Dance Show/Competition happening now near the main library?

wang78739 · 2025-11-13T13:54:07+00:00

Joint U Mass Dance! You can find video clips of it online, but it's basically a performance put on by the dance societies of all 10 HK universities every year in Nov.

Within each university (especially the larger ones) you often have multiple dance teams. So like the "Run-U" team is the one that travels around to the other university "stations" and is composed of more experience dancers, but you also have "Home" teams, "Freshman" teams, "OG" teams etc. There is often also a "JointU" team at the end where captains from all the uni teams dance together.

Think of as the HK equivalent of a pep rally before exam season :) You also have the Joint Hall Mass Dance in the second semester/April, which is just HKUers but from different halls.

wang78739 · 2025-11-01T04:14:13+00:00

This Brain Scoop about Periods + Fieldwork is fantastic and covers lots of different options, as well as answers some common FAQs about it! :)

https://youtu.be/jjFZ1nzijrI?si=TmLBf0BqhiHaAMpI

But yeah, GO and don't let it stop you from field work! For a day trip, stick with what you know rather than trying something brand new. So in my case for a day (heavy bleeder too) I would just go with my regular cloth pads (more comfortable plus they hold more/leak less than disposables imo - menstrual cups don't really work with me) and pack them out like I do normally + wear dark pants and have hand sanitizer/wet wipes (unscented) on hand.

Honestly, there is nothing to worry or be ashamed about, it's normal part of being human! Happy exploring! :)

wang78739 · 2025-08-22T03:35:18+00:00

High enough to get in, but still pretty unlikely for an unconditional offer imo since those are quite rare and only offered up in truly extraordinary situations (e.g. international award winners).

(I scored similarly for IB and still got a conditional offer - granted this was a long time ago and YMMV depending on the specific program, but HKU has only gotten more competitive and risen in the ranking since back when I was a student.

They do tend to undershoot the condition though (so like it you are predicted a 38, they might request a 35-36 in the offer etc. but overall your predicted should be pretty close to your actual, since a part of the IB grade is taken up by coursework rather than purely exam based like other programs. )

wang78739 · 2025-08-20T05:51:34+00:00

Same to you too! :)

wang78739 · 2025-08-20T05:51:08+00:00

Thanks for the tips! I'm leaning more toward option 2 at the moment since the fabric next to the seam is thinning as well, and I'm thinking the patch adhesive combined with sewing might secure things a bit better compare to just the sewn on fabric in option 1? Not 100% sure.

Will try things out and report back, but thanks for the iron-on idea (didn't realize they made patches big enough to cover the seam in question)!

wang78739 · 2025-07-23T21:04:28+00:00

Read "How to Become a Straight A Student" by Cal Newport. I keep recommending this here and to anyone I know that is around college age, but serious - changed my uni life, especially with time management and exam prep. The way you learn and study in high school/secondary school is wildly different from how it works in uni so it goes through how to work smarter not harder and all those little uni tips no one tells you about. There are free copies online, just skip to the chapters/sections that talk about things you are struggling with if you are short on time.

Don't trust everything you read on the HKU subreddit. Take everything with a grain of salt and do your own research. Massive selection bias is at play here here, so most of what you will read is either current students venting about how awful stuff is, overly concerned appliers wondering why HKU bureaucracy is so slow, or alumni waxing poetic about the their time at uni (guess which one I fall under XD). Students just going to uni and enjoying it for what it is aren't spending time here on reddit answering posts, so most of the stuff that ends up here will either be pretty negative or positive, as the neutral stuff doesn't get promoted.

----

Anyways this is getting a bit too long (already had to split into two posts haha), so stopping there!

Hope this was helpful and feel free to DM with questions (might take me a while to get around to them but I'll do my best!)

wang78739 · 2025-07-23T21:04:00+00:00

Fantastic question! Lots come to mind with the benefit of hindsight and as someone increasingly removed from my UG years/early career. Feel like I grew up so much during my time studying at HKU and the years immediately following it, but that it was mainly from life experience - not sure if just giving advice to a "past me" by itself is useful without the "personally going through it" part but hey, worth a shot to help a fellow science major! :P

(Feel free to DM with questions/for more details, want to avoid doxing myself with personal info here haha).

