Chui is 12 years old and a student at a prestigious school in Sha Tin. Three months ago he posted two images on an adult forum, one of his face, and one of his genitals, alongside his personal contact details and text which read: “I will have sex with women aged 10 to 45 in exchange for money. Or, I will pay $450 an hour to have sex.” Outraged forum users condemned his actions; one even tracked the boy down and sent his information to the police.

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So you’ve been in the same job for a while; gotten a few promotions, and suddenly, you find that you’re banging your head against a glass ceiling. Or, you may be out of a job entirely. Either way, it’s time to make a change. And whether you want to get higher up the career ladder or pursue a new path entirely, your best bet is to take a course and get a new qualification. In the following pages, you’ll find listings on part-time degrees, distance learning and short courses currently on offer in Hong Kong.

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While Hong Kong hasn’t historically been a main area of concern for global Aids activists, studies from the Department of Health show that the local infection rate is rising. It’s been up 5.32 percent in the first six months this year with 242 new cases, especially among gay men, with the total number of reported cases since 1984 up to 4,788. Winnie Ho, program director at Hong Kong’s Aids Concern, stresses the urgency of the situation. “It used to be a scattered epidemic,” she says. “There was never the sense that it was spreading quickly.”

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What are you reading? Still plowing through that last chapter of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”? Or speed-reading e-mails on your Blackberry? When was the last time you picked up a local novel? Probably never, given the sorry state of our English-language literary scene.

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HK Magazine: Would you consider yourself some sort of sexual guru, or “sexpert”?

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I was born in Macau. I went to the States to further my education after Form five.
I went to the University of Austin in Texas. Everyone was so open minded and willing to explore everything. It was the best time of my life.
I was never noticeable - not until I went to high school. I became very active and got involved in school activities, running clubs and started a school magazine.

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HK Magazine: Everyone thinks you’re making easy money. What do you think?
Oten: It pays well, but it’s not easy. Every day I have to spend 10-16 hours preparing teaching materials. You have to come up with ways to make the lessons interesting, which can be hard as the subjects can be very boring. Also, you have to think of ways of keeping your students, like sending them little gifts.

Walk into one of Hong Kong’s four biggest tutorial centers and you’ll probably see the same thing. There’s an admission ticket you get at registration; TV screens in the lobby play promotional cartoons with little characters shouting, “You’ve got pressure! It’s not solved yet!” And the cartoons are right – yes, you do have pressure; pressure to pass exams; to get good marks; to get ahead in school.

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