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Published: September 10th 2006
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Mao for sale
Mao statues in the Cat Street Market I’m back from a successful 5 day solo trip to Hong Kong.
I arrived in Hong Kong on Sept 2nd in the afternoon. After checking into my very basic hostel in Causeway Bay, I headed out onto the streets of Hong Kong Island. Causeway Bay is a high-end shopping area on Hong Kong Island and after much deliberation it’s where I decided to spend my 4 nights in the city, thanks in part to friends who had spent time in Hong Kong.
I hopped on the subway using the incredibly useful Octopus card- a debit type card that you load with money and use on public transportation as the exact amount is automatically deducted from the card. Beats fumbling for correct change every time. I made my over to the Cat Street Market. Despite the name, it is not a street that sells cats or caters to cat-like things. It’s actually a street market full of antiques and Maoist trinkets. I merely browsed the stalls before heading along Hollywood Road and the Soho area before stopping at the Man Mo Temple.
Man Mo Temple is old, dark, and filled with incense. Its also incredibly warm thanks to a
Browsing the stalls
In the Cat Street Market burning fire outside the main entrance for people to burn offerings. The temple was built in the 1840s and is dedicated to two deities: Man, the god of literature, and Mo, the god of war, which is an odd combination. My camera didn’t want to focus properly on the inside of the temple due to all of the incense in the air. People had laid offerings of fruits and vegetables on the main altar and tourists mingled in between those who had come to pay their respects.
Back out into the scorching heat (had I not suffered through August in Japan, I think I would have found the temperature unbearable and would have gone to take refuge in an air conditioned store) I went to the Mid-Levels, an steep, sloping part of the island which has a series of escalators running up hill. During the morning rush hour, the escalators run downhill allowing commuters to beat the road traffic as they make their way into the downtown core. The escalators are the world’s longest covered escalators. A good alternative to hiking up the hill.
I hopped off the escalators near the zoological and botanical gardens in the center
Man Mo Temple
The incense coils hanging in the Man Mo Temple burn for weeks of the Central district. Entry into the zoo also required a steep hike uphill, as the entire zoo is built on the side of a hill. For a free zoo in the middle of Hong Kong, it wasn’t bad, mostly featuring monkeys and birds. After the zoo I took the peak tram up the Peak for some spectacular views of the city.
The peak tram opened in 1888 and has not had a single accident. Remarkable given the fact that it runs on a single cable and glides up the hill at a 45 degree angle, pinning you to the back of your seat. The tram drops you off at this anvil-shaped observatory on the top of the Peak. After going up about 8 escalators, I finally reached the outdoor observatory level. I had planned and timed my trip to the Peak to make it just before sunset to catch the city in the daylight, and hang around long enough to see the lights turn on at night. As the sun set and the lights started coming on, the observatory became packed with all kinds of tourists fighting for elbow room along the railing. Luckily, since I was there
alone, I could wedge myself into the small spaces between people. And the best part- there was a cool breeze at that altitude finally giving me a break from the heat.
The view is incredible. Hong Kong has to have one of the nicest skylines of any city I have ever been to. From the Peak, you can see the surrounding outlying islands and the mainland part of Hong Kong called Kowloon and Tsim Sha Tsui, as well as the ferries and boats that criss-cross the harbour. At 8pm every night, the skyscrapers and other buildings along the waterfront on both sides of the harbour participate in a light show with lasers. It was good to see it from so high above as all the lights on the buildings flash in synch with a pre-recorded musical track.
Back in Causeway Bay, the streets were crowded as most stores are open until 11pm or later. In contrast, the stores and some museums don’t open until 10:30am which makes late starts in Hong Kong obligatory. Even Starbucks doesn’t open until 8am. Sadly, Starbucks became my new place to eat since the (Chinese) food I ate in Hong Kong was terrible.
Escalators
The escalator in the Mid-Levels I actually resorted to eating at McDonalds and The Outback Steakhouse. The Chinese food was far too greasy and inedible. After 3 attempts at finding some decent Chinese food, I just gave up
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