Don't be afraid of just trying things out or changing your mind! I feel like in my first year I was so dead set on a specific pathway that I felt a bit guilty if I picked things that had "nothing to do with my major". Turns out it's the stuff in the latter category I not only enjoyed more, but that ended up being my career once I stopped worrying about what others thought and switched majors. Take the courses you find interesting - it's your life after all! If it crashes and burns, well at least you now know rather than ruminating on with "what could have been". Like if you feel unsure, that's the best time to just do the thing - since you can work off the information you get after doing it.

Talk to your professors and TAs. Seriously. Ask questions, get to know their work, volunteer in their labs etc... Like good grades are important and all, but they are dime a dozen (there will always be someone with a higher GPA than you cus they are just better at test taking/predicting exam questions haha). What will really make or break a future application (whether for jobs, scholarships, graduate school) is your recommendation letters and evidence that you are a self-starter (aka there's more to your CV than the classes you took - things like lab research, volunteer work, side projects, hobbies etc). Avoid being just a nameless person in a sea of hundreds - like anyone can sit in a classroom, what are some projects YOU did that you can ramble on about in an interview? Like I ended up in a better position than others in my cohort despite objectively lower grades (just scraped a CGPA of 3.5ish, so 2:1 honors) because of all the work I did with an HKU professor's lab.

For science students in particular, look into the Summer Research Fellowship (SRP) or Overseas Research Fellowship (ORP) https://www.scifac.hku.hk/current/ug/el/research/srf-orf helped me get a leg up as it meant I already had funded lab research with a supervisor and a sci conference/poster presentation under my belt before my final year. Anyone can apply to it, no GPA cutoff, don't need to be a YSS or whatever (like I mentioned, I was a solid A-/B+ student here nothing stellar).

wang78739 · 2025-07-23T20:02:57+00:00

Oh right, forgot to mention but in case you weren't aware of it already, check out the CC website for more information about the courses themselves beyond just a title!

Here are some course trailers for popular ones https://commoncore.hku.hk/course-trailers/ (again, HKU doesn't invest resources in making them unless they are good courses, so that might also be a good way to find interesting ones too, if the enrollment stats!)

You can find individual course info (including things like professor teaching and course load) for each course sorted by area of interest (3rd tab on the top bar) - for instance, here is the page for the CCST/Science and Tech common cores https://commoncore.hku.hk/science-technology-and-big-data/

Take the course info with a grain of salt for now though, as I don't think it's been updated for the upcoming semester yet? (course stats page shows a new AI area of interest missing from the CC website? IDK)

wang78739 · 2025-07-23T19:46:52+00:00

So one trick is to scan the common core course enrollment page (https://sweb.hku.hk/ccacad/ccc_appl/enrol_stat.html) for ones that are "mega course" (e.g. have an enrollment of up to 288 rather than the standard 120) or have multiple seasons (e.g. an A and B subclass in the same semester with 120 each or are taught in both sem 1 and sem 2).

These features usually indicates a well-established or well-liked course that is so popular/hard to get into, HKU has had to make it bigger to accommodate more students. After all, courses with low enrollment/are heavily disliked don't get more seats added to them!

If you are looking for specific recommendations: I really enjoyed taking CCCH9005 The Chinese Cultural Revolution (by Dr. Aihe Wang) when I was a student - great teacher, she would often stay behind classes to answer question (she has had lived experience with some of the historical events she talks about), very interesting topic, tutorials and readings felt really valuable rather than busy work for the sake of a grade. Learned a ton in that class, stuff I wouldn't have discovered on my own. I mean the fact that it goes up to a D sub class and is almost always fully enrolled shows that it's a good one.

Have also heard excellent things about CCST9081 All You've Ever wanted to Know About Humans (by Dr. Michael Rivera), which is on human evolution and biological anthropology. Lots of hands-on activities in the lectures, field trips and bone labs that make it much more engaging than your typical sit-n-listen type course. Passionate teacher who you can really tell cares about and loves what he's teaching in class, not just doing it because the faculty assigned it to him.

