Next morning.
Over breakfast, I meet this bloke. He's like, from China. Speaks really really quickly. I can't keep up.
'What's your name?'
'Chunping.'
I look at his tag.
'Liu Chunping.'
I tell him that the weather is so hot. He nods. 'Mhmm'.
So we hop on the tour bus. First time. Where do we sit? Back row of course, that's where all the cool kids are. Kristina, Mear-yi-land girl (now known as Monica), Eva, and a few others who I will introduce later join me. We talk. What do you study? Medicine at Cambridge. Pre-veterinarian at Maryland. Medicine at Buffalo. Comm/Law at New South Wales. Cool. Up ahead, a guy with really short hair and a wide face starts speaking to us through the microphone. 'I'm Eric, your tour guide. Or you can call me panda, cause I look like one.' He does. 'Today, we are going to Stanley...'.
The bus winds around mountains and cliffs. We pass one of Jackie Chan's houses. It says 龍, with 'Jackie' slotted inside it on the stone walls that surround it. 'All the rich people in Hong Kong live here,' says Eric. Yup, that's them.
Bus stops. We get off, and step outside. It's bloody hot. Approximately 32 degrees celsius. Fantastic day to go sightseeing. Except there wasn't much to see. We wander around the Stanley shopping centre, I lose Kristina and Walter and find Eva. She's with her roomie, who seems to be a pretty quiet person. Doesn't say much.. Lugs around a huge camera. Says her name is Carrie.
We visit a small temple together. It allows no photography, but people do it anyway. Incense burns - I like that smell. A huge tiger pelt hangs from a wall, protected by a glass screen. We leave.
I fnd Kristina and Walter and the rest of our group. We check out the menus on display out the front of a few restaurants. Pricey, for Hong Kong at least. I complain about prices in Australia. Kristina complains about prices in the UK. I concede the argument.
Our little group finds some shade underneath a taupalin. Chat some more. Then, it's time to go.
We have lunch at Aberdeen in a nice restaurant. So nice, that I was surprised to find people passing their chopsticks around to one guy.
'What's he doing?'
'Cleaning the chopsticks.'
'Why?'
'Cause they gave us a bowl.' I note the huge bowl placed on our lazy-susan (chinese turn-table, for the ignorant).
A Malaysian girl next to me starts talking to me about tennis. Turns out she's been playing for about as long as I have. She must be good. If I ever get to Malaysia, I'll be sure to bring my racquet along.
After blocking a road getting entire group back on the bus, we head off to the Convention Centre. Lovely building, reminds me of the Opera House. Within its shadow stands the Golden Bauhinia Statue of Hong Kong. Apparently you haven't been to Hong Kong until you've been here. I tried, it was all up to Monica.
We then hit up a museum which more or less catalogued the entire history of Hong Kong, starting with the days of early man. Not much to talk about here, except that Li Lei, one of our mentors (older people who organise us), didn't seem to see eye to eye with our tour guide about some things in relation to Hong Kong - China relations. I was merely appalled at some of the possible flag ideas for Hong Kong. Unfortunately I forgot to take photos, but trust me, I am so glad that the Hong Kong flag is what it is today.
Next stop, Avenue of Stars. Beautiful view of Hong Kong as we walked alongside the harbour.
The Convention Centre can be seen. The Avenue of Stars is where the handprints of big Hong Kong stars are immortalised in concrete slabs that run along the avenue. It is a very touristy thing to compare handsizes with such celebrities. So we did it. I don't remember everyone that we saw, but I'm sure you'd recognise Jet Li (has VERY small hands. Henry might fit this print.), Jackie Chan (has HUGE hands. I fit his handprint. Proof when Kristina uploads her photos.), Andy Lau (don't remember how big his hands were), and Tony Leung (the little one).
Our first taste of 'structured free time' was to be had at Hong Kong's shopping district, Causeway Bay. To be fair, Hong Kong has a lot of shopping districts - this is the more retail oriented one. Called 'Being a Hong Kong citizen' (city name changed depending where we were), t his 'structured free time' allowed us to explore the city and have dinner while doing so. After realising we didn't have much time, we decided to go for an early dinner. But first, an incident. My Cantonese is atrocious. We decided to try some Hong Kong delicacies before dinner. Most people tried a type of pastry which looked like little eggs joined together. I thought I'd be adventurous and go for some fried squid.
'Ow yu', I asked the person serving me.
'Dai, sai?'
'Dai.' I thought I was going ok.
She starts cutting up bits of meat. What? She pulls out something that looks like a frilly meat. I'd seen it before. It was ox tripe (cow's stomach). Adds some radish to it. Throws some sauce on top. Puts it on the counter. Oh well. I dig in. I was meant to ask for 'Yow yu'. She thought I'd said 'Ow tou'. Luckily, I like ox tripe.
Victoria Peak was our final stop in Hong Kong. You can see the Hong Kong skyline at night from Victoria Peak, with a lightshow on at 8pm every night. It was a bit of a disappointment for me, because I had expected something awesome, having not seen it at night before. The Bank of China building didn't even illuminate itself during the lightshow. We took a few obligatory photos and left.
But the day was not yet over. Tomorrow, we would have our commissioning ceremony. A ceremony where we would be comissioned. We practised forming into lines. We practised taking a particular path around the auditorium. We practised smiling for the camera. We practised clapping for certain important guests. Was gonna be a long ceremony tomorrow.
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