Hong Kong: Adventures in Eating and Shopping

  Hong Kong, China
Thursday, January 17, 2008

Well, here it is... our first entry from abroad. 

On the evening of Monday the 14th, Andrew had checked the status of our flight from home.  We had spent the better part of the day twiddling our thumbs waiting for our flight as we had been packed and ready to go for a few days and were just waiting for the moment we could leave for the airport.  The flight status said that we were rerouted to Taipei, 500 miles from Hong Kong.  "Great", I thought to myself, "we hadn't even left yet and were already running into travel issues".  When we checked in at the airport, the small agent said in a whisper that the rerouting was due to high winds over the Pacific and that we wouldn't make it to Hong Kong without refueling first. So with that, we slipped through customs and sat in the British Air Business Class lounge in cozy leather recliners drinking wine and hot tea waiting for our flight to be called.

Business Class on Cathay Pacific

Upon boarding our huge plane, we were told to go upstairs to business class where we were greeted with hot towels, champagne, seats that fully reclined and a huge selection of entertainment options including over 50 movies and TV shows.  With all of this, not to mention the noise reducing headsets and Arden B travel packs filled with an array of fabulous high end lotions, the 15 hour flight with its unplanned stop in Taipei was a breeze.

We arrived in Hong Kong at 8:40am on Wednesday, 4pm Tuesday in San Francisco a little tired and not entirely with it, but to my delight we sped through customs and our bags arrived immediately.  So far so good.  We went to the counter at B01 in the enormous Hong Kong airport and were given a sticker and corralled like small children to a waiting area where men came in from outside and called the names of hotels.  When Lanson Place was called, Andrew and I were the only ones to board the 30+ passenger bus that would whisk us away over bridges, freeways, tunnels and cramped city streets in the cool Hong Kong morning.  We were surprised as we looked out the window at enormous skyscrapers as far as the eye could see. Some looked like high rise low income housing, while right next to the tenements were what looked like modern architectural marvels.  Here I thought 1 Rincon in San Francisco was a feat, imagine hundreds of the tallest buildings in San Francisco side by side by side.  It was pretty amazing.

View from our room

An hour after boarding our bus and what seemed like us driving in circles, we arrived at Lanson Place, a beautiful boutique hotel in the middle of the bustleing Causeway Bay district on Hong Kong Island.  We were very happy to find that our room was ready and we were taken to the 21st floor to our modern apartment like room complete with a kitchenette and a frosted glass bathroom in the center of the room.  We both took what felt like the best shower of our life in the small frosted glass bathroom and ventured out into the city streets to get lunch.  The concierge recommended we find a place on Jardine's Bazaar, which was right next to our hotel and if we wanted something more upscale that we should go to Lee Gardens Two up the street.

Our Room

Upon exiting our hotel, we were immediately confronted with busy city streets, smells that were unfamiliar and a very foreign feel that would take some time to get used to.  Upon seeing our options on Jardine's, with what we refer to as "flattened duck" sitting in the windows and no English menu's, we opted for Lee Gardens Two.  Andrew ordered a chicken and prawn dish, while I played it safe with friend rice.  I started to laugh upon seeing Andrew's basket of giant shrimp heads, fried chicken with bones in every tiny morsel and more chili peppers than I could possibly use in a year arrive in front of him.  I think his face might have turned white.  With that Andrew said, "I may actually lose some weight on this trip" and we proceeded to share my fried rice.

We walked around Causeway Bay like salmon swimming upstream and visited Hong Kong's version of Times Square.  The shopping area had every store you could imagine, organized by floor based on what they sell.  There was Patagonia, Lacoste, Polo, Chanel, Club Monaco, Zara, New Balance, Juicy Couture and a host of electronics stores. I was amazed, and I was also surprised to see that all of the prices were the same as at home.  After grabbing some coffee we made our way back to our hotel, meandering through the small streets where I took a nap.

Andrew woke me up and I did what I normally do before going out: I reached for my beloved flat iron to give myself a little touch up before going out.  In my haze of having just woken up, I plugged my flat iron into what looked like a converter.  I flipped the switch and pow, a fireball emerged from my flat iron and all of the electricity in our room went out.  "Not again!!"  I cannot tell you how many countries I have done this in.  After getting the electricity restored in our room we held a proper buriel for my flat iron and hope to buy one when we reach Sydney as for those who know me... I don't leave home without it.

Happy Valley 3 (Huge!)

