The Last Day!

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This morning as I wearily got up I said to John “I think I’m ready to go home now” and he said “yes, its time - its raining”. And would you believe it, after breakfast the rain stopped! Hurrah!

After the final pack of the bags, we went to the Airport Express in Hong Kong MTR. A wonderful idea - you can check your bags in for your flight any time and then go off for a last day sightseeing. This was great for us as our flight is at 11.45pm and dragging the cases round all day or storing them at the hotel weren’t great options.

Luckily the weather had cleared enough for us to catch the Peak Tram to Victoria Peak to get a good view of Hong Kong, Kowloon and the lands and islands beyond. It also gives us the opportunity to see some even more expensive real estate than the day before! Its difficult to explain the wealth in Hong Kong - John had been amazed at a huge poster advertising Maserati - well, we passed one place on the tram that had a Ferrari and 2 Porsche on the drive, and that’s not mentioning the number of Porsche and other high-end cars we saw on the roads (well, the few roads they have ... as a girlie I wonder why they bother ... they are only cars in the same traffic jams after all!).

A final trip on Star Ferry, a quick whiz round ‘Chinese Products’ to look at the really tremendous items for sale if you’ve got a few thousand pounds going spare ... carvings in various varieties of wood and bone (not ivory), exquisite porcelain, huge statues, ornaments in semi-precious stones ... and of course the textiles! Afterwards, we went for a dose of reality through the street markets, getting some last minute purchases!

I finally managed to find the Mong Kok food market, so took John in to see the fish stalls, which I’ve always found fascinating. Bearing in mind the heat, the Chinese have to be very careful purchasing seafood and will only do so if it is fresh (or dried!) - hence they display live fish or fish that have been cut to show their swim bladders still inflated and hearts beating. There were a wide variety of fish of all colours as well as turtles and frogs for sale.

Our last meal of spiced crabs was wonderful, if a trifle messy as they were covered with chopped garlic and fresh and dried chillis. We then caught the MTR back over to Hong Kong to watch the start of the festivities for Bhudda’s birthday. We stood around for an hour with the rest of the crowd watching a couple of boats and lion dances, but eventually had to take ourselves off to catch the train through to the airport and home.

Our overall feeling about Hong Kong? - well, we enjoyed it, but I think we’re both a little disappointed. It has changed so much, and not for the better in my opinion. Having said that, I think it’s also that we have finally worn ourselves out and perhaps didn’t give it the best shot we might have done 5 months’ ago! Having said all that I thoroughly enjoyed living here, I’ve enjoyed being back and it will always have a warm spot in my heart.

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