Visiting Hong Kong has been one of my favorites since I first visited in 2004. I’ve done it eight times so far. I loved to stroll on Sai Yeung Choi Street South, where people were very cheerful and energetic, to enjoy wonton noodles, steamed duck, and gwilinggao at restaurants, to get Nokia’s brand new and second-hand smartphones and accessories at mobile phone shops of the Sincere Podium building in Mong Kok, and to open and use a bank account of HSBC Hong Kong. I saw the Big Buddha at Ngong Ping, visited a prison museum at Stanley, stayed at a hotel in Chungking Mansions, worshipped at Che Kung Temple, had a fortune-telling session at Wong Tai Sin Temple, and extended my journey as far as Macau and Shenzhen. All the memories of those places were impeccable.
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Revolution With Revolut
I live in Japan. I have bank accounts in Japan to get a monthly income and make regular payments. Besides, I have bank accounts in the United States and Hong Kong, keeping some of my money in different banks and currencies to minimize risk. I manage my assets in these countries because there are more investment options than in Japan.
A consideration is how to transfer the money you get in Japan to a foreign bank account. Wire transfers at a bank in Japan are expensive. I tried some online international money transfer services. All of these services require at least 2,000 JPY per transaction, so sending tens of thousands of JPY with them is costly.
Having two PayPal accounts can resolve this problem. I got two PayPal accounts with my different email addresses and linked one of the PayPal accounts to a debit card of the bank account in Japan, and the other to the bank account in the US. When money was credited to the Japan bank account, I logged in to the PayPal account linked to the debit card and sent money with the debit card to the PayPal account linked to the US bank account. Then I logged out and logged in to the other PayPal account, and I withdrew money credited to the account to the US bank account linked to the PayPal account. The fee is cheaper as long as you send a small amount of money. Unfortunately, you cannot send money from Japan to Hong Kong because if you live in Japan, your PayPal account doesn’t allow you to link bank accounts in Hong Kong.
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Changes of the World From COVID-19
COVID-19 is dreadfully spreading throughout the world, hospitalizing more than 3,100,000 people and taking the lives of more than 200,000 patients as of April 29, according to Johns Hopkins University. It is no exception here in Tokyo.
The virus is forcing all people in the world to change their lifestyles. Many have been grounded for months. Essential workers, such as doctors, healthcare workers, firefighters, law enforcement officers, supermarket clerks, garbage collectors, delivery service personnel, and staff involved in public transportation, work outside facing the fear of infection.
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Prelude to WWIII
The second year of the Reiwa period began with a nightmare. More precisely, at the beginning of the year, nobody could predict what would be going on just two months later. I am talking about what the entire world is fighting against—COVID-19.
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The Words of the Year 2019
Looking back on what I experienced in the year 2019, the words of this year are: Hokkaido, Mercari, and Grand Cherokee.
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The Words of the Year 2018
I’m writing such an entry right now because I couldn’t post any entries in the end of 2018. When I tried to open the “add a new post” page, I had a 500 Internal Server Error and couldn’t open the page. Now I fixed it. It was because some of the plugins I installed in this blog system conflicted, so I deactivated the troublesome plugins and now I can post new entries. Thank you this article.
I’m looking back what happened in the year 2018 as I usually do it in the end of every year, and picking out some short words representing the last year. The words of the year 2001 were getting a flat within the Tokyo metropolitan area, a position change at the office, and Soarer. The word of the year 2002 was America. The words of the year 2003 were the airplane and the musical. The words of the year 2004 were the blog, Asian countries (Singapore and Hong Kong), and the GSM mobile phone. The words of the year 2005 were darts, the GSM and WCDMA mobile phone, and visiting Hong Kong again. The words of the year 2006 were the US stock and the mutual fund. The words of the year 2007 were changing my car and visiting Hawaii. The words of the year 2008 were England and Fukagawa. The words of the year 2009 were office position change, MacBook Pro and JR Seishun 18 Ticket. The words of the year 2010 were Taiwan, Singapore and Malaysia, iPhone and the credit card. The words of the year 2011 were the car, the British culture and China. The words of the year 2012 were Oji, the mahjong, the flight attendant and Facebook. The words of the year 2013 were Ayurveda, Korea, high school alumniand Tsuyoshi Takashiro. The words of the year 2014 were England and Android. The words of the year 2015 were Maine, United States; Estonia and transfer of workplace. The words of the year 2016 were traveling to places in Japan, mapping and Jeep. The words of the year 2017 were Yurie Omi, NHK, shingles, and English exams.
Now I’m picking out as the words of the year 2018: cashless, Japanese language and comeback.
I’ve been in touch a lot with the cashless society since last year. I set up Apple Pay in the Wallet of my iPhone8, and stored my American Express Gold Card and Suica, a rechargeable contactless electric money card used as a fare card on train lines, convenience stores and other shops in Japan. Other than Apple Pay, I have used Line Pay, which allows payment using your Line account, mainly for the payments at Lawson and major drugstores. I use Origami Pay for dining at KFC and shopping at Loft department store. Today I rarely use cash for buying a can of soft drink at the vending machine, buying groceries at the supermarket, buying coffee at Starbucks, dining at McDonald’s, and passing through the wicket to take trains. All I need is my iPhone8 to do these things.
I paid attention more to brushing up skills of Japanese language than to mastering English this year. I took the first grade of Nihongokentei test (This is not the JLPT N1 test!) and passed it. I don’t know how it helps in my work or life, though. As for comeback, I was appointed to a new position of the company I work and my workplace was relocated in November.
Almost three months being passed since the beginning of the year 2019, I have already experienced a lot of things in this single year. I’m so excited.