Hong Kong

* Take the Star Ferry between Kowloon and Hong Kong Island to clearly see the mass of high rise buildings teetering on the shore.
* Explore the outlying islands of Macau, Lantau etc for a complete change of character.
* The carnival atmosphere of the Hong Kong Sevens

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Desperate to live within our meagre means, on a trial run 3-week holiday to Hong Kong, just before setting off round the world for a year, we chanced across the Café de Coral chain.

Enticing as a relatively cheap fast food outlet, we queued up on a busy working day at lunchtime noting the reassuring English translation together with the Chinese listing of the dishes available. Only when we got to the till did we discover that neither the staff nor our fellow diners spoke any English, as only by hand signals did we infer that the option with the least offal we wanted was not available. Further hand signals indicated we were being offered an alternative, although exactly what was left to our imagination.

Our relief on sitting down to discover we had a banana leaf parcel with nothing more daunting than steamed rice and chicken portions, quickly turned to how on earth you are supposed to eat a chicken drumstick with chopsticks. Only when I spotted a fellow diner greedily tucking into the same dish over my boyfriend’s shoulder was I able to report on progress and guide on eating; peel back banana leaf with chopsticks, shovel in rice with chopsticks, stab chicken with chopsticks, suck vigorously and spit out bones! How glad we were that the Chinese seem untroubled by ‘neat’ eating.

Undoubtedly Hong Kong’s number one tourist attraction, we queued in the relatively small weekday queue for the Peak Tram, and trekked our way right to the summit (rather than just to the Peak Galleria) to find it shrouded in cloud and drizzle with no views what so ever. Later we were advised, if you wake to a clear day drop your original plans for that day and make a beeline for the Peak, as a clear view is an unreliable occurrence. Thankfully, an interesting walk made up for the lack of views back down through the Botanical Gardens and Mid Levels to Causeway Bay.

Determined to experience some views from the Peak we returned a few days later, taking a double decker bus up the winding peak road like an uphill rollercoaster. At the Peak Galleria we were finally rewarded by sunset views over Hong Kong and Kowloon followed by a light show as the city began to light up for the night.

As we both love food and drink, and markets by association, Hong’s Central Market was high on our list. However, we found the market has none of the vibrancy and colour of fruit and veg markets. This market is essentially fish and meat, as the smell that surrounds the building like a buffer, infers.

We didn’t think we were squeamish, until we saw fish be sliced up live. Taking the desire for fresh produce a step further, the Hong Kong Chinese, apparently need to see the heart and lungs pumping to guarantee freshness, so the fishmongers carve fillets of the gasping fish. Even if this sight doesn’t turn your stomach, the smell eventually will.

Many expatriates in Hong Kong tried to discourage us from going to Macau, warning us about the triads, and saying it was dirty. As the triads are pre-occupied with gambling, we were unconcerned as we had no intention of gambling, in spite of this the main attraction of many Hong Kong Chinese. Only on our return from a long day exploring on foot on our first day did we learn from the news that the cacophony of police sirens was due to the drive-by gunning down of the gambling regulator in the street in the middle of the day. Only then did we begin to learn a little more about Macau’s triads, who only a month or so before had burst into a packed casino, spraying the hall with machine gun fire. I only wish our friends had been a little clearer when they had simply said ‘Watch out for the triads’.

Rather philosophically, we concluded the triads would probably lie low for a while giving us a ‘quiet’ few days to explore the island. Nothing was particularly astounding, just a fascinating and decaying jumble of Portuguese and Chinese influences. The Tourist Office provided us with a leaflet with several walking tours, providing a few goals to our meandering like the ruins of St Paul, A-Ma Temple, Luis Camoes Gardens, the fortress (from where we first heard the police sirens), and Lou Lim Loc Gardens.

We stayed in a fabulous corner double room with air con and en suite at the East Asia Hotel. The hotel appeared to house a fair number of young Asian prostitutes. Very smartly dressed young women hung around the main entrance both day and night. As a couple we were not bothered, although the service from the reception slowed up in the evening as the men were either engrossed in conversation, or handing out a constant stream of keys. For an experiment I rushed on ahead one evening. My bemused boyfriend followed me up to our room only a few minutes later. Several women had approached him, but seemed far more interested in his Celtic colouring, simply pinching the fair skin on his arms lightly as he walked by!

The dim sum breakfast in the hotel was a tasty experience. A constant stream of steaming trolleys was wheeled by us, in the café cum commercial kitchen of a dining room. With no common language, we simply beckoned for the trolley to stop, and gestured approvingly as the waitress opened the baskets one by one. If it looked interesting, a nod was enough to get the basket left at your table. We got loads of encouraging grins from other diners and tried to follow their lead, but with so many baskets it is a little hard to play copycat. Until we bit in we quite simply had no idea what each steaming parcel contained. Most were savoury, so the odd sweet sticky one always came as a sudden shock to the palate.

By sheer coincidence, despite both being keen rugby players, our trip to Hong Kong coincided with the Hong Kong Rugby Sevens.

Rugby does not have a strong following with the Hong Kong Chinese; however, the Hong Kong Sevens attracts one hell of a multinational crowd in an impressive purpose built stadium. Held over a weekend, the party atmosphere (particularly in the South Stand) is overwhelming and we too eventually succumbed to drinking the overpriced beer and dancing for 2½ days in the stands with Japanese, Fijians, Spaniards, Americans, French, Australians, Moroccans, New Zealanders, and nameless others.

