Uni Days: 27th Nov

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27th November 2013 ~ Lost and Lonely  (Photos will be up tomorrow afternoon UK time) 

Have been putting off this blog for a while as I have found that Uni life is completely different from those cheesy books and movies I have read. Sure it has its ups and downs and for me this experience has seriously changed the way I see things... it depends on how you view it.

These past few weeks have been fairly hectic with all my assignments coming up I was wondering if I would survive it all. Alas I have. One thing I learnt in Uni is that time passes by really quite quickly! You don't really have time to reflect. I have found that planning my days (yes it seems a bit compulsive) has helped quite a lot. I have a list of things to do before I fly back to HK for Christmas! I am ecstatic! I thought instead of writing about EVERYTHING I will just list it below so I don't bore you guys.

1. Friends: When I got here man it was difficult to make friends, common friends sure they were easy but they are nothing like the ones you had in secondary school. I really missed my friends and if you have noisy and party fanatics living in your dorm I felt left out. I must admit I was nervous just leaving my room and seeing them. Don't know why... I'm usually more sociable. I made some friends and I found out that they weren't as nice as I thought... I would advise you not to become best friends with someone who you met only a month into uni... they change. But it is up to you.

2. Assigments: I had my first assignment 2 weeks ago and I wasn't too worried about it actually. With my prior knowledge from IB I felt the work was very similar to what I have done so a thumbs up for the 2 years of IB :) I planned it fairly well and handed it in on time however, I had no idea you had to fill in a form in order to give it in! Make sure you know how to spell your Module Convenors name!! (Mine was from the Netherlands!).

3. Home sickness: Just an update on my current well being haha! I had a few bursts of homesickness during the 3 months I have been here and they were tough but I started a countdown til HK and that cheered me up. I also wrote some Chinese characters for strength and hong Kong on my wrist for a little umph!

4. Going places:  I walked around my area and went somewhere far away! My friend and I went to Bluewater last week it was incredible! Huge! There were so many stores and my legs actually hurt from walking around the mall! I also had frozen yogurt so that was good :) Salted Caramel! Will attach a photo soon!

Tips: 

1. Plan your meals! This is not because of a diet but when you have so much to do the last thing you want to do when you get back is cook and you will end up popping something unhealthy in the microwave! It is called freshman 15 right?

2. Finish your assigments early - this is a huge benefit! If you finish early you won't have to rush last minute and fight for the printer! Also most of the assigments pile up before the xmas holidays so if you have a few done before then you have nothing to worry about! BONUS!

3. Take a chance to explore the area: you are going to live there for the next few years of your life right?

4. Make some friends - It's a well known fact that making friends has loads of benefits! Of course it is safer to walk in a group at night than alone. They can help with homesickness! All those movies with the girls watching movies all night and popping popcorn, that can come true too (if you are interested in that kind of stuff).

5. Volunteer- You can get certificates for volunteering and you can gain experience for your future jobs. In addition to this you can make some new friends and learn some valuable things that you can never find anywhere.

6. Christmas Fayres! - When I first came here I thought it was called a "fair" rather than "fayre" but anyway I digress. Since christmas is right around the corner, search up your nearest christmas fayre and get your but there! There are so many around and you can pick up last minute decorations, go on rides, watch the circus and have a great time! Your uni may even run a free bus there an back just for students (check with your uni!). The biggest fair I must say is "winter wonderland" in London. Just incredible! I will be going there just before I leave so check back at my blog for what I did, what I bought and some pretty pictures :)

xHong Kong Girl

Uni Food: Recipe #2 (Roast chicken and broccoli rice)

Uni Food: Roast Chicken and Broccoli Rice

This recipe is probably the first thing I actually cooked in my dorm room kitchen. This recipe is a lot harder than the pan pizza. It tastes delicious however you might want to check if your oven is strong enough/hot enough to cook the chicken as I found that ours was a little undercooked on the inside. This recipe can make 4 servings! So you can share them with a flatmate or friend :) I made this recipe with a friend and we managed to have some leftovers for the next day. Keep in mind that this recipe takes quite a while this is good for the weekends, if you want a hearty meal!

