TRAVEL: HONGKONG 香港

 SUNDAY 19TH JULY BIG BUDDHA ISLAND

BIG BUDDHA ISLAND  

from the top were stunning - blue clear waters, green mountain tops full of luscious plant life, and pale white sands far below. it was hot, we relaxed under the shade of the trees near the Buddhist monastery, so relaxing. the air heavy with incense. it was a hot humid 30'
we decided to explore the region a bit strolling back down to the town area and getting invited to a tea ceremony! (on my sisters must do list, and not a scam - like in some place...i got scammed in Shanghai like an idiot)

 wouldnt mind being in prision here haha!

好喝！香港花茶

Monday 20th July

So a yellow warning monsoon has descended onto Hong Kong, heavy winds and non-stop rain since last night, although the winds died down during the day the weather was awful. So no beach trips. Instead we went to Hong Kong History museum 香港历史博物馆 it was really informative and interesting, we had a nice lunch in the restaurant and even got to dress up and the staff took photos. The first floor was all about Chinese history and culture with some interesting videos, animals, sets etc., all in English and really interesting. the floors above where more about Hong Kong in particular, the factories, daily life and struggles with environment, the change from a wild island to British rule and one of the most expensive cities in the world. Was really interesting, unfortunately we ran out of time and we didn’t even get to see everything! Definitely worthwhile.   

We chilled back at ours before Rebecca and I went to the Sino centre - full of comics, games and figurines of different Japanese anime characters. after this we did the ladies market in MONG KOK where I haggled in mandarin for things and got Rebecca a beautiful silk and cashmere scarf, it’s beautiful. we chilled in a park temple area in the rain, hot rains of Asia although heavy are much nicer than European and Irish rain, sometime I actually quite enjoy it, especially if it has been too stifling of late - in particular in shanghai, a nice plum rain shower does cool things down.

Tuesday 21st July

Again rotten weather, the strong gusts of wind from the monsoon actually
woke both Rebecca and I up at 6am, madness! we decided to not rush
out anywhere and instead lay in until Rosie and Fei were also up,
thankfully the rains and winds stopped and we went to the Nanlian gardens
and Nunnery free in and all very beautiful and peaceful. Square, ponds full of
beautiful water lilies and pads, not many there and all quite quiet and peaceful,
 barely any people as well, golden huge Buddha’s. Was really nice.

from here we headed to the harbour and got the star line ferry over to Hong Kong island and began looking around the old English and French style buildings, an exceedingly rich area, hard to believe this was once a small deserted island that the British colonised, when now it is in the Top 10 most expensive places to live. We went to St. Joseph’s church for a while, the interior glass windows with imagery relating to fishing and the Chinese population which was nice - incorporating the island life into the church. There was a lot of Filipino community things, a lot of them come over her and stay.

From here we walked around some of the landmark skyscrapers, before Rebecca and I checked out Hong Kong Park with some beautiful man made waterfalls and ponds; however we saw a few signs warning not only of MERS but also mosquitoes and Japanese enchilada. Opps didn't get that as a vaccine.

from here we waited in a large queue to get the tram up to Victoria peak, to see the beautiful views over the islands and harbour, a return was under 50HKD although we waited for a long time, this is clearly a usual thing, we did get there just as it was getting dark, but the waiting area itself was a sort of museum about the tram’s history. Telling us that it would go backwards down and there has only been 4/4 trams in total, with of course different areas/carriages for different classes of course, and there was always a seat reserved until the last minute for the mayor. In case he made an unexpected journey. the journey up is approx. 8 minutes, and the angle so steep that holding my phone upright for a video to match the slant would have had to have been at around a 200+ degree angle. We waited outside at the top gazing at the view of the island and harbour and the peninsula across the way. We had expected to see a light show, however if it was a light show - it was atrocious and didn't seem to have one at all. we decided to call it the "lie show" rather than "light show" as there really was nothing, but perhaps if we'd watched it at the peninsula we may have seen something more or heard music or something. However the view was nice. The newly forming line for the return back down was not - it was huge! So we decided to have some dinner up there. It was really expensive plain noodles with ginger and spring onions, and was also quite small. But it was a simple dish full of earthy taste - and not so greasy and shanghai’s foods.

we climbed upstairs to the viewing platform which had a telescope - we could see into some of the main buildings - was crazy - seeing people in work in the famous Hong Kong HSBC, like they were metres in front, not Km away and so many many floors up!

We eventually lined in around 11 in a crazy queue which was still long, and eventually got the last boat back to the peninsula. It was late however we stayed up enjoying our last night together hanging out in our room. So we only got a couple hours sleep before getting up in the rain yet again for the bus to the airport - which was eerily empty - Rosie got up and helped us with cases before we said our goodbyes - she also gave us a lovely heart-warming letter each!

we strangely flew to the Philippines before getting a long 14 hour flight to London, which was freezing for some reason but the food was decent - for some odd reason we flew all the way back over China, how strange!   We only slept a couple hours on it too. finally arrived in London and my bag was one of the last to arrive - we were exhausted and spaced out and we were both having conversations in our heads as to whether we should just leave my bag as there wasn't anything of value - but it did eventually arrive. we got the airport subway to terminal 2/3 waiting for ages before and during to get the next one to terminal 5, thankfully the free bus that would take us to our hotel was there and we hopped on - quickly arriving as it was only 1 stop away, the area is nice but the hotel was awful! for some reason I had to pay again, and our room was in another house which the guy took us outfit and pointed to, not even helping with bags let alone taking us to our rooms - bad service much - think we were spoiled by the helpful people in China and even Hong Kong. The room was awful, super basic - and the bathroom and kitchen area was more like an abandoned house. But a bed is a bed and we needed it. Got the flight the next morning easily along with free breakfast and drinks as we were on the first flight home to Belfast.