Thanks Hong Kong :D ! Part 5

And so we come to the last section of our five-part Hong Kong miniseries. It's been great having you along for the ride but please put your seats in the upright position and restore your tray tables. And since planes seem to keep on flying another half an hour after these useless announcements, I'm just going to keep on writing.

On our second to last day Elliot went to to explore one of the islands near Hong Kong. He'd wanted to rent a bike and ride around and had planned on it since way before the trip so I said he should just go for it. Since I felt like hell, and not on high heels like the subject of the eponymous Motley Crue song, I decided it was time for more relaxation. I went off to find out exactly what foot reflexology entailed. According to Wikipedia, reflexology is an alternative medicine, complementary, or integrated method of treatment involving the physical act of applying pressure to the feet and hand with specific thumb, finger and hand techniques without the use of oil or lotion. It is based on what reflexologists claim to be a system of zones and reflex areas that they say reflect an image of the body on the feet and hands, with the premise that such work effects a physical change to the body. There were signs ALL OVER the city for it. Complete with neon-lit images of blinking feet. Now, I hate feet. I think they're gross and yucky and just bleh. But, I was willing to push aside my feet prejudices in the name research. Maybe by rubbing a certain area of my foot they could make me not quite so congested. And I really wanted a massage. Maybe one that didn't leave marks.

Our hotel was connected to a bigger one, it was like the satellite branch except they were right next to each other. Good job Hong Kong. So I went to their spa. It was on the bottom floor and made up of a series of rooms connected by short passageways. It was like a very dimly lit labyrinth where people went to get pampered and didn't come back alive. I said I wanted foot reflexology, a massage, and a manicure. I'm a girl, deal with it. They led me to a one person couch that was so comfy. Beaded curtains separated the hallway into partitions that each had a couch. They made makeshift rooms and each "room," had a couch, a table and small TV mounted on the wall. They gave me some tea and then I soaked my feet in warm water. The lady in charge of my treatments asked if I wanted the TV on and I said sure. They gave me little earphones, set the channel to National Geographic where a show about India was starting, then had me lean back and prop my feet up on a footstool.

And then I saw the DO NOT SCREAM sign. I'm not kidding. There was a sign fixed right across from me that read exactly that. Good grief, what did I get myself into?

Bliss. I got myself into bliss. Oh good God, it felt good. I mean, I don't know how "healed" I was, but it definitely felt nice. She rubbed my ankles and massaged my calves (who has knots in their calves? Me, apparently) and just applied the best amount of pressure to ease up my poor little feets. Plus, the show about India was really good. I learned all about cow wranglers. And then came a show about the tallest building in the world, Taipei 101, and I learned all about it. It has a special window-washing system made personally for it.

The reflexology took about an hour after which they graciously asked me if I need to use the bathroom (I did. I drank a lot of green tea) and then led me to the massage chamber where I changed into the same kimono top and shirts the other place had. And then I had the most miserable massage experience of my life. I'm not a hypochondriac or a fussy person. When I'm sick, and I say I'm sick, I am honestly sick. So when I had to lie on my stomach with my head propped on the padded toilet seat thing they have on massage tables for your face, all my mucus drained to the front of my head. I couldn't breathe, I couldn't sniffle without making a lot of noise and I could feel everything dripping. I couldn't even enjoy the massage because I was too busy silently willing my sinuses to cooperate. They didn't. At one point, I had a droplet splash down through the face hole of the massage table onto the ground. I felt so sorry for the poor Chinese lady having to touch the diseased white girl. But bless her she finally gave me tissues and had me rest my head on the side. That didn't work. I got a coughing attack and kept jerking around as she was trying to rub. Finally, she had me on my back and even tried to rub my sinuses but nope, I just felt too gross and too miserable. Thankfully it was over soon but I couldn't even hang my head and make my escape. I had my damn manicure. I was led back to my armchair (DO NOT SCREAM) and it was a different girl and I had the stupid glitter OPI nail polish that took about half an hour for her to remove. Then she basically scythed my cuticles with one blade of the nail scissors as I watched horrified. She left me there, after she was done applying whatever weird chemical-y nail polish she put on me, so my nails could dry but I just paid up and made my escape. It smudged. Thanks Hong Kong :D !

Elliot got back a little after I did and he was sun-burnt and a little let-down, as per Hong Kong usual. There were no bikes but he did get a lot of pictures. We hung out for a little while, got free coffee at the hotel's terrace cafe and then decided to give Indian food anther try. We found a place on the 6th floor of a building in Wan Chai and had a pretty decent meal. Much better than the Indian bazaar where I'm pretty sure I watched a woman agree to certain "services," for a creepy Indian man. I'm not just making this up either. Elliot missed the whole thing but I watched the man come in, talk to the woman (who I think was Malaysian. Definitely not Indian or Chinese), smile as she nodded, leave as she told him to go wait outside because she had food coming, and then come back in and inquire several times as to what was keeping her food to the girl working. When the woman got her food, he escorted her out. Something fishy definitely went on. After dinner we finally made it up to the Peak. It was so dark and the city was so beautifully lit, it was truly a spectacular view. Everyone should see it at some point in their lives. Of course, there was a lame couple making out like they'd never seen tongues before. We yelled, "EWWWW," at them. We are very mature.

