Day 105 - Props Shopping

Today I had plans with Rachel and Liz to go out and shop and do girly things like maybe find a place to get a manicure and just spend some time together. I met Rachel early, and we woke Liz up after breakfast. We decided that if we woke her up, gave her some time to get going, shower, dry and straighten her hair, and get herself organized, and then came back and got her, then we could all go out by lunch. The plan worked. We planned to meet Liz at about noon, hopped on the metro for Mong Kok, and went looking for the electronics block. It wasn't hard to find and didn't take us long to find exactly what we were looking for. We didn't have long to browse, but we were sure of what we needed: we both needed external hard drives, and Rachel needed a new memory card and card reader for her digital camera. They were so cheap I thought of getting myself one, but quite honestly if I filled up a whole 2G memory card before I uploaded the pictures, I had other problems to deal with. So I resisted the temptation.

chicken curry

It was the ride on the metro that took the most time, and we were a little late meeting Liz. But that turned out to be perfect timing, as Liz has fashionably late down to an art. She'd invited Jonathan along too, and we went looking for lunch. We were properly hungry by the time we found it because we had to be picky - Rachel is a vegetarian and Liz doesn't eat beef, not to mention the fact that Liz is more than a little picky when it comes to food. About like I was before I got to the point where I'd try anything. Well, almost anything. I ordered chicken curry and it was about the most wonderful thing ever. I know I say that about food a lot. I must just really like food, eh? But it was really, really good.

fun sign

We just wandered for a while, the four of us, and then I had to meet Lindsay to go back out after props. Rachel had other plans for the afternoon, so Lindsay, Jonathan, Liz and I rode the metro to Mong Kok together and then split up so Lindsay and I could buy our props and Jonathan and Liz could go back after electronics. Lindsay and I were in a frenzy - not a rush frenzy, yet, but a frenzy of excitement as we hunted down all the amazing fun things we would need. Fishing poles were the hardest, and we asked directions several times before finally happening on a little shop that had exactly - exactly - what we needed, right down to the fact that the poles were collapsible. It was amazing. We found everything we needed and much, much more, and spent every penny as wisely as we could. We almost missed the art supply store closing; Lindsay slipped in just as the heavy metal outer door was being shut. They let her in because she was clear what she wanted and that she was going to buy something, and then we were on our way. We realized too late that we'd already missed our ETL and we still had to get back, so we decided to get a cab rather than brave the metro with all our excess stuff. The cab ride was long and I was surprised how far we'd actually come from the Ocean Terminal. Lindsay didn't have enough Hong Kong dollars to pay the driver, and he really didn't want to accept American dollars, but we were late and had no other choice. And he would be silly not to accept it, because it was a huge tip - American dollars are worth more than 7 times the Hong Kong dollar, and all Lindsay had was a $5 bill.

happy holidays sign

Anyway we got back and lugged all of our stuff up the gangway and into the theatre where we were meeting our cast (we were late for that too, actually) and started pulling things out to show them off. It was like Christmas, everyone trying on their new clothes and playing with the props and tossing wrappings and bags around. It was quite a mess. Eventually we packed everything up and stashed it away and had a short rehearsal before going to bed. The plan was to rehearse most of the day tomorrow - the showcase was tomorrow night. Yikes!

purple flowers

wallace shirts