Hong Kong 3/19-3/22

After last weekend’s heavy partying in Bangkok, it was nice to take a couple days to prepare for Hong Kong.  I spent Monday thru Wednesday in Asia Cement’s corporate office, and despite not knowing much about the business, I found it very informative and interesting.  Once again, everyone was very accommodating and set aside a lot of their own time to show me the details of their business.  What was also very interesting is that less than half of the people I met with were Thai, and I found myself sitting in a staff meeting that consisted of 2 Italians, I Bulgarian, I Greek, 3 locals and myself….I guess Thomas Friedman’s “The World is Flat” actually has a lot of truth to it!.....and I can’t thank everyone at Asia Cement enough for the great experience they provided me.

Although we were in “recharging” mode last week, we met up with Andrew and some of his friends to get in touch with our Irish roots for St. Patty’s day at a local pub called the Dubliner.  The bar was packed with young expats, a band was jamming some 80’s and 90’s tunes, and everyone had on green.  The only thing I was mad about was they didn’t have green beer, but we still had a great time and also made a few new friends.  We are also beginning to realize how crucial pubs are when traveling…..a great time can always be had at a pub, and they are also lifesavers with what I’ll call “normal foods” when you just can’t take the local cuisine anymore.

After work on Wednesday, Trey and I decided to go catch a movie at the IMAX theater, which is located in one of the nicest shopping malls I have ever been in called Siam Center.  The place is packed with all the shops you would expect to see in a mall, is 5 stories tall, has a nice grocery store attached to it, and even has a gym called “California Wow”.  We showed up early to buy the tickets, so we had some time to kill and decided to check out the food court.  Again, very nice, lots of familiar places like McDonalds, Burger King, Starbucks, Duncan Donuts, etc….but we decided to try the Thai section of the food court.  After a few minutes of browsing, I decided to get some sort of soup…..not really sure why I went with this option, but I did, and after one bite, I realized I had made an awful choice.  Once again, the majority of the soup consisted of unidentifiable pieces of meat, and it just tasted like hell.  Thankfully, I was not concerned with offending anyone if I didn’t continue to eat the soup, so I put it down and settled on a few sushi rolls.  I am beginning to lose my “adventurous” spirit towards foods….but, I still have not pulled the McDonalds card yet.  This is something that I am proud of, but am not confident that it will last much longer.  The movie itself was good….we decided to see Watchmen, and we both thought it was definitely worth seeing.  The highlight though had to be before the movie started and after the previews ended when everyone in the audience stood for the King’s Anthem.  It is about a 3 minute song, with many favorable images of Thailand, the Royal Family, and King Rama IX himself are displayed on the screen.  I have to say, I found the anthem to be very emotionally charging and persuading towards the King.  It shows the countries unwavering support of the King, but it can also be argued that all of this is just propaganda…..either way, interesting to see.

On Thursday, we took the 2 and a half hour flight to Hong Kong.  Both Trey and I are beginning to notice that most of the non-US airlines do a much better job of taking care of their passengers, because we were both pretty excited when we learned we were getting an in-flight meal and free alcohol….its the little things I guess.  Anyways, we got into Hong Kong around 7 pm, jumped on the train to the city, and were in our hotel room in Wan Chai by 8.  We learned that Hong Kong’s airport was voted #1 in the world for the second straight year, and couldn’t argue with that considering how easy it was to get from the airport to the center of Hong Kong.  That night, we checked out a couple of bars in the area, but decided to turn in early so we could have a full day on Friday.

Friday started off with a trip to the central station where we grabbed some breakfast and then elected to take the 45 minute bus ride to the other side of the island (Hong Kong is on an island) to see Stanley’s Market.  By the time we made it to the market, the sun had burned through the clouds and the weather resembled a sunny San Diego day.  We wondered through the market, found a few t-shirts, but unlike the markets we have been to in Thailand, this one did not offer the same level of “wow” factor that we were getting use too (no dogs, monkeys, etc).  For the most part, it was upscale, factory reject items at a reasonable price.   Since it was such a nice day, and we had been told that in the event of a nice clear day in Hong Kong (apparently not all the common), you must go to the top of Victoria Peak (highest point on the island) to get a view of the city.  So, we took the tram up to the top, and were blown away by the views….it really put into perspective of how many huge buildings are in Hong Kong.  After taking in the views from the peak, we headed back to the hotel, put on our Sunday’s best and headed down to Lan Kai Fong, the bar district of Hong Kong.  When we walked up to th

e first bar (yet another pub), the scene consisted of mostly white men in the work attire.  We grabbed dinner and noticed that as the crowd got bigger, the makeup of the people really did

n’t change much, except a few older business men were rotated out for younger Brits and Aussies.  

