Hong Kong & Macau

The Night View from Tsim Sha Tsui

 

It’s been 13 years (I think?) since I’ve last travelled to Hong Kong.  The last time I came, I was only 14 years old.  I fondly remember living in the child home of my mother in Hung Hom and really enjoying it.  Even though it was small, cramped and dusty, just knowing I was living in the same home that my Mom grew up made it feel special to me somehow.  As if I’d never felt before like I had so much history with a place before this, I felt connected to this small flat.  This trip is completely different.  I’m now 22, I am travelling here without my mother, on my own free will and I think I can safely say I’m a completely different person looking through different eyes at this familiar city.  On top of all that, this was also Abby’s first time to Hong Kong, so it was really a trip back to our roots for the both of us.

 

In search for…

The trip’s plans were somewhat driven by a few specific things that Abby and I specifically had wanted to find.  Number one priority was quickly given to what we’ve warmly dubbed the “canto blanket”.  This blanket/towel is a childhood blanket that I and many other Cantonese (ABC’s) grew up with.  Like many others, mine is now tattered, torn and still in my bed.  The very first night in Hong Kong, we eagerly hit the Ladies Street Market expecting to see every other stall selling this blanket that we’d known so well and seen at so many Canto friends’ houses.  But to our dismay, we were unable to find it anywhere.  Even after some recommendations and searching all of Causeway Bay, we still had no luck finding the now increasingly elusive childhood blanket.  Apparently, it’s something that is not very popular with local Honkies now, either because they’ve become antiquated or because it was just something that only ABC’s grew up knowing.  We were sad at this dying trend because it was a part of both Abby and my childhood that we know and remember very fondly.  

 Cousin Angie

Angie and Amy are two of my closest cousins that I’ve spent the better part of my childhood growing up with.  Those of you know me long enough will remember a period when I was living with them in Arcadia.  I was just in elementary school then, but I grew up with them knowing them as nothing less than my older sisters.  But when they returned to Hong Kong I’d lost contact with both of them almost completely.  So perhaps, for 13 years, I have not seen Angie.  I wondered from time to time where she was, what she was doing and I would hear vague details about how she was doing from distant family, but nothing concrete.  The only no contact information I had for her was one questionable phone number my mom somehow found.  I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to see her or if the number would even work.  The first time I called there was no answer.  I knew that this was a possibility and tried not to be too disappointed.  The next day I tried again and her familiar voice answered.  We exchanged cordial greetings excitedly and set up a meeting later that night.  I think we had dinner for 3 or 4 hours that night.  Sorry to Abby who was falling asleep next to me as we caught each other up for the last 10 years.  I would end up seeing her every single day of my trip and would share many fun and nostalgic meals sharing childhood memories and stories with her.  Oh and yes, she also was the one to help us navigate the otherwise impossible Chinese department store to help us find our long sought after canto blankets.  We bought three between the two of us.

Is there something behind Amy or is it just my imagination?

Impressions

Hong Kong’s streets are a smorgasbord of smells and sounds.  People are out at every hour of the night, probably because the public transportation is so good.  There are either trains or busses that can take you almost anywhere anytime of the day which is more than I can say for Tokyo or LA.  I felt strangely comfortable in Hong Kong maybe because this is the first time in six months that I was in a place where I almost completely understood everything and everyone around me.  I immediately switched to speaking Cantonese almost naturally and was eager to communicate with the locals.  I haggled at the street markets and had no problems talking to people, the only snag I would run into was when I would be forced to ask for menus in English because I still can’t read Chinese.  That was a dead giveaway that I was still a foreigner.  Also people didn’t believe us when we told them that we were from LA and SF.  They looked at us and asked if we grew up in Chinatown.  We took that as a compliment.  Also, the subways are very color-coordinated.