Recipe: 
1 whole chicken
Chicken seaoning: ginger
                              garlic
                             pepper & salt
                            mixed herbs
                            olive oil
Roasting pot
2 cups of rice (there will be left overs)
water
chicken stock (1 cube)
1x Broccolli

Method:
1. Pre-heat your oven to 200 degrees.
2. For the Chicken: wash your chicken under the tap making sure the insides are clean
3. Remove the chicken feet using a knife. Only the Feet!
4. Make a marinade for the roast chicken using garlic, ginger, pepper, salt, herbs and olive oil. Rub this on the chicken and leave the chicken out for 5 mins while you cut up your broccoli.
5. For the Broccoli: Cut up your broccoli and place into a pan with oil. Cook until the broccoli is a little soft. Add a little bit of chicken stock into the broccoli and cook until the broccoli is soft.
6. Place the chicken in the oven and cook until the meat on the inner thighs are cooked. Poke your fork into the meat. If blood is coming out instead of a clear liquid put back into the oven or if the meat is still pink.
7. For the Rice: Rinse the rice and place into the rice-cooker/pot. Add water about 1 cup of water or more. Cook the rice in a rice-cooker or a pot until rice have fully absorbed the water.
6. Place the broccoli into the rice and stir.
7. When the chicken is done take it out and slice the meat off the bones removing the wings and the thighs first.
8. Serve with rice and store in a box (leftovers) if you are serving only 2 people.

x Hong Kong Girl

Uni Food: Recipe #1 ( Pan-cooked Pizza)

Pan-cooked Pizza 

Ok this might sound strange as it is a well known fact that pizza is baked in an oven. However, the oven in the kitchen refused to work when I made it and with the dough I made I had to adapt.

Tastes just like a regular pizza except crispier!

The Dough: 
2 1/2 cups of flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1tsp salt
1tbsp oil
3/4 water

Method: 
1. Mix Dry ingredients in a bag/bowl.
2. add water and oil. If the dough is too stiff add more water.
3. Kneed for 3 minutes.
4. Put flour onto counter and Roll into a circle.
5. place in a hot pan (medium heat) with just a little bit of oil.
6. put the rolled pizza dough into it. Cover the pan with a lid or aluminium foil. Cook until the bottom and top is crispy (around 4-6 mins).Take out or it might burn!
7. Add your toppings and place into the pan again to heat/until cheese has melted (around 5-10 mins).

x Hong Kong Girl

13th October 2013- Walking down the Uni Life road...

13th October 2013- Walking down the Uni Life road...

Been debating what to write for the past few weeks... and haven't felt like writing in a while which is uncharacteristic of me. I always love to write whether it is fantasising about a future book I would like to write or writing in my diary. Yes you must be rolling your eyes by now after hearing that I love writing yet I haven't written in about a month -_-. Not proving my point haha! But for those of you who are reading this blog let me tell you about what I have been up to :) 

First day of "Introduction lectures" was nerve wracking was wracking my brains trying to find the names of buildings and following the long line of students going to class. For me it is as 20 min walk to get to the University even though they say that my accommodation is "on campus"... ok I digress. I was late to class so I panicked and practically ran to class. Ok I admit I might have misjudged the time it took to get to the University but whatever. The class was quiet and everyone made friends really easily. Not me I wanted to sit alone. I must admit the first few weeks at uni I felt horrible. I thought about going home every second I wasn't busy. My flatmates were friendly however I somehow felt that I connected with no one here. It was truly a big culture shock when I went to the supermarkets, you have to bag your own stuff, I got yelled at a couple times because I didn't know how to work their self check out machines! Yes I said it "self checkout!" Ok Taikoo has them but it is rare in HK that you have self checkout. Everyone here is so independent! 

Checked out the area but mainly stayed in my room the rest of the week avoiding anyone and everyone. However, I tried to warm up to people and attended a gathering with my flatmates. However, they all drank ALOT! However they were welcoming and we played the ring of fire with me and another flat mate drinking lemonade instead of beer or wine or vodka. The game was fun but I felt that this was out of my element and I felt left out. 

                                                          (Bluewater Shopping mall!!) 

Going to class was the only thing I looked forward to doing. I really wanted to just make myself busy... Oh god this is getting depressing... haha! Anyways this reminds me of Bella in New moon (Twilight series) god the book was painful. Hope this isn't too painful! Fast forwarding it I have made some friends and regularly skype or video chat home to keep me in the loop (and keep me sane). It really helped with my homesickness so a big thumbs up to video chatting! 

OH and the great thing about the UK.... wait for it.... chocolate! The chocolate selection is amazing! Rows upon rows of chocolate! I have even bought stuff to bring back home for the holiday season! 

x Hong Kong girl 

p.s. I will be posing a Quick recipes for university soon! And DIY pencil jars and an update soon on my part time job! Stay tuned! 

20th September to the 23rd 2013 :

20th September to the 23rd 2013 : The First day in the new world.

Ok. Yet again it has been a while since I have written anything. I must admit that I haven't had a personal drive to post anything. I have successfully landed in the UK and it has been a busy week at Uni.

