Would you respect my impatience?

Published at the Libertines Pub, Hong Kong

Ever wonder why Hongkies are always in such a hurry? One of the reasons I discovered is that we have to queue for everything in our lives, e.g. food, buses, school places and even my H&M headpiece. So many people are competing for so few resources. So much time is spent on waiting. We can’t help rushing to compensate for the time lost.

As a typical impatient Hongkie, my life is filled with irritating moments every day. For example, when I finally get to the cashier after waiting for ages, the shop attendants always find ways to push me to the edge.

“Do you have a Buy-our-overpriced-items-then-get-one-cent-refund Card?”

“Do you want to redeem your Octopus Reward$ because we feel bad about selling your data?”

“Would you like a bar of this tasteless chocolate? It contains 1200g of sugar but only costs $12!”

“Why don’t you buy this mango shampoo too? It goes well with vanilla foot cream.”


When I keep rolling my eyes and uttering ‘no’, ‘nope’ and ‘no ah’, they show no signs of disappointment or any awareness of my grumpiness. It’s all programmed in their body. By the time they release the garlic bulb I’m buying, my pasta is already overcooked and I no longer want to eat. Just wonder if they are this fluent and persistent with expats.

Same thing happens when I go to the cinema. Though the official filming time is 7:30pm, the film actually starts at 7:45pm as they need to replay FANCL commercials for the thousandth time (lucky to those who don’t watch romantic chick flicks). I finally decided not to buy their products as I noticed the dry skin of the models on the big screen.

In case you don’t know, I’m a fast walker. I cram a lot of activities (manicure, workout, shopping, getting a haircut…) into my lunch break as an escape from my daily prison. Therefore, I always need to rush in mid-afternoon. You know what irritates me most? It’s a group of three people walking adjacent to one another, blocking Central’s infamously narrow pedestrian way. Most of them are OLs like me, and they loathe office life as much as I do. They try to delay work by walking lazily, chatting about interesting topics like what models of LV bags they are going to buy in their next Europe trip or which salon works best on flattening their tummies without any hard work on their own. They are so in the moment that they couldn’t notice I'm fuming behind their hair.

That’s why I grew addicted to online shopping. No queuing, no mechanical selling, no Octopus Reward$ and no one is in my way. I’m so tempted to buy pirated DVDs there except I want to pay Christopher Nolan for real.