The Food

My god, the food!  I always felt that the two main attractions of Hong Kong were the food and the shopping.  This was definitely true on this trip.  My love for Canto food combined with my huge lack of available Chinese food in Japan was a volatile combination this trip.  I ate everything and anything in sight that looked good.  On our first night out, Abby and I adventurously tried a street vender’s small dimsum-ish snacks then tried a dingy little alleyway wonton noodle stall filled with locals.  Again, we got really lucky because we didn’t get sick at all from the food.  I’m not sure if this is just my stomach getting stronger from Southeast Asia, but I remember getting pretty sick before when I used to come when I was younger.  We ate practically everything that was on our to-eat-list including some that we added along the way.  I had every recommended baked pork chop rice which has been a favorite of mine since I can remember.  I had it 4 times in a period of a week.  Abby got every dessert and dan-tat that we saw along the way.  Everything was comparatively much cheaper than in Japan and even the States, so every time we saw anything we even felt remotely like eating, we ate it.  Not the healthiest of trips.  I gained 1 pound when I got back to Japan.

The Annual Hong Kong Flower Festival

While walking around randomly in Causeway Bay we came upon the yearly flower festival held in Hong Kong only once a year by pure coincidence.  We had fun seeing all the exhibits and played our part with all the other hundreds and thousands of tourists eagerly snapping away pictures all basically trying our best to take pictures of the same thing while trying to get a shot with as little people in the way as possible.  Once, I did a handstand picture and a very excited Cantonese lady standing next to Abby got very into it saying how cool it was.  Eventually, she called over her man and asked him to take a picture of us jumping and then one where Abby is jumping and I’m doing a handstand.  That was fun.

Sights

We tried our best to cover all the major sights in the short amount of time we had.  I think we succeeded in general and though I know we skimmed over a lot, we were also very busy every day touring.  The streets of Mong Kok are a busy rush of both locals and foreigners that I vaguely remember from my previous trips, but places like Ngong Ping 360 were new (very commercial) sights that felt like it could have been anywhere.  The “culturally” styled Chinese village built around Ngong Ping’s Buddha feels more like Disneyland imitating Hong Kong than it does Hong Kong itself.  Everything is brand new and Starbucks line the corners.  But it is also the world’s largest sitting bronze Buddha statue, so it was worth seeing.   At the right time you can catch a glimpse of the Buddha just slightly obscured by passing clouds.  Also the ride up and down on the all glass floor gondola was a pretty good highlight. 

One other very cool part about Hong Kong is the Nightly Night Light Show they host.  Every single night, the city of Hong Kong is transformed to a veritable stage of lights and song.  On either side of Tsim Sha Tsui and Hong Kong Island Bay, the tallest and most prominent buildings are coordinated to a single song that is played at key lookout points and aired on radio stations.  Lights mounted on the rooftops of buildings on either side blink and shine reflecting off the water and it does make for quite an impressive show.

Cool right?  Now imagine + music.

The highlight of all the sightseeing in Hong Kong for me was definitely the Peak.  On Hong Kong Island, the Peak is accessible by a short tram ride that ships customers up an incredibly steep trail (it felt like the buildings were at 45 degrees at times) to the top where there is a large shopping and entertainment complex complete with an observation deck of course. 

The Day View from the Peak

Choice Shot: Night View from the Peak

The Maid Café

I suppose this is worth mentioning simply because we laughed so much there.  We decided to try a maid café which is nothing more than a restaurant where the waitresses specifically dress up in costumes of maids for the amusement of their patrons (who are usually otaku).  I think Angie always was curious about this place, but never had a good enough excuse to go until now.  And for Abby and me, we really didn’t care and decided to just check it out.  When we couldn’t find the entrance to the restaurant, we called the number for the restaurant and was greeted by a soft voiced girl.  When we told her that we couldn’t find the restaurant she said, “Just one moment, we’re on the second floor, I’ll come down and get you Master.”  We were all kind of shocked that she called us Master.  When we got to the restaurant, the waitress spoke to us with the daintiest, most delicate voice.  But in the background we could hear her normal voice and it was quite normal.  Angie dared me to be mean to her just for the sake of living up to the expectation of superiority that must be expected from the types of customers that must frequent the restaurant.  But I couldn’t bring myself to do it even though I was pretty annoyed that they ran out of cheesecake and replaced it with not-so-great ice cream.  The food was pretty bad, all of our food tasted of varying amounts of ketchup and the rice was poorly cooked.  But at least we got a picture to commemorate our night with the maid because I ordered a dinner set (which was written on the menu as dinner for 1 master).