Coming off the flight I was exhausted. The maximum I slept on the flight was probably 2 hours out of a total 12 hour flight. The seating was ok wasn't the best as I was on the aisle people were constantly asking me to move so they could go to the bathroom. It was irritating but what can I say. The food was surprisingly good. 40 minutes into the flight they gave you dinner, I had mashed potatoes, veggies and pork. It came with bread an ice-cream! Yum!
The food was a plus because it gave me something to look forward to in comparison to the woman on my left who was practically sleeping on my shoulder.  Cathay Pacific had quite the range of movies but I found that the touch screen was harder to use that I had expected and I must have annoyed the person in front. In total I watched 2 movies: Epic and Monsters University.
When arriving I thought ok I can do this but my suitcase weighed 35kg. Ridiculous I know but there really wasn't a lot in there ;p. Got onto the buses which was a hassle as one of the bus drivers refused to help me with my suitcase. So me, and 18 year old had to haul my 35 kg suitcase onto the bus. I was really annoyed.
Getting to the university took me about 3 hours by bus. And I managed to get there at 3 (UK time). It was a smooth process to my room except the 2 flights of stairs I had to drag my suitcase up. But luckily there was an elevator at the top of the stairs. Why? Don't even ask.

First thing I did when I got to my room was let things settle. My brain my heart and just sat on what was going to be my bed. I would be lying if I said that I didn't cry. Pathetic I know! But what can I say I'm a HK girl :)

After settling in my rooms now finally seems familiar. Still miss Hong Kong though. Even now the culture shock is pretty impactful, I have no idea how things work and the people here are very independent. At convenience stores like tescos and sainsburys they do not pack your plastic bags for you and you can self check out as well ?? What is this sorcery? haha!

Will post another post on things I have done at the uni and how to get settled in your room!

September 15th 2013~3 days left

Sunday Sep 15th 2013 ~ 3 days left!

Hand luggage

So I have been very organised and have written almost every day! Yippee for me! Anyways today's post will be about my hand luggage and ideas on what to bring! Also there will be a part on what to bring in your makeup bag. Since my flight is over 12 hours long.... soooo long. I will bring some travel sized cleansers and what not. Oh and I realised that my post from yesterday was wrong! You can bring any liquids under 100ml and no sharp objects!

A hand luggage can vary from person to person, for me it is a backpack but I heard from a couple of friends that they are bringing a duffle bag or a mini suitcase. It is really up to you! But I like using a back pack as it is stuck to me! I am well known for losing anything that isn't stuck to me so... Anyways here is what I plan to put in it:

Hope this helps!

Saturday Sep 14 2013 ~ 4 days left

Saturday Sep 14 2013 ~ 4 days

We are bubbling down to the last few days. This can be something super exciting for some while others not so much because of packing or the reluctance to leave HK. All in all there is no going back! Just tread the university experience as a mini holiday! Thats how I am taking it, for me school terms usually go by really quickly for me so in no time I will be back in HK to celebrate Christmas! Have a lot of Christmas blog posting ideas so stay in tune!

Today's post will be about Electronics e.g laptops, Microsoft Office, USBs, DVD drives etc. Here is what I am going to do: I recently bought a new laptop from Apple it is a Macbook Pro with retina display. Fancy right? When I got this I was super pleased because it was super light unlike my old Macbook notebook from 2009 which weighed a tonne! It had beautiful HD screen however it lacked a CD and DVD drive which you had to buy separately -_- and only had 2 USB ports. So before I leave I had to buy a USB to ethernet cable ($78), a CD and DVD drive ($550), a USB port that branched out into 4 other USB ports ($100-200). So the total was pretty high... Not going to be buying anything new for a while haha!
For my phone I got sent a Sim card through the mail by UCAS which was a top up one that I can use in the UK! It is pretty good as I don't have to go through the hassle of finding one myself. But if you want to make a call from the UK when you arrive to HK you can use your hk sim card if you have IDD which is explained in my old post (so check it out here). If you don't have one I'm sure you can get on in the airport :)
When you go to university some people get the Microsoft office for mac. You can do with or without it because on a mac they already have pages and keynote but it is traditional for a university to use Office so I would recommend buying it! You can find these in any apple store or in the Computer centre in Wanchai.

(All found on Apple US website) 

Insurance                                                         

(logo from endsleigh website) 

A lot of my friends have asked about whether you should get insurance for your electronic devices, musical instruments, bikes and more. Below I have found on company that works with international students to ensure insurance for thier devices and will issue a replacement if they are stolen. The company is called endsleigh.
Facts about them:

•  UK's No.1 student insurance specialist according to them.
• 24hour replacement service 
• You can create your own package and do it online. 
• "we'll replace your laptop or phone with the latest compatible model"
• "Cover includes theft, accidental damage and loss. 

Sounds pretty good to me. Here is the website www.endsleigh.co.uk/UCAS or call: 03303030284/ 01282672108.