On our list of things to do in Hong Kong, Andrew had put going to the Happy Valley race track, one of the two race courses for horse racing in Hong Kong.  The best day to go was Wednesday night, so we hopped in a cab and headed over to the track, which was a short 5 minute drive from our hotel.  Upon approaching we saw the enormity of the track situated among the tall buildings of Hong Kong Island.  It must have been the size of 16 football fields surrounded by skyscrapers.  We had some dinner at the track consisting of a pork sandwich and beer for Andrew and a Won Ton soup and Coke Zero for me at the tune of $5 US and put some money down on Thunder Valley, Happy Sunday and China Divine and watched the races among thousands of Hong Kong residents.  As we left $80 HK poorer (about $11 US) we noticed that all of the Americans and Europeans were in the beer garden by the entrance, but I for one was happy that we had endured the authentic horse racing experience.

The Race

After a glass of wine back at the Hotel, 32 hours after our departure with only 6 hours of sleep under our belt, I can suffice to say, we passed out cold!

We woke up to our 7:45am wake up call feeling fantastic and we went down to breakfast refreshed and rejouvenated.  I was shocked at how easy it was to adjust to the 16 hour time change.  Our table was quite small, not to mention our plates and coffee cups were tiny, leading us to spend the better part of breakfast getting up and down to walk across the room to replenish our stash.  After all, it was a shopping day and we needed to fuel up.  Andrew joked that he might go shopping at Starbucks to get a mug to use for tomorrow's breakfast. 

We left our hotel at 10am to venture onto the subway to Kowloon, part of the mainland, just across from Hong Kong Island, which is a melting pot of everything relating to spending your money.  We were on a mission to Tung Choi St. (the Ladies Market), Fa Yuen St. (the Sporting Goods street), Gold Fish Market

Fish Market storefront

and Temple Street (the Men's Market).  We found the subway to be extremely pleasant.  It was fast, easy to understand and inexpensive.  Andrew appreciated the fact that it was clean, not overly crowded and cool.  We arrived at the Mongkok station and upon emerging to the street were immediately overwhelmed by the sheer size of the streets and the buildings.  It felt like we were in downtown New York City times four.  We got lost amongst the shuffle of the busy streets and yet again were surprised by the incredible organization of all the shops.  It reminded me a lot of Hanoi, where every street served a purpose:  one street for fish and live animals, another for electronics and appliances, one for tiles and flooring, another for only sporting goods, on and on and finally one for the tourists looking to get great deals.  Andrew and I fit into the last category, but before venturing into bargain mania, we stopped for lunch at Langham Place, a modern 13 story shopping and dining mecca.  We wandered through many of the floors and stumbled upon a modern Thai restaurant called Orchid Thai where we decided to sit down and have lunch.

At the Ladies Market

We ventured back to the Ladies Market, which had 4 city blocks dedicated to hundreds of stalls holding clothing and accessories.  Andrew and I escaped with only a few items, a Swiss Navy watch for Andrew and a Siwss Army watch for me that we could use on our trip.  At $10 a piece, we could care less about their creative titles, so long as they ticked. 

In the late afternoon, we made our way to Temple Street with a hot tea in hand.  After meandering through the stalls that were being constructed and readied for the busy night crowd, we stumbled upon the Tai Pan Spa.  It was beautifully decorated and superbly kept, so we ventured upstairs for a 25 minute foot massage.  We were greeted by friendly faces who placed us in massage chairs and washed our feet in hot water foot spas.  We were then led to plush red beds where we were covered in warm blankets with warm neck pillows placed behind our heads.  Andrew said he was somewhere between laughing and shrieking from pain the whole time, but I loved every second.  We were treated to a fantastic foot massage and were sent on our way, completely rejuvenated after our full day of walking.  We hopped on the subway back to our hotel, where we made a quick turnaround to head to the tram that would take us to "The Peak", the highest mountain on Hong Kong Island that is renowned for its spectacular views of the city.

Top of the Peak 1

We upgraded our tickets to the Sky Terrace and after a short, but incredibly steep tram ride up the mountain, we made our way up 6 more floors of escalators to be confronted with the most amazing views of Hong Kong, Kowloon and beyond...  It was freezing at the top and partner that with Andrew's fear of heights, it made for a slightly painful 30-minutes of waiting to see the City Lights Show, which would begin 8pm.  I was a little disappointed when the buildings simply changed colors and sent spotlights into the air, as I would have much rather been in one of the warm tall buildings with a martini in hand watching the show, but it was a good experience overall. 

Top of the Peak 3

We made our way back down the escalators to Zen Restaurant, a recommendation by both Trip Advisor and our concierge and found a few items on the menu that sounded appealing.  In an effort to be slightly adventurous, I had us order the minced pigeon, but came to regret our order when it arrived with a fried pigeons head sliced in half and placed delicately at the side of our plate.  I couldn't help but feel the little guy was staring at me questioning why I had to kill him for my dinner. 

After dinner we made our way back down the mountain to return back to our hotel exhausted and excited for our next days trip to Macau, a dynamic city that was a Portuguese enclave from 1557 to 1999, slightly resembling Vegas and only an hour ferry ride from Hong Kong.