Traveling in Hong Kong, Day 2

Tuesday, June 8, 2008
WOW - what a day. To make up for not doing as much as we felt we should have done yesterday (enjoying the first rate hotel room amenities and spectacular view too much!) we decided to pack in a lot today...and man, did we ever!

We had not done the proper research for a good breakfast joint and wanted to save our dim sum experience for lunch or dinner (many locals have this every morning) so we were pretty clueless about where to go to start our morning refueling session. We tried locating a breakfast spot recommended by one of the guide books which apparently did not exist anymore, so, starving and in dire need of caffeine we settled on a mediocre French cafe chain nearby, then hoofed it a quarter mile away to Kowloon Park to take in some local nature. We were hoping to see some folks practicing Tai Chi in the park but found out they only really do that on the weekends and this was a Tuesday. This large park had some interesting gardens, ancient trees, a small (and surprisingly boring) history museum which wasn't fully complete, and a recreation center where we spotted a large sign with a Beijing 2008 Olympics countdown clock.

After walking around a bit we started to realize just how new most things seem to be in Hong Kong, something we weren't quite expecting. We had seen a lot of tall new high rises on the way from the airport to the hotel on the previous day, and we saw tons of tall buildings surrounding Kowloon Park, as well as mid 20th century apartment buildings. It seems as if Hong Kong for so long has focused on destroying the old to make way for the new and has only recently found a new interest in the past. Sounds a lot like Los Angeles!

After exploring the park we decided to check out some of the local markets including the "Ladies Market" in the Mongkok neighborhood where we found some good deals on scarves and souvenirs. Then we headed to the Goldfish Market (link here to an interesting article by a self-proclaimed "fish addict"), a stretch of street with TONS of aquarium stores and bags of fish hanging on racks by the sidewalks. Apparently with living quarters in Hong Kong being so cramped many people own fish as pets because they take up so little space. We also walked through the Flower Market where the most curious item we saw of the day was a plant called the "Golden Orange." We thought for sure this plant was some sort of fruit or vegetable but we recently found out from our friend Philip that it's a plant given out mostly around Chinese New Year because it represents good luck and wealth. We've included a photo of this intriguing plant that looks like a combination of a squash, gourd and a sort of citrus fruit.

Having worn ourselves out by this point and in need of sustenance, we decided to head back toward our hotel and find something to eat. We went back on the subway which we were again thrilled with--so easy to navigate and CLEAN! So clean in fact that you could probably eat off the floor! We didn't want to eat a large meal because Laura had secret dinner plans to celebrate Charles' birthday that evening, and we remembered a story Charles' dad told us about his trip to Asia 20 years ago. It seems that after a week or so in Thailand when the tour group got to Hong Kong everyone made a bee line for McDonald's! His story inspired us and we had seen a McDonald's near our hotel so, yes folks, we decided to explore what a McDonald's in Hong Kong looked (and tasted) like. Would they have any local variations on typical American McDonald's fare? Would they have the Hong Kong equivalent to the French McDonald's Royale with Cheese immortalized in the movie Pulp Fiction? We had to find out...plus we were craving some "tasty" burgers and salty fries!

As we walked into the local McDonald's our first impression was just how immaculate it was and also how packed it was with prosperous looking business people on lunch breaks, mostly neatly dressed in sharp suits or trendy black clothes (we could've been in New York). We were probably the grungiest looking folks there with our khaki pants, colorful shirts and sandals (holdovers from our hot, humid time in SE Asia which now seemed like a lifetime away). We didn't seen any stereotypical Asian dishes that we thought might be found at a Hong Kong McDonald's, but for some reason unknown to us they needed to include a side dish of corn on the menu. (Perhaps this is a way for the McDonald's home office in the US to get rid of all of our surplus corn?)

After our satisfying McDonald's experience (we were sated, but in the end, a McDonald's is just that -- a McDonald's), we headed back to our hotel for a quick nap before beginning our evening's festivities. Our plans were to head over to the Wanchai area on HK island, buy some Super-8 film from Jam, an entrepreneurial friend of Philip's who had a small film studio/screening space nearby, then take the tram up to "the Peak" -- the highest mountain on the island (1,810 ft) for the amazing view, head back down to the Central HK area for some bar hopping, then go to a mysterious restaurant Laura made reservations at for Charles' birthday dinner! Alas, our ambitions got ahead of ourselves and things didn't quite turn out as planned. But that's half of what traveling is all about...

We took the subway over to Wanchai and walked up to the Federal building to meet the mysterious Jam...he was the sole supplier of super-8 movie film in all of HK -- amazing that an area this big would have so few cine-enthusiasts...but perhaps not -- HK is such a progressive, forward-thinking state -- ancient cinema enthusiasts were few and far between. Anyway, we made it up to the 1960s-era building, found the office and found Jam. "I've been expecting you," he said, welcoming us into his modest quarters (space is at a premium here). Jam not only sold Super-8 and Single-8 (Japan's answer to super-8) film but taught classes, held screenings at his onsite microcinema, in addition to directing TV commercials and industrial films. Quite the entrepreneur! He was also quite interesting and we spent awhile hanging out, getting to know the HK cinema scene.

