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Published: March 11th 2008
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Hello! Ive had another four days since I lasted posted anything to you guys. Over this period I've felt a lot more settled into Hong Kong, and finally realsing that I wont be home until July 21st. It sounds strange, but a a part of me felt like it was always going home everytime I was packing to a new destination. I thought id also do my best to describe, or should i say conclude my thoughts of Hong Kong. Although it's a good 7000 miles from the sunny England, there are many noticable similarities. For a start, I beleive that the people of Hong Kong take alot of influence from Western culture. I see it as a place where people flock too, as a release from the dominant way of life the Chinese impose upon it's own people. I see it as a Country of escapism and creativity. From the prominent fasion scene to the ridiculosuly modern architecture, it is somewhere which has taken influence from its prior British rule, but developed itself further, in a way that Britain may never be able to do.
Anyway, I left off my previous blog describing what was done on Thursday (the
night of arrival) and Friday. On the Friday night we met a group of strange but funny people at the hostel. Namely, Steve, Edd, Heather, Pier, Matt and two French dudes. Although i was feeling pretty queazy from India, i decided to go out to Wang Cahi with them anyway. After getting a 10 minute taxi to Hong Kong Island, we stumbled across a club Steve had previously been too. It was such a weird place. Basically, the place was full of prostitutes and creepy old men paying for dances. The night passed in a a blur of crazy dancing and sneaking drinks from the 7/11 off licenece opposite (much cheaper than the bar and we felt like hooligans sneaking drinks in). This hilarious cover band played a few western classics, namely Shakira and Santana which we all get well into. Me and Luke blew many a kiss (receiving few!) to the girl lead singer and adored the cheesy lead guitarist who absolutely loved the attention he was receiving from such enthusiastic Santana fans. I also thought it would be hilarious (which it was!) to grind up on and around any prostitute who had been paid for a dance, in
the hope of successfully ruining the payers night (which it did). I realised how disgustingly pathetic the men are who regularly visit clubs like this one. It made me sick to see fat , old men treating women like mere objects, especially considering they were my age and under. Me Luke and "the crew" were shouting "Were gonna tell your boss!" to all the business men who were taking advantage of these women. Anyway, it's all abit depressing so i'll move on. After meeting a few really good Irish Lads who bought us drinks for being "safe as man!" and embarrasingly sobering up and realising how sad i looked on the dance floor, we headed back around 4 am (after a regretful Mcdonalds).
The next couple of days were "the write offs". Saturday was spent lingering around in our dorm, sleeping lots and having the occasional wander outside. That night was mine and Luke's eagerley anticipated Liverpool Vs Newcastle footy match. As id told him countless times earlier, Newcastle got thrashed 3 goals to nil and i loved every minute of it (especially when Newcastle's Steve Harper ran backwards into the goal post). That night Luke drank and smoked
himself to death while I celebrated and rubbed in his loss. The next day I was going to head off to watch LA Galaxy play Hong Kong in Causewaybay. Not being a particularly big fan of David Beckham's , I decided to stay behind and do some exploring of Kowloon. After going to my local cafe and ordering a BBQ beef sandwich and Coke for 20 dollars (1 pound 50pence), i headed toward a park that had been erected to celebrate 10 years of majoritive independance. With lush fountains, pools of flamingo and beautiful flowers, I was lucky enough to get caught up in a pre olympic celebration. Im sure you've seen them on television, but it's where 50 or so people hide under many fluroscent dragons and bang drums loudily. Although this sounds pretty rubbish, it was exciting and im glad i found it. The rest of the day was spent watching rubbish Chinese daytime t.v and getting my much needed laundry done for the first time (I wasnt enjoying wearing the same boxers for 4 days on the trot!). When Katie and Luke arrived, and i was told 30 thousand times how amazing Beckham is by Katie, we
decided on an early night and to visit Lantau the next day.
Suprisingly, and for the first time yet, I awoke not only on time, but early at 9am. We all showered down , got changed and head off to get breakfast. Hong Kong is strange in the sense thatthere is absolutely no where to pick up easy on the go food, that wont do you more harm than good. After not being able to find anywhere, we settled on what felt like my 30th Mcdonalds since arrival. Not being able to make it though the egg McMuffin, we head for the subway. The underground subway system is so much better than ours. The organisation and simplicity of the whole thing is so much easier to handle. Half an hour later we were in Tung Chung (or somewhere near!) where a cable car took us over an amazing scenic view of Lantao and eventually Po Ling, where the worlds largest outdoor Buddah is situated. It was quite soemthing to see it from afar, as the shire size of it suprised me. Although the entire area had become very touristy, something remains very spiritual and peaceful in the giant Buddah.
However, we would all have much prefered it, if it was more desolute and less crowded with obese americans talking loudily and taking more photographs than might seem physically possible. We spent half an hour at the giant Budah, looking all around it and reading up on what it meant. Those who had built it, assocciated everthing about it with a meaning. For example, something as insignificant as it's broard forehead was symbolic of its far reaching understanding and wisdom of others. Details like this impressed me, and led me to believe that it wasnt such a touristic cop-out. After visting the impressive but Buddah, we headed to the Po Ling monastry opposite and later bought some gifts to be sent home. The monastry was decked out with golden gods and very lavish religious objects of praise. Local people had to purchase incense to burn and pray too the gods (which many were doing by what seemed like a rythm of bowing and nodding).
Considering we head already bought soem gifts at Po Ling, we went back to Kowloon and visited the Temple Street Market which got progressively better. I wont say what, but we bought some hilarious stuff
for all the lads and I bought a few things for myself. If one of you guys reads this, I think we are going to send all our gifts to Rich Cottarells house because we cant afford to individually ship them. When you go back at Easter pick them up from him or something. So, with my newly bought ray shmanns we made our way down to a friendly man called Chai who charmed us to eat at his restaraunt. With chop stocks in hand, I happily made my way through ribs and noodles which went down a treat. Truely knackered, and having felt like id walked the great wall of China, we made our way back wearing shades in the dark and feeling like we owned the place. I love Hong Kong but i wouldnt be so keen on livng in Kowloon. Everything is very hectic and the pollution would become intolerable for me. However, the Chinese seem a friendly bunch- a group of girls even ran over to me for a photograph with me which was just as odd as it was satisfying! Anyway, gotta go, internet is paid for every hour and im running out of time. Miss you and love you all very much. Send messages to let me know how your doing- I can read them i just cant reply. xx
p.s. Mum, If you recieve a samuri sword through the post, its from me! xxx
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emz
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jealous as anything
well roberto i just spoke to you on msn but i thought i would messege you anyway. blogs are looking gooood. wish i was there with you guys as life in england sucks. haha speak to you soon! xxx