Finally landed in Hong Kong and easily found my dorm thanks to my "buddy" (which is an assigned student that helps introduce the city to me) named Wing Yee.  I had to buy what is called an "Octopus Card," which is like a super debit card that every Hong Kong citizen has in order to buy food, use the subway, etc.  The airline left two of my bags in Dallas, but those should get to me tonight, and I can't upload pictures until that gets to me.  The city is really cool though, as every single building that I've seen so far has been a skyscraper, which is unbelievable.  There are also about 1,000,000 stores in the city (I wouldn't be surprised if there actually are that many), so if you can't find something here, it probably doesn't exist.

I haven't met my roommate yet, but his stuff is in our room (he seems kind of messy) and I'm assuming he's from China due to the fact that he has a Chinese flag and a communist flag hanging on his desk.  But the view is really cool from my 10th floor room, which is really small, because Hong Kong is very compact.

Besides a few dirty areas, Hong Kong is a really scenic city, especially with the skyline along the water.  When they decided to make Hong Kong a scenic city, they decided to leave grass out of the picture, as the only grass you will see is either a rare patch that is protected from pedestrians, or one of the tables that has grass on it.  I kid you not, there are tables in certain areas that has a patch of grass and a tree growing out of it and people lay on them to relax.  There are a lot of trees and plants around the city, however, so it is not only buildings, and there are lots of mountains and trails outside of the city that I have not seen yet.  So far since I've been here I've only seen Kowloon and Tsim Sha Tsui (two towns in Hong Kong), which were very interesting.  People LOVE their brands here, as almost every person is wearing designer clothes, watches, purses, etc.  There are Luis Vuitton stores, Rolex stores, Armani stores, etc. everywhere, so I feel a little out of the loop with my American Eagle pants (which by the way there is an American Eagle store in one of the tourist areas here).

I have tried, and liked, a lot of new things here already on the first day.  I had the dumpling filled with pork that was good, I had Chinese tea (which they drink almost every day), dragon fruit (which costs less than $2 for four of them the size of my hand), and a chocolate banana pizza (they have really fancy pizzas here, nothing like I’ve seen in America).  They have what is called “Tea time” here in Hong Kong, which is from 2-6pm every day.  This is kind of like their break time/siesta and restaurants have really cheap food during this time.  Also during this time, they serve free soda, juice, coffee and tea with your meal, something I could definitely get used to!  Speaking of food, there is a convenience store next door called ParknStop, which has food that is cheaper than in America, which makes me happy.

Tomorrow I have orientation for my university, so hopefully I will meet some people from other countries and learn more about my university.  So far I have met guys from Israel, Netherlands, Australia, Florida and California, and everybody has been very nice here so far.  I am very happy being here, so all is well and I look forward to continuing my exploration of this interesting city!  I start classes on Monday January 12th, so I have until then to see the city before I have to study.  Also, I have to figure out a way to watch the Packer game this weekend, which actually is on at 2 am Hong Kong time on Monday, which is very unfortunate!

I will try to upload pictures as soon as I get my bags back, and I will continue to post updates occasionally.  I hope all is going well in Wisconsin and I wish you all the best!