Regardless of national allegiances, by far the loudest cheers were heard for the ‘local’ Asian teams; Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, China, Japan, and of course Hong Kong. The event may not rate highly with Chinese heritage and culture; however, it is a great multinational carnival, and a good opportunity to watch the less well known Asian teams score points against some of the great rugby nations, supported by their infectiously gleeful supporters.

Tickets prove easier to get the less well known teams playing, and apparently can be bought through Hong Kong & Shanghai Bank and large hotels. With England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, not playing when we were there, about half the stadium was empty.

Through English/German friends, we were talked into going for a couple of runs with the Hash House Harriers. A British tradition started in Malaysia, we met many expatriates of other nationalities including some of Cantonese ancestry.

There are many ‘hash houses’ that welcome new and even ‘once off’ runners. We ran twice with ‘Little Sai Wan’ whose runs took place after work on Wednesdays and could be anywhere in the greater Hong Kong area. One run was in the hills above Kowloon providing great views across to Hong Kong Island, and with the other in the streets around Causeway Bay much to bewilderment of the early evening pedestrians.

Runs are marked in chalk or flour by a ‘hare’ earlier in the day. Serious runners run ahead finding the trail, which can include lengthy false trails. The lead runners shout back to the ‘dawdlers’ keeping them on the right and, therefore, quicker trail.

The runs usually followed up with a cheap meal and a few good humoured drinking fines for being new, being quick, being slow, and so on so as to include everyone.

Aberdeen Harbour seems to be one of the places that all tourists know about and head off to if at all possible, to see the hordes of junks and their daily life.

We duly set off on a rather grey day, to fairly quickly find ourselves in a small harbour dominated by residential skyscrapers, with only a few junks, many of which had been dressed up to give tours of the harbour.

After the initial sight of the harbour and its few junks we found there little to do. We walked up and down the concrete promenade, which appeared to be in the process of being gentrified. Nor could we see the much-talked about floating restaurants, which turned out to be in a neighbouring inlet. In all we probably spent under an hour in Aberdeen.

One of the overriding memories of Hong Kong for me is the antique smoky red temples tucked around the base of the city's glistening skyscrapers.

One of my favourite temples, possibly because it was the first we saw, was Man Mo Temple. Despite apparently being a top tourist attraction, we found it all but deserted by tourists when we visited, allowing us to take in the atmosphere and unobtrusively watch daily worship.

A small, ornately bat-winged building guarded by cauldrons and dog/lions, inside it seemed even smaller with a maze of shrines, burning incense. A deep red, made darker with years of incense burning, small windows, and jam-packed with religious imagery. Spiral incense sticks, like giant mosquito coils, seem to be a feature of this and all Cantonese temples. With so many burning, hanging from the ceiling, the building seemed like a smokehouse, with traces lingering in our clothing for hours later.

Having enjoyed our trip to Lantau so much, we decided to venture out to another of the outlying islands for a day trip to do some walking.

We took the ferry from Central to Yung Shue Wan in the north-west of the island. The township has Hong Kong’s largest hippy community, and while I’m used to seeing European hippies, Chinese hippies were a slightly more unusual sight. From Yung Shue Wan the path was well marked and we walked south along a paved trail, first to Shing Ye Beach (unfortunately with a clear view of the nearby power station). From the beach the path then climbed to the island’s relative high point, with a thoughtfully provided Chinese style sun shelter, particularly given the lack of trees on the island. On an only mildly hazy day we had great views from the ridge across to Lantau Island in one direction and back to Hong Kong Island in the other.

After only around an hour’s walking we ended up in Sok Kwu Wan, with another ferry running back to Central. Starting our walk in the morning, this was a planned end point as Sok Kwu Wan has a reputation for good seafood. After a less than stressful walk we ended up on an airy stilted veranda looking out over the bay of fish farms, eating chilli squid and garlic prawns fresh from the tank before catching the ferry back for a night in Hong Kong.

Encouraged to visit Hong Kong’s outlying islands for a change of pace, we opted for Lantau Island with seemingly more to see and do that some of the other islands.

With an early morning ferry departure, it was rewarding to be heading out of the city as hordes streamed into work. Arriving on the island, the concern over finding the right bus was immediately solved by the bus being marked in both Chinese and English. The brief bus journey found us weaving around gentle hills in a sea fog, only to have the gilded, world’s tallest, Buddha of Po Lin (Precious Lotus) Monastery appear out of the fog like a celestial vision.

‘Doing’ the statue and monastery took us very little time at all. In fact all that delayed us was stopping of for the vegetarian lunch at the monastery that was quite simply fabulous. On communal tables we were presented first with a large tureen of a very Chinese soup, a fascinating selection of what appeared to be wild mushroom, tree fungus cooked in variety of different ways. The only disconcerting dish was some jelly like green stuff. Even though safe in the knowledge it was vegetable not animal, we tried hard not to think what log it might have been scraped off as we ate it.

Wanting a night ‘away from it all’, we spent the night in the YHA’s SG Davis Youth Hostel, close to Po Lin Monastery. Whilst the hostel itself was rather spartan, it is in a great location close to the 70km Lantau Trail around the island. Thankfully we rang up in advance to book, to find that the hostel opens and closes at the whim of the resident manager. When he wants a day off the island it's closed! When we visited, the hostel was closed between 10am and 4pm, so we needed to catch an early morning from Central, and then cart around our bags with us on the day we left. The final surprise was having to do chores (sweeping the yard, rooms, & kitchen) before we left. Until then I had thought chores in YHA hostels were a thing of the past, although with hindsight maybe a little humility particularly in a hostel frequented by Buddhist monks is no bad thing.