Hong Kong Day 44 -- Heading Home

This morning I woke up at 6 (6am Tuesday in HK, 3pm Monday in CA) to finish getting ready and to head down to the airport.  We walked over to a bus stop to catch the “airport express” bus.  It is a city bus, similar to the others, but it has a bit of extra space for luggage.  It also only makes a few stops so it gets there pretty quick.  I was planning on taking a cab to the Kowloon MTR station and then take the airport express MTR, but decided that this would be easier.  The MTR allows you to check in at the station and they can take your baggage but they also charge for the service.  This was the main reason I was thinking of taking the MTR, but Samantha had mentioned the bus, and after looking into it, the bus seemed to be the better option.  I am really glad that I took it, there was a nice view of Hong Kong from the bus, I could see the mountains and parts of the city as well as the bay.

The bus stopped right outside the terminal, so I was able to just walk in and go to the counter to check in.  I had checked in online last night so all I had to do was drop off the luggage and get my boarding passes.  There weren’t too many people at the airport so security was really quick and then I went in to get some breakfast while I waited for the plane.  I had  some money left on my Octopus card (the card used for all public transportation) so I used that to buy breakfast.  I got porridge, shrimp dumplings, and pork pastries.  It was only around $7 US for all of that.  After eating I headed down to the gate to wait to board the plane.  We boarded and then headed to Tokyo, a 4 hour or so flight.  The flight from Hong Kong to Tokyo was with ANA and they had TV screens on the back of the seat in front.  It had movies, TV shows, music, and a map of where the plane was and a camera from the front of the plane. There was also a video game controller and they had a few games that you could choose from.

We landed in Tokyo, and had to take shuttles to the terminal.  Once we got to the terminal we went through security and then were able to head to our gates.  I waited in a line for connecting flights, something that I'm not sure I had to do, because once I got to the counter she said that she would reprint the boarding pass.  After finishing with that, I stopped by a shop in the airport and picked up a couple of things.  I was planning to get some food, but the line took a long time, so I didn't end up having time.  We got food on the flight, so it was fine to not get any.  The flight from Tokyo to SFO was about 9 hours long and was really smooth.  I watched a few movies during the flight, Wreck It Ralph, Admission, and Monsters Inc.  Tried to sleep some also, but I wasn't really able to, so I just watched a bunch of movies.  

Got to SFO and headed down to customs.  Getting through customs was really quick and easy, there were quite a few people, but there were also a lot of agents checking everyone.  Went over to baggage claim after customs, and waited for the luggage to come out.  There were a lot of bags out, and there were two big flights on the carousel so there were airport employees taking some bags off and putting them on the floor.  It took some time for our flight to start coming out, but my bags were pretty early, so it wasn't too long of a wait.  Got my bags and then headed out to get picked up.

Mom picked me up, and then we went to see Uncle Brad, Mia, and Reece for a bit on the way home.  It was really fun to see them, and I even got a burger that totally hit the spot!! We spent some time there for a while, and I was able to play some games with Mia and Reece.  We headed home after a couple of hours in Pacifica.  Fresh/raw food and salads aren't very common in Hong Kong, I had 2 salads the whole time, so I was really craving some fresh food, and also some bread.  We went to Sweet Tomatoes for dinner, and I definitely got my money's worth.  I had 2 big plates of salad, a couple of bowls of soup, some bread and muffins, and also tapioca pudding for dessert.  It all totally hit the spot, and tasted so good.  We got home and I watched the Giants game for a little while, but I had been awake for a long time so I was having trouble staying awake.  I went to bed at 9:30, had been awake for 30 hours, with 17 of that on the airplane or between flights.

Bus ride to the airport

Bus ride to the airport

Crossing the bridge

Crossing another bridge

View from the bus

Bridge

Hong Kong Day 43 -- Walking around Hong Kong

And now it is all posted.

Partial post.  Finishing it on the plane and will post when I get to Japan!!

Today was my last day in Hong Kong.  Samantha had her first day of research/work, so she had to get up early for that.  I got up at the same time and we took a bus over to Hong Kong island.  I got off in Wan Chai and walked around there for a bit.  Picked up a few little buns and stuff for breakfast and stopped at another little shop and then headed over to Causeway Bay to look for some note cards.  There is a bookstore at Hysan Place that I thought might have some, but they didn’t really have what I was looking for.  I got a smoothie and a piece of prawn toast (thick piece of bread with a butterflied and fried piece of shrimp), which was really good.  I also sent by the Hong Kong Jockey Club to try to go to the racing museum, but it is closed on Mondays.

After eating, I headed down to Wan Chai to go to lunch with some people from the office.  I went to the 10^th floor to say goodbye to the people that we had been around for 6 weeks, and then went up to the 20^th floor to meet up with Ana.  Kathy is also here for a few more days, so we both went down there to go to lunch and see people one more time.  Lunch was with Ana, Mark, Vivek, and Nicholas.  We went to the Indian buffet that we went to near the beginning of the trip.  It was nice to see them all one more time, the food was really good and really filling.   We finished lunch and then went back to the office to get one more picture and then headed down to Admiralty to go to Hong Kong park.

