Hong Kong - The City of Lights

It’s a 24 hour city. No matter the time, no matter the day, there’s always something going on.
Deanna and I left Friday evening on the bus from Foshan to Hong Kong. It was a bout a 4 hour ride with 3 borders and customs crossings. We arrived at our hostel and checked in our luggage. The room was extremely small with two beds, no windows and the tiniest bathroom ever, but we weren’t planning on spending our time enjoying the accommodations anyways. After getting settled we headed out to see the ‘city of lights’. Hong Kong has many night markets. The whole street is typically barricaded off to traffic and vendors et up their stalls in the middle of the street. The market as many thing to buy, selling mostly souvenirs, watches, purses, hats, jewelry, clothes, and electronics. On Saturday morning we headed to the tourist bureau to pick up maps and brochures of Hong Kong. We also signed up for the Cantonese Opera Appreciation class. To promote tourism in Hong Kong they offer many free cultural activities for tourists. We wanted to sign up for some more classes but they were all full. After leaving the Tourism Bureau we headed to Pacific Café for bagels with cream cheese, mmmmmmmm they were delicious and a good start to our day.

The Cantonese Opera Appreciation Class was held at the Heritage Museum and for $10(HK) we were able to see a short performance and view the exhibitions in the museum. We learned lots about the history and traditions included in the Opera. There are only 6 performers in the Cantonese Opera with one head female lead and one head male lead. There are 4 parts to the opera song, reciting, movement, and fighting. The singing is very high pitched and nothing like your typical western Opera but only has 2 two pitches high and extremely high,one for the males and one for the females. The museum had many interactive displays, one that would take a picture of your face and then digitally transform it so you would look like a Cantonese Opera actress.
In the afternoon and evening we went shopping and bargained at the Temple Street Market. I ended up buying some clothes and souvenirs. We returned to our hostel quite late and exhausted from a full day. At our bedroom door we were greeted by a nice note saying they had switched rooms on us. It was a very frustrating ordeal because they packed up our stuff (good thing we locked our suitcases) and moved it to an even smaller room that had so many bugs. We complained so they gave us a can of Raid for killing cockroaches. On the whole, it was not a great night sleep. In the morning we complained again and they moved us to a much nicer room.

On Sunday we had Dim Sum with some of Deanna’s relatives who live in Hong Kong. We spent the entire afternoon on the Avenue of Stars, not Holly wood but the Hong Kong movie scene starring Jackie Chan and Bruce Lee (well those were the only actors I recognized). The boardwalk allows you a great view of the skyscrapers in Hong Kong. The buildings tower of the shops and streets at an average of 50 floors per building. After several pictures and a fun time walking down the Avenue of Stars we searched for a place to eat.
The weather was not cooperating during our stay other wise we would have headed to Victoria Peak were you can ride the tram up the mountain for one of the best vies of Hong Kong City. Maybe next time the weather will be better and we can see more sightseeing.