Sheffield

Ok, so this will only amuse people who have had the pleasure of living in this English city but we found its Asian twin, Hong Kong! It has its own Peak district - but it’s a suburb not the countryside, Conduit Road – that is likewise on a steep hill and Hillsborough (Court - a hotel, not a town) all within the same area. It amused us no end. Anyway…

Hong Kong (HK) was given up as a British colony not too long ago and is currently classed as a special adinistrative region (SAR). It is due to be handed over to the Chinese properly in 33 years but for now you cross the land border between the two countries via an air-conditioned bridge. Once on the HK side, you’re suitably transported into the Western world by underground train.

Bright lights

The footprint left by the British is evident. The roads are no longer uniform but wind around the place. There are many bars and clubs, western eateries, malls of expensive designer shops as well as you’re standard high-street shops. The ratio of Asian to Caucasian is less bias than mainland China and it is easier to find locals who speak English. Indeed, the ex-pats are not just from Britain (though prevalent) but from various western countries as well as other Asian countries. You could nearly fool yourself to think that you are in London… only the weather is hot and humid and you can take a quick metro ride to the beach!

What people think when I say 'I'm travelling'...

I assure you this is not always the case

The beach was certainly a destination for us and our friends that we were staying with, as it was the Mid-Autumn festival (Chinese celebrations), so the residents get a ‘Golden-week’ national holiday. We timed our trip to coincide with this to experience Chinese style celebrations, which are famous worldwide for the dancing dragons, fireworks and lanterns and we saw them all. They were a bit different than expected though...

Ok so we are used to the British organisation and events run like clockwork with proper schedules, officials, crowd management etc… so that’s what we expected… but these events were run by the Chinese so things were done much more lax and even the organisers didn’t seem to know what to expect... weird. That said it was still an experience worth seeing, only the dragon we saw was a huge construction of incense sticks made it difficult to actually ‘see’ as the smoke made the eyes water. The fireworks were impressive and were set off from 3 boats along the water that separates Hong Kong Island from the Kowloon side (note: the city of Hong Kong is made up of many islands) and inVictoria Park the was a lantern show, of various size and shapes, which had the atmosphere of a night-carnival.

When we arrived in HK the first thing we did was go to Disney Land. Ok I know why on earth would you want to do that when you are in Asia but when it’s linked to the metro, doesn’t cost too much to go to and its Disney! Then why not! It wasn’t busy either (being a school day) and being relatively small in comparison to the other Disney Lands, we got round all of it in half a day. It was fun.

Hong Kong certainly does have enough tourist attractions to keep you busy, including a statue of the biggest Buddha in the world, accessible via the longest cable car in the world. Next to the statue was a Buddhist monastery that had arm-sized incense sticks burning outside. In the city there was a nunnery (also Buddhist) that had the most immaculate model garden attached. It was filled with trees that looked exactly like the miniature bonsai ones, with strategically placed rocks and precisely grown grass. Crazy detail! The aforementioned Peak is a well-to-do area but also a popular place to visit for views across Hong Kong. There is a Chinese equivalent of ‘Walk of Fame’ (named the Avenue of Stars) for the celebration of famous Chinese people in the film industry; Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan and Jet Lee being the most known. Luckily for us we had a good few days here so were able to visit all these places, which are spread out between the main islands (but all accessible via the tube network).

The Buddha

On the food side, HK didn’t really match up to Chinese standards but saying that we did have a fun experience at the night markets, where we ate at a place specialising in crab. We didn’t know how to eat it initially but we were with people who showed us how it was done, useful. There was also a dancing lion and accompanying band, which were going around the stalls and shops blessing the owners with good luck, cool to watch. The market gave us a good opportunity to practice our haggling skills and the atmosphere was fun to soak up.

Overall, a nice break from the stresses of travelling/ language/ culture barriers, but the enthusiasm for more adventure never dies.

Casual surfer (with a paddle)