Hong Kong trip

As promised, here's a little story behind our trip to Hong Kong:

My mother, son and I were treated by my husband to a pleasure trip to Hong Kong. It was a packaged travel for 3 days and 2 nights. The package included hotel accomodations with free McDo breakfast, Disneyland tour, City and Victoria Peak tours.

We stayed at a small but decent Hotel in Kowloon, the Dorsett Seaview Hotel (but there is really no sea nearby, hence the seaview title is not really true). The Win Travel Agents were accomodating and friendly.

Victoria Peak was the coolest among all the places we went to. We visited the place during our first night in HK and one could clearly see the whole Hongkong City at the top of the mountain. It was simply spectacular and I couldn't help but praise God for His wonderful creation. It is also where the wax museum is located. Prior to Victoria Peak tour, the package also included a yummy dinner treat at the "Delicious restaurant". It was supposedly a fine dining restaurant, however, the meals were served in no particular order, like the soup after the 4 main courses, and their specialty, roasted goose, was served right after the soup. Inspite of this, my tummy still managed to accomodate everything. It's an authentic chinese food and I liked it.

One thing we learned from Chinese is the inclusion of green tea in our diet. Since we came from Hong Kong, my mother and I drink green tea after dinner together. It's healthy and refreshing.

That's me with Johnny Depp

The next day, we went to Hongkong Disneyland. It's smaller than I expected. Here in the Philippines, our own amusement park, the Enchanted Kingdom is just a 20-30 min drive from our place. I could say that if a Filipino just wanted the rides, then he or she should just go to EK and not bother to go to HK Disneyland. But of course, there's no doubt that the ambiance in HK disneyland is a fairy tale-like, almost as if you are one of the casts of aladdin...what with the disney music, playing in all parts of the park. If you have creative imagination, you might be able to see flying carpets. :-)

It was also nice to watch the 3-D theater with the adventures of Donald...that was really good, seemed that Donald duck was just inches away from your face. My son even attempted to touch him. Oh, and Disneyland, has its own train going back to the City.

The city tour at the last day was grand. We went to the fisherman's village, the harbor, avenue of the stars, and a jewelry factory. I give credit to Hong Kong's jewelers, the pieces are intricately made, the designs are original and they're all insured. But of course the price is very high.

Even for such a short stint, we experienced a bit of culture shock. We found it really hard that most of the people in Hong Kong cannot communicate in English or many of them even do not understand the language. Here in the Philippines, the foreigners might have less difficulty, for even the "tambays" the ones without jobs, could understand english.

We missed our hotel on the first night after going to the Ladies' market, and got lost because the taxi driver sent us to another hotel. What made the matter worst was that helpful (but turned out to be not so helpful people) do not know where the hotel or location is even if we showed them the map. I didn't understand, why would they found it difficult to direct us to where we should be heading. We walked and asked and looked and asked again for almost an hour (at 11:30 pm). It's not that the people are not literally helpful, I think, they wanted to help but because they do not understand what we are saying or maybe they do not know how to lead us to our destination, some preferred to turn their backs to us and some led us to wrong direction.

One thing I learned, that Hong Kong people gauge distance based on how long they would walk towards there. Like for example, they would tell us, "it's just a 15-min walk from here", and I heard that instructions for maybe 4-5 different times. I asked somebody in Giordano where we can find a Lego Toy store, and he directed us towards a Big Shopping Mall (by the way there's not one toy store in that BIG mall, toy stores are lacking in HK, they should set up more toy outlets there), with a distance of a "15-min walk", that's also the instruction of a saleslady in 7-eleven when we got lost, and that's also the exact words of our tour guide when asked how we can reach the ladies' market, etc...However, I failed to ask them how fast should I walk so that their 15 min could apply to me.

For Filipinos, if you have not enough money to shop for branded clothes, shoes, make up, etc., then don't shop. You might end up buying in their local "tiangges" which are the Ladies' or night markets and there's a big chance that all those brands you can see there are just imitations. Honestly, our prices here in the Philippines are much much cheaper. Same quality, same products from China but double or triple the price. Some sellers, even seemed to course if you don't buy their products. Don't ask prices if you do not intend to buy. The sellers could get scary, really.

Walking is IN in Hong Kong. We, of course, used their cabs, btw, the tour guide told us that Taxi drivers have no right to refuse a passenger to wherever the tourist wants to go. The passenger should ride first and while inside, tell the driver where he is heading. The driver should send him there without complaining. It would be best to carry a map with you though, so that they would know where you really are going, they might just assume the place if they hear your instructions incorrectly. It's also best to say the words by syllables.

One way of preserving one's culture is to preserve the native tongue. It has it's disadvantages on the tourists, but I believe, they get a lot of advantages when they chose to use their own language. Besides, English or no English, Hong Kong is beautiful and enjoyable.

In all fairness, Hong Kong is very clean, I wonder why I hadn't smelled smoke while I wandered in the city. Maybe because they have lesser vehicles, most of the people are using the MTR and buses. Lesser vehicles, lesser smoke emissions. Also, there is no smoke belcher, as far as I observed. One thing nice is that there are no factories in HK, all factories are located in mainland China (please correct me if I'm wrong).

The HK airport is super big, with mall inside. It's quite confusing also. Terminal 2 is where you should check in and deposit your baggages and Terminal 1 is where you should board. There is a subway train to go to terminal 1 from terminal 2. The staff don't bother to tell you where to go, so practice the art of questioning. Also, if your plane was delayed, there would be no announcements (or maybe I missed it for I just hear chinese announcements), so be alert and check in their postings maybe every 5 minutes (that would be safe, I guess).

Our Hong Kong trip was over all pleasant, it's worth the time and money. It's nice to travel and experience different culture. Many thanks to our sponsor...lol