How many muffled laughs we had that night.

Macau

Have you ever wondered what Vegas would be like if it was completely designed by Asians?  Well then, you’re in luck because just such a strange parallel universe exists in Macao.  Occupied by Portugal for 300 years, the resulting amalgamation of western and eastern styles is a mix of cobblestone streets and traditional Catholic cathedrals with an increasingly modernizing city center that is beginning to rival Las Vegas in big name hotels and may have very well surpassed it already in sheer size.  The casinos are designed in giant forms of blossoming flowers and huge domed LED lit building billboards.  

The following 3 collages are of some of the shows and sights of Macau with the use of some telescoping effects.  Learned from Angie.  Many taken by Angie.

We went to Macau with my Uncle and Angie on a whim when they both decided to take a day off of work to take us out which was both very nice of them and unexpected.  We were going to try to just tour Macau on our own, but I was so thankful that my Uncle took us because he had such a thorough understanding of going to and from Macau that it was just so much easier to see Macau with him guiding us.  We arrived in the morning at the port terminal, he led the way talking to some venders of ferry tickets.  These venders acted more like scalpers than official ticket venders because somehow, he was able to actually haggle for the tickets for less than what they were actually listed for.  After we bought the tickets, we rushed inside and were stopped by a huge line for immigration.  He pulled us around the long line of foreigners and we went straight for the line of Hong Kong citizens.  Each Hong Kong citizens can bring in one non-Hong Kong citizen and so we zoomed by all the dozens of people waiting in line and got from the port onto the boat in a matter of 10 or 15 minutes (a feat that would have probably taken us an hour to do by ourselves).  He then had it perfectly planned out and we toured the big hotels most worth seeing, the main historical district of remaining Portugal architecture, a view and then all the way to the remote side of the island where Angie treated us to a fantastic Portuguese dinner.  The boat ride there was easy, but the hour back was rough because we hit rough waters and much of it felt like a bobbing roller coaster ride.  I was kind of having fun with it, but Abby woke up to the feeling or falling and did not enjoy it at all.  She curled up and clung onto my arm for dear life, but I felt bad because I couldn’t do anything to make her feel better.  We just rode it out but the ride back seemed much longer than when we went.

Many of the b&w shots by Angie Mak.

Stanley Market

Slightly off the beaten track of the subway system, Angie took us to Stanley Market on the south side of Hong Kong Island.  It was a nice bus ride around Repulse Bay and sightseeing parts of Hong Kong we otherwise would not know how to access.  The shopping there was the most fun we had in Hong Kong because of the variety of things.  Unlike Ladies Street Market or other night markets, the stores and stalls here didn’t just sell repeatedly the same things.  We saw many of the same stuff in all the stores in other night markets, but things here were both cheap and unique.  

Hong Kong will always have a special place in my heart.  Being in Hong Kong is easy, like being in a second home.  Getting around, talking to people and even haggling is not only easy, it’s fun.   The best part of this trip I would have to say for me was reconnecting with my cousin Angie.  Though we haven’t seen each other for such a long time, we can talk freely and reminisce fondly about old times.  We’re both very different people now then we used to be before, but I feel like we’re both mature now and can relate on a higher level.  It’s also very nice that we share many of the same interests like architecture and photography.  I felt like I gained an older sister from this trip and I miss talking to her already.

But also I’d like to say thank you and sorry to Abby for having to sit through many boring dinners about my whole childhood.  And also thank you for coming all the way out to see me and sharing this unforgettable trip with me.