I hope you all had a fabulous xmas and are looking forward to the new year festivities! I thought I would write a little about my crimbo experience just so that you can be relieved that I was not sat at home depressed by myself watching Chinese MTV!!

I have had quite a busy few days in actual fact and being the generous person that I am, I shall share with you the interesting parts! Well last Saturday my friend arrived from the UK, he was actually born and raised in Hk and then went to Uk for schooling and was back here to visit his family for the hols. We have never actually met but have a gazillion mutual friends (in fact he is now living with one of my old flatmates) and we have been in touch via email for a while so decided to meet up... cue lots of drunken messiness! Hilariously good fun, I love meeting new friends, he plans to move back to Hk next year and it would be nice to have another friend in this strange little land!

Sunday night it was a friends bday and a large group of us headed up to the peak for a turkey dinner, delicious and a beautiful restaurant, very cosy and snug and christmassy!

Xmas eve I went to a party in Tsim Sha Tsui but had been on the verge of a migraine for most of the day so had fun but had to bow out early due to a pounding headache :-(

Xmas day... very strange not to wake up and run excitedly into the lounge to see what santa has bought me during the evening, instead I woke up and headed to Starbucks for a coffee!

Had to pick up some fresh herbs for the turkey and was expecting a number of shops to be open and not closed like the UK is a ghost town on xmas day... and boy were they open, to the max! People were just shopping like it was a regular day, I wanted to stand up and shout at them all to go home, shut the shops and stop eating pizza etc on Xmas day!! It was a big eye opener in how differently cultures celebrate different holidays!

One tradition that did remain the same (although a 1st for me considering my veggy past) was the turkey dinner, with all the trimmings!

A group of us got together and Ronnie & Alice very amazingly organised all the food, all I had to do was cook it (gulp!)... now I think somewhere along the line I might have exaggerated my expertise in turkey cooking, in that I had none and told everyone that I was a complete turkey genius and that not to worry, I would be in charge!

Well I am happy to report that after 5 hours of cooking (Ronnie bought a 16lb bad boy) the turkey was a success and tasted delicious, and so far no one has accussed me of poisoning them so I can give myself a gold star!

James arrived here on the 27th and will be staying for 10days so i will most probably be updating once again upon his departure. So far we have done the peak, star ferry, mong kok market etc. James 'santa in disguise' King bought with him a stack of presents from people in the UK... I was shocked and so pleased to have so many beautiful gifts so thank you to all !! Also to thank is all those who posted cards and gifts, I was shocked to discover so many of you had not yet forgotten about me!

Well, signing off once more with much new years love for you all, I have a large list of resolutions and am in the process of narrowing them down into a shortlist as Im sure you are not allowed to have more than a few ?!

Tx