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Published: January 2nd 2010
Sweet Popcorn
Disneyland Hong Kong - the popcorn in Hong Kong is sweet, not quite as sweet as caramel corn but similar. Yummy.After Sukhothai we went to Bangkok for a few days. In the middle of December, we flew from Bangkok to Hong Kong. We had to get out our sweaters and socks, because the weather is a bit chillier there; but not sweating all day every day felt great for a change. We seemed to have more energy to get out and do things. We went hard every day and saw many different places in the city and out in the suburbs too. We fell in to our beds every night and slept well.
Mong Kok We stayed in a hotel that was one of four little hotels on the 9th floor of a building on Nathan Road in the Mong Kok neighborhood of Kowloon. Hong Kong is a city consisting of Hong Kong island, Kowloon (part of the city that is actually on the mainland of China), other outlying islands and suburbs called New Territories that stretch out for a ways towards China, north of Kowloon. Mong Kok is one of the most densely populated places on earth. It is incredibly packed with people.
At first when we walked down the side walk we
Neon on Nathan Road
Hong Kong is famous for its neon, and Nathan Road is one of the big tourist roads (hence the English signs). tried not to bump people but we soon got over that. You bump and get bumped, never hard, but there is a lot of contact. Hong Kong natives don’t even seem to notice. They have this instinct for darting in and out of people and traffic that I just don’t have. It was impressive.
Our Hotel Room Our room was teeny tiny, almost humorously so. I’d estimate it was 8 feet across and maybe 10 feet long, not including the little bathroom (whose shower sprayed out over the toilet, but that’s another story). There was one single bed, one bunk bed and one bed that folded down at night in front of the door and bathroom (that was my bed, because I’m the one who always has to use the bathroom at night). We learned to get along in that little space. We just took turns doing everything, so it took us a while to get ready in the morning but that was OK. By the end of our 10 days, I think we all felt kind of fond of the room.
Fun Things to Do We did many fun things in Hong Kong. One of my favorite
City from the Peak
View of a portion of the city from the peak - the panorama spreads this out times 25. things was going up to The Peak on our first (and practically only) sunny day. The Peak is the mountain that rises straight up behind the skyscrapers on Hong Kong Island. Supposedly the richest of the rich live up there.
We took a tram straight up and then found a little mall that had a roof top viewing garden. We spent time out there oohing and aahing over the view and looking through the free powerful binoculars at the city below. We then went on a 45 minute walk on a pathway that wound around the actual peak. It was a great walkway built onto the side of the mountain, through tropical trees. It was Sunday afternoon, so there were lots of other people up there, enjoying the fresh air and room to actually take big steps as you walked. We took a curvy double decker bus ride down, that made us all a little car sick, but it was interesting too.
I also liked just walking around the different neighborhoods in Hong Kong. I especially liked our neighborhood. It was very decked out for Christmas, lots of twinkling lights and Christmas music playing from most stores. Most
Contrasts
Colonial British architecture and modern skyscrapers. streets seemed to have a focus- like there was a goldfish street, an electronics street, a street full of paneling, toilets and tiles, an area with several hobby shops, and a flower market street. There were convenience stores, restaurants and clothing stores in amongst the focus stores too.
People poured in and out of the stores, shopping like crazy. I’ve never seen such shoppers. Everyone had bags of merchandise. We often wondered where they could fit it all, if our hotel room was anything like their apartments’ layout. At the fanciest stores, like Prada and Gucci, there were lines out the door of people waiting to go in. We heard that these lines were mostly of mainland Chinese tourists, coming down to Hong Kong with money to burn.
Conquering Germs Hong Kong was big on not spreading germs. There were signs in malls and museums saying that the surfaces were disinfected 5 times a day. Sure enough we saw cleaners with spray bottle and rags, wiping down escalator railings, elevator buttons and window sills. Many people wore face masks whether it was because they were sick or simply paranoid, I’m not sure. There were hand sanitizing stations on
Portion of HK Skyline
This was 5-6 of hundreds of skyscrapers. They were lit up for Christmas. It was a hoot. every floor of the museums. I can understand why, because germs would be happy to spread quickly amongst those crowds of people.
We had a great time in Hong Kong. We saw museums, Disneyland, malls and parks. It was all very interesting but not overwhelming in any way. Jordan decided to stay in Hong Kong an extra month while Ella, Paul and I head into China. It feels like a safe, fun place for her to spend a month alone.