We got to the Admiralty MTR station and went out to go to Hong Kong Park, for a tea lesson.  The lesson is at a tea shop next to the tea museum, it wasn’t until four and we finished with lunch around two.  I was there a few weeks ago, and it was really neat, but it was really rainy so I wanted to go walk around it again in better weather, so we decided to go.  We entered the park at the Admiralty end, took escalators from the station and the Pacific Place mall which is next to the station.  

There is a fountain near the entrance that has water flowing down all the way around.  There are a couple of spaces where they have the water stopped so that you can walk into it and stand inside the fountain.  We took a few pictures here.  It is really loud once you are inside, you can hardly hear anything that is going on outside.  After the fountain, we walked down along the pond to the Olympic Square.  It was dedicated in 2005, and has a connection to the 2008 Beijing games.  There are steps around the side, we walked to the top of that and took a few pictures.  After we finished looking at it, we walked over towards the aviary.  On the way to the aviary we stopped at a SARS memorial and tai chi garden.  The SARS memorial had statues of people who had been involved with the 2003 SARS epidemic.  

Past the memorial, there was a vantage point, a 30-meter tower with 105 steps spiraling up.  We climbed up, and it was really hot out, so we were tired, hot, and sweaty when we got to the top.  There was a nice breeze up there, so it cooled us down pretty quickly, it felt really good.  The view from the top of the tower was really pretty, we could see a lot of the park and also other parts of Hong Kong.  There were a few spots that we could also see the harbor through the buildings.  We could see the top of the aviary, which was right next to the tower.  We climbed down and then walked over to the aviary.

It was much nicer to walk through the aviary this time, since the roof is mesh, it was really wet and drippy last time.  This time it was dry so we weren’t having to hold umbrellas or anything, and it was a lot easier to look at the birds.  There were the same kind of birds as last time, a few others were flying around.  We saw a couple of parrots on perches eating ears of corn.  Near the end, there was a little pool of water in one of the branches of a tree, and there were 3 birds all playing in it.  A couple flew away, leaving just one, and then a different bird came flying and chased the first ones off.  

We finished walking through the aviary and then walked over to the conservatory to spend a few minutes looking at some flowers.  There was only about 20 minutes from when we got done with the aviary to when the tea lesson started, so we didn’t have a lot of time in the conservatory.  Because of this, we decided to just look at a little bit of it before starting to walk back to the tea shop.  We went into a room that had a bunch of different orchids.  They were really pretty, nice and bright.  I love orchids, so it was neat to see so many all in one place.  As we walked out of the conservatory there was a nice waterfall that the path goes behind.  We walked down to the main path and then headed over to the tea shop for the lesson.

Vana and Samantha joined Kathy and I for the tea lesson.  The tea shop is really neat, they have a little cafe or restaurant where you can have afternoon tea, a meal, or dim sum.  They have a wall of different types of tea and also have different tea ware for sale.  They had a table set up near the entrance for the lesson, and had it all ready for the lesson, with some tea out and also the tea pots and cups.  We sat down and then the lesson started.  She gave a little bit of history about tea, and then started making tea.  

The first tea that we had was their green tea.  This tea was brewed with cool water (room temperature), which keeps it from getting too bitter.  She passed around a bowl of the dry tea leaves for us to smell and look at, and brewed the tea in a glass.  To brew the green tea, she put the leaves in the glass and then added some water and stirred it some in order to get it to brew faster since it was a class and time was limited.  She poured out the tea into a small pitcher and then passed around the wet tea leaves for us to smell.  It was a very different smell from the dry tea leaves, the wet leaves almost smelled like chicken or some other kind of meat or even a meat soup/broth.  She added some boiling water to the cool tea and then poured it into cups for us to taste.  This tea was really good, there was barely any bitter taste, a lot of times green tea can be pretty bitter.

After we tried the cool-brewed green tea, she brewed some with hot water so that we could compare the taste.  She poured hot water over tea leaves and then poured this into a pitcher very quickly.  The tea probably only brewed for a minute or less before being poured out.  She brewed enough for everyone to try and then we got to taste it.  This was much more bitter, it was a very different taste being brewed with hot water than it was when it was brewed with cool.  Everyone at the class enjoyed the cool-brewed version better.  

The next tea that we had was a red tea.  She put some tea leaves into a cup and used hot water to brew this tea, rinsing it once before brewing.  We were able to smell and look at this tea when it was dry, and did the same for all of the other tea that we tried.  Rinsing the tea isn’t really to clean it, it is to wake up the leaves and moisten them some.  She poured water on top of the tea leaves and put a little cover on to brew the tea.  Like when she brewed the green with hot water, this tea didn’t brew for very long.  Just a minute or so and then she poured it into the pitcher.  She had to make a few batches so that everyone could try some, and mixed the batches together so that everyone had the same taste.  The tea changes a little bit every time it is brewed, whole tea leaves can get 3-5 batches, possibly a few more.  The first batch will be the least strong, and then it gets a bit more strong with each batch before getting less flavorful again.  The red tea was also really good, it was a little bit fruity in a way.