It was with a hacking cough and more rib pain that I woke up on our last day. Elliot kept trying to convince me that we needed a doctor but I waved him off. We had presents to buy and bird markets to see. Though, I did get a little apprehensive about going to a Chinese bird market while sick. I mean, I joked about SARS and the bird flu but... we were in China and I had been growing steadily worse for the last ten days. I drank my weight in liquids though and off we went.

Hong Kong has a lot of markets. They have the fruit and vegetable markets set up on the streets during the day on Queen's Road where Elliot and I bought delicious crisp apples and sweet bananas. They have the night markets in Mong kok, the most crowded place on Earth, where they sell everything from vibrators to paintbrush sets to Super Mario figurines (we got them for our friends). They also have the two animal markets where, for once, you don't actually eat the animals. These are the bird market (or gardens as they were called) and the goldfish market. We went to the bird market first. It was this little area that had all sorts of birds in pretty wooden cages. There were African grey parrots I made Elliot take pictures of for my cousin who has one so she can see Gypsy's (that's his name. He's 19) Chinese cousins, and so many little budgies and parakeets. I think I saw some myna birds as well as blue and yellow Macaus, my favorite kind of parrots. It was a little uncomfortable seeing so many birds crammed into the cages though. Elliot is kind of a bleeding heart when it comes to animals, more so than I am, so we didn't really linger.

The goldfish market was amazing. I admit, I was kind of ambivalent about it because let's face it, goldfish are kind of boring. My family has had one goldfish or another in the house since I was a child and they just don't really excite me. Not like turtles, haha. But the market was not so much as a market as one street with all the shops next to each other and they all had rows and rows of plastic bags filled with water and fish on display right outside. Beyond just goldfish there were several other kinds of fish for sale too, including some really weird spotted ones. Of course, there were turtles too. I could've stayed and stared at everything for hours. We saw a little case of bright yellow frogs just swimming about like froggies do. This street also had pet shops and of course, I had to look at them. Elliot's stomach turned at all the kittens and dogs and bunnies on display, and I tried to make him feel better in between squealing. They wouldn't stock so many (and put them all together, like 7 kittens in one small enclosure) if there wasn't such a high demand, right? They probably sell them fast. But then I got distracted by a window filled with bunnies and stood there cooing. As we walked by apparently there was a giant bucket of guts right next door. I'm glad I didn't see it. Though it was odd that there were so many seafood restaurants next to the pet stores. I assured Elliot that the giant store with the big pawprint on the sign was probably just another pet store not a restaurant... thanks Hong Kong :D !

We'd finally managed to get in contact with Nikki and she asked if we were free that night. We were going to go to Jumbo, the famous restaurant that had a version in Boston, because it was our last chance to that night. But, we decided we could fit her in too so we used the free Internet at a Pacific Coffee Company (sort of like a Starbucks) to send her a message asking her to meet us at 8 p.m. by the clock tower in the Kowloon harbor. We went to lunch back on the Hong Kong side at this small, Chinese (doi big surprise) restaurant. A guy sitting next to us told us to get the set menus because they were cheaper and really good and told the waiter to give us the menus. The waiter got all fussy but did it and we ended up eating some of the best food on the whole trip. Noodles in clear, spicy broth and crispy pork in a honey glaze with fresh, crunchy cucumbers in garlic. Yeah, it was delicious. We spent the rest of the afternoon getting gifts including personalized stamps for each of our dads. We had to give the man an hour to make them so we made a plan. We'd go over to the Kowloon side for Elliot's final fitting and to give them the hotel address to deliver the suits (and free beer!), then come back and get the stamps, then make our way to the bus station to go and finally see Jumbo, then either take a cab or the bus back to Kowloon to meet Nikki, even though she hadn't responded back to us yet.

Elliot's suits were great and the tiny store was filled with energetic Indian men, all friendly and personable and measuring various customers. The stamps were made; my dad's with a carved horse on top (he loves horsies) and Elliot's dad's with a pig as he was born in the year of, and so we trudged back to the bus station. We'd had trouble finding the right bus earlier in the week but luckily, it was right there so we hopped on for a merciful half hour of sitting down. I was next to this kid playing, according to Elliot, God of War and he was not doing so well, also according to Elliot who was watching from behind us.

When we got to our stop it was right by the water. A few steps and we could see out towards some lights just floating in the middle. Jumbo. So we walked. We walked for half an hour and ended up at some car service district with no sign of water anywhere. Where the hell was it?! How do you get to the damn restaurant!? Finally, we gave up and went to pee at some food court we found. Needless to say, we were danm exhausted and we were pretty far from where we had to be so we found a bus stop rather than a cab and decided to just take it to the pretty much the end of the line. The bus rolled down the street in the opposite direction of where we'd been walking and it drove right past a giant sign, JUMBO. It had steps and a pier right to it. We'd gone the wrong way. At least we got a glimpse of it on the way back? We just didn't have time to get back out and go see it, we were already a little late.

