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Published: August 31st 2007
We left Cairns for a night of torture at singapore airport! We believed that the airport had loads of cool stuff, and so therefore we didnt need to book any accomodation for our one night in singapore - it does have cool stuff, but only once you go through departures and we were stuck in arrivals for 16 hours. To prevent us going insane we decided to kill a couple of hours at the night markets in town, before heading back to the airport where we discovered if you are tired enough you can get to sleep pretty much anywhere and we settled down for the night on these really hard wooden benches.
We arrived in Hong Kong the following day, and first impressions are that it is just like new york with the business and all the skyscrapers, but chinese. Our first full day in Hong Kong was supposed to be the day that we organised eveything for china, but instead was dominated early on by the bank blocking Adriennes card despite the fact that she told them that she would be travelling in Asia. To add another dampner to the day, we were charged more than expected for our visas leading paul to some conspiracy theory that we were charged more just because we are British.
The day was not a complete loss though, we wandered round a couple of markets and a temple, and it seems to be a popular pastime to play some strange checkers game, and spit on the floor! We got the ferry back to the island we were staying on in the night, and discovered then that Hong Kong has by far the most stunning skyline of any city we have visted, and it is an understatement to say that the skyline dominated our pictures in Hong Kong! We also had our fist chopstick meal that night - we didnt have a clue what to do but had become chopstick masters by the end of the meal! Paul is still a whizz with them, but Adrienne has totally lost the technique and complaims repeatedly about having to eat with sticks!
The next day we visited the sight which was pretty much the whole reason we visited Hong Kong - the giant buddha on Lantau island. Pretty much everything on lantau was big, buddahs butterflys mosquitos etc etc. We walked up the 260 steps to the buddha, but had not bought a ticket to go inside (being stingy as we are) so satisfied ourselves with millions of photos of the buddha, who has a remarkably flat back! We also walked along the path of wisdom, a really quite nice walk but didnt leave either of us feeling any more wise! Then we went to Po Lin Monastry and watched the monks chant as part of their prayers. The monastry was really beautiful, the main hall was really colourful and very ornately decorated. Adrienne also got pooed on when we were there, and believing a cricket had just landed on her arm she flicked it off onto paul!
Hong Kong is amazingly hot and humid, so walking round in the heat all day was exhausting, and it generally stayed smoggy until later in the afternoon. With that in mind, we decided to have a lie in and did not leave the hostel until the afternoon the next day as we were going to go to the Bank of China Tower where it is free to go to a viewing platform on one of the higher floors. As we had waited to go up, the views were pretty clear. It was never going to beat the empire state building but gave us really nice views of hong kong and best of all was free! We were going to go on the Peak Tram, but decided instead to spend the rest of the afternoon in Hong Kong Park. It was really nice to get away from all the traffic noise and we played in a fountain and walked around the lake for a couple of hours.
We had a bit more of a culture shock in Hong Kong than we expected. We had thought english would be more widely spoken than it turned out to be, and there are also some really quite poor areas that we walked through, whereas the impression of Hong Kong is that it is really sophistocated and westernised. That is certainly true in some parts - designer stores are 10 a penny and paul discovered he is a particular fan of Armani, though Adrienne doubts he will ever be willing to spend the amount required to actually own any armani!
On our last night in hong Kong, we had heard on the news that there was to be a full lunar eclipse and so we went down to where they had set up all the telescopes. We arrived early, and paul was approached by an Indian Fortune teller who told him he was going to be a very rich and lucky man then demanded some money! Pauls response was to say "if you could read me that well you would know i didnt have any money to give you" then we stalked off! There was far too much cloud for us to see the eclipse, but we got to see the skyline gradually get brighter and brighter as the sunset which was spectacular. There was also a light show, which having read a guidebook, i think some people think is gaudy, but we both really enjoyed it and it was the perfect way to end our time in Hong Kong.
So we caught the train to Beijing. We had splashed out on the most expensive cabin as we would be on the train for 24hours, and it was one of the more comfortable and luxiourious places we have stayed on this holiday, so the time seemed to fly by! Unfortunately t isn't the most hygenic of transport for the places we travel through as the toilet empties right onto the track. Poor railroad workmen. Stepping out of the train station was a shock again in Beijing for the sheer number of people there, and we struggled to find a place to get money so that we could actually get transport to our hostel, but one dodgy taxi ride later we made it, and it is more like a hotel than a hostel - one of the nicest places of the holiday for 6 quid a night!
We spent today in Tiantin Park, which is where the Temple of Heaven is. We feared for our lives everytime we had to cross a road to get there, as it seems to be a free for all! people turn on green, and red, and the only rule is beep before you hit someone! Adrienne's advice for people coming for the olympics is when you cross the road , ignore the splatting and snapping of other limbs around you and run like hell when you have a gap! (dont want to give the wrong impression though, we havent actually seen any accidents!) It was lovely to get away from the traffic and the near missed to walk around the park. We saw all the buildings used in the worship of the heavens by the old emperors, where they used to slaughter calfs as a gift to the gods. They were all really colourful and intricately detailed buildings. Unfortunately the method of herding tourists through quickly to take photo's (at some of the buildings anyway) leaves you staring at your photo more than at the real thing. It was hard to imagine that we were staring at buildings that were construcetd and have been in use since the 13th century, and only stopped being used for worship last century. The last pice of chewing gum added was probably a lot more recent though. We had a really good day exploring , the park was lush and green, and the buildings were all really beautiful, so we have high expectations for everything else we visit here!
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dad
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china
Do the chinese call China china? Has brains beer reached beijing? I bet there is an oirish bar serving guiness somewhere and Marks and Spencer will be on global high street China version. From my LED Magazine I found- "A new retail center in Beijing features a giant suspended LED Skyscreen. A huge suspended LED screen forms the centerpiece of The Place, a new retail development in Beijing's central business district. The Skyscreen is 250 m long and 30 m wide, and screen is suspended six stories high (80 feet) above a plaza between two new retail centers. " Maybe worth a look and a picture if you are passing.