talk 566

After I have written “Looking forward to the rise of HK population” , several Lighters asked me to write about WT Pang’s speech, and what is my suggestions for low fertility rate in HK. I promised both CC Luk and WT Pang that if CC Luk would write down what did WT Pang said at his daughter’s wedding, I would respond to that question. I used that just as an excuse. Next thing you know, CC Luk wrote that article and subtly mentioned in his article that “老彭” 的廣東話講詞，“上海仔” JAMES KOO 席上聽不明白，要求解釋，我只好向 “彭哥” 取得講詞內容，以便JAMES可以看過明白.” A promise is a promise even it is 3 months late.

After expressing of his mixed feeling of giving his daughter away, WT Pang assured his wife again that he was very happy they have a daughter. Like all the parents in China, he admonished the new couple to live together for better for worse, and work hard. Then he concluded his speech by thanking his guests for cerebrating the wedding.

Now my first-born was also a girl. I, being a Shanghainese man, did not have the courage to think if I was happy or not that the baby was a girl. By definition I was very happy that Winnie has born us a child. I was.

Being a Shanghainese man (excuse me repeat that again should you forget), after my daughter grew up, I treated her as an equal, as a friend. You do not admonish her. Soon she will be always right also, at least that is our family tradition. It happened that in the Sun family (my son in law’s family), Suzan, the mother is always right also. So at the wedding, I wished the new couple would carry on both families’ tradition, and extolled the virtual of “Winnie and Suzan are always right,” to make sure Ed, my son in law, would carry on this tradition.

Then being an engineer, I explained to them the new math to start a new life. In the old math, one plus one equals to two. In the new math, one plus one equals to three, four, or more.

Now what do I know about fertility rate problem and the solutions. However, while enjoying reading articles by 郭大淦, I noticed uniqueness about his articles. HK is a small place. If you stay here for a while, you will develop “cabin fever.” I then would take one of those 2 days tours on weekends visiting Canton or surrounding areas with rest of the group of HK people. I noticed for HK men, it does not matter where we are going, what we are seeing, or how is the weather, if the food is good, they would say this tour is good, then their wife and female companions would chime in saying this is a good tour. If you have not noticed, these are the same criteria 郭大淦 used to judge his trips. Eight of 郭大淦’s nine articles mentioned food. If you delete food related paragraphs in郭大淦’s recent articles about his 4 day Taiwan tour, then you will be left with “I flew to Taiwan early and come back late. When the food is good, then Taiwan is good. If bad, then it is better to stay in HK.” After 4 days in Taiwan, did he tell you anything about what did they see or do?

Taxi drivers both in Shenzhen and in Shanghai would tell me that while Taiwanese men ask for companionship, HK men always ask for restaurants for the best food when they step off the plane. 飲茶is probably most common saying or past time in HK than anywhere else. Take somebody to “飲茶” will solve any and all problems in HK. Instead of ”How do you do?”, “ 食著冇?” is the most common greeting. If Confucius said “食色性也,” for Hong Kong men it is “食食性也.” That is the possible reason at 0.9 births per woman; HK has the lowest fertility rate in the world. When there is a massive power failure in U.S., no TV's to watch, the birth rate goes up. Shut down a few of the “tea houses,” possibly the fertility rate in HK will go up. What do you think?