Dynamic Hongkong

I am trying to catch up with a lot of work that piled up during my short hiatus. It hasn't helped that throughout my vacation, we were leaving early for shopping and sightseeing then getting back to the hotel late, so I am also sleepy most of the time at the office. The good thing is that we already have a coffee machine so I load up on brewed coffee to stay awake.

Prior to the trip, I planned quite a lot of personal tours for us to really explore Hongkong especially since my last HK vacation in 2002 was a blur of shopping and arranged visits to this or that tourist area. I especially wanted to visit the Peak and watch HK at night, Teddy Bear Kingdom, the Wax Museum as well as take a short dinner-cruise around Victoria Harbour. However, I was only able to have the Peak visit as we were again caught in a whirlwind shopping spree (you can't take the shopping out of a city girl it seems).

It was really fortunate we got the Disney tickets for a day of non-shopping. Initially though, our itinerary had us booked for a full day Disney visit and another half-day complementary city tour. But our HK tour operator wanted to make a few more bucks and squeezed both city tour and Disney to one day, offering other tours for the other free day! We were outraged, and tried to get the Disney tickets so we could go there on our own. The tour guide informed us that another guide was to meet us at Disney (around 1PM) and she had with her the tickets. Life hands you lemons... we made lemonade.

The thing is, you really can tour Disney for just half a day especially if you are not fond of waiting in long lines to get on a ride. The park itself is smaller than our own Enchanted Kingdom, so it was fairly easy for us to switch from one 'land' to another. There are of course 4 worlds to explore just as in the other Disney parks, namely Fantasyland, Adventureland, Tomorrowland, and Main Street which is a conglomerate of souvenir shops and restaurants arranged in an old American town-style. We were also fortunate to catch the regular 3PM parade, where all the Disney characters came out on a pre-determined path lined with ropes to hold the crowd.

We noticed that most of the Disney folk looked suspiciously like Pinoys, and some Pinoy HK residents confirmed it. I took a picture of a Pinoy theater actor who was part of the final float during the parade, the one where Mickey, Minnie, Donald and Daisy were sitting on a double-decked ride.

The food wasn't what we expected, as mom and aunt had high hopes of getting to taste authentic US burgers and fries. We lined up 12 NN at a restaurant and found it was run by Maxim's and was taking reservations for 4:30 PM! At another food stall, we asked where the hotdogs they were selling were from and found these were from HK.

My mom had a field day shopping (yet again) for souvenirs, though. She was able to get a Minnie Mouse doll worth around HKD180 which she mentioned was for my sister. I liked the Mickey Mouse earrings and pin I found, which cost HKD80 and HKD40 respectively. Brother asked for mouse ears, so I got him a Santa hat with ears that cost HKD120. Key chains cost from HKD35-80 depending on the material. They weren't cheap but got them anyway because we figured we weren't spending for the rides and a sit down lunch (or dinner). The same day as the trip, before we got back to the hotel, I was able to buy a Mickey Mouse doll similar to what my mom bought at Watson's for HKD60.

Actually, shopping at HK wasn't like the first time I was there, and we found Bangkok to be more affordable. At Mongkok, the shawls and various souvenir items start at HKD25. Nice keychains that previously cost us only HKD10 were now HKD15, but if you buy wholesale I guess you can still get down to HKD10. Diesel bags start at HKD120, and t-shirts are 3 for HKD100. We were able to find the Esprit outlet store on our last day, and were able to get bags at HKD120-140.

As for food, we were able to get a taste of Asia with the various small eateries that we visited. We tried this amazing bakery near the hotel, and found great egg tarts for HKD20 each. In our Kowloon wanderings, we came across a restaurant that cooked stir fry rice meals for HKD35-50 each (generous portions). We also took out food from Jollibee just to get a feel of how it differs from the ones we have here and found their palabok to have a bigger portion and accompanied by a lemon wedge instead of calamansi.

Everywhere we noticed all sorts of construction going on, and my aunt mentioned they were building a lot of low-cost apartments to meet the clamor of the increasing HK population. Even the areas near the airport and HK Disney (Lantau island) were in a constant state of building/repair. I look forward to next year, when hopefully my brother can join us, and where I shall definitely see a different Hongkong.