Two Tours and a Weekend

The weekend before last, we were offered two tours of the area: on Saturday was Kowloon and the New Territories; on Sunday was Hong Kong Island. Promoted through the Office of International Student Exchange (OISE) here on campus (the organization that gave us nifty university-branded tote bags as souvenirs), they were organized by a private company that, while good, failed to meet my expectations.

I’ve been on two main tours of this type prior to these: One was a day trip to the Grand Canyon in Arizona from Las Vegas, Nevada, via bus, and the other was my two-week tour of China in which my family and I visited Beijing, Xian, Shanghai, Suzhou, and Hangzhou.

Day 1

Saturday, we were to be off at 9 a.m. One of the charter buses broke down before leaving, and as a result we didn’t get on the road until 10:30. Though the effects of this setback were not altogether noticeable, they compacted the day. They still took us to all the places on the schedule, giving us a little less time at each place to wander around and get a deeper feel.

The first stop was a bird garden near Mong Kok, a major shopping district in Kowloon. With the exception of a lively parrot, the birds were all small and in cages. Most of the birds were there for sale, along with cages and birdseed. What struck me the most about this bird garden, which I probably would never had visited had I not been directed there was its age—it was gracefully old, and not in the same way that any other building in Hong Kong would be old.

Their bathrooms had pooper stoopers. My mom’s friend, who happens to be a nurse, once told be that anatomically and physiologically speaking, pooper stoopers were more natural (and therefore better) for trying to osmoregulate, for they require the user to step over a hole in the ground and squat.

In my opinion, seeing the dampness of the ground (not sure if it was due to water), those pooper stoopers (a name of my own creation) were true germ spreaders. Beholding them reaffirmed my policy of not letting people put their shoes on my bed.

The Bird Garden was definitely worth going to, and after we walked around the surrounding streets, which had flower shops on them. They had roses along with many of the other standards, but what was in the most abundance were orchids, visible at every shop in every color.
After that was a viewing platform and visitors center for the Tsing Ma Bridge, which while not the most impressive of dual-level suspension bridges, was one of the first to link Lantau Island (home of the new airport and Hong Kong Disneyland) to the rest of Hong Kong. The top level is comprised of automobile traffic and the lower level, which is enclosed, is home to two lines of the MTR (Hong Kong’s subway system).

Also visible from the viewing platform was the Tin Kau Bridge, which, as a self-anchored suspension bridge (more accurately a cable-stayed bridge), I found much more visually appealing.

From there it was on to the Wetlands Park in Hong Kong. It housed one of those kid-oriented conservation-focused museums. This one was particularly focused on swampland, demonstrating its benefits as a buffer to tidal waves and other inclement weather. Out in the park was a good place to take hikes around, but the blasting heat and humidity of the day inhibited any such desires.

For those who don’t know, the territory of Hong Kong SAR is only 25-40% developed. (And my hometown of Thousand Oaks, California, attempts to brag about its 30% open space!) The parts that haven’t been serve as wilderness and often as permanent open space. It’s really quite nice to have such open areas to relax so close to a massively crowded city.

This particular park that we went to sat on the northern border of Hong Kong (with mainland China). As such, you could see the major development of Shenzhen, which is quite visibly built up to that border.

From there, we went to a Taoist temple on the east side of Kowloon. Excluding myself, not having found out about this until after departure, they were providing people with this traditional fortune-telling mechanism. (I’d say game, but it’s not really considered such.) I never found out the name, but to do this, you have a whole bunch of sticks in a cylindrical cup and you shake it in the temple in front of the Taoist gods to find out your luck and or fate. When one falls out, which can take such time, they help you interpret what it means.

In the last stop of the day, we went to the Chi Lin Nunnery in Diamond Hill, another district of Kowloon. It had a major garden complex that, minus the tourists, would provide quaintness and serenity until one realized the giant skyscrapers in the background. Otherwise it was a really nice place. I think it was definitely a highlight of the trip.

I went to bed tired. The majority of the group was exhausted. It had been a good day, but the worst part was that some of us had to do it again the day after.

Day 2

These two tours, one day after another, were run by the same Black Castle Tour Company. With three tour buses each day, there were three tour guides. For Saturday, we went on the bus with the guide on summer vacation from PhD studies in the States. His English was quite terrible. Sunday, we decided to try a different tour guide. This time, we got a local woman who had better English and made an attempt at telling jokes. The content was good, the execution average, and the reaction dead. Oh well.

This day was set back a little later. Our first stop was a museum that opened at 10 a.m. on Sundays, so we got onto the buses at 9:30. On one hand, the buses didn’t break down, so we were on time. On the other hand, Starbucks on campus doesn’t open on Sundays, so I was coffee-less unfortunately that day. But that’s beside the point.

The museum we went to was that of Dr. Sun Yat-sen, who is frequently credited as the founding father of modern China. While interesting, the museum housed few authentic artifacts and the museum’s tour guide simply read off the story boards on the walls.

The next stop was Aberdeen, a fishing village (formerly full of pirates) on the south side of Hong Kong Island, about 10 minutes from my dorm by bus. There we went on boat tours of the bay in what we were told were Sampan (literally “three pieces” of wood), though ours were noticeably more posh than the examples on Wikipedia.

Like many other places in Hong Kong and China, the most notable part of this boat ride was the contrast between new and old that was presented to us. Right next to the large commercial fishing boats were smaller houseboats, that according to the tour guide were dying out as more people preferred living in the local high-rises.

Next was Repulse Bay. Other than being a really nice beach (not littered with trash like the nearby Deep Water Bay Beach), it was notable for its collection of Taoist and Buddhist sculptures, including a Buddha whose tummy has been blackened in the name of good luck.

After was Stanley. I had been to Stanley once before, though I didn’t blog about it. It’s a nice little town (with skyscrapers) on the south side of the island. It’s home to many ex-pats and Stanley Market, which reminds me so far the most of American Chinatowns of anything here.

My favorite parts of Stanley, though, are the Murray House and inhabiting Hong Kong Maritime Museum (which I have not visited) and two temples, one claiming to be the oldest building in Hong Kong and the other with a giant Guan Yin (a Taoist goddess turned Buddhist bodhisattva) statue that looks over the area.

From Stanley, we were off to the Naval Museum on the northeast side of the island. The buildings themselves were built by the British as a lookout for the colony. It had decent exhibitions of the naval history of the Ming and Qing dynasties (the last two) as well as decent views of Victoria Harbor.

With that we were taken back to the university. Not quite as tired as the day before, we went to bed to get up for classes