Posted by
shoop80
15 yrs ago
I am due to have my second child next week and hubby and I would like to move away from town and Sai Kung looks like a good place to live. Rents are cheaper and you get much more space for what you pay.
I have a few questions though to help me decide if Sai Kung would be a good fit for our family:
1. My son who is 2 will need to go to kindergarten. Are there schools which offer classes only in English? Hubby is Italian and frustrated about our son learning to speak the language and is afraid that another language (Mandarin or Cantonese) might confuse him at this point.
2. I won't be driving, will I end up being holed up at home with 2 boys and my helper unless absolutely necessary?
3. Food shopping. Is there a fresh market nearby to get fruits and veggies? Also does the park n shop in Sai Kung town sell imported products like fresh herbs?
Thank you in advance for your input. We were looking at a place in Chuk Yeung Road and really needed some questions answered before we make an offer. =)
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no offense but if you are so concern about your children learning a second language then you should go to a country that only speak your preferred language or a very common pharse that I heard a lot when I was a kid in the UK.. go back to your country!
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i don't think that was a fair response to shoop80 - as hong kong residents lets try to be welcoming and helpful.
as a teacher and lecturer of almost ten years experience, i am all too familiar with the issues related to medium of instruction - hong kong has regrettably experienced problems by mixing languages resulting in many students developing less than desirable english and chinese. this is a result of using english text books with chinese instruction or a hybrid of the two - its not about teaching in chinese or english but having a clear and fully supported medium.
that is why schools are now choosing between EMI or CMI (english or chinese medium of instruction). i agree that some children can readily develop bilingual or trilingual skills simultaneously but not all are able to do so... moreover, one can always enroll their children in additional or separate language classes to develop other language skills...
also, lets not forget that english is an official language in this self-proclaimed "asia's world city" so inquiring about the use of english in schools should not be considered out of the ordinary...
as for your experience in the uk about being told to go back to your country, i can only say this is most regrettable and sad but lets not apply that narrow minded attitude to others...
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Tune
15 yrs ago
Well [y]auhoo, an unfortunate experience indeed. I feel that it is important for our children to learn, if only briefly, the local language. For example, my son is enrolled in a local kindergarten for the time being until he goes to an international primary school. By doing so, he will learn not only the language but also gain valuable insight into the social fabric of Hong Kong.
Furthermore "thomsonda", your claims in lines 4-11 are stigmatised and one in particular is contradictory. Please explain your points clearly with supporting evidence. You may do so by sending me an internal message.
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stigmatised? didn't realise a little openness would hit such a sensitive nerve. speaking of stigma, how about the assertion that people in the uk tell other nationals to go back to their country? surely more of a stigma than anything i raised. anyway, i won't get into the english vs. chinese debate - that's not for these columns. you may check for yourself the amount of schools in the sar that have chosen and or changed their medium of instruction and have henceforth labelled themselves CMI or EMI despite being otherwise in the past. ...and this i quote from personal experience as a school i currently teach at in fanling is doing just that in september - owing mainly to pressure from parents.
nothing wrong with chinese or english as the medium of instruction - the importance is having a clear and consistent medium irrespective the language.
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Back to Sai Kung facilities: I totally concur with Cara about the wide range of stores within easy access if you have a car, and there's also TC Foods, of course, for really good fresh imported meats and deli stuff. I do know people who don't drive and get on just fine here (if you find a home near a bus stop you shouldn't need to be holed up indoors) but it definitely helps if you have the use of a car now and again. Any chance you could do a recce by car to see what's here?
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as mentioned earlier, there are a number of mini-bus routes between sai kung town and choi hung, kowloon bay, kwun tong, hang hau, po lam, mong kok and to a lesser extent causeway bay. while they are very frequent, you may wait 15-20 minutes for a seat depending on your location and or if it is rush hour - you can call the mong kok mini-bus however and they will save you a seat. the number can be found advertised on the mong kok mini-buses. double-deckers are also frequent and cheap but they can be very slow on the slopes and hills of which there are many throughout sai kung / clear water bay.
moreover, if you are doing lots of supermarket shopping and don't have a car, most supermarkets will deliver to locations in the vicinity subject to a minimum spend.
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Please note that Sai Kung may not be the best place for kids. I mean the kids dont have many places to play with - unless they play by themselves around the house or at your pool (If you have one....). My kids enjoyed living in the city where the parks, club houses, etc were plenty, friends every where.
Yes during the weekend one can have funnnnn!
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Apart from there being plentiful amenities there is surely less pollution here in the Sai Kung/Clearwater Bay area (and I say this from personal experience, suffering runny nose and itchy eyes as soon as I hit the island). So, still not a good place to bring up children, fliedice?
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My views on more people coming to Sai Kung are probably known so I'll skip that and post this link.
