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Published: August 6th 2007
Arrived into Hong Kong airport after what seemed like an eternal flight, the time just dragged on, strange really as myself and Sus in our tenure of being world class globe trotters (ahem!) had taken flights longer in travel time, but this one seemed to be the worst. However after making it through the endless queue at airport immigration the smiles finally came back on our faces as we got picked up by a chauffer driven limo!!! Just the way to begin the last leg of our trip and ditch the backpacker look! Needless to say we arrived in style at our hotel, the Cosmopolitan located in Wanchai near the city centre.
It was certainly refreshing to have the door be opened for us upon our arrival and me and Sus felt like movie stars!
The hotel was beautiful. The lobby was marble and very elegant looking and the staff were so friendly and courteous, I just wish I hadn’t arrived carrying a backpack wearing combats and trekking shoes! Our room was gorgeous, very quaint and cosy, not to mention spotless and sophisticated (unlike us at the time of our arrival!)
We were pretty exhausted from our flight and wasted no
time getting showered and vegging out on our comfy beds which were dressed in silky pillows and down quilts, this is the life! Me and Sus were delighted to have found robes and slippers in our room and began lounging around the room like ladies of leisure watching Lost on our cable TV! (…I missed you Sawyer!)
After a great nights sleep, we peered out of our 6th floor window to be greeted with the rain pouring down from the heavens but decided that, ok at worst we get wet…lets go shopping! It just has to be done. After a hearty brekkie at pret a manger, we walked back through town to catch the number 40 bus to take us to the famous Stanley markets. The rain never seized the whole day and we looked like two drowned rats, we were drenched to the skin but our newly purchased bargains kept the smiles on our faces. I bought plenty of nic-nacs including a bag, purses, a jade bracelet and necklace, a Chinese kimono and loads of other gifts for the family. Susan bought an ipod speaker deck which she was delighted with and a t-shirt.
But the bargain shopping did
not end there, we were just getting warmed up!
After arriving into the city we got the subway to Mongkok where we could find the open air ladies market located at Tung Choi Street. I think at that point I started to curb my spending as I just kept seeing the same stuff over and over again. Susan on the other hand was a different story, she went a bit mad and ended up buying four "designer" handbags!!!! They really looked the part and she was delighted with them, but I have to say I don’t think I’ve owned quite as many bags in all my lifetime, still Sus is quite the fashionista these days since hanging up the backpack! We were pretty exhausted after all the shopping excitement and after getting back to Wanchai with all our bags we found ourselves a bit lost. After wandering aimlessly around the back streets we decided to grab a cab and get to the Cosmo. So funny really, the taxi driver literally drove two streets and there it was in all its glory- the Cosmopolitan Hotel, you could have thrown a stone at it! (I should know, I’m from Belfast after all!!!)
So with red faces we paid the driver and exited as fast as humanly possible. Upon returning to our grand coffee and cream coloured room, we inspected our buys of the day and it wasn’t long before Susan realised that her ipod didn’t fit the speaker deck she had just bought. Disappointed we put Stanley market back on the agenda for the next day.
The next morning, having arrived at the electrical shop where Susan had bought the speakers, she explained the problem to the sales staff only for them to pop out a piece of plastic from the speakers and bingo the ipod fitted! We couldn’t stop laughing! It’s so typical! No wonder the jokes go “two blondes walk into a store…” ha, ha! Well at least we saw the funny side.
Moving on swiftly, that afternoon we were feeling adventurous (as well as all shopped out. I think it was a temporary feeling though!) so we decided to take the trip to the big Buddha on Lautau Island. This statue is the world's largest Buddha statue using bronze. It's 34 metres tall and weighs 250 tonnes, empowered in December 1993. We arrived at
the Buddha via subway and
Mong Kok Station...my fav!
(Ladies market here I come!)made our way to the cable cars which where to take us on a 30 minute journey to the village of Ngong Ping. The cable car ride wasn’t too hairy, even though it was pretty freaky when you realised just how high up you were. Me and Susan kept joking and trying to freak each other out about the cable car falling off the rails. When we arrived to Ngong Ping, there he was all majestic and grand, the big Buddha on top of the mountain. It was such a massive sculpture, very impressive to say the least. But as with our luck with the weather goes it was pretty misty and we had to rely on luck to get any clear photos of him.
The walk to the top didn’t seem to take too long, however the humidity did get to us a couple of times on the way up. At the top many people began to pray to Buddha as a sign of respect and it was very interesting to see them chanting and see just how passionate they are about their faith. It wasn’t long before I started to notice mozzie bites swelling on my leg or,
I dunno, maybe they were Chinese dragon-fly bites or something! They were massive, so taking no risks we quickly visited the nearby monastery for photos (where Susan strategically placed me next to a statue so it looked like something was growing out of my head! lil swine!) and got the returning cable car to the subway.
Having made it back to the city it was time for our next tourist attraction- the Avenue of Stars, where we got to pose with the statue of Bruce Lee and put our hands into the hand prints of many Chinese stars which included Jackie Chan and Jet Li and the guy from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon- Chow Yun-Fat. The Avenue of stars is also an amazing spot to see the city’s skyline in its entirety. Of course it was very misty the day we turned up and it began to rain but we still managed to get some great photos and watch the Chinese variety show by the river.