Visiting a Family Friend John Victor Samuel and his wife Shirin live in Hong Kong with their son. John Victor worked with my dad, Bob, in Pakistan in 1959. He is a long standing family friend. When I was little, John Victor would come visit our house every year or so and he would always come to my class and be my show and tell. I have very fond memories of his visits.
Well, I got to see him again in Hong Kong, and got to introduce Paul, Jordan and Ella to him and to meet his wife, Shirin. It was a treat. We ate at a vegetarian Indian restaurant. It was delicious food and a very
Donald and Daisy
Disneyland Hong Kong fun visit. Jordan and I also met John Victor and Shirin at their church for a Christmas Eve service that was all in English and attended by English speakers from all over the world. It was a lovely evening. We sang Christmas carols on the steps of their church to the Hong Kong people getting off the bus and passing by.
Thoughts on Hong Kong, by Paul Hong Kong was a British colony until 1997, when the British handed it back to China. In some ways, it's a Chinese city with a very different history than the rest of China; in other ways, it seems very Chinese (or Cantonese, Southern Chinese). It feels very much like Singapore, which is also a former British colony and also primarily Chinese. It also feels a bit like Tokyo, a hyper-modern, hyper-stylish place.
Here are a few random Hong Kong thoughts:
Fashionistas. Hong Kong people may be the most stylishly dressed and groomed people I’ve ever seen, with the possible exception of folks in Tokyo. All of the young people were incredibly fashionable and stylish and funky-looking. It was like walking around in a fashion shoot. They make people
Pedestrian Street, Mong Kok
This was fun - every night they closed off this street right near our hotel, and it was swarming with strollers and shoppers. from the US / Canada / Europe / Australia / New Zealand look like dweebs.
Shoppers. I guess they’re so stylish because they spend so much time shopping. May mentioned this, but it’s worth mentioning again. It seems to be the focus for the city. There were malls everywhere, ultra-fancy ones. Most of the subway stops come out into huge malls. There are also several pedestrianized shopping streets, always chocked full of people in the evenings. Young people shop in these burrow-like malls called trendy malls. They’re full of these teeny little shops, packed with fashionable young people buying fashionable clothes. That seems to be pretty much what they do.
Holidays in Hong Kong. We spent Ella’s 11th birthday and Christmas in Hong Kong. For Ella’s birthday, we went to a science museum and a 3 km long mall. She had a great time. For Christmas we had a sort of rest day and went to a restaurant, Chef Mickey’s, at Disneyland Hong Kong. It was a buffet, and very international (Indian, Western, Chinese), and it was fun to gorge ourselves after eating $2 rice meals. We also went to Disneyland Hong Kong, which was like a holiday
for us. Mickey and Minnie spoke Cantonese.
The Hong Kong skyline. Hong Kong is packed with skyscrapers, as a few of the pictures show. Much of the city is on the water, so there are several places where you look across the bay at this marvelous collection of astounding buildings. It's easily the most stunning skyline I've ever seen. It continues to grow and boom, even as the US and Europe are struggling, because it's one of the gateways to China's rapid growth.
Hong Kong food. Hong Kong was the first place where we didn’t like the local food. The food we saw and ate was very meat-focused and gristly. Not to our taste. We ate a lot of $2 specials at a Japanese fast food restaurant, Yoshinoya. Everywhere we had been before had had fabulous food. It was a drag not to like the local food.
Museums. We went to some great museums in Hong Kong. There was a Hong Kong history museum, which told about how Hong Kong was a part of southern China, then a British colony, then a Japanese-occupied city during World War II, then part of China again in 1997. A Hong
Path around the Peak
We hiked a beautiful path around the peak, with lush tropical greenery and views out over the city. Really nice. Kong art museum had an excellent collection of Chinese art, with great captions on the art to help me understand it. We also went to a Hong Kong heritage museum, which had some fascinating pop culture exhibits, like one on Sister Fei Fei (Sister Fatty), a Hong Kong movie and TV star that they clearly loved dearly.
We had a great time in Hong Kong. We went really hard, and did interesting stuff all day. It's hard to write about it. The pictures may portray our time there better than words.
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Marian
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Hong Kong comments
Germs, or Conquering Germs was really interesting! Maybe the proximity to the bird flu scare helped Hong Kong get into high alert.