GersGers in the open plains of outer Mongolia

In this season, I am reminded of the nomadic tribes who wander the picturesque grasslands of Mongolia. They move camp anywhere from 4 to 30+ times a year depending on seasonality and the grazing needs of their animals. Favoring mobility, exploration, and fluidity, they have built their lives around perpetual movement and intentional change, limiting their personal possessions to only what they can move quickly and easily over vast distances. In my limited experience and interactions with these nomadic tribes, my sense was that they placed less value in material goods and accumulation, but instead find deeper value in immersing themselves in nature, exploration, and cherishing the challenge of constant change.

I think we have much to learn from the nomadic life. While my nomadic season bears no little resemblance to that of the nomadic Mongolian tribes, I have learned a few things from my very limited observations during my time there a few years back:

• Accumulating experiences is better than accumulating stuff
• Building relationships with people you love and care about is more valuable than building empires
• When you have to pack your life into a suitcase or ger (yurt) to live out of for an indeterminate amount of time, it is a good forcing function to understand all the stuff that's non-essential

The overused trope "less is more" certainly holds true for the freedom that comes with having less literal baggage, but there's also a mental freedom that is derived from not having to worry, protect, and preserve that stuff. Perhaps the anxiety shifts to different persuasions - the uncertainty of not knowing the next place to live, having to find new community and make new friends, feeling like a stranger everywhere you go.

“The sense that in this universe we are treated as strangers, the longing to be acknowledged, to meet with some response, to bridge some chasm that yawns between us and reality, is part of our inconsolable secret. And surely, from this point of view, the promise of glory, in the sense described, becomes highly relevant to our deep desire..”

- C.S. Lewis

Someone asked me the other day, what do you have in Hong Kong that you don’t have in New York and after thinking about it for a while, I replied, “a different kind of diversity.”  Hong Kong’s largely Chinese, (Cantonese) with a  rising number of Mandarin speaking folks coming in from Mainland China.

However, there’s also an amazing diversity of expats from all over the world. Kids with parents from UK, Australia, Canada, US who were born in Hong Kong, grew up in international schools and went to Uni (Uni, not college) abroad. HK locals who get sent to boarding school and come back with impeccable British English. People who grew up all over the world and come here for work. Sub-cultures. Macro cultures. Worlds within worlds. Hong Kong has a degree of diversity of Chinese people that I’ve never seen before. Third culture kids - ethnically Chinese people who local Chinese see as outsiders, It’s quite incredible.

causeway dusk

Certainly, anyone inside the city could move 30, 60, 90 minutes away and find increasingly larger lodging for decreasing prices. Yet everyone wants to be where everyone else is - we are communal beings. I saw an abandoned house in Lantau Island a couple weeks ago that reminded me of one I saw in Staten Island. Not to knock Lantau or Staten Island, but I bet if those same houses were in Hong Kong Island or Manhattan they’d be sold, knocked down and turned into high rises or overpriced lofts within a matter of months.

abandoned abode

People are willing to sacrifice comfort, space and lifestyle to be surrounded with other people, yet at the end of the day, find themselves rushing to find that corner table, the not yet discovered restaurant, the private club, to seek solitude and quiet in a city they chose for one reason or another – proximity to something. I suppose one could fill that blank of proximity with grandeur, invention, beauty, art, culture, or genius – things that might keep some of our hearts and minds captivated. I would suggest that fundamentally, it’s an innate human desire to be in some form of community with others.

The more introverted among us may perhaps desire more solitude so one might preclude that introverts have a greater appreciation for suburbs but this doesn’t seem to be the case.  On the contrary, we also don’t find that densely populated cities are filled with extroverts either. Thus, I return to the assertion of humanity’s need for community. Fundamentally, we desire to be known by others and to know others deeply.

foggy twilight

Going to San Francisco this past weekend for a dear college friend’s wedding and reminded me of how nice it is to know and be known. Years may have separated the last time I spoke to some of these friends but having a shared history of growth, struggle and joys, mostly we pick up where we left off. I’m excited to see the seeds of some of these friendships being planted here in Hong Kong as well.

“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of His work from beginning to end.”

Ecclesiastes 3:11

There have been many moments like this in the past few weeks both leading up to this decision and even after moving and settling in a bit. While my convictions are still clear in coming here, a late night at the office or a dinner alone at a table of strangers in a curry pork chop over rice type dive can often feel unsettling and quite lonely even though the food is undoubtedly stellar.

New friends, new language, new job, new apartment, new city, new church - it all takes adjustment, adaptation and a staunch refusal to compare even though it's very much in my nature to do so.