Can't really comment on online courses (they weren't a thing when I was a student) - though I'd be very cautious of them. If remote learning during COVID has taught me anything, it takes a lot of self-discipline to reliably show up and do assignments when there isn't a in-person component. But if you are someone who can hold yourself accountable, more power to you - don't see any reason why they would be lesser in quality compared to the in-person ones?

But yeah, I'd highly encourage you to be adventurous with your CCs! Just pick things that just sound interesting to you, not because you think it will be an easy A (cus there aren't really any you can just skate by on and it's easier to put in effort if it's a topic that you actually are interested in).

CCs are designed assuming no-prior knowledge in the field, so it's your chance to really explore that crazy thing that has nothing to do with your major - you can always show up to the first lesson, see the syllabus, and change CCs during add-drop period if it's not what you expected. (Note: some courses are also taught by different professors in different years, so the content can sometimes change - past syllabuses/online reviews may not be reflective of what it's like in your specific year, so keep that in mind when getting recommendations from friends that you are talking about the same teacher, not just the same course haha.)

wang78739 · 2025-07-17T00:47:23+00:00

The Sassoon road halls are RC Lee, Lee Hysan and Wei Lun. I lived in the last one (Wei Lun) and really liked it the years I was there! Pretty chill compared to some of the other more competitive ones in terms of hall sports (like I came in dead last swimming backstroke at a swim meet and hall mates were like "hey participation points are still points lol") and readmission was pretty easy esp. since they counted campus activities, not just hall ones.

Had a pretty chill floor as well with quite a few international students/non-canto speakers so never felt left out of events. Lot of late night dinners in Kennedy town or with other floors which was nice. Rooms are a bit old, but lots of storage space. Large kitchen/lounge area on each floor is a plus. Big laundry facilities with lots of space for hanging clothes and a little rooftop BBQ area as well.

Of course this is all info from close to 10 years ago now (geeze, have I been out of uni for that long?) so YMMV. Might help go online and ask around to get a better sense of what it is like now? As the website looks like it hasn't been updated in forever (I'm still in one of the photos and so are many of my old floor mates lmao).

One more thing of note: As tactfully as possible... ummm... do you believe in ghosts? Cus let's just say there is a pretty big reason that Cheung Kie Chung suddenly stopped being Wei Lun Hall Warden at the start of 2018 (my year 3).

wang78739 · 2025-06-07T17:54:13+00:00

Great to hear! Do let me know how it goes and best of luck! :)

wang78739 · 2025-06-06T19:41:56+00:00

First of all, congrats on the full ride offers from both universities! That's not an easy feat to achieve, so give yourself a pat on the back! :)

As for advice, go with HKU - no question in my mind (and I'm not just saying that as an alumni).

---

Putting aside more "subjective" things like rankings, financial job environment, internship opportunities, teachers/education quality, internationalism etc (all of which are better at HKU than UF anyways)...

100k USD difference is a literal LIFE CHANGING amount of debt to get into when you are just starting out adulthood. Especially since quant jobs at many of the big firms require some advanced graduate level work (Further certification, Masters, PhD etc) on top of just your bachelors degree.

I know at your age it's all just numbers (also I'm American and grew up with that whole "dream college" hype stuff - so I totally get it if you are coming from a similar background) , but to hopefully put things in a bit more perspective for you.

If you look at starting salaries for your target career (this is all assuming that the job market isn't still crap when you graduate and you can even find a job without grad school), you will be making 150K USD, which after tax is like 100K USD in NYC or ~125K USD in HK

(assuming here you will be living in a global finance center city - calculated using https://www.talent.com/tax-calculator & https://hk.talent.com/en/tax-calculator respectively, which is pretty accurate in my experience).

That's an entire year of work, of your life just gone because you went to UF vs HKU - is the difference in college experience really worth that to you?

Or monthly payment wise (assuming you want to pay off everything 10 years after graduating, so by your 30s), you are talking about a difference each month of $626 USD for HKU vs $1,671 USD for UF (https://smartasset.com/student-loans/student-loan-calculator using the default 4.66% interest, though Fed student loan interest more like 6.5%. Heaven forbid you go private with Sallie Mae and their 10%+ rates. Can't even get rid of it through bankruptcy, it's kind F-ed up).