We were at the clock tower a little past 8:30 but there was no sign of Nikki. You can kind of imagine how tired we were at that point (the market trips had been the same day) and we waited for almost and two hours but no sign of Nikki. We took turns getting hot coffee at the 711 or checking the internet and the heavy wind did not help my developing headache. We'd had a long day and at that point I hadn't eaten since lunch, nine hours earlier. After giving up on Nikki we got back on the ferry and crossed over to Hong Kong. I had a raging headache by this time and I just thought food was what I needed. We walked around trying in vain to find a roast pork place (or suckling pig. Elliot found out the name of what he wanted so we ended up walking into places, asking if they had it, and then turning around and walking swifly back out when they said no. We asked maybe 7 places. Note: this is a food Hong Kong is famous for) and after while, fed up, we ended up at the same building the Indian restaurant had been in. We picked a random floor and walked in to a restaurant. I think it was Taiwanese food. It was odd and I felt like throwing up because my headache was so bad. Elliot was getting increasingly worried, especially when I went to retch in the bathroom. No vomit though. Finally, I said I was just going to leave and grab a cab back but my darling boyfriend abandoned his meal, paid up, and led me out.

Back in the noise and mess and chaos of people we were. I had enough. I was just done with Hong Kong. A passing double-decker bus had an ad all over it for Turkish Airlines and Istanbul. Thanks universe. Your timing, as always, is super. I almost started crying, I wanted to go home so badly. This was of course, before my exchange with Cengiz Bey so Turkish Airlines was a sign of comfort not extreme hatred (haha their catchphrase is, "Globally yours." My dad cracked that it was, "Globally up yours." Amen sir!). We walked out on the street, stopping only so Elliot could get pork jerky from a corner store, and went to track down a cab. Our hotel wasn't too far away, but far enough distance walking so we had some trouble finding a cab but thank God one stopped. He dropped us off, Elliot begged me to eat something, I told him to get out as I did not want him to deal with me vomiting, he did, at which point I went to the bathroom and actually did start crying. This did not help my pounding head. And still no throwing up. That usually makes me feel better but I wasn't about to force myself. I'm pretty sure I burst some blood vessels from heaving anyway.

Elliot came back after a while with some yogurt but I had taken some Tylenol PM at that point (it knocks me out so I didn't want to take any earlier and I didn't have regular Tylenol with me) and was curled up in the bed. I've had migraines before but usually they're like once every six months or so. In Hong Kong I got two within three days of each oher. The Tylenol helped a little and I finally drifted off to sleep to the dulcet tones of CSI, my new friend.

The next morning I felt fine (well, still mucus-y and cough-y and gross but at least my brain didn't feel like it was about to come out of my skull) and it was kind of sad how happy Elliot and I were to be going home. We were almost giddy. We took a cab to the airport express terminal, got to check in our bags there (it's a subway station for just the airport in the city. You can check in and leave your luggage and it'll get to where it's going, no problem. Jesus, Hong Kong. You are so amazing at some stuff and so ass-backwards about others. It blows my mind), and then peacefully rode the subway to the airport. We got our last buns (pork for Elliot, cheese and mushroom and I think some pork too as I doubt they have anything without pork there. Yep, I was a bad Muslim this vacation) and I bought the sequel to the, "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo," as I'd finished the first one and we boarded Continental bound for that magical, glorious land; NEWARK.

Now, we were spoiled by Cathay Pacific so we didn't have high hopes for our Continental plane. Boy, were we wrong. Every seat had a TV with probably hundreds of movies and a fair amount of TV shows. They had Dexter! They gave us food and snacks and even though I was in the middle seat, I was quite comfortable the fifteen hours back. I watched Desperately Seeking Susan because it was a comfort movie with my Madonna in it and I realized I'd never seen it all the way. It's not very good. The problem is, it has a decent plot and the writer(s) gave reasons and alibis and explanations for everything so that it would be plausible. But, they got so caught up with making sure everything made sense that the actual story and movie fell by the wayside. It was kind of boring but fun. Madonna was amazing though, just because she's so cool. I mean, acting is so so but she's just so cool! My darling muse was there right when I needed her. Oh, and her outfits? MAN. She had a pair of sequinned boots I would very happily sell my cat for. No, I LIED. NEVER. Not my Egglet. Oh I just got a heartache-y pang. I have to go hug her right now. No, not my cat. My sister maybe. I love you Mina. Rosanna Arquette talks and looks like Sarah Michelle Gellar, by the way. It was really odd. I think that might be way I like her. I always wondered why and assumed because she kept appearing in mvoies with my loves, Madonna and David Bowie (The Linguini Incident, one of my favorites), but it might very well be because I love SMG and Rosanna and she do have a fair bit in common. She's in Desperately Seeking Susan too, I didn't just randomly start talking about the best Arquette.

It wasn't until we reached Newark that I saw I had a message from Nikki. She slept through everything. Oh Nikki. Good job :D

We got home and were immediately greeted by an ecstatic Egg. She spent the rest of the afternoon and night going from my arms to Elliot's and slept curled up close to us all night. It was good to be home.

I wouldn't say it was a bad vacation but I also wouldn't say it was the best. China is not for the weak. Especially those with a crappy immune system (my cough went away a day after I got back home but I remained congested for another week). But, I guess I'm still pretty happy I got to go and see it. It was an experience and well, maybe next time it'll be for 3 days rather than ten. THANKS HONG KONG :D !