Lantau Island . West Dog Teeth

The one thing I found refreshingly consistent is faith. I've gone to four different churches over the past few weeks, a variety of local and expats, congregants of varying denominations, yet something about the sentiment, warmth and love of the people is joyfully familiar. The fervent passion with which people sing even as I make poor attempts to join in with broken Cantonese although linguistically unfamiliar is spiritually refreshing. One minute, I'm thrilled to hear a familiar song and to have met some friendly faces, the next, I'm saddened when I open my eyes and realize that I'm not actually at a little auditorium in Midtown.

Tomorrow might be another pork chop dinner at a table of strangers, but I'm sure the pendulum will swing again.

The contrast between new and old is also incredible in it's parallels to New York, skyscrapers stand adjacent to temples (Man Mo Temple - 1847) that date back 200+ years much like One World Trade sits across the street from Trinity church (building1839, history 1696). 

The next amusing parallel is the diversity of cultures, food and people. Most people are Hong Kong locals but there's a fascinating sub culture of other ethnicities that only makes life all the more interesting. In one corner there's a sushi chef importing from Tsukiji everyday, across the street, a taco place (not great but props for trying), a couple blocks down, a Filipino hipster singing Yellowcard and serving up craft beers from New Zealand. Simply stunning.

I love this city’s energy – the unique amalgamation of hearing five different languages as you walk down the street, wandering into a restaurant as if transported to another country, the contrast of raw grit and hustle on one block and top-end epicurean refinement on the next. Not to mention street art, museums, snow days, summer streets, pizza, artists, singers, architecture, climbing, hiking, sailing, cycling - the list goes on.

Of all the things in New York, I love the people in this city the most. New York is a hard place to live - it’s expensive, the weather is brutally temperamental, and the hustle will chew you up and spit you out hopefully just once if fortune smiles.  Survival in NYC is an act of sheer will and yet, in my tenure here, I’m thankful to have journeyed alongside friends old and new, each walking, running and some dancing through with elegance and tenacity.

I’m going to miss my family, friends, church, and colleagues turned friends who hustled alongside me as we built companies, volunteered, conceptualized products, road mapped projects, prayed and counseled each other through hardship and and dreamt together about how we could make this world a better place one relationship and conversation at a time.

This next chapter of life brings me to Hong Kong where I’ll be leading the analytics team at the South China Morning Post, a newspaper & media company recently acquired by Alibaba. While I’m excited for the new opportunity and working in Asia, I’m also anxious about the unknown and saddened to leave this little town that has become ever more like home.

With more joyful memories than I can count or express gratitude for, I bid this beautiful city and its lovely people farewell for now. Thanks to each of you who made this city home - for sharing a piece of your life and story with me. A wise man once told me, "humanity desires one fundamental thing - to know and to be known, to be loved and to be missed." If you're reading this, I'm thankful to know you and be known by you and I will miss you. May we cross paths again, whether it be New York, Hong Kong or beyond - the adventure continues!

Finally a little touch of CS Lewis for the road.

"It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendors."

Ps. All contact info is the same including phone # which can still receive texts so don't be a stranger! 

In a concrete jungle it's nice to have @LittleGreenKingdom.

building updubai . uae . 2010

Thought this photograph had a metaphorical parallel in its linear display of code juxtaposed by unique fingerprint of each individual software application's impact on the world - some fuzzily obscure, others sharply present, but each part of a rich tapestry.

Stone Town in Zanzibar is famous for its beaches, doors, and apparently license plates.

taken off the highway outside of salt lake city utah

spiralshong kong . china . 2012

the peak was fogged over so i decided to take the tripod and camera down the streets. turned out to be a pretty fun shoot. always something going on in HK even at 1am.

]]> (Korey J. Lee) https://www.koreyjlee.com/blog/2011/1/every-now-and-then-we-all-need-a-little Fri, 14 Jan 2011 13:46:12 GMT https://www.koreyjlee.com/blog/2011/1/war Taken a few months ago in DC at Vietnam Veterans War Memorial. Quite a sobering and sorrowful place.

Try their eggnog if it's still out. Quite spectacular.

*sigh*

not sure if king kong could climb this puppy.

taken en route to the summit of kilimajaro at ~ 13,000 feet in -10 C weather. worth every minute of the icy chill.

Just returned from a trip to Peru. Will be adding more photos shortly. Here's a night shot taken up in the Peruvian Andes at 13,000+ feet.

]]> (Korey J. Lee) Peru scenery https://www.koreyjlee.com/blog/2008/8/peru Fri, 29 Aug 2008 12:24:00 GMT https://www.koreyjlee.com/blog/2007/9/chicken-scratch