Hello Friends. I hope you are all well and enjoying the weekend in your own little corner of the world. As those of you that regularly follow this blog are well aware, I've been lying down on the job, so to speak. Its high time I spend more than 20 minutes on a blog entry. I promised several weeks ago that I would document my trip to Hong Kong on the internets. Better late than never, right? Without further adieu, I give you HK: (A Real Blog Post)........
The great thing about living in east Asia is that a lot of really cool places are a relatively short flight away. So, when my work colleague Travis (who's stationed in Singapore) suggested we make a quick weekend trip to Hong Kong, I quickly agreed. What follows is a semi-structured (chronological) account of the weekend:
Friday (Travel from Taipei to HK)
I'll spare the details of your typical 3.5 hour flight, but I will say this: Asian airlines are significantly more focused on service and the comfort of their clients than their American counterparts. I haven't had the distinct pleasure of flying on Singapore Airlines yet (which is apparently the gold standard of flying), but both China & EVA airlines have been a pleasure to fly on. While I don't have a picture of the flight itself, I do have a little gem from the men's room in the Taoyuan International Airport (and yes, this is quite literally potty humor, but I am not one to outgrow potty jokes just because I'm almost 32 years old.)
This is just another example of how nice the Taiwanese are; if I were in charge I'd be a lot less subtle with this particular message. In fact, I had a pretty awesome bathroom sign back in the day that conveyed the same message but in a more graphical and blunt way. The sign below is the closest thing I could find with the magic of the internet. And no, this isn't the funniest bathroom sign that you can find if you Google "funny bathroom signs" and click on images, but hey, I'm making a quasi-concerted effort to keep this blog PG-rated. (Said another way, I highly recommend a Google search on that phrase.)
Anyway, other than the humorous trip to the Taoyuan Airport, my flight was uneventful. Upon arriving at the Hong Kong airport, a nice stroke of luck occurred: Travis and I bumped into each other in the shuttle queue. Turns out, this was a good thing. We found an ATM, got some HK dollars (1 HK dollar is worth ~ .1285 American dollars, and yes, this is a worthless comment, I just like saying "American dollars"; get used to it), and hopped on a bus into town. Our bus was very similar to the one pictured below.
Its pretty easy to see the British influence in Hong Kong, and riding a double-decker bus, for whatever reason, was definitely on my to-do list.
After wondering around aimlessly for about an hour looking for our hotel and generally coming across as clueless, non-Cantonese speaking Americans, we stumbled into a really nice, English-speaking dude from some country in Europe (I say some country because I can't remember where the hell he's from, but I think it starts with an "S"). He was cool enough to show us the way to the Cosmopolitan, our home for the weekend. The hotel itself is not worth a picture, but the view out the window is.......
That is some kind of park where they race horses or something. Polo anyone?
So, after hitting the showers to freshen up from our sweat-inducing march around Hong Kong (have I mentioned how humid island countries near the equator are? Every bit as bad as Houston in August about 3 hours after a thunderstorm on a 100 degree day), we struck out for Lan Kwai Fung, the famous bar district in Hong Kong (requisite picture below.....)
For someone who's spent 8 years of their life living in Austin, TX, yet another bar district half way around the world doesn't just blow me away. LKF (Yes, its another acronym in a world that could probably do with a few less acronyms) was amusing for people watching purposes, though, and Travis and I managed to establish ourselves as petty criminals (or maybe just asshole Americans) while dining at the local Mediterranean restaurant.
We checked out a couple places and had a few beers before ending the evening in another part of town at a Carnegies (which also has a location in Taipei near my apartment.)
Note: Carnegie's is famous for its policy of allowing patrons to dance on the bar top. While I won't win any awards for my picture editing skills, I was able to touch up the picture below so you at least get some sense of what this spectacle looks like. Girl on the right was the main protagonist of the bar top dancing that night.
This is not exactly the safest bar policy I've encountered. True to form, the poor girl above fell off after one too many shots and was unceremoniously dumped outside by the bouncer. For obvious reasons, I didn't bother to capture this on film.
Saturday (Daytime)
Saturday was pretty uneventful during the day because Travis and I both slept in and were worn out from travel and our Friday night. But, we did manage to grab lunch at a solid local joint close to the hotel. We ordered enough food for four people, ate about half of it, and crushed a couple of bottled Coca-cola's. Honestly, is there anything better than a bottled Coke? (Well, maybe a bottled Dublin Dr. Pepper, but work with me here.....And don't say Pepsi, you know my thoughts on Pepsi....)
On our walk back to the hotel, we happened to glance down at a street crossing. This is what greeted our eyes:
It seems to me that its rather obvious when crossing a street that you'd be better off actually keeping your head up and looking both ways instead of staring at the street, but the folks in Hong Kong apparently saw the need to point this out.
When we returned to our hotel, we found the tour guide saleslady and she hooked us up with a harbor tour Saturday night as well as a bus tour on Sunday (all for a pretty penny, of course.) We cruised down to the harbor in a taxi and I snapped a few pics before our boat showed up.
Given the fact this post is getting a little long winded and I still have the rest of Saturday night (boat tour, an encounter with some Bangladeshans, and the Ladies Market) and all of Sunday to cover, I've made the executive decision to break this post up into two volumes. Maybe this will convince those of you that are totally annoyed by this to sign up as a follower. If nothing else, you will get updates in your blogger dashboard, and my ego will get a boost (23, well, actually 22 followers and counting!)
Stay tuned.....