Goldfish market



Bird gardens.




Hong Kong from the Peak at night.



Us. Where will we end up next? My vote is for Australia.

Thanks Hong Kong :D ! Part 4

All right, I got my German bowel-movement tea (don't ask) and my King Diamond DVD waiting for me so I'm ready to finish this sum bitch up. Bring it on Hong Kong.

:D

I have no idea where we left off so we're just going to start off with the nice Korean dinner we had one night. There was a huge sign outside the place that read, "WE SPEAK ENGLISH," which seemed kind of odd but we went in. Yes, they did speak English. Very well. It kind of weirded us out. I don't know why but hearing an older Chinese (Korean? Wait I don't remember if it was run by Chinese or Koreans) spit out rapid-fire, amazing, English and then throw in some slang was just odd. But the food was so delicious. We weren't hungry enough for Korean barbecue (except I kind of was but I didn't want to bully Elliot into eating sizzling meat, hur hur that's what she said) so I got my stand-by Jap Che noodles and Elliot got... something. They were like tubes of noodles with veggies. Both very good.

The next day, we decided to go see the big, giant Buddha. Now, I was kind of excited about seeing the big, giant Buddha. It's a big, giant Buddha for crying out loud! All peaceful and big and giant. Who doesn't want to see a big, giant Buddha? Pish tosh. Oh, and to get to big Buddha you have to ride up by cable car.

!!!

I love cable cars. They were my favorite part of the skiing vacations my family used to go on. Besides the tost (grilled cheese) and tea/hot chocolate we'd have in the little restaurant at the bottom of one the slopes. And the game room with the pinball machine. Not to mention the foosball machine. Back in the days when I used to be good at it. Grr. Okay, I liked all the supplementary stuff to skiing. Skiing itself is kind of a take or leave. Since we haven't been in years it's more of a leave. But anyway, cable cars = good, creaky fun high above land!

Yeah the cars went rather slowly and swayed quite a bit and they had gaps where freezing wind snaked in and made me feel like we were in a rusty deathtrap but we lived. We went up a pretty long way but it was so cool seeing the big, giant Buddha slowly come into view. It lay just beyond one of the highest hills and even though it was a hazy day, it looked so majestic. And that was about the only impressive thing about it. The place was like a bizarre theme park. China Presents : Buddhism! There was a Starbucks, a Subway and various other fast food places and fake snow and Christmas music piping out of everywhere (you could get your picture taken with Santa!) and cheap, touristy crap. They also had an animated feature starring monkeys named Doofus and Clever. It was the most underwhelmed I've ever felt at an international landmark. The Buddha itself was all right. I'm actually surprised it wasn't plastic seeing as how commercial the entire place was. But it was big and we could climb the 300-odd, yup OCD me counted, steps up to it's base. Of course, I was excited because I didn't do my research and thought it was a historic place. It's barely 15 years old. The spiritual, mystic monastery right next to it? Still under construction.

I had fun laughing about it with my equally disgusted boyfriend. It became a running joke, "So help me God, I'll take you back to Ngong Ping!" That was the name of the place. But the most magnificent thing happened on our way back. We passed this couple, we can only assume a husband and wife, and the man looked like he was ready to kill himself (or more likely, her), he just looked like the most brow-beaten man ever. His wife was this rather large lady and all we heard her say, for about a full minute was, "MungmungmungmungMUNGMUNGMUNGmungMUNGmung." She said it maybe 15 times and she had no teeth and I sincerely hope she wasn't having some sort of stroke because oh how we laughed. I mean, we walked away really fast before we cracked up, but still. Hilarious. I guess you had to be there.

Then we got stuck in the cable car, suspended above water, with a Korean family for about half an hour. We assume someone threw up even though the announcement said there was just, "routine maintenance." Suuuuure. We did get a nice view of the sewage treatment informational facilities though. And the airport. Yes, the view was a little lackluster.

My Elliot and I don't really fight that often, and we usually resolve it in minutes, but we did have kind of a tiff in Hong Kong. He kept saying I looked miserable and I kept trying to tell him I was fine. Dumbest argument ever. I mean yeah, I was sick the entire time so I probably did look terrible but I don't ever really exclaim like a crazed banshee when I'm having the time of my life either. I absolutely hate it when he thinks I'm having a bad time and feels guilty about it because come on, I'm not a child. If I'm not enjoying myself I'll excuse myself and go do something else. Hell, I've done it with my other friends. Some nights I just don't want to laugh at fat hipsters at our bar. I'll bid them all have fun and hang out by myself at home or whatever. I was getting mad at him for being overly concerned and he was getting mad at me for not making any plans to see places and I guess it was secretly that we were both kind of disappointed with Hong Kong and taking it out on each other. I guess we assumed it would be like Japan where we had a blast but eh. But we cleared that up pretty fast. And then spent the rest of the time taking Hong Kong with a grain of salt. Thanks Hong Kong :D

Hong Kong is known for it's tailors and Elliot wanted to get a suit made so he found one of the more famous places, Samm's, where his dad and grandfather had also gotten suits and went in for a fitting. They had a pretty great marketing scheme for customers; offer them beer. It's Hong Kong, nobody cares about anything! So after every fitting (there were 3) Elliot would just walk back out into the city, carrying his open, and free, beer. He got two suits made there and they're excellent. One is a deep charcoal color with bright orange lining and the other is dark, dark navy with subtle pinstripes and a royal blue paisley lining. Yeah, my boyfriend has Iranian taste in his clothes. Loud and paisley. Thanks Hong Kong :D !

