Goodbye Thailand, Hello Hong Kong (where it all began)

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Quite excited today!

Despite having to pull myself out of bed at 5:20 I was excited by the fact I was catching a flight to Hong Kong. Not only is it the place of my birth and I spent the first eight years of my life living there, I was also due to meet my little sister (who I havent seen for 5 months.)

Caught a taxi to Bangkok international airport and killed off some time by having an early early breakfast before boarding the Cathay Pacific flight to HK.

The flight was easy and straight forwad but apon arrival the immigration line was quite long.

Apon entering the arrival lounge my Sister (who had arrived a day early) was there to suprise me, which was very nice and touching.

We took the 1 hour bus journey to Kowloon Nathan Lane. Despite not having been here for 19 years and being so young at the time I was suprised to find myself completely comfortable and at home with the noise, smog and overcrowded pavements.

We were to be staying in the Chung King Mansion block. I can only describe it as a hugh appartment block full of little guest houses (of varying quality) run by Africans and mainly indians. In fact this block was essentially little india with curry outlets on the groundfloor and shops selling the latest bollywood DVDs.
One thing I wasnt prepared for was the shear aggression and persisitance of some of the indians trying to sell me a room to their guest houses. One fella followed me in all the way from outside to the back elevator saying his was cheap, had aircon and tv ect ect.. All this despite me and my sister repeating over and over again "no thanks got a place booked!"

We were staying at the lucky guest house which was nice and clean and had a TV (wow what lux).

Once i was settled in me and Sis decided to wonder down to the star ferry terminal. What a great view of the harbour HK must have the second most recognisable sky line in the world. Fortunatly alot of the buildings I knew as a kid were still there apart from now they had all been totally eclipsed by much taller and more modern skyscrapers.
The view was some what hampered by the thick smog.

We hopped over with the Star Ferry to Hong Kong Island and Central. This is where all the banks and main business are based. It is also home to endless numbers of the top most expensive designer stores and hotels. It is a warren of marble walkways, escelators to pedestrian platforms and airconditioned malls (all interconnected by airconditioned walkways - you could probably walk kilometres without having to set foot in the humid outdoors.)

We spent some time walking around admiring the buildings and seeing old childhood favourits such as the HSBC building (now dwarfed by the China Bank).

We decided to sit down and have a beer in the Georges bar in Wan Chai (Soho) which was very ex-pat.
We then headed west into a market and manged to find a local place to eat. Here we had an excellent crab curry.
Afterwards we went back to SoHo and sat and had another beer while we decided what to do (and try and plan out the rest of the week.)

We decided to head to the night Market on Temple street (back on Kowloon side.) So we jumped on the star ferry again and then caught a taxi to the market. We spent a fair amount of time here before returning (with t-shirts, purses and necklesses) to the guest house.

Left my Sister to her Diary while I watched a bit of TV before falling asleep.

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