Hong Kong
I'm leaving in a few hours to go get Michelle from the airport, but I'm determined to get this post up first. Please excuse me if the quality of the writing isn't up to par.
In November, shortly after my computer died but before I got my new one, Lynn and I went to Hong Kong for 4 nights/3 days. We had a great time. Hong Kong's no cultural mecca, but there was surprisingly a lot to see and do. We stayed busy, that's for sure. Out of the hundreds of pictures I took, here are a representative 20 or so to give you a glimpse.
The first day we went up to Victoria Peak. Beautiful view of the city and of the bay. We walked around trails on the top for about an hour. More gorgeous views and some really prime real estate. Apparently anyone who's anyone in Hong Kong (all of China?) has a house up there.
After coming down from Victoria Peak, we hit Hong Kong Park and the Central district for some shopping. Then we headed to the Midlevels for, well, more shopping, although the Midlevels was more antique-type stuff. All throughout the Midlevels there are covered outdoor escalators. They're upbound only--you get to walk back down--but one way or not, they were certainly appreciated.
Nestled in the Midlevels is the Man Mo Temple. This was the most incense I have ever seen in a single place. No, scratch that. This was the most incense I have ever seen cumulatively. Lynn had to immediately run out again, and I only lasted a few minutes.
That evening we took the Star Ferry over to Kowloon, which is the part of Hong Kong on the mainland. All of the buildings are lit up spectacularly at night, and at 8:00 there is a laser show everynight.
On the Southern tip of Kowloon is an area called the Avenue of the Stars. It's pretty much like Hollywood's Walk of Fame with Chinese actors. Though most of the names were meaningless to us, we did find a few we recognized. If anyone's curious, the Chinese characters mean "to become" and "dragon."
Also on the Avenue is a statue of Bruce Lee.
Nearby we went to the market on Temple Street. Bustling, busy, and a great place to get really cheap crap. Not as big as the night market in Thailand, but somewhat less chaotic.
Day two... We slept in a little (ok, not much), and visited the Tai Tam Reservoir and Park, some of the most pristine land in Hong Kong. Like all of Hong Kong, it was quite clean feeling. It may have something to do with a sign we saw listing the fines for littering. Spitting on the side of the road is $1500 (HKD), which is about $180 (USD). This led to Lynn and I childishly daring each other to spit for the rest of the vacation.
Next we went to Repulse Bay because Lynn, a native of Hawaii, was jonesing to see a beach. It was really too cold for swimming, but I did get some nice photos, all of which have been cut from this post to increase the likelihood I'll actually get it posted. At the end of the beach is Kwum Yam, which is a rather unusual shrine. It was filled with statues of all different types that had been donated by various famous people. It was nothing so much as a giant bric-a-brac shelf.
Next we ventured a bit outside the city on Hong Kong's rail system to the 10,000 Buddhas Shrine. Literally, on the top of a mountain, the entire walkway up is lined with nearly life-size statues of Buddha, all of which are different. Are there really 10,000? Beats me. I lost count after the first mile or so.
There was a nice pagoda at the top.
After our exhausting march uphill, we thought we had finally reached the end (and hopefully gained some god's favor), when leading away from the shrine proper we saw another trail lined with Buddhas. This time they were painted instead of the solid gold color. After walking a little ways and seeing how much further the trail went up, we decided we had had just about enough enlightenment for one day.
As long as we were in the area, we decided to check out the Wishing Tree. People would go to this tree, write their wish on a piece of paper, tie it to an orange, and throw it up into the tree. The higher branch it could get stuck in, the better, Sadly, due to damage to the tree from overzealous orange hurlers, you are no longer allowed to throw oranges, but must instead put your wish on a pegboard nearby, like at many Buddhist shrines all over Asia. Giant disappointment.
It wasn't until our last day that we properly explored Wan Chai, the area our hotel was in. (Hey, folks. We had an itinerary.) A sizeable portion of the neighborhood was a meat market. A really unappetizing meat market. Check out this guy's cigarette ash about to fall onto the... something.
The chickens were something else. It wasn't so much cages of chickens as it was a living, breathing cube of chicken encased with wire. This is where bird flu comes from. Women would point to a chicken, and then the butcher would hold it still so they could squeeze it, I guess to see if it was fat enough. If it passed inspection, the butcher cut off its head right there. They really do keep moving after decapitation. It's not just a myth.
We ate vegetarian for lunch.
This was only one area of Wan Chai. A few streets over Lynn managed to buy a nice suit for something like 30 USD.
The last thing on our agenda was going to see the Tian Tam Buddha, the largest outdoor seated Buddha made of bronze in the world. (Anyone who's ever traveled in Asia knows that every Buddha is the ~est in the world.) If we'd known how many steps were involved, we might have skipped it, seeing as we were already pretty sore from the 10,000 Buddhas.
The statue is located on the grounds of the Po Lin Monastery. While it is certainly the main attraction, the rest of the grounds were lovely as well.
Finally, we stopped for a late lunch at the vegetarian restaurant. It was surprisingly good. Easily the best vegetarian food I've ever had. Considering how we had just watched the animal carcass-->meat process a few hours ago, we thought if there was ever a time to go veg, this was it.
The rest of the day was spent making sure we left no shopping area unexplored before we left the next morning.
Labels: vacation
posted by Melissa @ 11:04 AM
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