On one of these days we also ventured back to the Walk of Fame and took pictures of all the stars' names we recognized, both for our friends and for ourselves. We found Jackie Chan and Michelle Yeoh and Chow Yun Fat among others. I also took a picture of Elliot with the Bruce Lee statue. There were a bunch of school kids prowling around the area too, and they were conducting surveys for class. We got stopped a couple times each and asked questions. One girl who interviewed me also took my picture. I assume it shall become a Chinese internet meme soon. The questions were mostly about Hong Kong and the food in Hong Kong. They were short and kind of fun, actually.

We still hadn't heard from our friend Nikki so we went on making plans by ourselves. The next morning, after getting a breakfast of French toast at this little place run by a sweet old Chinese man, we rode one of the subway lines all the way to the end, outside the city, to try and find a certain monastery. There were signs pointing uphill and I was still a cauldron of boiling mucus (yep delightful, I know. I woke up every morning hacking and coughing and spitting out chunks of green phlegm. I am the most attractive girl in the world) and walking was cause for a weird stabbing pain in my ribs (I seriously was falling apart for ten days. When did I become such a weakling? Need to start hitting the gym again, I guess) so I asked if we could take a cab up. The guidebooks even recommended we do that. But the one cab that stopped was kind of a jerk and it just turned Elliot off of the whole deal so we decided to go find something else. We got on another train and followed a path to a secluded little garden. Elliot had looked up locations from Bruce Lee movies he'd wanted to visit and this was one of them. It was so quiet and so pretty; lots of big trees and small pools filled with giant carp and turtles again. Yay, turtles. There were archways and a couple buildings that we weren't allowed in but we could see inside and they had just rows and rows of pictures of people and incense burned everywhere.

There were big cauldron-like things set up everywhere and what looked like incinerators. Oh. It took us a while before we realized it was a type of crematorium center and those little flakes floating everywhere weren't leaves or blossoms, they were ashes. Human ashes. Thanks Hong Kong :D !

It was still pretty cool though and we got back to the city in time for lunch. This is where we gambled with our lives and picked a random place off the street to eat. Elliot and I both ordered our food, and milk tea which everyone around us was drinking and it looked really good, and waited in trepidation. There was an Istanbul Kebap branch right across from us so that was our back-up plan in case we were served something particularly inedible. That day I learned that lo mein in China is THE SAME AS IN AMERICA. It kind of blew my mind because I thought that was an Americanized dish. But nope, totally had noodles with sprouts and meat served to me. But I don't know what kind of meat. I'd like to think pork. Let's say it was pork.

Oh who am I kidding, it was probably horse.

Elliot had a dish of beef and rice and we both ate quite well. Our tea was also delicious, and let's just try not to think about how the the glasses probably hadn't been washed since they were first delivered to the restaurant. Everyone on the street was watching us eat too. There was a group of Indian men just staring. When my food came, a man walking by looked down, looked back at me, gave me big smile of approval and walked on. I guess I passed some sort of test?

That night we went to our stand-by of Japanese. How sad is it that we had to have Japanese as our stand-by? Poor Elliot. All he wanted was roast pig and we couldn't find one place. Hong Kong really let us down in terms of food. We went to this Indian arcade type place that was all stuff from India and we had lunch there and although I enjoyed the music videos (all of whom I recognized and could name the stars in them and the movies they were from) the food was kind of bad. I guess I'm a meat snob because the cuts of chicken there were terrible and the rice was not at all good. I also really wanted to try the crab with chili, a Hong Kong trademark, but I knew it would just come served as is; this giant crab staring at me from the plate and I would stare at it and it would stare back and I'd have no idea how to eat it and it would just be an ordeal. Next time I guess. Or we'll go to San Francisco and try there. We did find a restaurant that Anthony Bourdain went to, though. His picture was splashed across the door. Anyway, Japanese was good and I decided it was finally time to have my Tsing Tao. Yes, I ordered Chinese beer at the Japanese restaurant. It came in a bottle the size of a large, wine bottle. Elliot didn't have more than a couple sips, his tailor had supplied him wit enough earlier, so I drank most of it. I was feeling no pain by the time I got up from that table.

Wan Chai is simply the best place to walk around when you're buzzed. I wasn't drunk or tipsy but I was at that nice point where you really can't work yourself up about anything but you've still got your wits about you. It was a nice state to be in as we walked around the hooker and "dance" club section of the city. And by dance I don't mean dance. It's unfortunate though, every time one of the "dance" ladies called out to us, it just broke any spell her looks may have sought to cast. Yeah, the language of love, nay seduction, it is not. Then we rode the double-decker tram back to the hotel. I got a nice hot Nescafe from the 711. I really enjoyed the trams and the cans of Nescafe drinks, hot or cold.

