April 7 Hong Kong
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A very good night’s sleep of about 10 hours left me feeling tired. Now there’s a surprise. The view from my room indicated another dull & cloudy day, weather that I have come to expect in Hong Kong. Following yesterday’s excesses, I took a banana from the bowl in my room and ignored breakfast. I did a short stint in the hotel’s internet café, found lots of work and decided to ignore it until I reached the UK. |
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Outside it was dull and almost chilly, about 20 degrees I should think. Many of the locals were wearing scarves and coats. The Lonely Planet described a walk in Mong Kok, so I took the MRT four stops to Prince Edward and alighted in an unprepossessing part of town. The road I had to follow, Boundary Rd, had an overpass running along it but it soon led to a petrol station, a reasonably rare animal in Hong Kong. |
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 Mong Kok Stadium |
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There was also a church, Seventh Day Adventist, I think, but it was in a position that made decent photography almost impossible. On either side of the road were sports pitches which I couldn’t photograph because of the road to one side and a high fence to the other. There was also the Mong Kok stadium, with massive floodlight towers and very high walls. Next door, however, was the Yuen Po bird garden. This had everything. Spectacular architecture, beautiful wall tiles and hundreds of birds in cages. Some lived in penthouse suites and some in blocks of flats. |
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Everywhere were people talking about birds, looking at birds and carrying birds around. There was even a supermarket full of birdie treats. I don’t really go for caged birds but here they certainly do it in style.
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Immediately outside the bird garden was Flower Market Street. Wall to wall magnificent colours being kept clean by the local street sweeper. The face mask came long before the Mexican Pig Flu. The care with which the blooms were wrapped was amazing and created some wonderful images. Right: Pre-swine flu mask |
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Tung Choi Street is the home of the goldfish market. The fish obviously need their beauty sleep, however, so that at 10 am it was largely closed. There were some in evidence, creating spectacular pools of colour and fascinating patterns created by the ones hanging in plastic bags Another shop caught my eye – it contained more mice than my kitchen – but they were moving so fast in their cages that my photos didn’t work. There were also some bunnies awaiting new homes. |
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The Tung Choi Street Market had fruit, vegetables, fish and meat. The fish was so fresh that it was still flapping while it was being filleted. Not a pretty sight. I didn’t examine the meat too closely!By now, I had returned to the centre of Mong Kok so called in at a camera shop and bought a battery for my Panasonic. |
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I would have done some more window shopping but, at 11 am, many of the shops were closed. 11 am also means the time for a mackerel of something so I returned to the DeliFrance that I had visited yesterday for a scrambled egg and a tea. This seemed about the healthiest option on offer. When I emerged from the café it was drizzling very slightly and seemed even cooler than before. Back in NZ I might even have been wearing a sweater but mine was back in the hotel.
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The Ladies Market now sells men’s clothes as well but it is really an afternoon and evening venue so that it was only just beginning to open. Dundas Street has a “sitting out area”, paved but with some trees. All were dwarfed by the surrounding buildings. |
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Following the Guide I passed some fascinating old and seriously rundown buildings - the overnight wholesale fruit & veg market I think - before returning to the main road, where there was a collection of kitchen equipment shops. I could have spent a fortune in these but decided that there would be too much for my suitcase. I might consider a cleaver on the return journey as these were ever so cheap.
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The Jade Market is what it says it is. The Guide says that it is not a place to shop if you don’t know exactly what you are doing. I don’t, so I didn’t. There were some very pretty colours on display so, not for the first time, I tried to be artistic.
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The remaining part of the walk along Temple Street was very quiet. I must visit in the evening, when the market is in full swing. I caught the MRT home again, thought about a rest but then decided to hook into the hotel’s broadband system to shift a load of the work which had come in. A couple of hours later, I decided that I was bored with that game & went out again.
Left: Temple Street |
Just over from the hotel is the museums complex, the architecture of which is very reminiscent of post war brutalism from the UK.
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There were lots of people doing their evening activities, including playing draughts or the local equivalent thereof.As I walked around a helicopter took off from the roof of the Peninsula Hotel, over the road. Not what I expect to see in the city centre. |
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Inside the Museum of Art were displays of calligraphy & brush painting and ceramics. The ceramics from 1500 years ago were of amazing technical complexity, given that NZ was uninhabited at the time & the UK was enjoying the Dark Ages. Some of the items from more recent times were exquisite, both delicate and beautiful. There was a gallery of contemporary art but this didn’t excite me too much.
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Outside again, I walked along the promenade, surrounded by hordes of others. The Avenue of Stars featured numerous Chinese film stars of which I knew nothing but there were people clustered around a host of bronze models.
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Bruce Lee, however, meant a lot to me and also to everyone else. They were queuing up to be photographed next to his statue. I fought my way through the crowds to take my own photo. The statue certainly was large and made a very impressive sight.
Inside a huge shopping complex, I found lots of designers shoes on sale. There were even some New Balance ones, which I was hoping to find cheap in the UK. The prices here were, if anything, higher than they would have been at the outlet store in Wellington.
My dinner plans were frustrated when I discovered that the place listed in the Guide had been converted into a Pizza Hut. After walking up and down Ashley Road a few times – it is street of non-stop restaurants – I settled on Hing Fat, a scruffy looking Chinese restaurant full of Chinese, which was a good sign. There, I found a good dinner of salt ‘n pepper squid, bok choi and rice, washed down with a large bottle of Tsing Tao. What better way to finish a couple of days in Hong Kong.
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