We’re on the flight from hong Kong to Beijing right now and all of us getting excited to be in China (we realize Hong Kong is part of China, but we feel we’re going to the real China now). We’ve already had a few hiccups :1 of our 2 pieces of luggage never got to Hong Kong with us, but came on the next flight; Ilani wouldn’t eat the noodles at an outdoor place the 1st night because he didn’t trust the hygiene- we’re all paranoid of the water (he’s now carrying around his own fork); and I have somehow lost my glasses,and if I keep doing that will go through 35 pairs on this trip which will increase the cost of this whole adventure by about 20%. On top of that, food, and Dani’s vegetarianism (a vegetarian who eats very few vegetables is a challenge) promise to be interesting.
Having said all that, Hong Kong is an amazing place, even when totally jetlagged and exhausted. At night it is just a huge assortment of lights, neon and people. Like Times Square everywhere. Last night we went to the Ladies’ Market, a huge pedestrianized street of hundreds of stalls mainly selling everything you never wanted, but we still managed to do some shopping. While Liora and Dani looked at bags and purses, Benjy and Ilani shopped for soccer shirts, and both got very cool China national shirts, and Benjy also got a cheap (and fake) Barcelona shirt.
So while we did a few of the touristy stuff (The Peak tram, Star Ferry, markets) these are some interesting things I found out:
The sports pages of the local daily newspaper had great cricket coverage;Starbucks is a great place to eat when you’re stuck (chicken pies, spinach pies) and we’ve eaten at Starbucks more in 2 days in HK than I did in the last month; flight attendants have interesting mannerisms – 1 just came up to Dani and asked to look at her ipod and how much it cost.
So on to Beijing where hopefully guide and luggage will greet us.
