things that I miss and one of those is the difficulty to listen in to other people’s conversations.
OK, so it’s easy if they speak English … even American … but when the majority of the population speak an entirely different language – one I am endeavouring to get a grip on – I know I am missing out on tons of ‘stuff’.
To be honest, this desire to hear other people’s conversations isn’t just because it’s obviously very useful for work, it’s because I’ve always found it very interesting for life.
Whilst the work issue is a major one, having lived/worked in none-English speaking countries for quite a few years, I’ve been able to find ways to help me get around this issue whilst still picking up the subtleties and intricacies of conversation and none-verbal communication … but as this is the first time I’ve lived in a country where English isn’t the main language – and I have little desire to spend all my time hanging around the people who only speak the ‘mother tongue’ – I spend an inordinate amount of time people watching, wishing I could easily understand what it was they were saying, even if in reality they are probably talking about [1] how shit Speidi were on ‘I’m a celebrity, get me out of here’ or [2] why the freaky 4-eyed white guy is staring at them.