I might have found a new favorite city...

Hong Kong! We pulled into Hong Kong around 7am into the most surreal and beautiful harbor I’ve ever seen. Everyone was out on the 7th deck completely shocked at this place which looks like New York City spread out onto islands and surrounded everywhere by water. We were told we were docking in the best possible place in the city, which was really close to Victoria Peak (the highest point in Hong Kong and a great place for sight-seeing). The ship docked and we all ran around figuring out what we wanted to do for our first day. Most people had trips planned through SAS to Beijing, Xian, and other places in main land China. We came to Hong Kong early instead of docking in Qindao, China because the captain wanted to avoid hitting a serious typhoon at sea. So we had four days at sea instead of two and we skipped one port to head straight to the next. But SAS did a great job organizing our trips so that we could fly to where we were originally supposed to go and they even refunded half of the trip costs. Most people were leaving for the airport around 3 or 4pm so we got off the ship around 9am and headed into Hong Kong to do some exploring. I headed out with Corrine, Steph, and Dave to find something to do. The building that we were docked directly next to was a huge shopping mall with an incredible selection of stores, just like you would find at home. Right when we stepped off the ship (from the 5th deck this time) and started walking through the building we saw Patagonia, Lacoste, New Balance, Chanel, See’s Candies (I couldn’t believe that!) and hundreds more. We discovered that Hong Kong’s shopping is incredible and ranges from the cheapest goods from venders in the street markets to the most expensive high-end stores. We had heard about a place called Stanley Market that was a 20 minute bus ride away so after we got off of the short ferry we hopped on the Stanley bus and were on our way.
The bus had two levels and we went up to the top for a better view. It was amazing and a little scary how the driver handled that huge bus. A few times when he stopped it was only about literally 6 inches behind the bus in front of him and we were all holding our breath every time. We drove through the city streets and twisted around winding freeways. Touring through this downtown area looked very much like an American city. The number and height of buildings all over Hong Kong was incredible, especially because they were placed between the water and the gorgeous mountains. The bus continued up a road that wound up hills and the scenery changed from the city to tropical forest surrounding narrow paved streets. I was surprised at how many trees and beautiful houses we saw as we made the trip to Stanley market (which was on the other side of the island). Every time there was a space in the foliage we could see that we were high above scenic coves, beaches, and small islands out in the distance. The houses along this area were beautifully built and their views must have been amazing above all of the trees. We hadn’t expected such a beautiful drive especially for a bus ride that cost about 10 Hong Kong dollars (to roughly convert to US dollars you have to divide Hong Kong dollars by 8). We finally made it to Stanley Market, which was a very cheap and somewhat touristy marketplace by the water. There were tons of fresh fruit and absolutely beautiful flowers as we first entered and then alleyways full of fun cheap souvenirs and merchandise. There were strands and strands of real pearls (we were guessing after doing the biting test) for really cheap prices (around 15 dollars for a necklace). But we got into the habit of bargaining as much as possible and usually if you gave a price and walked away they would accept it for around 2/3 of what they originally asked for. There were also booths with tons of cashmere and pashminas for a fraction of what we would pay at home. There were a ton of cheesy souvenirs as well, and Dave, Corrine and I bought oil paintings on cloth of Hong Kong harbor for about 8 dollars each. We wandered throughout the market for quite a while, ending our shopping with a trip down a very dirty back alley to look at some fake designer purses. They had boxes of purses hidden down the street (because it’s illegal for them to sell the knock offs) and one man lead us all back to them and showed us Louis Vuitton and Gucci purses that were pretty bad fakes. When we were all shopped out we headed down the waterside street to find some lunch. There was restaurant that looked like an international sports bar and it had an English menu and food that we recognized so we went in there to eat. As much as we were all for trying authentic food, we had just seen into the kitchen of a restaurant in the marketplace and there was meat on the floor and the most unsanitary looking cooks I had ever seen, so we opted for a little American food for that meal. There were a lot of foreigners (mostly Europeans) around this area eating and shopping as well. I had a Caesar salad with steak that was delicious (and reminded me of the good food at home after 4 days of ship meals). After a satisfying lunch we headed back on the bus in time to get ready for our trips.