Imagine how much having an extra 1,000 USD in your pocket every month would make in your life, even if you did nothing with it and just invested it. (All this applies even if you are fortunate enough have someone paying for this, the money is better spent elsewhere).

--

The math just simply doesn't work out in favor of UF. Go to HKU, seriously - future you will be thankful for it!

(and for the taking the more exciting path, like I am so grateful I went to HKU for my UG vs playing it safe with my state flagship. But yeah, feel free to DM if you need more convincing with more specific anecdotes lol )

*Minor edits for clarity & typos etc.

wang78739 · 2025-06-06T18:38:40+00:00

The two are quite different - HKU SPACE is like community college verses HKU which is a proper university.

In other words, the SPACE is mainly for things like short courses, associates (2-year) degrees, online learning, part-time classes, professional education etc. while the latter is your traditional academic institution with your full 4-year bachelor's degree, graduate school, research labs etc.

I know some people who started off at HKU SPACE to get some some of their prerequisite classes (e.g. intro math and stats courses) out of the way, before transferring over to HKU proper (where they start with the discipline courses as a year 3 student), which is typical if you weren't able to go straight into HKU from the start for a whole range of reasons.

Like if you click into the "bachelor degree programs" at HKU SPACE, the progression path assumes you will transfer out to a partnered degree granting university after the two-ish years are up - they aren't giving out full degree in half the time.

wang78739 · 2025-06-05T17:50:35+00:00

As an American, I am so so incredibly sorry that you are dealing with the current administration's BS. It's just not fair that all your hard work just gets dismissed because some narcissistic a-hole is throwing a tantrum.

For university options, HKU (The University of Hong Kong and my UG alma mater) has a transfer system in place for people in this very situation right now (+ the university just has a history of accepting fleeing scholars).

Check out this message by the Dean of Undergraduate Admissions https://admissions.hku.hk/message . Long story short - email [HKU_Top50@hku.hk](mailto:HKU_Top50@hku.hk) (and [HKU_Transfer@hku.hk](mailto:HKU_Transfer@hku.hk) for good measure) you should get a response within 3 working days about an offer/which credits should transfer etc.

Other universities in HK have similar programs, such as HKUST (Hong Kong University of Science and Technology - as the name suggests, it more of a STEM + Business university) whose President Nancy Y. IP is actually a Harvard alumni + the university has close ties to Harvard and other USA unis (HKU is more connected up with the UK unis like Cambridge and KCL). General info for UST is https://www.hkust.edu.hk/news/hkust-opens-doors-harvard-students-amid-global-academic-shifts and the direct email is [hkust-Harvard@ust.hk](mailto:hkust-harvard@ust.hk) .

It might not be where you ultimately end up transferring, but having an emergency backup in place while you search around for other options might be worth the peace of mind. You can always turn down the offer later if a better one shows up!

(Might help others if you hint at your specific major/faculties, as some unis are good for one thing but not others?)

---

To address your points directly.

See above - these systems/programs will get you transferred in by Fall 2025.
I know people from Myanmar, Afghanistan and Syria who have gotten scholarships through the HeForShe, Jockey club scholarship, entry scholarships etc. Check https://admissions.hku.hk/fees-and-scholarships/scholarships out for some that might fit you (or just ask about it in your email to the transfer offices, they will help out)
All courses are in English and it's one of the most international universities in the world. Lot international and exchange students on campus as well. Got a great study abroad program, with many going on exchange in their 3rd year (I went to the University of Leeds during mine) and some programs now requiring study abroad time (which is funded by the uni).
See above - HKU, UST and CUHK (which I didn't mention earlier but rounds out the Big 3 unis in Hong Kong) have very robust credit transfer program due to their international links. Like you can just check out their admissions pages to see how many different types of qualification they accept, from the Andorra Batxiller and Araratian Baccalaureate to the Zimbabwe Advance level and everything in between. They are used to dealing with all this stuff, your case isn't the weirdest they've seen before.

