“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” Mark Twain

Monday, March 8, 2010

Hong Kong - Monday, February 2 and Tuesday, February 3

After getting up at the crack of dawn we headed to the airport with to catch an early flight to Hong Kong. I was so looking forward to getting back to the ship, dropping off my stuff and then meeting my friend Ingrid. What is interesting about where we ported in Hong Kong is that it was attached to a shopping mall which also happened to have office buildings above which is where Ingrid’s husband Drew works. So, Ingrid knew exactly where we would be. Ingrid met me outside of the ship and I was able to get permission to give her a tour of the ship and show her where I am living. She was amazed at the quality of our accommodations; it truly is cruise ship quality care that we are given. Ingrid asked what I wanted to eat, hoping I would say something along the lines of Chinese food. Instead, I said a good sandwich!! I had not eaten a good sandwich in quite some time and as much as I enjoyed the mass amounts of food I had eaten the 6 days prior, I had 2 meals a day of large Chinese food feasts and I wanted a break. So after apologizing for disappointing Ingrid we headed to a BLT restaurant where I had a great Buffalo Chicken Sandwich with an order of French fries. It was exactly what I had wanted.

After lunch we headed to some of the markets that were on Kowloon Island (this is the Island of Hong Kong that we were ported at). The first stop was the Flower Market – this may have been the best smelling city street I had ever been on. People come here from all over Hong Kong to get there flowers at a reasonable price.
Next stop was the Bird Market and this was a fascinating experience. This is where men walk their birds. Yes that is what I said this is where men walk their birds. Here is the picture to prove it.
Those are birdcagres that are hanging with their birds in them.  I guess these men come to this ‘market’ everyday and socialize and bring their birds, it is kind of like a dog park for birds.

Then it was off to the Fa Yuen Market where a lot of the local people do their shopping and the Ladies Market; more knock off goods!

After walking around for a while we headed back to the ship to get my stuff and then we took the Start Ferry to Hong Kong Island, which is where Ingrid lives.
Here is Ingrid and I wih a view of the Hong Kong Island skyline in the background:
Here is my ship at night:
We dropped my stuff off at her amazing apartment which is the Midland part of the Island then it was off to meet one of Ingrid’s friends for dinner at a Spanish Tapas restaurant in the Soho part of Hong Kong. Again I did not want to eat Chinese food and Ingrid and I reminisced of our days at NYU when we would get Tapas in NYC, so this was an appropriate thing for us to share. This was also about the time when I realized that Hong Kong is the only city I have been in that kind of made me think of Manhattan. It is interesting because that there are a lot of Ex-Pats in Hong Kong, especially Hong Kong Island and the area Ingrid lives on and everyone speaks English. I could have easily adjusted to living in Hong Kong. After dinner Ingrid told me that she needed to take me to Lan Kwai Fung which is essentially a bar district. She warned me that we would probably see some of my students which we did of course!! I guess this is the place that all of the tour books recommend to people if they want to go out. It was a fun area and I actually met up with some of my SAS friends so they got to meet Ingrid. It was back to Ingrid’s apartment for the night where I was surprised with a new episode of Grey’s Anatomy. What a great end to a great day!!!!

Tuesday

So as we were getting ready to leave in the morning Ingrid tempted me with another episode of Grey’s Anatomy and I succumbed to the temptation. I have truly missed lying on the couch and watching TV. I did not realize how much until I had it available to me again. So after a little Grey’s therapy we headed out to take the Peak Tram to the Peak.

Me on the Tram:
A view of the skyline from the Peak:
People in the distance performing morning Tai Chi:
When we got to the top we sat and drank coffee and observed eh view of Hong Kong. We walked around and took in the views and took pictures of course. I was still in awe at the fact that I was here in Hong Kong hanging out with my friend Ingrid…crazy!!!!

We take the Tram back down and the night before when we ran into some of my friends we had told them that we would be going for Dim Sum today so Janelle and Laura met us at Maxim’s City Hall for some Dim Sum. Though I had been requesting non- Chinese food the day before, I would not turn down Dim Sum. As previously stated in another entry I love dumplings and though I had Dim Sum when we were in Xian, it is really the food of Hong Kong and I would have been remise if I did not eat it while I was here. Dim SUm for those who do not know is small dishes - kind of like Spanish Tapas actually!!!  But with traditional Dim Sum they are coming around with carts and you point and order food as they walk around.  And it really was an amazing dumpling lunch and I am pretty sure that Janelle and Laura enjoyed it as well!

Ingrid and I went back to her place so I could get my things and we took the Mid-Levels Escalators to get a portion of the way up. If the men walking birds were not enough how about escalators cut into the mountains to get you to where you wanted to go, it is really an odd phenomena but such an ingenious idea. There were places to get off all along the way and shops, restaurants at all of these stops.
This was taken from one of the escalator stops:
 We took the escalator as far as it would go and then taxied to Ingrid’s place to get my stuff and then it was back to the Ferry to return to the ship. I must say again that it was so good to see a familiar face and after some things that we had to deal with in Beijing it was nice to have someone removed from the situation to be able to talk to.

After my time in China and the great visit I had with my friend I was actually happy to return to my ‘home’ and a sense of normalcy. Though like between Japan and China we will only have 2 days to prepare mentally and physically for our time in Vietnam.
My home:

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