A good place to recover...

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Except if you are planning to stay on what turned out to be a very tight budget for Hong Kong, US$30 a day. The guest house I stayed at in Kowloon was ok, other than a horrendous first night. But overall I really enjoyed Hong Kong, expensive as it was. I was there over a good weekend...the weekend of the Hong Kong Sevens Rugby tournament, which England won. I wasn't able to get tickets, which would have broken my bank account anyway, but I did spend that Saturday afternoon of my visit outside the stadium with more than 100 others, watching the games on a big screen. Each game was only 14 minutes long, but there were more than a dozen countries represented, including a dismal US side. It was a lot of fun to just lounge around and soak it in, because it was a hot and humid day anyway, so it wouldn't have been much fun to walk around anyway.

Let's see...Hong Kong is fun because it is cosmopolitan, although that feeling comes across more on Hong Kong Island than it does in Kowloon. Kowloon is where the immigrants from other parts of Asia, mainly Indians, Pakistanis, Sri Lankans and others from Central Asia live and work. There are tailors everywhere and young men asking you if you want watches, DVDs or Hashish. Hong Kong Island though is beautiful if busy. It has some really nice parks with great hiking trails and lots of trees. It also has every type of restaurant that you can imagine and I had some really good and very cheap Indian food, and on Sunday night, I went to an Irish Pub to watch the rugby final and had a traditional Sunday roast complete with potatoes and Yorkshire pudding and really, really good gravy. I can't even remember the last time I had that, but it wasn't cheap by any standard.

My final day, I went to Lantau Island to the Giant Buddha and temple, which is pretty easy to reach by riding the subway and then a 50 minute bus ride through the hills. One thinks of Hong Kong as being just a city, but it is covered in forested land that has miles and miles of trails that would take a hiker years to walk. So, I wouldn't mind going back if I was to find a good teaching job there.

Finally, the most famous spot I went to was Victoria Peak on Hong Kong Island. The tram is HK$20 one way and it's well worth it. I took it to the top and then spent several hours walking around the peak before hiking down, which took nearly 2 hours. While I didn't really know my way, it would be difficult to get truly lost because all you have to do is keep the city in front of you.

I did that on Friday, after picking up my passport from the Chinese Visa Agency. In that case, I actually saved money. My initial visa, which I got in Seoul was for 30 days and cost US $120. The new visa is for 60 days and cost about US$50. So, if you're planning to visit China and plan to see Hong Kong too in the same trip, it might be worth flying to Hong Kong first and getting the visa there. It only takes 3 working days and if you pay more, they put a rush on it. However, Hong Kong requires at least 3 days to really see anything.

Now, I am writing this with considerable hindsight. I left Hong Kong more than a week ago, so I plan to follow this entry very quickly by my entry for the Guilin area and especially Yangshuo, which I will tell you now is the best place I've been in China.

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