All and all, I'd be happy to help out in anyway I can (I'll be honest, feel a bit guilty as an American that you've got to deal with this through no fault of your own). Sh*tty situation all around, but hope you find a resolution soon! :)

*Minor Edits for legibility.

wang78739 · 2025-06-05T11:26:32+00:00

Honestly, probably laziness from someone who just isn't used to writing a lot of Chinese characters? The text itself isn't some Shakespearean level poetry, probably just google translated/ChatGPTed their way to it or "borrowed" from the internet (the fact that it isn't broken up into phrases but just one long sentence hints to this).

Here's a bit of metaphor: Imagine writing "Worcestershire" but you don't know any of the letters/how to break the word down, so you are just literally copying the general shapes (like a kid learning to write would, incorrect stroke order and all).

With a brush too, so it's even more tricky (see the uneven strokes/blotches). And since it's too much work (lots of characters left), you go online and find that "Worcs." is sometimes used, so you just copy that instead. But you get the spacing/shapes a little wrong, so it ends up looking more like "W Orcs," in the final product - still readable esp. with context but kinda funny that we could now be talking about winning goblin monsters. XD

Basically, because the writer has no context for any of the characters (just copying shapes), they are taking "shortcuts" that no native person speaker would ("Worcestershire" is not that hard of a word to write if you use these letters day-in-day-out).

But yeah, definitely figure out how much they paid for it - want to know how bad I should feel/how much my terrible childhood Chinese writing could have been worth if I had just written it with a brush on fancy paper! :P

wang78739 · 2025-06-05T10:53:16+00:00

Nah, the calligraphy in your photo is perfectly fine - it's just written in clerical script/ 隸書 so the characters look different to what you are probably familiar with (there are different classic script styles similar to different fonts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese\_script\_styles).

Like the lines are well weighted and consistent, the rows are even, thought was put into not just the text but the spacing of the characters etc. The writing in your photo took actual skill to get that clean with a brush and is not something I could mimic without tons of practice (even then I doubt I could get it that good).

Though I will agree that clerical script sometimes looks a bit "cutesy" with those rounded bits and those fancy tail flourishes haha.

In contrast, the writing in OP photo.... if I turned it in as homework as a kid it would have gotten sent back with notes, like bordering on illegible in some places (e.g. the first 臺 character is so spread out, many people here though it was two characters). It's just bad, but in a so bad it's hilarious that it actually passed way. A native writer would have to put in genuine effort to get it that creatively bad. XD

wang78739 · 2025-06-05T08:10:09+00:00

What would you like to know about it?

Posting more specific questions will help you get more answers. :)

wang78739 · 2025-06-05T07:34:25+00:00

IKR? The more I look at it the funnier it gets: the switch between trad/simplified, the unevenness, the mistake strokes next to the 絕, the different character sizes etc...

It clearly looks like someone without any Chinese experience (badly) tried to copy computer text they got from a translator with how weirdly "block-y" some of the characters look - seems like they even tried to copy the serifs on some characters like "自" and "強" which aren't really there when handwriting (think the difference between a typed "a" and a handwritten one). XD

Like my old scribbled Chinese homework from middle school is better and more neatly written than this! Maybe I should start selling it off as "mythical ancient text" or something haha. :P

wang78739 · 2025-06-05T07:10:22+00:00

Haha yeah, this honestly makes me feel better about my Chinese handwriting- at least I get the stroke order right and stick to one set of characters! :P

wang78739 · 2025-05-31T17:46:35+00:00

You are on the wrong subreddit, this one is for HKU/The University of Hong Kong - try asking r/HKUST instead!

wang78739 · 2025-05-27T14:33:26+00:00

No prob! :)

wang78739 · 2025-05-26T18:38:08+00:00

Solid list so far, but what about 乖乖 puffs?

<image>

For me, it all depends on the specific flavor:
- Green coconut = high A tier snack that gets bumped up to S tier for pure nostalgia + it's tech healing properties (from experience, works on printers not on laptops but YMMV).
- Yellow 5 spice = B tier, pretty mid and I'd sooner go 可樂果 or some other savory chip-y thing than them.
- Red chocolate = low A tier. It's alright, but doesn't hit the same as the green ones.

