This week I finally went to the Hong Kong Museum of Art (on Wednesday when it's free!). The building is on the waterfront at TST, which is one of my favourite areas in Hong Kong, but it's not exactly an architecturally pleasing building. Luckily the exhibitions inside are a bit better. I saw 2 galleries of old style Chinese art (bamboo scrolls with birds and flowers or misty looking mountains and a bit of Chinese poetry down the side), a room full of Chinese ceramics (the exhibition contains examples of pots from all the different dynasties and wasn't terribly exciting) and a contemporary exhibitions called Made in Hong Kong (the work of 7 different artists currently working in Hong Kong). I liked a few of the old scroll type works, but after a few rooms of it they started to seem very similar. The contemporary exhibition was nice because most of the works made reference to things that I've actually experienced or seen in Hong Kong. I also found some maps on display as part of the Charter collection which was a huge collection of works in colonial times but can now all fit into one small room. It was interesting to see how Hong Kong looked back in the day but there was a guided tour going on in the room so I didn't stay for long.
Yesterday I went back to the Museum of Teaware in Hong Kong park to take part in a Wuwo Tea Ceremony with some other Chatteris people. The ceremony comes from Taiwan and 'celebrates the pursuit of ideals of peace, sharing, simplicity and naturalness' (or so says the leaflet they gave us!). The idea is that each person brings their own teaware and their own tea and shares it with the others, and no one is accorded any special rank because the order of sitting in the circle is decided by drawing numbers out of a hat and each person has to serve tea to the 3 people on their left and receive tea from the 3 people on their right. It's a really nice idea but our group had slight difficulties because we didn't really know how to go about preparing the Chinese tea! We had traditional style teapots which can easily sit in the palm of your hand, tiny little teacups that hold about 3 sips of tea, a big bowl that you use for pouring out waste water or used tea leaves and a delicate tray and 'delivery' jug that you use to serve your tea to the other people. It was quite fun, despite our cluelessness, and it's the sort of thing that you'd be very tempted to try at home if you had all the necessary bits of miniature crockery.
After all that Chinese culture, it was time to reinstate some British traditions, so last night I went to a Burns supper! Scott had invited some people round to his flat and prepared haggis, neeps and tatties for us all. There wasn't a piper to pipe in the haggis but Scott did a very good job at reciting the first verse of 'To a Haggis' from memory and afterwards a really tasty meal we gathered round the TV to watch a DVD of Scotch and Wry! It all felt so comfortable and homely that it was a bit of shock to go back out on the street and be greeted by a blast of Cantonese conversation.
Haggis, Neeps and Tatties.
School has been very quiet this week due to students being on exams and me hiding in the heated staffroom. Back to normal for next week though.
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