Advice for Travelers in Hong Kong

Places we stayed and things we did:

Nathan Hotel: At US$100 (700 hk $) for a swank double, this was a really nice mid range option in Hong Kong. It was hip, incredibly comfy, and located conveniently on Nathan Road in Kowloon. We got a free upgrade -- better room and free breakfast -- by filling out a form for a Corporate account. (Which included such questions as whether we'd be staying in Hong Kong under 50 days a year or over. . . )

378 Nathan Road Kowloon Hong Kong www.nathanhotel.com info@nathanhotel.com 852 2780 9798 fax: 852 2770 4262

The Hong Kong Art Museum in Kowloon was fantastic--well-detailed with interesting information and stunning jades and paintings.

Club Feather Boa was our favorite (secret) ex-pat bar. It's an antique store turned into a bar. No sign on the door but really friendly once inside the comfy, Roccoco room. Members only on the weekends, though.Club Feather Boa38 Staunton St. Central, Hong Kongtel:2857 2586

Afternoon cream tea at the Peninsula Hotel is considered touristy, but still really yummy and worth it.

Advice We Could Have Used

Someone might have told us that there is pretty much no way to get a train from Hong Kong, well, to anywhere. Except -- if you really push and you go to about 5 different travel agents and you finally get to one that services mainland China -- you can get a ticket to one of three cities, but only with five days advance notice.

We sucked it up and bought a plane ticket instead.

Sep 6: Hong Kong by Night

Whether or not you come to Hong Kong as the first port of call, you really should show up at night. In daylight, it's just another city with tall buildings. At night it's divine. Who knew that neon and laser light shows could be classy?

Eleni and I began yesterday climbing up to the top of Victoria's Peak. We took a 20-minute bus most of the way and had a half mile walk straight uphill to get the much-touted view over the whole city and the harbor beyond. Walking back down, sweat everywhere, and trying not to slide on the steep path, we started talking to a pair of British naval officers and a French girl. The three of them -- Sean, Guy, and Sophie -- had just met that morning, and we joined them for a drink at the bottom of the hill. Sean and Guy were on a six-month tour-of-duty through Asia, and had naturally gravitated towards each other as two sailors on the ship who had some interest in seeing more of the cities they visited than the inside of the ex-pat pubs and the local talents' bedrooms. So after hearing tales of everything from Brunai's fierce Nepalese soldiers who must draw blood if they draw their knives, to how Sean lost his golf ball the previous day to a cobra in a bush we got invited to a cocktail party on board the ship -- the HMS York -- that night. This was, for all of you who are now snickering, a bona fide cocktail party for Britishers in Hong Kong, not some made up excuse to get us on board. (Let not the fact that once we got on board they barely let us near the cocktail party and kept us hidden away in the officers' mess the whole time distract you from that premise.)

Which brings us back to Hong Kong at night. What you wanna do, is see Hong Kong at night from a battleship docked in Kowloon. All the buildings -- great big sky scrapers that stretch pretty much as far as you can see in either direction -- are all lit up throughout the night. But at eight, it turns into a coordinated full city show. Lights blink on and off in concert, electric triangles dance up and down the glass facades, and from the top of five or six of the buildings come staccato bursts of bright green lasers that beam out across the harbor over your heads.
Have I mentioned recently that Hong Kong rocks?

The battle ship was pretty cool too. We got a full tour and met a lot of really nice men in uniform: Sean and Guy, our hosts, were that wonderful kind of funny and smart that makes them insta-best-friends; there was the older gentleman who policed other people's language and uniforms while simultaneously talking about how much he loved Washington and then listed every shopping mall in a 20 mile radius of the Capitol; there was the guy who'd gone briefly AWOL for a few hours when he'd passed out lying on a Turkish toilet at a Brunai night club and had to break his way out at 7 AM to get back to the ship.

And then there was, well, the guns. Missiles and lasers and those things where one person stands behind a major gunbarrell and shoots it up into the sky. At the end of the evening, as we were taking a last set of photos, Sean said: "Do you want to take a picture in front of the gun?" And, without missing a beat, we two peaceniks jumped at the chance. (Prompting Eleni to say "Hmm, I wonder if that makes us boys or girls?")

Sophie, Guy, Eleni, and I then went out into expat heaven to drink sangria (Have you tried Sangria with star fruit in it?) for many more hours and finally collapsed in a cab at 3 AM for home. Though only after Guy slurrily told us that we were the most fun guests he and Sean had ever invited back to the boat ever -- and while I did, of course, respond with "I bet you say that to all the girls", I have to say that the British navy rocks about as much as Hong Kong.

Sep 6: Hong Kong by Day

Hong Kong is a city you can smile in. This is a big deal for an American -- especially one who automatically flashes a smile any time she makes eye contact. Here's why smiling doesn't work in most countries: First, it could be the kind of country where smiling marks you at best as a too-emotive American (I.e. Sweden where the natives will only be nice to you if you frown at them and don't say a word) or at worst as mentally slow (I.e. in South America). Second, and far worse, it could be a country where a smile is seen as an invitation to follow you down the street for three miles -- either pressing you to buy a sarong or agree to dinner.

In Hong Kong, you can smile. The whole city is such a Westerner's dream of a travel destination that it almost makes one a little embarrassed to love it so much. It's like Travel Lite. You get comfortably lost, pull out your map, and instantly someone walks over and asks in flawless English if they can help. The streets are dappled with about 40% Caucasian faces -- a different ratio than you're used to at home, but not so's you'd notice. And look! Weird food being sold on the streets -- but it's all written in English on the menus.

And the smiling. It's just like home. People smile back. Or if I was smiling while saying "No thank you" to the guy who wants to sell me a fake Rolex, he smiles too and then walks away.
Different guide books gave us different suggestions on whether to use Hong Kong as your port of entry to China. One said it was best to go after you'd seen mainland China, because only then would you look past the superficial bits and see how Asian the city really was. Another said it was the best way to start, a nice way to segue into the culture. I am going to back the latter view. I know my German backpacking friends would be disappointed in me for not slogging through the back alleys to find the cheapest bowl of shark's fin soup to truly immerse myself in local life. But I cannot tell you how nice it is to get to jump into another culture in half-steps, to be able to see what's similar first, and then slowly open yourself up to what's different.

I've said it before, and I'm sure I'll be saying it again: Hong Kong rocks.

Sep 6: Morning Conversations

Sleepy, mumbled morning conversation at 7 AM upon noticing that Eleni was awake too:

"Hong Kong ROCKS."

"I know. . . I can't believe we were on a British battleship last night."

Pause.

"I think I need an advil."