Preparing for work

On Friday in my first week I visited BASF's headquarter to meet with the HR responsible because I had 2 important things still to get done:

1. receiving my working visa
2. opening a payroll account

But before going to BASF I had a look at the HSBC building. The headquaters of the Hong Kong & Shanghai Banking Corporation was designed by Norman Foster in 1985. Costing over 1 billion USD iIt's said to be the world's most expensive building in that time. Built of glass and aluminium this 52 floor building is full of examples of good feng shui, for example there is no structure blocking its view of Victoria Harbour as water is associated with prosperity. Two bronze lions are guarding the main entrance. They were actually designed for the previous headquaters in 1935.

Luckily, my visa arrived just in time - Friday at noon. So I could pick up the visa documents as well as a letter of BASF stating that I'm working with them until end of March, 2014. That letter enabled me to open a payroll account. Usually, opening a bank account takes 20 minutes in Hong Kong. Tough, I spent more than 1 hour at the citibank branch in Exchange Square 1, Central HK. The assistant was still on training. So she had to double-check all documents with her supervisor. And - if something is supposed to get wrong, it will get wrong - printers were out of order for a couple of minutes, too. But as you see below, I finally received my citibank ATM card. ;)
 

 

As the weather was just perfect - 25°C and sunshine, I decided that time was there for my first visit to one of HK's beaches. The only problem was, that I considered myself more intelligent than Lonely Planet. Therefore, I decided not to follow the instruction to take the MTR and then a bus to Clearwater 2nd beach but to try to walk from the last MTR station to the beach. Well, when I arrived at the final MTR station, I found myself at the end of a residential area with skycrapers only. No water or beach to be seen somewhere. So in the end, I stopped a taxi and tried to explain the driver where I wanted to go. Well, he did not really know where Clearwater 2nd beach was, but he tried his best figuring that out on the map while driving! at the same time. When he noticed, that he was not able to find the beach he called the general office. Luckily, they found the location and told him how to get there. As you can see below, it was definitely worth going there! Besides myself there were only 5 other people at the beach. So after one week wandering the crowded streets of Hong Kong, I enjoyed two hours of fresh air and quietness. ;)