A home away from home

When I was 3 I used to call Hong Kong, Honk Konk. Now that I'm 2 weeks shy of 30, I only call it that in my head. So I used to travel for work a couple times a year. It was great at first, being a rookie and feeling like I had finally made it far enough to be important enough to go away - and Hong Kong is pretty cool. After a few trips it got a little exhausting. I actually had to WORK... hard. I simultaneously also then realized that it wasn't that I was important... it was that I was a sucker for thinking it was a privilege. Anyway. I digress. That was before the recession of 2009. I haven't been back to Hong Kong since October 08 and that was a stopover en route to a family trip to Australia and I do miss it.

My favorite hotel in Hong Kong is the Intercontinental in KOWLOON. It's got the most amazing lobby in all of Hong Kong and I feel at home there except a happier, more motivated version of myself.

The rooms are really comfortable and I love the staff. I like to think the concierge knows me as well. They really helped me out the last time we were there in April 08 when we were desperately applying for our China & Vietnam visa's with literally 0 room for error and my anxiety level skyrocketing. (Let it be known that my anxiety level is inversely related to my patience level.)

Aside from the romantic, humbling view of neon lights across the waters of Kowloon Bay, the comfy bed, the giant deep tub (all to myself!), people occasionally calling me "Miss Wong" the delicious, delicious breakfasts which left me full of fruit, hash browns and gas, the part I miss the MOST about Hong Kong is the song the TV plays when I come back to my room after turndown service. It's the default channel 1 that just replays the same extended Intercontinental commerical that is the most soothing, relaxing song. I have been scouring the internet and beyond to find it, and I'm just about desperate enough to write a polite email to the hotel and asking where I could get it. There are wooden flutes involved, some fluttering sounds, and there there are scenes of an older non-Asian couple in Asia, who are being sold something by a happy Asian woman. Maybe a baby, maybe some herbs. Then, there is a woman taking a tai chi class outside at the pool at dawn with the same old tai chi instructor who taught me! That song is magic! For now, as I continue on my plight to locate this commercial so I can program my own TV to be playing this when I come home after work with the lights dimmed, I am going to have to settle for adding a soundmachine that plays rainforest sounds. I will return to you, my Intercontinental Hong Kong Hotel screen saver. XO, V

Robin's Egg

I have not updated for a while, it's been quite a hectic month of May! That doesn't mean I haven't been thinking a lot though! So I decided against putting up the vintage classroom map that I prowled after on ebay. Now it's just leaning against the column next to my desk at work, taunting me everyday. I think I may export it to my dad's garage in CT for the day I move into a loft and have the space to put it up in a common area.

I have a good reason for not putting this map up... it just didn't feel right. It seems like a very permanent thing to install in my rental apartment, especially over a brick wall. Everything seemed very committed about it - the friend who was going to expend his time and energy installing it for me, carrying it home for me, putting holes in my brick wall... I felt like I would have no freedom of choice to like it, considering the guilt I'd feel after a friend helped me with it, and also, if there is something that is almost as bad as getting seriously injured by a falling metal map weighing 30 lbs, it would be forcing myself to like something that I just didn't. I am a terrible faker. In addition to all this, the map is really bright. It would be quite the focal point of my room and I wasn't sure I wanted that. I want my bedroom to be a relaxing happy space where I can daydream, work, and read peacefully.

So. I decided to paint the wall behind my bed a very pale hue of Robin's Egg Blue. Then I will outline the world in silver (or gold?) - That way, I kill all these birds with one stone.

- color
- texture
- saving myself the cost of 1 wall of art/mirrors
- no danger of being killed in my sleep by falling art/mirrors
- geography

And if I hate it, I'll just paint over it. At least I wouldn't feel guilty about that. This is the front door of designer Miles Redd that I saw in Domino Magazine that I just loved. I will probably go the same hue but in a lighter shade.

I have many silver accessories/frames/lamps in my room so I am really leaning towards the silver outline of the world.

Now where can I get a projector for me to trace the world on?