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Published: March 26th 2008
Hong Kong Blog
Just had 4 days in HK and feel knackered. It is a full on city and everything concentrated, nothing diluted. As space is short the city seems to exist on the vertical. There are shops, stalls and markets at ground level, cars, trams and buses at ground level up to level 3 on suspended roads, restaurants from basements through ground to level 6 (in our hotel) level 11-13 in the shopping mall next to us and upwards in the posh hotels. Our room was on the 28th floor and we looked up vertically to see the top of the building next to us.
Regarding shopping Carol said she would be sick if she saw another Chanel shop - there is every luxury brand here - including at least 4 shops solely selling Rolex watches. Everything is clean and there is no rubbish at all in the streets.
The other day we caught trolley bus to Central area. As the shops don’t really open till 10.30ish we had massage chair demo and felt rejuvenated before walking through local markets full of good produce at normal prices. Went to Man Mo temple - fascinating use of
Man Mo Temple in old part of HK
...incense was overpowering....incense coils - nearly choked with the thick smoke given off. Hollywood road also stuffed with high quality antique shops.
Caught taxi to Peak tram terminal and took a trip up to the top. Very strange standing in a skyscraper at the top looking down on the sky scrapers in HK below us. Had burgers and chips in an American style place and it was dreadful after eating Thai food for 6 weeks
Went to another local watering hole and had mango dishes and pork dumplings then as the place was buzzing went to cinema at 10pm to see The Empress and the Warriors a Chinese film that’s just come out with English sub-titles - walked back to our hotel by midnight.
The highlight for us is the harbour view at night with all the tall buildings lit up - there is then a sound and light show where the colours on the buildings flash and lasers come on and all to music. Definitely one of the wonders so far.
So now we are on the plane to Beijing and everything has the Olympic logo on - the TV on
Easter Sunday HK
..Bhuddist ceremony commemorating ancestors and rebirth... the plane has a cartoon explaining what the different contests are - apparently the hammer throw originated in ancient Scotland where blacksmiths used to amuse themselves throwing their hammers around.
We are both very excited and will let you know our progress - I think this will be our biggest challenge.
(Ed note - there have now been 2750 hits on our blog!)
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