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Published: January 4th 2009
Hi everyone,
This vacation continues to bring surprises around every corner. After New Years, Sheena and I took a day to go over to the Kowloon side of Hong Kong to tour around. We took the old Star Ferry across the channel for $2.20 HK, which amounts to about 34 cents Canadian. The subway system here is just as cheap. Anyways, the bay area on the Kowloon side is really nice - it's where the Hong Kong equivalent of the Hollywood walk of fame is and we saw Jackie Chan's star amongst others. From there we walked up to Tsim Sha Tsui which is a nice big promenade walkway with all sorts of shops and cool stuff.
The next day we went up to Maria's place outside the main part of the city. They call it countryside, but there are still lots of high rises out there. Anyways, that far out there are actual houses and Maria has a pretty nice one on the top of a hill. Maria had a closet full of shoes that she had gotten for shows over the last year or so and so Sheena and her sister went bananas in there taking all the cool shoes they could grab. There's a promise of the same thing happening at Maria's studio sometime this week for clothes. Sheena is looking forward to that.
After checking out Maria's place, she decided that we should all go to a club and dance. I don't know if you've ever rolled into a nightclub with a celebrity before, but I can tell you that it's pretty awesome. We strolled in to the front of the line, and as soon as we got in the staff ran to the front of the place and booted out a bunch of people so we could have the best table in the place. And you know what came next? That's right - champagne all around of course! So that was all fun and we were hanging around watching the live band play. About 3 songs into their set guess who was suddenly on stage. Yup. Maria was up there stealing the show. We could see people in the streets had stopped and were gawking in, and the place was suddenly packed. Oh, and beers kept arriving at my hand without me ordering anything. Yes!
On the 3rd, the vacation got even weirder. Sheena's cousin Gaby had just recently bought a flat here and needed to get it painted. Apparently she had asked a contractor who came back with an estimate of $18,500 HK (or about 3000 CAD). Jeff (Sheena's stepdad) decided that 3000 for a 700square foot apartment was retarded, and so we all decided to show them how we do things in Canada, and paint it ourselves! So, yeah we spent yesterday painting an apartment. It was pretty funny though because Gaby and her boyfriend were completely clueless on how to do any of that stuff. It seems like people in Hong Kong always contract out that sort of thing. It was a pretty far train ride just to get to a place where you could buy any home improvement stuff. Not like Canada where there's a Home Depot in every neighbourhood.
Then, last night we were back to the celebrity rollin'. This time we went to a private show where a bunch of Hong Kong musicians were just jamming. It was a sort of recording studio place that was just packed with people, and lots were going on and off the stage playing different songs. Really cool. Both Maria, and Sheena's other aunt Janet (yes, Sheena's family is HUGE and confusing) sang some songs. It was all fun until some weird Australian guy started being a touchy close talker to me and Jeff, so we hi-tailed it out of there.
Today Sheena, Sabrina and I are going to go tour around some of the older sites in Hong Kong, and maybe some of the seedier markets so I can try my bartering skills. Then we'll see where we end up tonight. Honestly, I never know what the hell is going on until I'm at some club or private studio. Oh well, it's extremely entertaining.
Hope all is well back home,
Ryan
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Lisa Dixon-Wells
non-member comment
Jealous? yes I am.
How come no one comes and paints my place? And free shoes and clothes....Sheena, remember the little people (me) as you're going through the goods. I'd be a XXXL in Hong Kong sizes. Seriously, I'm so glad you're having a great time. This will be a vacation so full of stories that you can entertain us for many family dinners to come. Keep on truckin' Lisa P.S. Brent Charlene Talia and Ian are gone. They left today.....Hollen is sad (Hollen wrote this part)