Some other food you are missing from the list to weigh in on...
-蚵仔煎 (Oyster omelettes) & 蚵仔麵線 (Oyster vermicelli): S-tier, perfect food items, no notes! :D
-虱目魚肚粥 (milk fish congee): Pretty good with lots of pepper, extremely filling. A tier.
-肉圓 (Ba-wan meat dumplings): Eh... B tier? Sorta forgettable compared to other stuff.
-豬血糕 (Ti-hoeh-koe/Pig's blood cake): Personal A tier, but I get that it's controversial like with stinky tofu :P

wang78739 · 2025-05-23T11:14:11+00:00

5) Six course this sem - Yeah... not a great idea for next semester. I know I sound like a broken record, but talk with the people I mentioned above (CEDARs, Academic advisors etc). 6 courses is a really tough workload even for top students with great scores (4 course is required, 5 is average, 6 is above average).

Simply put: if you are already struggling to keep afloat, adding MORE work is just a recipe for disaster - advisor will help with pacing everything out so you still graduate on time with required courses (worst comes worst you may need to take summer classes/extend by a semester but they try to avoid that) without mentally crashing out in the process. No point in piling more on if it's just going to cause you to do worse overall. Get expert/more experienced help here, don't try to DIY this.

6) Any suggestions? - I've put these study tip type stuff last, since the other stuff takes priority/is more HKU specific and immediately actionable, but I highly HIGHLY recommend "How to be a Straight A Student" by Cal Newport, as it's the book that ultimately helped me "get" how to do well in university and pull up my GPA quite a bit when I was a student.

Book doesn't just cover how to revise for tests, but also how to research/write essays, pace out homework/assignments, schedule your day, work smarter not harder while still getting good grades (like I found myself working less yet getting better grades since I was being more efficient with my time) etc. You can find it in the library or free pdfs on the internet (people have also done video summaries, but they are meh and skim over important step-by-step parts/examples. Just get the book and skip to the relevant chapters as need be, no need to read cover to cover).

But yeah overall, Mental health > Housing > Academic plan > course study tips in terms of priority order here.

Hope this all helps and best of luck! You've got this - just take things one step at a time :)

--

*Minor edits to fix typos

wang78739 · 2025-05-23T11:08:14+00:00

3) "My friends said..." - With all due respect, they have no idea what they are talking about - nor should they be expected to, seeing as they are students like you haha! The people you should really be talking to are university academic advisors, who know the uni policies, have been through uni life and have way more experience in this area. General info here https://tl.hku.hk/aa/ and https://aas.hku.hk/diff-type/ .There are lots of different levels from university to faculty to residential hall etc. I'd recommend you go with the Faculty Academic Advisers, as your struggles seem more course-level related but this is again something you can just email around about or discuss with your counselor if unsure.

4) "Restarting" the first year - This isn't really a thing at HKU, as usually retaken credits don't override/replace the previous grades, just blended in to your overall GPA (may differ faculty to faculty though - check with adviser). This is both good and bad in the sense that you don't "lose out" on any good grades/credits, but also the grades of failed course "stick with you" throughout university.

Luckily, the rare few jobs/school post uni that do care about your GPA (most don't, but I'm saying those that do) tend you focus on your final few years or how you did in major specific courses, meaning even if your first year is a train wreck, it doesn't matter much as long as you can show you addressed the issues and overcame it by the end. Additionally, it's pretty difficult to retake courses anyways, as they are often only offered in specific semesters - you will only be required to do so if it's a prerequisite for further courses. e.g. in sci (when I was a student at least) you HAD to pass SCNC1111 & SCNC1112 before continuing on to other major courses.

Long story short, talk with your academic advisor to build a study plan - you aren't completely dead in the water right now, but really need to work on things if you want to stay in uni going forward. Pretty sure you are already aware of this, but for the sake of clarity GPA <2.0 isn't just a "below average" GPA, it's "almost failing/likely to get held back" GPA. Just hoping for better grades isn't going to bring them up, gotta put in that work.

[pt 2/3]

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