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=119731658073048
Our 'protected' country parks are being built on and polluted.
Don't expect the area to stay clean and a good place for kids if we continue the way we are going.
Please, join the group, sign the petitions and help Sai Kung, and the rest of our green areas, remain green.
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Tune
15 yrs ago
Sai Kung! Far too incestuous for my liking...
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Tune, what experience lead you to that conclusion?
Banjo-twanging inbreed,
Sai Kung/Clearwater Bay area
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Saimama - no, it's not.
There are snakes, wild pigs, poisonous spiders and free roaming cattle.
No doubt these are alien to your children and you're right in thinking they will probably eat your small children.
This also occurs in your backyard so that is no safe haven.
We're currently trying to kill off all the wild animals and concrete over the green bits to eradicate this nonsense.
Hopefully, once this is done, we'll have a nice and clean convenient Sai Kung that all can enjoy from the comfort of their own living room.
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Both serious and sarcastic.
There are the animals and plenty more besides but if we continue the way we are going there won't be.
My own yard has had 2 cobra and 1 keelback snake in it in the past 3 years and I live less than 10 minutes walk from Sai Kung town itself, so not in the sticks. The 'sticks' aren't the sticks anymore, hence my sarcasm.
It annoys me that we don't have the common sense not to build on them and that we insist on destroying the small remaining land we have.
People want the clean air and clean water and green hills and it seems that most want it 'convenient' and to be able to drive into it.
So many people have moved to the area looking for this that now we will soon have a 4 lane highway and an MTR to move them all. Lovely.
No doubt the MTR will continue its MO and build some stunning architectural complex that houses another 100k people and then we'll need 2 4 lane highways and a couple more MTR stops...
Forgive my rant.
I can hardly blame people for wanting to live here. Why not? I did.
I'm just venting frustration at thoroughly inept government control over land rights and developers greed.
The Sai Kung that I came to 15 years ago is far removed from the one I see today.
On a local level, I think people are genuinely concerned about the developers and the pollution they bring but without government backing, our hands are tied.
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ringo23, you should have seen the sai kung i moved to from kowloon tong in 1985... absolutely gorgeous. while sai kung still has its merits, there has sadly been an erosion of its beauty and appeal over the years - if you wanted seclusion and greenery, ho chung / nam wai was far enough but now people are moving as far as tai tan in the sai kung country park for peace and quiet - hope there are more out there like you to promote the cause.
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Cara the reason is the blatant abuse of the DING rights by local villagers who sell their rights to developers for a couple of million. Its not for self occupation. Its leading to a total reckless construction with parking controlled by the local village heads (mafias) allocating you any spot they want , at any price they want ON GOVT LAND. The DLO saikung has limited resources to check on these unscruplous builders and they go on an ad hoc basis to put their ownership signs that get torn down in a few days. I have been in the area since 1996 and we absolutely love it. Luckily our village only has 12 houses with no scope for further development around due to the nearby access roads. However the shaving off the mountain tops near mang Kung Uk is scary and who knows what they plan to raise there.
Its a shame to come to clearwater bay by sea from the northern islands and see the high rise in the backdrop. I also heard a rumour that the Clearwater Bay Film Studios will be changed to hi rise appt blocks.???
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Hype?
It's just countryside. A break from the big city.
Not for much longer...
The Ding rights are a complete farce and should be abolished immediately, if not sooner.
How an emigrant living abroad is entitled to land rights in HK is beyond me. At the very least, they should live permanently in the village to qualify.
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kcmac
15 yrs ago
Seriously. Stop scaring people who are considering living out in Sai Kung or the N.T.
Its a great place to raise kids. The air is clean here, there's plenty for kids to do esp in Sai Kung town, a good public swimming pool, great parks, the promenade for cycling, loads of basketball courts and soccer grounds. They can go to the country park, learn to canoe or wind surf or even go to the beach and boogie board!
There are plenty of play schools, kindergartens and schools.
If you have a car, you can go to any supermarket, fresh food market and you can even pick up fresh seafood straight off the fishermen's boat. You can do anything and go anywhere.
If you look hard enough - you can find a great place for next to nothing! we pay 9K for a brand new ground floor place which includes parking. Try doing that in the city??! Our neighbors are great and friendly. Try talking to a neighbor on the same floor as you in the city... hardly! People out here are nice. They remember you and if, as an expat, you come down from your high 'expat' horse - they'll watch out for you.
So stop dissing Sai Kung for f*$@ sake!
Saimama: the hype is living in the peak and spending a wallop of hard earned money. There are plenty of places that are great. Here's a tip: If you open your eyes big enough, you will see that Sai Kung has a lot of character - you just haven't looked hard enough.
