Hong Kong

So I woke up at 4am this morning- wide awake- it was a shocker- love that jet lag. I am staying in Kowloon at the Eaton Hotel: http://hongkong.eatonhotels.com. I ponied up a little more money to stay in a hotel rather than a hostel and I am really glad I did so.

The public transportation here is fantastic- the subway is fast and runs frequently. I took the subway today to Hong Kong and did a ton of walking. The map that came with my lonely planet books isn't exactly detailed and that combined with the fact where I was is on a hill meant I pretty much didn't know where I was going. I spent about half an hour trying to find a dim sum place that lonely planet raved about. I was incredibly hungry and could not find it, despite asking for directions- both people nodded and pointed me in the wrong direction. I scrapped that plan and settled with a sandwich that was actually quite good. I then headed to the Hong Kong and Shanghai bank building which is quite impressive and a funny thing happened with the ATM: first of all the ATM took my card very slowly and then nothing happened on the screen for literally 3-4 minutes- the bank guy was like "software updating" I was mildly concerned cause its a bank of Hawaii ATM card and attempting to get a replacement in Hong Kong would be a joke given the way Bank of Hawaii...oh ya and then the ATM informed me I would get a fee for using it- but didn't tell me how much the fee is- hmm hopefully not too much. I then headed on foot to Graham street market which was killer. It is basically an open air market with veggies, meat, fish, etc. I saw various animal body parts and still am not sure what all of them were. The stink at times was nearly enough to cause me to throw up my sandwich.













I then walked around the Soho area (south of Hollywood road) and stumbled upon the Man Mo Temple and I managed to inhale more incense smoke in 10 minutes than I have in my whole entire life- there is literally incense hanging from the ceiling in coils and hundreds or maybe thousands of incense sticks burning.


I then met up for a coffee with a friend of Kuniko's who is working here. After that I headed to the tailor for a fitting- the custom made clothes thing is really amazing- that is to have something made specifically for you and having it fit so well. After that I had some fantastic BBQ pork and veggies and tried not to think of the funky raw pork I saw a few hours earlier.