Getting back on the ship can be really time consuming, especially in places where they don’t have x-ray machines for our bags and only have one person hand-checking them all. Luckily there wasn’t a huge line and I got back to my room early enough to shower and pack for my next two days and two nights in Beijing. I packed as light as possible (SAS wanted to make sure nobody checked luggage because it would take so much time), and met my group of 60 SAS kids in the Union. We had to fill out departure cards and get our passports from the ship to be able to fly to main land China. All 60 of us boarded a bus for the 45 minute ride to the Hong Kong airport. We got there about 2 hours before our flight so that we could check in and get some food before taking off. The Hong Kong airport was absolutely huge, and it looked very much like the US because there was English everywhere. I got some dinner with my friend Virginia (she’s from Tennessee and goes to UT) and we boarded our flight on Dragon Air. The plane was huge and really nice, and so was the food! We were shocked that Chinese airplane food was actually pretty good. And they had Hagen Daaz ice cream for dessert, which was pretty exciting. Also we found out that the drinks were free so everyone was getting glasses of wine and cocktails the whole time. The flight was a little over 3 hours and we had another hour and a half long bus ride to get to our hotel in Beijing. When we pulled up to the hotel it seemed to be in a bit of a ghetto, surrounded by small dirty shops that were dark by this time of night. But the hotel itself was much nicer than the area it was in. Except that we found out later that there was basically a brothel being run out of a room in the lobby. Some of the guys thought it was a bar so they went in and there were Chinese women all dressed up in a line who started asking them if they wanted to get a room. We didn’t believe them at first but the Sheriff (basically the guy who keeps us in line on the ship and who came on our Beijing trip with his wife) said he went in there and found out the same thing. So that made the hotel seem a bit weird, and when we arrived our group leader told us we could shower but to make sure our eyes and mouth were closed and not to use the water to brush our teeth with. It was so strange to be in a fairly nice hotel where the water was basically contaminated but that is the way it is in a lot of China. The Olympics are going to be held in Beijing in 2008 and I’m not sure how they’ll deal with the water and the extreme pollution for that, but the city is already under a lot of construction getting ready for it.
It was one of our friend’s 21st birthdays so everyone wanted to go out and celebrate somewhere close to the hotel. The girl I roomed with, Megan (from Reno, goes to USD), and I changed our clothes and walked down the street with a few other people to find a bar or restaurant. The street was pretty creepy and there were only local Chinese people sitting and cooking really strange looking animal parts. Some of the SAS kids were sitting at plastic tables outside of a place that sold huge beers for 5 Yuan (the Yuan is the currency for main land China, and is different from the Hong Kong Dollar). 5 Yuan equals about 75 cents so they were pretty happy about how cheap the beer was. Megan and I bought some bottled water and decided that the area was a little to seedy to hang out in so we walked the block back to our hotel with some friends and got back to our room to get some sleep before the early morning wake up call. When we got back we realized that our beds were as hard as rocks so we wrapped ourselves up in the comforters to make it a little more comfortable. Our wake up call came at 7:30am and we got up to eat breakfast before starting our day of jam-packed tours.
The first stop on the bus was Tian’anmen Square (the largest square in the world). We walked around looking at the monuments and buildings in and around the square and listening to our tour guide race through a ton of Chinese history. I had heard that Beijing was much colder but it was actually probably around 80 something degrees and very humid. We took a bunch of pictures and got chased and harassed by people selling cheap trinkets and stamps. It was hard to say no to many of the people who were seriously deformed or had children with them. But if you gave any of them money then the other ones wouldn’t leave you alone so we had to try and ignore them. It was a huge change from Japan where people were much more reserved, never stared, and there were never beggars or vendors hassling you. The square was interesting for about an hour but we were basically just wandering around waiting for the next destination. At one area of the square there was a line of about a thousand people which was to see Chairman Mao’s body (it’s been preserved so that people can look at it) but we didn’t have time to wait in the line and see it. After taking a group photo in the square our guide led us across the street to the Palace Museum, which was where the emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties lived. It was built in 1406 and it has 8,707 rooms that take up 720,000 square meters. Within this area is the forbidden city, and it took us hours to get through all of the layers of buildings to get into the center. We were fairly sick of this by the time we were done because everything looked very similar and we had a lot of free time to wander around. Chinese people were staring at us as we walked around (mostly because we are so much taller than them) and at one point a little old Chinese woman grabbed my arm for me to get in a picture with her. She basically came up to the top of my ribs and she was really excited to get a picture with Christine (from St. Louis, goes to Santa Clara) and I, who are both tall girls.
