I have been to Hong Kong a number of times - what strikes me every time is how green and lush it is - and how much open space considering there are over 4million people crammed into 28 square miles.
What I hadn't remembered was how stinking humid and uncomfortable it is.
Wednesday June 16th is a holiday to one of the Gods - and it was the a Dragon Boat Festival. How fantastic that we fluked to be here on this one day of the year. How lucky are we? Well....not very!
Stanley is a little fishing village on the South Side of Hong Kong Island....and we're staying in Kowloon. It seemed liked a good plan to go over there and see the Dragon Boat races and "do" the Stanley Markets which are terrific, and have dinner there.
Simple but inviting, right? WRONG!!!
The forty minute journey took us more than two hours by train and Bus. At one stage we were stationery in a traffic jam on a steep hill for 35 minutes. Alongside us a traffic sign mocked us with the logo - reduce speed NOW! The sign was clearly a comedian on an island where the traffic is a joke!
When we finally arrived in Stanley we discovered that the entire 4million population plus a few terrorist types and some mainland Chinese dissidents had all looked forward to meeting us so much that they had all descended on Stanley at the same time.
Fighting our way through the crowds...all of whom were waving autograph books at us....or were they paper fans to drive away the humidity - we travelled the 100metres to the beach in a staggeringly fast 20 minutes. Don't laugh...that's ten times faster than the bus was going!!! We could hear the noise of drums and cheers and the atmosphere was starting to get to us. Unfortunately we couldn't get to IT! We reached the beach only to find a sign which said "Beach Full - you no enter anyone" - and even though we hadn't planned to enter anyone, we were turned away. Our only glimpse of a dragon boat was through a chink in a doorway - and he wasn't very happy about it.
The markets were too crowded to move and so we got on ANOTHER Bus and made the 2 hour (now 2hours and 20 minutes) trip back....By which time I had totally melted into several gallons of fatty water and had to be carried inside the hotel in a bucket like I was a refugee from the gulf oil spill. So much for our big day out.
Dinner in a little chinese restaurant with a pirate theme-(DON'T ASK) and some drinks with Tony's friends in the cocktail bar where a girl duo sang ABBA and Boney M hits and encouraged us all to join in ( Does anyone actually know the words to Ma Barker???) and then a trip to Temple Street markets which truly were just like a giant $2 shop - only more expensive than Australia.... Whatever was left of me in solid form melted into a pool of water which caused flash flooding down Nathan Road - and despite the hotel being only 400 metres away I insisted on getting a cab to spare passersby the ignominy of me splashing them as I walked by.
And so to Bed - England's green and pleasant land tomorrow.
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