Hong Kong Life

So it’s almost been a month since I’ve moved from UK to HK. For the most part, adjustment to “life” has pretty smooth since HK is not unfamiliar to me. Even the heat is now bearable, though it is now October, but I did get sunburn on a boating trip. Mosquitoes still bother me. I’m used to getting bitten by them but they still keep me up at night so my sleeping pattern is a bit screwed.

Life here in general is pretty good, many things better than the UK; some things not as good. Traveling is cheaper here, I find myself going to further places and more often just because it’s easy and cheap. It’s made networking and meeting people a lot easier on my time and my wallet. To compare, in UK I spend about £15+ for a return journey from Brighton to London (approx 1 hour) which is about $188+ ($12 to £1). I can go the same distance in HK for more or less £1, that’s cheaper than my 10 minute commute from Portslade to Brighton!

There are many more things better than UK such as cheaper food, nicer food, and choice of food (You see where I’m getting at?), activities, night life, and so on so I’ll jump straight into the other end of the spectrum.

Cost of living is a bummer here. I’m living with relatives so that weight is off my shoulders. The problem is that salaries are a lot lower here, actually to be specific, that is not the problem as everything else is cheaper too. The problem is that the rent is ridiculous compared to what you earn and the space you get for your money. That’s all I’m going to say as I’ve not experienced this first hand.

The other real downer is, from what I’ve heard from chatting to people, is that the web scene is behind the rest of the world. Apparently Flash is still used commonly, UX hasn’t broken into the mainstream and clients don’t appreciate the design side of things (by design I mean functional, pleasure of using something rather than graphical). The reoccurring topic is that local HK companies are generic, churn out websites like machines and disregard UX. Not to say all are like that but that was the feeling I was getting. On the other hand, it seemed like local web heads who have had some sort of experience outside of HK (maybe even Asia?) really do care about UX as well as expats (that I’ve met) who work and live here. It feels good and bad at the same time as it’s depressing hearing about how bad the web scene is but feels pretty good to be in the movement in the rise of UX (slowly but surely I hope). Maybe it’s a cultural thing, maybe it’s not. I’ve met some amazingly clever people who are updated on what’s really going on in the web industry which makes me happy.

Anyway, I’m still jobless but at least I’ve found people.