Raising Rockstar

Call the title a tribute to my Malaysian friends. Call it ungrammatical, or call it Manglish (you know, like Singlish.) Kings and I have been here 7 years, it qualifies us to apply as Hong Kong Permanent Residents, and apparently “you get to keep this forever,” in Kings’ words. (Which I guess means it doesn’t “expire” since obviously you can certainly still lose it.)

“Your document is… interesting,” the Immigration officer remarks, after first asking if I prefer English or Cantonese “There’s no way of knowing which one’s your family name.” When I laugh he grins and carries on. “In Hong Kong we would call that <pointing> your Christian name, but since it’s not specified in your (Malaysian International Passport) ‘Aileen’ could be some kind of family name for all we know. But anyway it was clarified on your HKID and your application is approved and please proceed to …”

(I still think HK Immigration are some of the nicest immigration we’ve encountered in our travels, which is saying something because of the contrast with your average local taxi driver/ waiter/ auntie on the street etc who is very much NOT the nicest we’ve encountered. We find people in Hong Kong, local or foreign, are outspoken and complain say, about government policies and other stuff that would otherwise be considered erm “caution topics” in say, Malaysia or Singapore… But I believe it can be a luxury that some of the people here who enjoy being outspoken overlook – probably because they are too busy being outspoken/ complaining about something to notice.)

At the next counter Kings, who got there 5 or 10 mins before I did and is several numbers ahead of me, asks me to come along when his number is up. Winding through a sea of cubicles, we end up in front of a jovial auntie-type and Kings asks if we can process our applications together.

“Come sit with your husband a minute.” She doesn’t say no to Kings, but technically she doesn’t allow us to cut the couple queue numbers either. When the auntie in the cubicle across from hers is almost off the phone a few minutes later, she calls over, “Can you take the wife? Then she doesn’t have to move to one of the desks further away.” There are more than 60 numbered cubicles down the length of the room and around corners, that I can see, though of course I don’t know how many are actually filled. She gets on the intercom to check if my number is up Then my new immigration officer across from Kings’ calls the front desk (I guess) to void my number so they don’t still page it in the waiting area (as in, rather than just leave someone to keep calling, then realize I’m not gonna show).

We finish in the next few minutes (I’m disappointed at not being allowed to take my HKID picture more than twice <sheepish>. She clicks before I’m ready, the first time). I mention the “auntie” form processors because they don’t move, speak or work the way you might have expected of the 50-ish aunties you see on the street, no “Aiya” and then make a big deal about “attempted queue cutting” or etc – they vaguely remind me a bit of the people I’m used to in dealing rooms, they just don’t look or dress like them.

As we wait for our interviews, I turn to Kings, “What do they ask?”

“I don’t know. Whatever it is, you love Hong Kong and don’t want to overthrow the government.”

“<dismayed> Are they going to ask me about the Hong Kong government, were you supposed to study for this thing??”

As it turns out I don’t get to tell my interviewing officer I love Hong Kong and don’t want to overthrow the government… She’s a smartly uniformed mid-30s officer who speaks in perfect English… “You’ll like your new HKID… Re-entering the country you get to clear immigration via whichever queue is shortest, PRs can go thru any gate, so much less waiting time for your travels… And of course there’s the auto…”

“Oh right, that’ll come in handy, I have a small child.”

“Oh. Sorry, you can’t use the auto for children under 12.” Ah well… The PR queue is usually pretty short anyways.But she retains my old HKID, much to my disappointment because I love my short-haired picture 🙁

Kings appears at my counter, having finished a few seconds earlier, and exchanges a smile and a nod with my officer, before muttering to me, “My one was not nice.” He doesn’t reply my, “Were you speaking in Cantonese?” but I’m pretty sure he was. I suspect “HK Cantonese” can sound rude in general to a Malaysian used to speaking Cantonese in Malaysia, even if the local didn’t intend for it to sound rude… It’s not the first time Kings has complained of “Cantonese rudeness” that I’m oblivious to, not speaking the dialect well enough. (I am Hokkien Peranakan, but can’t understand a lot of the Taiwanese Hokkien or even that much Penang Hokkien – fine, I am just useless at Chinese.)

I took the picture above from maybe 10 feet away with the zoom on  my iPhone in case he turned and maybe got mad at me… Like I said about the general outspokenness in HK, sometimes you just want to smile and walk away because you have better things to do than engage, and then a would-be bully (or salesperson) takes it as an opportunity… And then you have to snap so they leave you alone and, while satisfying, it just hijacks your wish to smile and walk away rather than expend that energy on someone you will never see again…

Kings has been in shouting matches on the street or in parks (btw he is generally very soft-spoken) because total strangers say things like “You are a father you should know better,” or “You are teaching your child the wrong thing,” in Cantonese over say, JD running past Rockstar in park, accidentally bumping him in the grass as she passes.. Not that Rockstar notices but these boh liao people notice…

(I know, doesn’t sound that different from say, Singapore, but I think where the sentiment comes from really is quite different: In Singapore you generally see much fewer large dogs running about freely with little kids as you do here in HK, so when you get something like that from a passerby they probably really do believe it to be a thing. In HK when they say it they don’t really believe it’s a thing, they just want to criticize something.)

Anyway. Quiz time: We queued at 3 different counters and 2 different floors for a picture, fingerprints, brief form filling and a final interview – guess how long the entire process took, between the time I walked into the building and when I exited again, including a mis-filled form (tick and correspondingly filled a wrong option) and an elevator switch (high rise vs lo rise)?

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Ans: One hour and eight minutes.

Welcome to Hong Kong.