Hong Kong Day 2 Pt. 1 – Day Tour

Day 2 – Saturday, 17th January 2009

I have way too many pics for Day 2 that I want to post up (bordering on 100.. no I kid you not) so I’m splitting it up into two entries, something I had sworn not to do on my travel entries so as to maintain some sort of system of consistency – but I know that most of you who read my blog don’t have a fast Internet connection anyway, so this is me being merciful wtf.

This entry will also be composed of mainly pictures, since there isn’t much to write in detail that you couldn’t possibly gleam off the pictures.

Dorsett Seaview hotel lobby. We had to wake up at 6am – good lord – to get ready by 7.20am before our tour guide arrives for our day tour, who then ushered us onto a bus that was a little too large for very few participants.

We were then ushered into this grand-looking restaurant for breakfast – we were told while in the bus that we could opt to pay a certain sum of money (I don’t know the exact amount since I wasn’t paying it wtf) to have both our breakfast and lunch covered, and on calculating, my parents decided that it would be cheaper to eat under this particular food package rather than dining out on our own.

Dad pouring tea. The two girls on the left (out of three girls) were actually.. ‘ji mui’ (sisters) – the pic shows the youngest (girl covering face with hands) and the eldest.

Porridge with yau zhar kuai, and dimsum, and wrapped chicken – the whole lot of us (the sisters sitting at our table and my family) couldn’t finish it as we had already taken our breakfast, local mee-in-a-cup bought at 7-Eleven in the morning. We didn’t anticipate that we’d have breakfast.. so the leftovers that we couldn’t finish we tapau-ed.

Brandon at aquarium of the restaurant.

Dad snapped this photo.

We then travelled through an underground tunnel (which supposedly was surrounded by the sea, and the reason why they didn’t use glass to build the tunnel so we could see the fishes swimming around us was because the pressure could easily destroy it) towards the Hong Kong island if I’m not mistaken.

At Golden Bouhinia Square – a view of the sea.

Hong Kong and China flags I reckon.

Family shot!

The skyline looking serenely beautiful thanks to the marvels of my CPL filter that I bought 2-3 days right before we left for this trip (and RAW conversion using DPP on Landscape Picture Style).

At this popular spot which was supposedly commonly featured in Hong Kong TVB dramas. You know, the exact spot where the characters commit suicide/smuggle things/suspiciously ride a boat/throw a dead body wtf.

Another look at the aforementioned spot – I love how the sea and sky looks like here. :)

Brandon and the good-looking scammer of a tour guide (one of the two tour guides) who snapped our photos using his Nikon DSLR – I thought he was quite friendly and nice initially as we made small chat (in Canto) and talked about snapping photos and him being a Liverpool fan (‘cause I was wearing a Liverpool windbreaker at the time). Details at the latter half of this entry.

The erm, golden bauhinia flower – national flower of Hong Kong.

We were then taken to Repulse Bay – the area where millionaires and rich people reside. Even though the condos are expensive, the rooms aren’t exactly that large.. Pic depicts the lookout point.

Stubbs Road Lookout, where you could see various landmarks.

One of the expensive condos.

We were then ushered to this particular temple (sorry, don’t know its name) where we can rub this particular god’s image and hope it’ll bring bountiful of wealth wtf – there’s a series of specific steps to do so according to our tour guide, where we had to first rub the god’s head, then right hand, then feet (and stomach if you want a baby wtf), then grab hold of the fake ancient gold, pretend to put it in your pocket then hop lightly so that the wealth enters your pocket lmao. Tour guide says that all of his clients who did that and then went to Macau to gamble reported to him that it actually works.. so yeah, suspend your beliefs or whatever, I did it too anyway in case it does work for my future income and gambling this coming CNY hahahaha.

View of the sea again.

And another.

Stairway to heaven wtf.

Me rubbing an ancient egg or something – sorry I’ve no clue what it is.

Another side look of the sea sparkling with the sunlight.

Yet another.

Me with an interesting background. <3 my Canon 24-105mm f/4 L IS. =)

A large Kuan Yin.

Dad observed that the constructions throughout Hong Kong utilise bamboos as their scaffolding. 0_o

Throughout the bus rides as we were brought to from one place to another, we were often told a few interesting cultural snippets of the Hongkees (I’m taking a guess here as to what people from Hong Kong are called, so pardon me if I’m wrong): like how the cars that are driven around are incredibly clean not because it’s a law requirement, but because they’re all incredibly ‘kiasu’ about how clean their rides are; or how the Hongkees like to drink soup and boil them for at least 10 hours; or that they’re all very feng shui-conscious.

Throughout this particular bus ride to the Aberdeen Fishing Village, I fell asleep as I was very tired.

At the jetty of the Aberdeen Fishing Village.

On the boat.

My parents.

I’m guessing that this would be the floating restaurant.

Fishing boats prowl the river/sea.

People actually live on the boats.

Also spotted this old man paddling around on a truck tyre or something wtf.

Our boat driver (if that’s the right term..).

One of these boats with a black top belonged to Lee Kar Sheng, the richest man in Hong Kong, or one of them.

Ushered to a jewelry shop. Yawn. This is in our itinerary and it’s hardly enjoyable – the sellers were incredibly persistent in selling one of them spinning feng shui things which do not come cheap.. this is the only pic I managed to snap ‘cause photography was not allowed when I asked one of the sellers.

A Chinese herb shop. Before we arrived here, we were told the story by the tour guide of this miracle herb which nursed this particular rich dude to health or something, and that even Andy Lau couldn’t buy blablabla double yawn (disclaimer: any inaccuracies in my tales could be due to my deficiency in Cantonese or the tour guide’s misleading info).

In another nice-looking restaurant for a late lunch at nearly 3pm.

So right after we finished our lunch, Mr. Good-Looking Tour Guide came (he initially left us at the Golden Bauhinia Square as he told us that he had to settle our lunch bookings) and proceeded to show us photos that he snapped of us earlier – already printed and some even on these commemorative plates WTF?? We did not ask for these things at all, so yada yada they all come in a nice sum of HKD$200 (~RM100) per stupid plate + pic package. The best part was that he printed 4 for my family. ^___^ Grand total of RM400. ^______^

Nabeh think we very rich is it!?? Worst of all is I thought the things looked pretty inferior, although my youngest brother was incredibly happy to see a pic of his own printed on a plate. -_- Parents had no choice but to pay for them, the three sisters who sat our table did the same as well (I think they only had one packaged photo thingy printed for them).. I didn’t understand why though ‘cause they could’ve just rejected these things. Maybe afraid we’d be left stranded there or get beaten up or something ‘cause we still have one more night tour to go that night.

So that RM400 basically set our budget back by a lot – parents had to retract their earlier statement (I guess, haha) that we could buy whatever new clothes that we want in HK hahaha, and we can’t buy that many souvenirs for relatives and friends back home.

This essentially set us off on a very sour note indeed – I was so pissed I wasn’t in the mood to continue with the night tour anymore but we had no choice as we had already paid for it.. so it’s persevering through the trip all the way. Although a small incident later on (in the next entry) lifted up my mood for the better.

I had already hated the idea of going around by tours, but I guess when you travel with your family, it would be a better choice, as my mum put it, “we can cover a lot of places in a short period of time”, which doesn’t make sense to me as my backpacking trips were hardly like that. Can’t compare a family holiday with backpacking though, as we only had 4 days in Macau and Hong Kong and we had to make full use of our time there – or so my parents told me.