We began bouncing around from bar to bar, with all the bars located on one big block (similar to 6ht street in Austin), and as the crowds got bigger, people just began to pour into the street with their drinks.  Trey and I both agreed that this was bad ass, and so followed the crowds into the street.  By the end of the night, the street was just as packed as the most crowded bar, beer was beginning to run down the streets like rain water, and there wasn’t a sober person to be found…..I decided the place wasn’t too bad.

Saturday didn’t start off quite as early as Friday, but we did make a huge find right after leaving our hotel room and in desperate search of a good breakfast when we found a place called the Flying Pan.  They offer a huge list of breakfast dishes neither of us had eaten for weeks…and in our condition, it definitely started the day off right.  After breakfast, we decided to wonder around the central area of the city and also ride a set of escalators that take you from the city center to a residential condo area half way up the side of a mountain.  Hong Kong is very impressive in the sense that it is built on the base of a mountain, has hundreds of enormous buildings, and is also a very clean and efficient city.  It has many similarities to New York City, but is much cleaner and is not as spread out due to the topography of the area.  It also has a very strong international feel to it, and would definitely be a good city to start in if you wanted to “ease” your way into Asia.

Saturday night, we threw on some slacks and headed over to the Peninsula Hotel in the Kowloon area, which we were told is home to one of the coolest bathrooms ever…they also serve $12 Heinekens, so we had 2 and then took pictures of the facilities.  I must say they were quite impressive, with a very modern architecture feel and it also provides a full view of the entire city while you use the urinal (I’ve got action shots, but I’ll refrain from posting them here).  After the Peninsula, we raced to catch the ferry to Macau (the Vegas of Asia), and got to the ticket line just in time….Scott:”One ticket to Macau please”…Agent:”alright, that will be $160 HKD and I need to see your passport”….Scott:”SH*T!!”.  We had basically run a couple blocks, were sweating to the point that our shirts were wet, and then we realized we didn’t have our passports.  So, we jumped into a cab, went back to the hotel to get our passports, and made it back to the ferry terminal in time to catch the 8:45 ferry.

After the hour long ferry ride, we made it to Macau and took the bus over to the MGM.  We had made plans to meet up with our buddy Ton from Bangkok, but hadn’t heard from him yet, so we sat down at a blackjack table and each started off with $1000 HKD ($130 US).  20 minutes later, Ton gave us a call, I was up to $4000 and Trey was up to $2000.  Perfect.  We 

both walked away from the table way ahead (something I don’t always do), and met up with Ton.  We walked to several other casinos, watched Ton’s buddy play in a poker tournament, grabbed a late night dinner, played one more quick round of blackjack at the Wynn (I lost $1000, Trey won $200), and before we knew it, it was already 3 am.  Deciding that it was best we walk away from the town altogether with more money than we started with, we headed back to the ferry terminal and caught the 4 am back to Hong Kong.  My overall experience in Macau was definitely a 

go

od one (I more than doubled my money), but the city does not have the same energy that you would expect from a big gambling mecca….most of the casinos are packed with serious gamblers, and not the hoards bachelor party groups we have all become accustomed to in Vegas.

I highly recommend Hong Kong to any traveler…..very easy to get around, incredible views and very foreigner friendly.  I would say it is a must see, but realize it is not exactly around the corner from the states.  You should make the trip if you can. Anyways, We made it safely back to Bangkok on Sunday, and plan to see a few more sites in the city before we head down to the southern part of Thailand this coming Thursday.  Our plans are to fly into Phuket on Thursday, stay there for at least 2 nights, and then hopefully wonder to some more remote parts of the region.  This trip will contrast our “big city” trip in Hong Kong nicely, and we will be down there for 8 nights…..should be an adventure.

Cheers,

sbt