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Room with a view
Stunning harbour view from our equally stunning apartment. We took a plane from Kunming to Shenzhen, the city in China nearest to the boarder with Hong Kong and a whose main purpose seems to be a low-cost base from which to interact with it. Our friend Emanuel, who we'd taught with in Tai'an and who was in the area with his family over the spring festival, had emailed us very kind and extremely detailed instructions about how to get from Shenzhen to Hong Kong, and we followed his advice by ignoring the taxi touts clustering around the airport doors (and they really did take some ignoring) and instead booking passage with an official coach company, who slapped a big blue sticker on each of us, charged us a very reasonable rate, and gave us a comfy sofa to sit on while we waited for the next coach.
The process of driving to Hong Kong turned out to be surprisingly complicated. China's very keen on HK being seen as thoroughly and happily returned and reintegrated with 'The Motherland', but you certainly wouldn't know it looking at the customs arrangements you have to go to between the two countries. The coach took us first to the 'leaving China' customs, where
Hong Kong opera
A display at the Hong Kong museum we waited in line, filled in a little 'departure card', and had our passports inspected and stamped. Then out the other side into a bus-station arrangment where (amound many others loading up differently stickered passengers) we found a new coach from the same company waiting to take us onwards.
We were driven across a kind of no-man's land. I don't really know if that's what it was, but that's the function it seemed to serve, because 15 minutes later we had to get off the coach again to go through the Hong Kong customs. Where we waited in line, filled in little 'arrival card', were given a 'happy new year' pen with a reel-out calendar, read notices to the effect that for our comfort and convenience we were not to spit (a widely prevalent habit/sport on the mainland), and had our passports stamped. Because we're British they got out a special little stamp that said we could remain for up to 180 days. Not that we had the time or the budget to, but it was cool anyway. Your basic mainland Chinese tourist can only stay for about 2 weeks. All our bags were scanned and then we were
Dragons
Another display at the museum. through and searching out our new company bus to take us onwards.
And of course, now we were driving on the left. And as we drove along, I kept seeing things that were strangely familiar. Road signs. Road furniture. Infrastructure in general. All British style. But in a semi-tropical landscape and with Cantonese dual signage. Theoretically just an interesting function of HK's history but to a British person just begining to feel rather homesick after a month on the road it felt just surreal.
As the bus drove closer in and onto Hong Kong island, the flavour settled down to 'Cantonese with a British twist'. Highrise apartment blocks and skyscrapers all over, mostly prosperous and practical looking, and built right back into the mountainside and right out on 'reclaimed land' into the harbour. Shops and more shops (including the first Marks and Spencers I'd seen in 6 months), people people and more people. We got off the bus and hauled our luggage into a taxi. Which was clean. And had seatbelts. And which was expensive.
We'd had a bit of a time getting somewhere to stay- everywhere was thoroughly booked until the next day due to the
Model ship
Museum exhibit on early trade to and from HK. I took a few close pictures of the rigging- I have a similar ship at home that needs some TLC. Spring Festival- and had ended up booking the first night rather over our usual budget at a luxury place overlooking the harbour. Even this place had, we were told when we arrived, filled up all its standard rooms, so we were being upgraded to a suite. Was this OK?
Oh boy, it surely was. A massive bed in a massive bedroom, a bathroom, more warderobe space than I have at home, a living room and a kitchen. A kitchen! Cooking has become a luxury persuit in Hong Kong because housing costs are so high that a lot of people who actually live here don't have kitchens! And a view over the harbour. I wished we'd booked in for more than one night, but we'd taken a rather more sensibly priced guesthouse room on Cameron Road for the rest of the trip- the kind of clean and tidy place where everybody's terribly nice and kind and considerate but the bathroom door has to be a sliding one otherwise the other person would have to stand on the bed so you'd have room to open the door. But I made the most of my time in luxury by using the rooftop
Lion!
It's a Chinese tradition to have two lions guarding the entrance to your bank. I've ever so many different interpretations on the theme of 'lion', but this one- one of the original pair from the original HSBC building- has to be the grandest in my eyes. pool three times in 24 hours. Yes, a rooftop pool, looking out over the harbour, among the skyscrapers. I had a bedtime swim at about 10.30, did backstroke and watched the stars.
Chris and I met up with Emanuel and got on with the task of Seeing HK. We saw the nightly harbourside laser lightshow, featuring various skyscrapers lighting up and flashing different colours and whizzing rooftop lasers about in time to music. We went to the very excellent Hong Kong museum and learned lots about the ex-colony's history from pre-history to Handover, we found low-denomination coins with the Queen's head on from 1983 in our small change, we spent a glorious late afternoon reading a copy of the Times newspaper, eating real cheese and drinking real wine at a place called PR classified on Hollywood road, we struggled through Mainland Chinese tour groups whose jostling and shoving were more conspicuous than usual in the context, and we spent an evening on Victoria Peak where Emanuel took a picture of us looking out over the very very pretty lights.
We decided to treat ourselves to a show, and booked tickets to Zingaro at a huge marquee on the
Ferry Pier Lawn. There was sawdust on the floor and the smell of horses in the air, and large displays by the Hong Kong Jockey Club and Hermes near the bar on the way in. Zingaro 'Battuta' was a kind of horsemanship/ acroatics show delivered at breakneck speed to the sound of two alternating and sometimes competing live romany-style bands; one oompah brass and one strings. To quote the show's website: "drawing from ancient life, gypsy myth and folk tales, a Battuta delivers a series of striking visions that appear and reappear under the big top; a lone bride fleeing on horseback, her wedding gown billowing out behind her; a bear, cart and even an iconic Citroen 2CV careering around and around in mock chase of one another, whilst the talisman white goose, present in all Zingaro's productions, sail through the space"... "a fantasia of horses, riders and musicians in wild and perfect union." I'd never seen anything quite like it and Chris had never seen anything even close, and we both hope very much it eventually comes to Britain so that we can encourage everyone we know to go see.
One lunchtime we met up with Emanuel on
Pleasant Palace
Slightly blurry, but then with that many people, shiny things and tables in such a large space I was beginning to feel a bit blurry too. Fantastic lunch in an amazing atmosphere. Kowloon, which we got to by crossing the harbour on the Star Ferry, and he took us out to have dim sum at a place called the Pleasant Palace. We'd left lunch til 2pm to let the crowds die down, though for a really popular place this actually means you have to wait less long for a table, and we shared a table (as is quite usual to do) with a pair of Hong Kong lunching ladies. The restaurant was all on one immense floor, with dozens of great round tables and bustling staff zipping around the place talking orders and bringing little plates piled with delicious little things. It hummed with Cantonese conversation. I loved it. Emanuel explained that the traditional practice at this type of restaurant is to bring round trollies for people pick and choose from, but eventually this place had to leave off because a) it was causing congestion and b)people on the out laying tables never got the chance to pick the nicest things!
Later that evening we waved goodbye to Emanuel on the subway, and traipsed back to our teeny 6th floor guesthouse room to pack for Macau. I hope we meet up
On the peak
Chris and I at the top of Victoria Peak just at the gloaming of the evening. again sometime. I'm not that much good at making friends lightly, which would be best when you know that you'll probably only know people for 6 months before moving on for good. I'm not really a nomadic beast at heart. But at the same time I love all the new things I've seen out here, and all the new people I've met, and I really loved Hong Kong.
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