Thus ended another night in Hong Kong. We still hadn't trekked out to the metal bar a MetalSucks reader had sent me a message about, or to the "old" Jumbo, but hey, I had my beer. Still prefer Kirin. But thanks Hong Kong :D !

Up with the cable cars.


The big, giant Buddha


The animated monkeys. You may wonder why one's head is up the others' ass. I wonder too.


Jackie Chan!


Elliot and Bruce Lee.


Peaceful crematorium garden.


Where we assume they dump the bodies.


The tram during the day.


On the the tram, empty street at night.



Warnings on a bus. Hee, boobies.

Thanks Hong Kong :D ! Part 2

Okay, I have notes from our trip because I'm lame and always take notes wherever I am in case it can make good writing later (I told you I'm lame) but some of the days kind of blur into one another. I'm gonna do my best to remember each day as accurately as possible but I may mix up certain meals and events because we did a lot in ten days and well, I was out of my mind tired with jet-lag and diseased more than half the time.

Where did I leave off? Oh yes, breakfast. After breakfast I went to lay down a but because I was still kind of sickly and early enough in the day that I didn't feel the need to start conquering China like my Energizer bunny boyfriend. Apparently on his lone exploration he stumbled on a music video shoot for a pretty big star. The back-up dancers were wearing shiny big pants and there was a pink Chinese dragon.

We met up for lunch and ventured around the hotel. The Luxe Manor is right off of Nathan Road, a sort of Newbury St./Istiklal Caddesi for the Kowloon side, so right out the door we were smacked with food stalls, stores, massage places, and Indian men hell-bent on selling us, "Copy watches sir? Copy purses madam?" They didn't even bother pretending their articles were genuine! Throughout the next ten days, Elliot would get approached more often than I did, weirdly enough, because along with fake watches and bags, they were hawking tailor services. "Tailor suit sir?" This question was often delivered in a low, machine-gun fire rhythm that had us staring uncomprehendingly at them for a second before realizing that no, we did not want a suit. After a while we started snickering to ourselves because the thought of toying with them was kind of irresistible. Like, seriously what would they have done had we stopped dead in our tracks, opened our mouths wide and just went, "REALLY?! YOU HAVE COPY WATCHES?! WHY, SHOW ME, MY GOOD MAN, SHOW ME!," What would they do? And on a related note, have they really attracted anyone with that sales pitch? Hong Kong is so cheap, you can get the original at probably a very reasonable price. And people do judging by the mansion-like Louis Vuitton, Prada, Coach, and various other stores on every block. I'm not exaggerating. Hong Kong is the city of labels. Every woman, and I mean every, single woman and most men had the LV monogrammed bag and each store was at least two stories tall or more. Not to mention, the giant malls everywhere. I kind of regret not going into to one to compare prices actually because again, Hong Kong is cheap. I will refer back to this several times.

Anyway, we found a nice little restaurant not far from our hotel, though not on our street. I don't know why but I guess the street we stayed on was wedding dress central. Every other store was a bridal shop. And some of the dresses, whoooo-eeeee. I wouldn't be caught dead in them as a joke on Halloween. The first place we chose to eat at in Hong Kong, the center of quality Asian cuisine, was a Japanese place. Another thing that will get reiterated a lot; the comparison between China/Hong Kong and Japan and the fact that we ended up at Japanese places more often than you'd think in a world food capital. I guess we couldn't quite shake off our first big vacation together. Elliot had some udon in black sesame broth and I had my trusty katsu with curry and rice. We decided to head back to the hotel for a quick nap (Elliot still hadn't slept unless you count the couple hours on the plane and I was still sickly feeling and hadn't gotten any more rest that morning. I accidentally spent it watching The Powerpuff Girls on Cartoon Network Asia. I don't know what it is about travel but it always makes me watch cartoons. My sister too, every time we've been in India we've ended up falling asleep to Dexter's Laboratory and various other kids shows). It was around 2 pm by this time so we set the alarm for 5 and curled up like cats.

We didn't wake up until 4 am the next morning.

Sure, we set an alarm but after hitting snooze several times, and after convincing a zombie Elliot that no, we would not be missing out on anything by sleeping because if we wandered around like sleepwalkers that'd hardly be "experiencing" Hong Kong either. So we turned off the alarm and slept for 14 hours. I woke up a few times drenched in sweat which I took to be a good sign that my fever had broken (yep, had been chilled/hot this entire time) so by the time we were up, I felt much better. Elliot decided to go take pictures of the city waking up and I stayed in the room and finished The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. It was a bit long-winded and I didn't get completely sucked in until well over 200 pages but the ending was infuriating which is why I am now reading the second book, The Girl Who Played With Fire. I like the main character and she reminds me of me sometimes. You know, besides the psychotic passive-aggressive sociopathic tendencies.