When we finally finished the tour and got back on the bus we were starving and we had boxed lunches from the ship that were terrible. It was another hour ride to the Great Wall, but the trip was well worth it because this was definitely my favorite part of the Beijing trip. When we pulled into the parking lot at one of the five sections of the great wall that is open to the public, there were tons of tourists and more SAS kids there as well. I didn’t realize that we could climb up the steps and Megan and I both had flip flops on but decided to do it anyway. There are about 1,600 steps to climb in this area to get to the top section of the wall. We started up and had to stop about every 300 steps because it was really hot and pretty tiring. It wasn’t hard to climb except for the fact that the stone steps ranged from around 5 inches to around 15 inches tall in a fairly random order. It was an amazing view as we got higher and higher up and stopped at the little castle-looking stations along the way. We took a ton of pictures and ran into a lot of our friends who were traveling independently or on other trips. We didn’t make it all the way to the very top but we got far enough up for a view of miles all around us. The way down was a little scarier since it was so steep but there were handrails luckily so that made it a lot easier. Being up on those steps and looking at the hills and the winding sections of the Great Wall was breathtaking, I can’t wait to show everyone pictures because it’s pretty indescribable. After all that climbing Megan and I bought some ice cream and sat on the bus for a few minutes getting the dirt off of our feet with wet wipes (thanks mom, those things come in handy!). The next stop was for our Peking Duck Dinner about an hour and a half away. We were all exhausted and fell asleep on the bus like kindergartners during naptime. We got to the restaurant and couldn’t wait to eat some good Chinese food after a long day or being tourists.
There were about 8 big round tables set for us and once we sat down the waitresses starting bringing out plate after plate of food. They put all the dishes on a lazy susan in the middle of the table and poured wine and beer for everyone. The bottle they poured said red wine on it but it basically tasted like wine that was on its way to turning into vinegar. They brought out thin “pancakes” and a dark sauce to eat with the Peking duck, sweet and sour pork, beef with vegetables, a spicy tofu dish, pickled cucumbers, cloudy white soup, sweet and sour fish (with the fried head and tail at each end), yellow rice with egg, and a mushroom dish. Our table cleared every plate and I think everyone tried each different food. There were 6 SAS kids and also a couple at our table who were adult passengers on the ship. They were really nice and told us how much they loved the trip so far, they have two sons (one who went on SAS a year ago when the wave hit, and another son who is going this spring). The waitress brought out the duck and showed us how to put the dark sauce, pieces of cucumber, some type of onion, and the duck into a thin pancake and wrap it up to eat. It was really rich but delicious! After dinner some of the kids went to a Kung Fu show and the rest of us headed back to the hotel. My friend Jed (Kate’s boyfriend from Vandy) had studied in Beijing this summer for a few weeks so he had emailed me the best places to go. We all got ready to go out and followed his directions in a cab to go to a place called Sunlitun (pronounced Sun-lee-twar) Street. The cab ride was about 20 minutes but only cost 24 Yuan (around 3 dollars), and there is no tipping in China. The street was shockingly different from the area where our hotel was. It was completely lit up and looked a bit like New Orleans with tons of bars and clubs lining the sides. There were a lot of beggars and vendors who came right up to us but we tried to just keep walking. There was a big group of us and one of my friends gave a homeless woman 1 Yuan because she came up to him with her baby and wouldn’t leave him alone. But after he gave her money a little boy who was probably 7 years old followed him for blocks begging for money. The boy would run through and elbow all the girls and chase my friend Joe demanding money. We weren’t sure how to get him to leave but eventually some police officers came and told him to go away. As we were crossing the street we looked back and saw a Chinese man who gave some sort of attitude to the three policemen who were walking the streets. They grabbed his bag but he ran and they chased him down and tackled him. It was pretty scary to watch and we stayed as far away as we could. We crossed over through a small street and saw the sign for BarBlu at the top of a building (that was one of the bars Jed suggested). All of us (there were about 10 SAS kids all together) went into the building and went up the four flours to the bar. It took up the whole floor but wasn’t very big. But it looked exactly like any American bar at home, with a dance floor, big stocked bar, and tables and stools to sit around. We checked out the drink menu but they were somewhat expensive so one of the boys bought the first round and then we decided to get a pitcher of Long Island Iced Teas because it was cheaper than buying 6 drinks individually. We ordered the pitcher (the boys said they made drinks stronger when girls ordered them) and I watched the bartender pick up four bottles of alcohol and pout them until the 12-inch pitcher was literally about 9 inches full. Then he poured in the mixers in the drink and added some lemons. I was a little shocked at how much alcohol was in it and when we poured glasses and took a sip it was basically impossible to drink. We thought it was pretty funny but the drinks were terrible. After dancing and taking pictures at BarBlu we walked around the street checking out the other places to go. We saw a foreigner (I think he was British) get hit over the head with a glass bottle by a Chinese man and run away with blood all over his shirt. It was pretty intense and by that time of night I was exhausted from traveling since 8am. Megan, Christine and I went back to the hotel and to bed to get some sleep before our morning flight.
