Hong kong day 3 - Hong Kong, Hong Kong
Hong Kong, Hong Kong
Ok so second full day, last full day before shooting off to pastures even more Chinese. We come back this way so not worried about spending all our hong kong dollars, but we're now conscious we've been spunking money like spunk and should really get into the budgetary vibe Started the day with some Pilates, which is good as I now feel justified in carting 2 mats strapped to the outside of my rucksack half way round the world. Turns out Leah is way harder than I am with my overly flabby, "just going to cram in 6 more kebabs in case i can't get any for 3 months" beergut. No real surprise. ******* hotel has provided is with some electric scales. They are wrong.... Got some breakfast and then went and paid a tenner to get a days internet....very expensive but needed to sync blog, read mails etc Not to break the mould too early we went back to the same non-starbucks coffee shop as yesterday and had almost the same thing It would appear that the big compound across the way from us, (check day 1 photo of how high up our room is) is in fact a police station. I'd have had it pegged at as hospital since it has 5 ambulance shaped vehicles and 9 coaches. No idea what kind of event would lead you to need 9 coach loads of coppers turning up in force but it reminds me of sometbing out of Grand theft auto when we go on a high speed killing spree It seems I have developed an addiction to fox's glacier fruits. May need some emergency dental work when I get back Useful observations of the day:- All scaffolding here is made of bamboo, and there's lots of it holding up buildings and some skinny nets protecting you from falling debri. Put no faith in either Traffic lights constantly beep. Slowly to say "not yet, not yet, not yet" and rapidly to say "gogogogogogogogogogogo". I wouldnt want to live on the ground floor near one of them. There are advertising tv's on the tubes. Genius venture in marketing that we should probably bring back to the uk. Millions of people getting your theme tune stick in their head all day at work. Worth every penny. Not sure it wouldn't be really really annoying but at least its more interesting than staring at a tube map and listening to **** apple headphones Fashion here appears to be influenced by Japanese manga. Something else that I'd like to bring back to the uk :) "Pay Attention to things other than your phone" notices are also piped over the tube tannoy, and double person toilets are available in the waiting areas. In a fit of irony i wandered around making blog notes and Leah took a picture of the event Todays excursions were the Chi Lin nunnery, the Sik sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin temple, and the Kowloon City Walled Park. Handily placed one stop from each other on the Kwun Tong line. There's 3g and phone signal available on the whole tube, for those not being ripped off by their uk provider and free wifi available on subscription. Happy days Another liverpool bag. Not sure if we should do an overall league, or a daily tally. So.....less sidetrack, more touristy..... Chi Lin nunnery and Nan Lian garden:- Really cool garden, which has been designed for you to walk round in one efficient direction. You no run, no smoke, no drink and no go round wrong way! Very scenic with lots of waterfalls, trees on hills, a couple of pagodas, little temple, mill, rockery, museum of chinese wood building, vegetarian restaurant, wild birds, gift shop, koi and several waterfalls. Steps lead up to a nunnery/temple in ancient chinese style buildings, with lots of big golden buddhas. Couldn't take a lot of pictures as it wasn't allowed but we sneaked a few through the side before we spotted one of the "enforcers" keeping an eye on us. These are little old women in police uniform that can harness the power of lightning to fry your brain. Whole affair was very weirdly offset by the skyscraper residential blocks in every direction. Decided to try walking to the next stop, went wrong way, came back, got on tube Sik sik yuen wong tai sin temple:- Well i hadnt really seen Chinese temples before and it was an eye opener from the Thai ones. Allegedly it's Taoist and is extremely colourful. It has loads of dragons, guys with swords riding clouds, and statues of the weird and wonderful. I have severely boosted my collection of "pictures of people taking pictures of things". Leah has allegedly a picture of me taking a picture of me, which I think is ironic. I got her back by getting a picture of her taking a picture of herself on the tram later Lots of people wandering around with insense. Very cool Stopped in the Wong Tai Sin metro station shopping centre for some juice and a pee. I had a green apple smoothie, which was in fact a green apple ice slush, and Leah had a strawberry and redbean milkshake. Red beans in this instance are kidney beans Ewwwwwww.......******* weirdos..... Leah thought it was nice though which is all that mattered after I'd scraped bean skin off the roof of my mouth Kowloon City Park:- This is an old walled fort 1800's built to protect some salt mining in the Qing dynasty. It then grew into a squat so big it housed 40,000 people. This place is tiny, and 40,000 people is a lot. No police at all, so gangsters and drug dealers moved in, and made it so bad the government ordered it to be torn down and made into a park. Archaeologists helped them tear it down over a period of 6 years to document it all Was very interesting to the history geek in me, especially the bits about opium wars with the british, and signing 99 year leases that expired in 1997 Managed to get off the tube at the right exit. Ate more rice and things from a different chain. Loads of food, 4 quid, musical taste left a lot to be desired Bird behind counter could understand us, we couldnt really understand her. Very weird. Ended up with what we ordered though, so all was good Went off to find a tram service late evening. They are ******* awesome little two decker crates on rails that run along the island line Ate more food came home for early night. My blisters have started developing blisters of their own Turns out Travelpod is good but most places we've visited aren't in the list....and also I have to write a review for each when adding. Not so cool....sure it isn't the end of the world considering it's free, and easy to use In the words of some chick called Gloria, "I will survive"