Swim Meet and Fashion Disasters

First, I have to applaud, well ... me. The wonderful people over at YouTube are now supplementing this blog entry. I discovered I could do video with my digital camera, so I have a few videos to show you.

Anyways, today was the Intrahall Swim Meet. The Residential Halls here are very similar in behavior to U.S's fraternities and other Greek organizations. They have initiation, songs, and dances. It's very similar to what you would see in the states at university areas.

Anyways, I was given a uniform to wear... and I screamed.

Here it is, I cannot believe I'm uploading this to the web:


AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Sleeveless shirts. Look how white my arms are; I don't think they have seen the light in a sleeveless shirt in probably a decade. Tragic, truly tragic. Yes, I had to go public in that. The shop workers at Prada or Gucci are saying:

Person A: "Hey, did you feel that, there's a disturbance in the force."
Person B: "Yes, I feel it too, something I haven't felt before. It's so strong... call the fashion police quickly, and probably an ambulance. And get Ken's name on The List. He can't shop here anymore."
Person A: "Yes, Agreed." (scampers away)
Person B: "I haven't felt this level of disturbance since a Mr. David Buck put on a madras blazer and considered that fashion, most disturbing."


Other than the fat, err fact that I looked like a beached whale in an ugly shirt; I proceeded to go cheer my floor mates at the swim meet. My roommate Danny was participating (I could not, because the practices were during school time for me, very sad). I couldn't show off my swimming skillz.

Between the races, the different floors would sing songs and do choreographed dances. Here's one of them, thanks YouTube.



Wasn't that special? I wanted to tell the girls over there that I love Les Miserables. Dad, see they love it here in Asia too. The musical is the gateway to world peace.

Just to make Danny mad, here's a video of his first swimming meet. He won actually, so clap, clap, clap for him. I sound like a swimming instructor in the video... wait, I was a swimming instructor. Sorry for it being horizontal, I couldn't figure out how to rotate the whole video. :(



What you hear in the background, "Yat Lau," is Cantonese for "First Floor, First Floor." That's the cheer. You usually don't cheer a person, you cheer a segment of people -aka First Floor, Simon K.Y. Lee Hall, etc.

Speaking of applause, here in Hong Kong, you applaud everyone for everything around here. When you're introduced communally to someone, a person of prestige, power, one level above you, you applaud him. It's not like when you applaud someone given a speech. No, No, No... It’s more.

Person A: "This is Franklin, our Floor Representative."
Everyone Else: "Oooooooohh..." (commence applause)

It's very interesting. If anything I am learning is how different two cultures take social interactions and group mentality differently. Yay for being a team player (my mom and Leslie would be so proud).

Anyways, Please Mind the Gap - and the water on the digital camera.

~Ken

PS: Oi, Ah, San, Tsi, Ooh, Lai, Chi, Ba, Jian, Sin - I learned to count to ten in Putonghua today! Now I can order Chinese food and sound smart. hahahahaha.

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