It's was a short walk from the hotel to the bay and ferries that cross back and forth between Hong Kong and Kowloon. Though we were in Hong Kong technically, we were staying on the Kowloon side, just to clarify to avoid confusion. It's like Boston and Cambridge or Istanbul with it's Asian and European sides. Along the way was the Walk of Fame with various Hong Kong stars' names and handprints on the ground as well as a huge statue of Bruce Lee. Elliot had explored there in the morning but I didn't go until later on in the trip, just caught glances as we walked by it. The ferry across to Hong Kong from Kowloon was about 30 cents and we used it often. My first time we did it early in the morning and the view was kind of awe-inspiring. Hong Kong looks like a very modern, very alien settlement with a very geometric and tall skyline. It towered over us in the daylight but it was beautiful at night when we were crossing back and all the lights were on. Except for the tacky season's greetings signs plastered and lit up all over the buildings. Seriously, I don't think I've heard, "Santa Claus is Coming to Town," as often as I did it there. Christmas music was blaring everywhere. From the underground subway stations to the malls to the random crappy little restaurants on the streets. You have not lived until you've listened to, "Feliz Navidad," surrounded by screaming Chinese women. That's another thing. People never had normal conversations there. Because of the language, everyone just sounded like they were yelling at each other all the time. It was not a place for quiet reflection.

We made our way up to the Peak, one of the highest points in Hong Kong by way of a tram. We headed up the hill on the steepest incline. We were sitting down but it felt like we were about to flip over and go sliding back down to the bottom. There was also a Madame Tussaud's at the Peak and we took a couple pictures of the Bruce Lee figure for Elliot who is a huge a fan. At the top we had a beautiful view of the city and Kowloon too and we had delicious drinks of milk tea with coffee before heading back down where we wandered, quite by chance, into the Botanical Gardens and Zoo. There were all these gorgeous orchids and I saw a Venus Fly-Trap in real life! As well as a, um, raccoon. You see, I love raccoons (thank you childhood viewings of Pocahontas) and I've never seen them except in movies and they had one in a cage at the zoo. It was so fat it looked like it was wearing pants. I loved it. There were also several swinging monkeys, chimps, a bunch of turtles and giant tortoises, and many, many birds. I saw a crane for the first time too. I've never really cared for cranes and barely paid attention to them in artwork such as Japanese, but they were so big, and so elegant I couldn't take my eyes off them.

As we wandered back down the hill (the gardens and zoo were at the base of the Peak but still uphill) we followed our ears to some music. We came across a marching band celebrating... something. I'll have to ask Elliot what it was for but they were amazing. At one point we both realized we knew what they were playing. The band was dancing and waving their trumpets and trombones in unison while they played Lady Gaga. Yep, 'Bad Romance."

After that little show we headed to Queen's Road which is the Newbury St. counterpart in Hong Kong and wandered among the vendors. I got myself one of those bags used for carting rice with a picture of an elephant. I love these bags and have wanted one forever but they went for upwards of 100$ in the States. I got it for 100$ Hong Kong dollars. Which is about 14 dollars. Hong Kong is so cheap! We had lunch at a mall called The One right by our hotel. It's a place that's 10 stories high with various, hilarious, store names (such as Rapee Living) and we had the best pork buns I have ever tasted in my entire life. Oh dear Lord they were heavenly. Soft and juicy and flavoured with scallions. I almost wept. I also had noodles with chili and peanut sauce that burned my mouth to high heaven but were so worth it. Elliot had a few other steamed dumplings and a noodle dish and our meal, in a really nice place, came out to probably like 20$. Hong Kong is so cheap!

I bought a shirt with a bunny that says sex on it from there. The mall, not the pork bun place.

Hong Kong is 13 hours ahead of Boston and I got tired pretty fast in the day. I can walk a lot but am no match for Elliot (and my mother in some cases. Man, traveling with those to two together would really be a special kind of hell. I love you guys, just kidding. But while you two would hike up a mountain, the rest of us would probably die on the trail). There's a restaurant in Boston called the New Jumbo and it has a huge panoramic painting of Hong Kong so one of our goals was to go to the original and have a drink there. But seeing as how we were so tired, we kind of called it an early night again, though we did send an email off to our college friend and my first RA Nikki who lives in Hong Kong. We had many night activities planned, including a trip to the metal bar a reader at MetalSucks had told me about. Thanks Hong Kong :D !

I know Elliot wants to save and show off the pictures himself but here's a sneak. He took all the photos as he's our excellent photographer.

The dancers.


Sun coming up over Hong Kong and the bay we crossed with ferries everyday.



The street right outside our hotel.


At the top of the Peak.


Bruce Lee at Madame Tussaud.


Orchids at the Botanical Gardens.


Marching band.


Stores at The One.

Thanks Hong Kong :D ! Part 1

My darling boyfriend and I decided to take a vacation. Now normal people enjoy warm weather and beaches and the Caribbean, we prefer the cold, weird places, and try to stay far, far away from sand. So naturally we decided to go to China. But not just China, ten days in Hong Kong.

Interrupting myself for a second though, I just got the new Hardcore Superstar record, Split Your Lip. It is absolutely fantastic and totally deserves it's place on the year's top fifteen list I wrote for MetalSucks. Coming soon, stay tuned. My copy came signed by the whole band! I shrieked and ran to show Elliot who just nodded encouragingly but really didn't know what the hell I was dithering about (he was playing Fallout). I'm such a fangirl, how am I a "music journalist?" It's ridiculous.

