The story so far

Hi all,

Well we made it to Hong Kong safely, the flight was uneventful but long!!! We had organised a pick up from the airport to our hotel and when we arrived we were very glad we didn’t have to think about how to get ourselves there. So, below I’ve listed a short summation of our time here in Hong Kong so far. We’ll be back with pictures, we've quite a few to trawl through, we'll probably do that on our next 11 hour flight which will be on Tuesday to Auckland!

HK Highs & Lows

Highs

Star Ferry at night – from Tsim Sha Tsui in Kowloon to Hong Kong Island. At this time of the year all of the skyscrapers are lit up with various seasonal greetings. Very pretty.

Shopping – oh, where to start. The shops are huge, well stocked, seemingly open all hours, and oh, so seductive. Everything is on sale or is tied into some promotion. You can expect at least a 10% discount off the listed price. It is impossible not to end up shopping even if your intentions for the day are sightseeing. To allow you cross busy streets you are navigated underground through a warren of department stores before you finally emerge on the other side. It takes a strong will not to get sidetracked. We had a long shopping list for Hong Kong and we knew we were going to spend a lot of time in the shops but on our first very positively we are not going shopping day we got sucked in almost immediately. It has to be said though it’s such a part of the city and is a tourist attraction in itself. There are so many higher end shopping centres with nothing but designer labels it’s hard to see how they all can survive but with a population of almost 7 million I guess the $ must be there. One of the best shopping centres we found was Times Square in Causeway Bay, 10 floors of retail therapy with a good mix of designer and more affordable brands! We bought runners, backpacks, a camcorder and an iPod here. The value in electronics is not as good as we would have thought prior to arrival but saying that you will still make savings over the same goods back home, but it’s not so good that you would veer from the shopping list and be tempted by other electrical goods. Cosmetics and perfumes are good value though!

The Street Architecture – I’ll leave that one to Cathal to describe but even I was impressed.

The Peak Tram and the journey back down from the peak – feels like a vertical drop – a definite must do for any trip to the city.

Cleanliness of the city

Politeness of people everywhere

Cathal’s first massage! Maybe I should let him elaborate but lets just say he was walked on – literally.

Very efficient and user friendly transport network

Pacific Coffee Company and their free internet.


Lows

Still having a bad cold in Hong Kong and getting a lot of scared looks every time I sneezed/coughed or blew my nose. Think I should have been wearing a medical mask. A lot of people wore them on the streets.

Fake Handbag and fake Watch hawkers – like anywhere these people are just annoying.

Eating my first full meal with chopsticks – a painful experience. I mean if I can manipulate a pair of knitting needles why oh why can’t I eat with chopsticks!!!

Chicken – fatty and grisly – everywhere, from cheap and cheerful establishments to restaurants where we paid over 20Euro for a chicken main course. (Liam & Sheelagh – the chicken in The Grand Paella is 1st class by comparison).

Christmas muzak in hotel

Clothes shopping when you are a UK Size 12 – the equivalent of XXXXXXXXXL in Hong Kong – depressing.

Hong Kong Museum of Art – disappointing to say the least, the contemporary art section wasn’t even open.

Walking the legs off ourselves every day.

Don’t know if I can call it a low but we’ve been on the go so much here I haven’t had time to either knit or read – a relaxing chilled holiday this ain’t.

Sharon