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Never happened to me. Not even a minor problem. Mind you,as Sai Kung is so out in the sticks my husband (who's also my cousin and uncle) and I do have to call our eighteen wild children who are foraging for food in the jungle when we need power so they can get peddling.
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Saimama you need to know what is SAIKUNG first. Saikung proper is anything past marina Cove and before Ma On Shan. Sai Kung Districtt goes all the way from Pik uk to Lobster Bay and covers all of CLearwater bay . In my 16 yrs in Saikung Clearwater bay we only had 2 minor power problems. The 1st one was a scheduled cable upgrade . The power was cut for 30 mins while they hooked up a 40ft containerised genset outside our block for a week while they did their work.
2 yrs ago we had an earth switch trip in a thunderstorm and we lost one phase of power from the 3 phases on one floor of our village house. It was fixed by CLP in less than half an hour at 3 in the morning without us leaving the house.
Previously we had serious problems in our 26 yr old village house. We upgraded all the electrics and everything is fine now.
These are problems (if you would like to call them) I can live with.
I totally agree with KCMAC. Its one of the best and environmentally cleaNER places in HK to raise kids with a v diverse cross section of people.
The play groups made within villages for kids by the parents are just wonderful and the social scene is v v good.
Our new next door neighbours (an elderly local couple) visited us a few days ago with a box of cookies for our kid just to introduce themselves.
Another elderly expat visitor just came in to borrow some tools to make a toy for his grandaughter.
All sounds a bit NORMAL to me.
I have also seen a big community spirit and environmental awareness here. Most residents be it locals or expats feel a sense of belonging. Hutchison tried to install telephone poles on the Clearwater Bay Main road about 3 yrs ago and the community got together and put up a v v strong fight. The Govt and Hutchison backed off and removed all those ugly poles within 3 months.
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Bausi
15 yrs ago
After having read all this and lived in Sai Kung for 3 years, DO NOT move to Sai Kung if you cannot drive a car, especially if you have small kids!!!!!! Sai Kung is lovely but you will go mad if you cannot drive yourself! Kids go on playdates, lessons here, sports there, emergency doctor visits etc...
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Please don't bring more cars!
I've lived here for 15 years and never had one. Public transport is great.
If you can afford to run a car, you can afford to call a taxi.
We're fighting to stop a 4 lane highway from being built because of this very gweilo habit of needing cars.
In my experience, Geraldo is correct.
I've had countless power cuts in the village I live in which is very close to Sai Kung town proper. They can last from seconds to several hours.
Also a problem in some villages is water shortage. Probably not the case with a HK water supply but a lot of the village houses are fed on village supplies and can be sporadic. Cheap as chips at $300 a year but a hassle when they go down.
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There are too many cars it's true, the main road in and out is a crawl at busy periods so you might as well be on a bus reading a paper as in a car contributing to global warming and throwing money away. It helps if you are not tied to 9 to 5 living and so avoid the congestion. Oh and please don't buy a dog already far too many sh**t machines everywhere
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Problem with 2 many cars in SK is not down to the local pop; some of whom rely on it. The problem lies with the day trippers, most of whom cannot drive properly to begin with and are not used to driving down narrow country lanes.
It seems that the 2 most popular weekend leisure activities going for the "high risers" are spending a day in SK or hanging out in the malls (window shopping).
Hard as it might be to implement, I would like to see some form of congestion charging for non local drivers in private cars coming into SK.
Cowleyp, you're so right about telling people not to buy a dog when they move here. It's just so wrong to spend so much on buying a dog when one can do a lot more good by adopting one instead. There are lots of unwanted and strays about in SK, so please for all that move here, adopt don't buy!
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yes, definitely agreed on the dog issue and too many irresponsible dog leaders or owners who don't clean up after their beloved pets - as for those wishing to have a dog, there are always plenty available to adopt that have been de-sexed / vaccinated etc., which would be the responsible thing to do.
re. electricity issues, i must add that i have experienced problems during electrical storms - especially when living in nam wai and currently in hing keng shek... my now tv decoder has broken twice, my phone line has had problems and i lost a computer 3 years ago. however, much of this can be easily remedied by fitting a surge-protection block between your devices and the electrical outlet which i have now since done...
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Agree with muchado about traffic problems . MOST of it is to do with NON SK /CWB residents packing their bags and going off for the weekend or day trips to the COUNTRY.
Perhaps the Govt should implement some form of system where they make the MA ON SHAN road more useable for non residents rather than put all the strain on Hirams Highway.
After all they do have special permits for residents of the country park to avoid it becoming a free for all.
They could do the same by giving priority useage of Hirams Highway to residents, specially on weekend and public holidays. Much more environmentally friendly than building a 4 lane highway . The highway is simply an excuse to start high rise like MA ON SHAN in HK's only natural green belt. Indisrcriminate approvals of village houses is bad enough anyway.
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