The trip started out innocently enough. We'd packed the night before so we kissed our little Egg good-bye and left for the airport at around 9:30 in the morning on Dec. 1st. Security was harmless enough even though we had to take our shoes off. I can't begin to explain why this pisses me off so much. NO OTHER COUNTRY DOES THIS. Why in the good God's name do I have to take my damn shoes off? One time, just one time, someone smuggled something through that way. And now we have to suffer this. TSA, you are worthless, a waste of money, and no you do not make us safer. You make traveling a fucking ordeal for everyone involved. Jump off a cliff because your presence is what inspires homicidal thoughts in me and probably most others too. Believe me, when someone finally snaps and tries to take you out, any weapon they have on their person will not be in their DAMN SHOES. But I digress. I digress a lot when I write. Anyway, we got through and sat. And sat. And waited. Then waited some more. Our connecting flight was through Newark and apparently Newark in it's infinite generosity, decided to have the storm of the century and restrict all flights coming in and going out.

A lot of people were connecting through Newark and going on to Hong Kong along with us, along with a Chinese lady and her baby. I seemed to be the only one who could understand her garbled English so I had to translate what she said to everyone else without making it too obvious. I think everyone's blank expressions might've tipped her off though. Finally, after letting us twiddle our thumbs for two hours without really giving us any answers (thanks Continental!) they booked us on an alternate flight. Instead of a straight shot to Hong Kong from Newark, we'd be going to London then on from there, adding about a day's worth of travel.

Which would've been awful had we not been booked on Cathay Pacific.

Oh. My. God.

I don't know if it was because everyone made such a fuss that the Continental people booked us on a rival airline (American to London then Cathay Pacific) but I'm sure as shit happy they did. Let me put it this way, you know how the Japanese are the best at everything including their airlines? Cathay Pacific puts even them to shame.

After making sure the Chinese lady and her baby were also taken care of, Elliot and I trooped back home much to the kitty's delight. We hung out for a couple hours before heading back to go through security and re-check our bags all over again. Taking our shoes off again (grrrr...). Our flight to London was pretty uneventful. We were on the same flight as some hardcore band I think. They were dumb. One had a head of bleached hair and Elliot and I called him Billy Idol (under our breaths) all the way there. When we were getting off, one stewardess went, "Ohhh I didn't know Billy Idol was on this flight!' I lost it and almost fell over laughing.

London was freezing. Everywhere was snow and ice and I think I got my first cold symptoms there. Oh yeah, I got sick and I'll get to that in due time. My throat was sore and I could feel the stuffiness coming so I got a few preventative medicinal things there and napped the four hours we had in between flights. Poor Elliot sat awake the entire time. At that time it was 11 am in London, 5 am in Boston, and he hadn't slept yet. But then we got on our Cathay Pacific flight.

The plane was huge and so spacious, even in Economy. It was nowhere near full so Elliot and I took over the four seats in the middle and took turns sprawling out and sleeping. Each seat had a video monitor and selection of TV shows and movies, as well as games. You had your choice of about 15 episodes per show too. I'm not kidding. Elliot watched a season of The Cleveland Show. The stewardesses were pleasant Chinese ladies with perfect English and the food was actually edible. It was the most comfortable I've ever been on a ten hour flight. We were so spoiled. Kind of dreaded the flight back where we'd be stuck on crappy Continental. But in the meantime, bliss.

I definitely got sick though. Nose got stuffed up about halfway through and then I got a fever. I couldn't know for sure because I didn't have a thermometer but I know when my body has a fever. My hands get unbearably hot as well as the rest of me but I'm cold to the touch and the slightest movement sends chills down my spine that wrack my body with shivers. Not good. I drugged myself with Tylenol PM and hoped sleep would make me feel better. I was out.

We arrived at 7 am Hong Kong time, on Dec. 3rd. Yeah, we traveled all the way through the 2nd. It wasn't too bad though, originally we would've arrived at night on the 2nd so we didn't really miss anything. The Chinese lady and her baby made it all right too and we waved bye-bye to them after the passport control. Our suitcases showed up no problem (mine was red, in honor of China bahaha) and we took money out and got our Octopus cards at the airport. Hong Kong has a system for travel called the Octopus card. It's basically a metro card you can keep putting money on and use it on every source of transportation and in most convenience stores. It was great. Best system. We hopped on the airport express and rode it all the way to Kowloon. Cue my ten days of quoting Cassandra from Wayne's World, "Oh my GOD, I WAS BORN IN KOWLOON BAY." The first half of the trip we were on the Kowloon side before moving to the Hong Kong side on the 6th.

Then we got lost. We got yelled at for trying to take our suitcases up the escalator (though we were dumb and missed the huge sign that clearly told us to take all, "hefty baggage," up the lift) then we couldn't find the bus even though a patient lady tried to help us. At this point, I begged Elliot to just let us take a cab and we did to our hotel The Luxe Manor. It had huge Chinese fortress doors and a snazzy, modern lobby with a giant plush red armchair. Breakfast was complimentary so we dumped our stuff in our room and went down to eat. It was 9 am at this time. After breakfast, feeling more or less ok and non-feverish on my part, we headed into the town.

Five steps outside and I walked smack into a Turkish kebab place called Istanbul Kebap. It's like there's an invisible cord connecting me to the motherland at all times. Thanks Hong Kong :D !

My airport express ticket.