Beijing wasn’t my one of my favorite destinations but I’m really glad I got to see the Great Wall. I couldn’t wait to get back to Hong Kong but our flight was delayed about half an hour in Beijing. We finally took off around 1:30pm and I fell asleep for most of the flight. Then after another 45 minute bus ride we made it back to the ship around 6pm and started planning our nights out in Hong Kong. I found Corinne and Dave on the ship and we decided to go up to Victoria Peak for the view of everything lit up at night. We took a 15 minute cab ride up to the Peak and went to the top of the building to take pictures. The view of Hong Kong from that high up was one of the best views I’ve ever seen. The entire city was lit up, and most of the buildings on the skyline have multi-colored lights that change or fade and create an amazing effect. It was really windy but we took the best pictures that we could while Corinne and I held our hair down. After sight seeing up at the Peak we took a cab out to an area of bars and restaurants called Lan Kwai Fong. This was one of the coolest places for going out at night that I’ve ever been to. It was lined with restaurants and cool little bars along a narrow street with no cars but eventually it was jam packed with people. There were a ton of white people (foreigners from everywhere, especially Europe) and a lot of SAS kids that we ran into. We found a small bar with a happy hour that was about to end so we sat down to have some wine and ordered food there. The people-watching was really entertaining in that area and it was fun to run into so many of our friends we hadn’t seen in a few days. We had a great time hanging out at the bars and talking with some British guys we met who lived up on Victoria Peak. It was a pretty late night but we finally headed back to the ship in a cab.
We slept in after our night out in Hong Kong and got up around 11 to go out shopping in the markets. Steph, Dave and I started walking around town and found “Ned Kelly’s Last Stand” which was a bar/pub that was based on Ned Kelly (an Australian outlaw from the 1880’s). We had burgers for lunch there and bought t-shirts for souvenirs. Then we headed off to markets for a day full of shopping. The first market we went to was all electronics. It was really hard to get through because there were so many things to look at. There were shops with hundreds of cell phones (some of them aren’t out in the US yet) that were around the same price as they are at home. But there were also entire tables full of clocks, batteries, walkey talkeys (I bought some for really cheap), binoculars, flashlights, cameras, computers and tons of other kinds of electronics. It took us over an hour to walk around and bargain for the things we wanted and we were all satisfied with the stuff we got and how cheap it was. I got two packs of double-A batteries for around 20 Hong Kong dollars (a little over 2 US dollars), and I thought that was pretty amazingly cheap. After we had our fill of electronics we headed to more street markets that had blocks and blocks of dresses, shoes, underwear, souvenirs, jade, pearls, Chinese fabric and jewelry, t-shirts, backpacks, chopsticks, and so much more. After wandering for a long time and checking out everything they had I bought some jade bracelets (a pink one and a green one), a pearl necklace for around $12, and four 100% cashmere wraps that are huge and cost a total of about $45. Walking around the streets of Hong Kong is really an experience. It was extremely crowded and busy, with shops absolutely everywhere and street markets that came out of nowhere. There were also food places that had miscellaneous cooked animals hanging basically right out on the street. At one point during the shopping Dave had us follow him into a building that he said would be worth seeing. When Steph and I walked in we realized it was a fish market with hundreds of dead cut up fish in rows. The first table we walked up to had a giant fish that had already been but in half and all of its organs were totally exposed. We walked up to it and it started flopping around like crazy, I jumped back about 6 feet and screamed because I didn’t know that half of a fish’s body could still move around like that. Dave and Steph were laughing at me for being so squeamish (this stuff was way grosser than the time you swallowed that goldfish Mare!). We walked through the center of the market with fish tables on each side covered in so many different kinds of chopped up fresh fish. There were also a bunch of bins with fish that were still alive and crammed in there with water just waiting to be chopped up and sold. I was a little freaked out but I walked through and calmed down after a while. But at the end of the row there was this fat Chinese man holding the top of a big green net bag. I looked closely and couldn’t tell what was in it until he pulled out a giant ugly bullfrog! The entire bag was full of squished together living bullfrogs, and next to it was another bag with big turtles in it, and they eat both animals frequently. It was definitely a culture shock comparing this to a fish market at home.