The Guinness record holder as the worlds largest permanent light and sound show was to be held at 8pm, so me and Sus wandered around killing time before it started. However about 30 minutes
before the show our hungry tummies got the better of us and so we swanned off to pizza hut for a quick feed. Unfortunately it didn’t come at a fast enough pace and we ended up racing back to the Avenue as the show ended at 8.10pm! We thought it would have been a longer show, but alas we would just have to return the next day (I’m starting to notice a pattern here!) On the bright side Susan tracked down a first class tailor in Tsim Sha Tsui and got fitted for tailored suit number two! This gal will be looking major sharp back in the Dublin office! Tailored suits and designer bags, I don’t know, some people have the life!
The next day while getting ready for the day ahead, Susan lifted the newly delivered newspaper from under our door and gasped, we couldn’t believe it…the cable car we were on the previous day had in fact plummeted to the ground over one of the valleys!!! Thankfully there was no one onboard, but I have to say the thought of us joking the day before about a cable car crash left a sour taste in the mouth.
That
evening, after well and truly taking the piss out of the phrase “retail therapy” at H&M at Central and the ladies market at Mong Kok, me and Sus headed back to Tsim Sha Tsui for her suit fitting and while watching the clock eagerly so as not to miss the light show again, we found a nearby restaurant serving authentic Chinese cuisine. We had been waiting for this moment from day one and were really looking forward to the chopstick experience! Sitting among the locals we ordered a chicken curry and while Susan went for the safe option of Coke, I decided to get in touch with my cultural roots and order a Chinese tea. Well the entire meal was absolutely rancid including my tea! The chicken had obviously been stored in some sort of oil preservative and the fat started to float to the top of the sauce! The chicken was more like lumps of chicken skin, I swear I don’t know how I wasn’t sick, it was so bad. Even my tea was undrinkable, but me and Susan seen the funny side and tried to leave as discreetly as possible without causing any offence!!! But I’ll never forget
the sight of Susan spooning out the fat into her cup!!! Oh god, my tummy feels funny just thinking about it! But we did finally get to see the light show which was very impressive. The laser light displays on all the skyscrapers danced perfectly to the beat of the music blearing out from across Victoria Harbour, it was a wonder to see, the only down side was our empty tummies!
Wednesday 13th, our final day in Hong Kong (time has just flown) and after our final trip to Tsim Sha Tsui in Kowloon for Susan’s final suit fitting, we ventured out on our final tourist spots- the Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin Temple and the Golden Bauhinia Monument. The temple was breath-taking, very artistic, colourful and very eye catching. The smell of incense was in the air as many prayed and chanted. Our final trip was to the Golden Bauhinia Monument. The Bauhinia flower is Hong Kong's emblem, it's on the flag of Hong Kong and is also featured on the coins as well. The Chinese Government gifted Hong Kong with this Golden Bauhinia Sculpture when Hong Kong returned to Chinese sovereignty on
1 July 1997. Every morning
at 7.50am, the national flag hoisting ceremony is held. After getting off the subway we had to walk quite a bit to the waterfront and the humidity was unbearable at times, and by the time we finally got there we had expected it to be a whole lot bigger and impressive!
After getting the money shots with the monument, it seemed our posing was far from over! An Indonesian photographer rushed over to Susan asking us if we would get our photos taken with three Chinese men standing nearby!!!! Rightly so, Susan pretended she didn’t understand and the two of us tried to creep away slowly, before one of the men raced up to us, standing between us while his friend took a photo! It wasn’t long before they were all swapping cameras and putting there arms around us for photos!!! We were so embarrassed but we couldn’t stop laughing! They must have thought we were Paris and Nicole or something!!!! lol. After our ordeal, we went to Causeway Bay near our hotel to cool down our red faces with some ice cream at the Haagen Dias café before getting back to the Cosmo to beg for the use of
a shower in a courtesy room (we had already checked out.) The staff seemed a bit miffed at our request, but being that we were drenched and sweaty and needing to leave for the airport for an international flight, they kindly let us use one of the rooms to get a quick shower. It was the best one of my life and we boarded the luxury coach to Hong Kong airport smelling sweet! Once we boarded the heavens opened again and the ride to the airport began to get a bit hairy! The rain was coming down so heavy and the coach was speeding at a mighty rate. A few times me and Susan thought the end was in sight! But thankfully we made it there in one piece.
After checking in with British Airways, Susan finally relaxed because she didn’t have to pay excess baggage or throw away any of the new editions to her wardrobe and the flight got underway to London. Thankfully it was a night flight so it wasn’t long before the plane was silent and we got our 40 winks.
Upon our arrival to London, the atmosphere changed from the chilled out tranquilly of our
plane and the elite service the Chinese staff had provided. Bloody Heathrow, what a zoo! and BA? learn to train your staff! They are just down right rude! Susan was given a hard time for carrying her newly made suit in hand (she ended up squashing the thing into her backpack) and a Chinese man was spoken to like an infant as he had joined the wrong immigration queue! Only in London! It was horrible to arrive to that not to mention how everything is so extortionately overpriced! Thankfully it wasn’t long before we flew to Dublin escaping the hell hole that is Heathrow, however not without an hours delay. Upon reaching our destination, I was really sad at the prospect of saying goodbye to my travel companion Sus. It was a trip of a lifetime and it was such a pleasure to travel with her. She is such a great friend and stuck with me through thick and thin (I’ll miss you babes, but we’ll catch up soon in Dublin or Belfast!) Her mother and father were there with open arms to welcome her home, it was a real tear jerker and so nice to see. Welcome home Susan!
As for me I’m not home just yet…
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Gary Byrne
non-member comment
Fair Play Girls
Brenda: pitty we didn't have your pleasure in NYC, you guys are mad but fair play, it was very interesting reading up on your travels GB