After leaving Jam we headed over to try and find the bus which would connect us to the funicular railway to the Peak. Alas, it was getting dark so we decided to put this off for another day...

Explored the Financial district for awhile. Laura was in her architectural delight as we gazed upon and walked pass some famous building including I.M. Pei's Bank of China building and the HSBC headquarters building designed by Sir Norman Foster, both designed following the principles of feng shui.

Decided to grab a drink at the "sensuous" M-Bar located on the top floor of the Oriental Mandarin Hotel in Central district. Tasty champagne-blended drinks and incredibly addicting lime-spiced chips were consumed quickly. Still getting over SE Asian culture shock, we were impressed with how well-dressed everyone was -- mostly young business-types meeting with friends all dressed in the uniform of choice - trendy black outfits. Excellent service, decor and a "breathtaking view" of Victoria Harbour. Not a bad way to pass the time on birthday cocktails...
In fact, it was amazing! This was one of the coolest bars we'd ever been to--great drinks, stylish crowd, amazing view, and it was Charles' birthday AND we were in Hong Kong! Life doesn't get much better than this!

So, we extricated ourselves from this glorious bar and headed in the direction of the super secret dinner destination. We found our way to Upper Level, Ice House Road. We passed by some contemporary art galleries where we saw the work of artists like Yue Minjun whose work Laura had seen in a New York Chelsea art gallery in fall '07. It was hard to miss his work--repetitious images of a wide mouthed laughing Asian man--a self portrait? At any rate, it was strange yet cool to see the work of this same artist in Hong Kong that Laura had just recently seen in New York. We did some window art gallery shopping for a while, realizing that we were in a higher rent district than earlier in the day, and passed by some pretty swank bars populated by ex-pats/Europeans. While walking around the steep sidewalks of this neighborhood we passed by a burger/hot dog joint whose menu specialized in burgers and dogs named with double entrendres like "Cushin' for the Pushin,'" the "Missionary," and "Debbie Does Dallas."

At this point it was time to head to the main attraction for the evening. A little back story to Laura's master plan to celebrate Chas' b-day...

We had gotten into the habit of watching Anthony Bourdain's show "No Reservations" on the Travel Channel, and had watched his show on Hong Kong within months of our trip. During Bourdain's restaurant adventures in Hong Kong, there was one restaurant in particular that caught Laura's eye...so that's where we went for Chas' b-day...

Bo Innovation! The chef at Bo Innovation, Alvin Leung, (to quote Travel + Leisure): "wears sunglasses in the kitchen and likes to tweak centuries-old Chinese dishes and cooking methods with molecular-gastronomy techniques, such as making froths out of caviar and vodka and air-drying pineapple." This was definitely the place to end our amazing evening by celebrating Chas' birthday! We splurged by ordering the tasting menu which included dishes like a blended caesar salad in liquid form (tasty!), duet of chicken slow roasted in lotus leaf and ponzu sauce, and a trio of deserts that we can't exactly remember but blew our minds. We'd died and gone to gastronomic heaven. It was definitely one of the most culinarily innovative and artistic meals we'd had. We hoped to run into Bourdain himself, but Laura simply bowed to the Bourdain god and was thankful for this fortuitous choice of celebratory meals!

The only downside to our rapturous meal was the hilariously annoying Latin dude seated at a table behind us who continuously blabbed on and on about his cultural knowledge and exploits to his uninterested dining partners. He rambled about his adventures in Mexico City, Las Vegas and New York, none of which made the slightest bit of sense to his captive (and uncomprehending) audience, and laughed over events which only seemed funny to him. (Video was taken but will have to wait).

Our dinner came to an end at last and we had to leave, unfortunately...
We saw the chef on our way out and waved to him grinning ear-to-ear (like our artist friend's--Yue Minjun's--work) like he was a celebrity. He nodded to us knowingly (or so it seemed to us).

We worked our way down the hilly neighborhood where Bo Innovation was located and headed to the Victoria Harbor ferry that everyone recommended taking back to Kowloon. While in the Central neighborhood of Hong Kong, we were reminded of downtown LA with its newly built high rises and above street level walkways. One that we walked on to catch the ferry was a beautiful lit, futuristic, silvery bridge that looked like something out of the opening scenes of the film "Westworld."

We boarded the Star Ferry at night and gazed upon amazing city skyline views on both sides of the harbor. Laura busily snapped photos while Charles shot video. We knew we had to get up early the next day to arrange for a ferry trip to Macau so we headed back to the hotel to crash.