We went upstairs to another level of the market that had cartoon pictures of other animals. This level had hanging rows of red meat and we couldn’t figure out what was what until we started looking closely. There were cow tongues, brains, legs, entire pig heads that were stretched out, meat from some unknown animal that had a tail coming off of it, and a bunch of other pieces of red meat that were just hanging out there in the open. I am one of the most carnivorous people I know but after that experience I didn’t really want to eat any meat in China. We left the meat market to do more shopping and touring around Hong Kong. Steph decided to head back to the boat to find some free internet around the port and Dave and I continued to walk around. Dave had all the maps figured out and knew how to get to a lot of the markets so I followed him around like he was my tour guide. It would have been a lot more difficult trying to navigate myself, especially because I’m pretty bad with directions. We made it to the Temple Street Market, which is a big night market, but it was only about 5pm so people were just setting up. We did a bit more shopping there and then decided to find some dinner before heading back to the boat for “on ship” time which was at 9pm. We took a cab to an area where there was a boardwalk on the water that was all lit up with rows of red paper lanterns.
There was a shopping center connected to a nice hotel so Dave and I went in looking for a place to eat dinner that had a view of the city. We wandered around and basically stumbled on a restaurant that seemed pretty nice and had a spectacular view of the skyline all lit up at night. The hostess asked if we wanted to eat at the buffet and so we walked past it to see what kind of food they had. I really hadn’t loved the authentic Chinese food so when we saw this buffet we were both really excited. It was three tables of the best possible things we could have asked for. There was fresh fish, lobster, tuna sashimi (the best I think I have ever tasted), roast beef, chicken dishes, soups, bread and butter, gourmet quesadillas, guacamole, and anything else we could have possible dreamed up. We filled up our plates and sat down struggling to split our focus between the incredible food and the incredible view. When Dave went back for his second plate I went to the dessert table and I couldn’t believe what they had. There was a four tiered chocolate fountain with every kind of fruit on skewers to dip into it, as well as rice krispie treats, cookies, and cakes. There were rows of jelly bellys, gummy candies, puddings, custards, and cakes of every kind. The entire meal was one of the best I’ve ever had and was definitely unforgettable for my last night in Hong Kong. We took some pictures to remember our favorite meal in China (especially because we had to go straight back to ship food), and then headed back in a taxi to make it on by “on-ship” time. When we got to the port it was around 8pm but there was a huge line to get on and we didn’t need to get back until 9pm. There is usually a build-up around one hour before and then it dies down a bit so we found a place in the mall that was facing the harbor and watched the laser show that happens every night in Victoria Harbor for about ten minutes at 8pm. It was kind of strange but really beautiful. There were huge green and multicolored lights that would shine into the night and on the water from the tops of buildings along the skyline. Also a lot of the buildings themselves were lined with lights that were set to patterns and motion. There is a Chinese radio station that has music set to coordinate with the light show, but we didn’t have any radio nearby to listen along to. After the light show we decided to get in line since it had died down a tiny bit. We waited for a really long time because every person’s bag has to be checked individually by hand before they can get on, and most people had done a serious amount of shopping in Hong Kong. Right when I got through the metal detector and my bag was done being checked Dave grabbed my card out of my hand and swiped it in the computer. It was 8:59 exactly and he saw the time on the computer, and he swiped my card so that I would be in before 9pm and wouldn’t have 2 hours of “dock-time” in Vietnam. Thank god he was quick enough because we were literally the two last people to get on in time and about 70 kids behind us had dock time for being late. I got on the ship, showered off the humid layer of grime I had acquired throughout the day, and unpacked all of my shopping purchases. Everyone was out on the top decks and I went up to talk to my friends about what they did all over China. There was a consensus that Hong Kong was definitely the favorite city and almost every person wanted to go back.





I just finished this one a little late and I’m back from Vietnam now so I have to work on that one for a few days because I have so much to say about it! It seems that each port gets better and better. Enjoy the blog and check back in a few days for Vietnam, my best stories are definitely from here!