After the red tea, we got to try Oolong tea.  First she made red oolong  This tea was my favorite I think, this time she brewed it in a little tea pot.  Everyone at the table commented about how small it was, but she said that it was actually large for tea.  It was about the 4 inches in diameter and only a couple of inches tall.  There were two different tea pots, one was short and fatter around and the other was a bit taller.  The pot that you use depends on what kind of tea is being brewed.  It depends on which direction the tea will expand.  This time, she made and served it “kung fu style.”  Everything moving in circles, and placed the cups together so that they fit the right style.  There were four cups placed together (sort of in a square), and then the teapot next to them.  She placed the lid on the middle of the cups.  She talked about how everything needs to be done in circular motions.

Then she started to make the tea.  First she poured hot water in to prep the pot, and she poured this water out into the cups.  She filled the pot almost all the way up with the tea and then poured water in to rinse the tea, and poured this over and into the teacups.  Then she poured the hot water in to brew the tea.  She let it brew for just a minute or so and poured it into the cups, going around in circles over all of the cups to make them have them all as even as possible with the flavor.

Next we had green Oolong.  It was pretty similar to the regular green tea, but had a few other flavors.  She brewed this in a cup like she did with the red tea (regular not oolong), and then poured it into pitchers so that everyone could try it.  This was good, but not quite as good as the red oolong, and not as simple as the regular green tea.  This was the last tea that we had with the official class, she also made some white tea but some people had left by then.  The white tea did not have very much flavor.  It was very mild.  I bought some tea from the shop they have it all available to taste so that you can see what each one tastes like before you buy it.  

After we were done, we walked back to the Admiralty MTR station and took MTR over onto Kowloon to go to the Goldfish market and the Temple market.  We got off in Mong Kok and walked over to the Goldfish market.  It is pretty impressive, it is a whole block with pet shops and fish shops all along it.  There are terrariums with turtles and different bugs outside some of the shops.  All along the street there were a bunch of shops with cats and dogs too.  So many puppies and kittens in cages playing.  These shops were very popular, lots of people were in there looking at them and they even had some out where people could pet them.  The shops with fish were very impressive.  They had bags of fish tied up on racks in the front, and then had tanks inside.  There were beta fish, gold fish, and other types of fish.  One shop had a full wall of tanks that you could look at from outside, there was a little alley next to it that had the tanks. 

At the end of it, there was a stall with street food, and around the corner there was a little shop selling juice.  They had coconut juice and sugarcane juice.  Vana, Kathy and I got coconut, and Samantha got sugarcane.  They had a juicer for the sugarcane, and he took a long stock and ran it through to get the juice.  The coconut juice had coconut water, coconut meat, and a little bit of evaporated milk.  He put the juice and some meat in a blender and turned it on and let it run for a while.  Then he added ice and a little bit of evaporated milk.  The blender was completely full.  He poured this into a pitcher and then poured that into cups for us.  The milk was very rich, it had all of the pulp and texture from the meat.  The combination of coconut meat and evaporated milk made it very creamy too.

After the goldfish market, we walked from there to Jordan where the Temple market is.  It was a couple of kilometer long walk, and didn’t take too long but it felt like a really long time because it was so warm. We walked around the market for a while and then headed home.  Vana took the MTR back, Kathy got on a bus to go to her hotel, and Samantha and I got on a bus to go back to her grandma’s house.  We got home and I finished packing up to get ready to go.

Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Crown Relocations Truck near The Pawn

Wan Chai Fire Station

From the Tram

Hong Kong Jockey Club

Hong Kong Jockey Club

Hong Kong Day 42 - Wetlands

Today we got to a bit of an early start, which was really nice.  We didn’t wake up really early, but we got going pretty quickly after getting up.  Left around 9:30 to go get breakfast and then head out to new territories.  We went to a place near the house that is famous for their porridge.  Samantha’s grandma ordered porridge for all of us, with different fillings.  I’m not sure what hers had, but she ordered one with pork and “thousand-year” egg and one with beef and peanuts for Samantha and I to choose which we wanted.  I decided to stay on the safe side and took the beef one.  I did try a piece of the egg from Samantha’s, and it was a bit different, I’ve never had thousand-year egg, and it isn’t necessarily something that I will have again.  The porridge was really good, nice and warm and flavorful.  It also filled me up for a long time.  We ordered some donuts to go with the porridge, these donuts are two connected sticks of dough that are fried.  They were really good, I may have to get some more somewhere before I leave.  We also got flat rice noodles in two different forms, one was just the rice noodles rolled with no filling, and the other was wrapped around a donut.  They both had sauce on them, and were both really good.  They make the noodles at the restaurant.  

After we ate we got on a bus to Jordan so  that we could take the MTR out to New Territories and the Wetlands Park.  We got on the MTR at the Austin station and took it to Tin Shui Wai.  We walked out of the station and went to see a pagoda that is right next to the station.  It is part of the Ping Shan Heritage Trail, a trail that goes through old villages and other structures.  This pagoda is at one end of the trail.  It was really hot when we got there and we wanted to go see the Wetlands Park so we didn’t walk on any more of the trail.  We went back to the station and got on the light rail out to the station for the park.

The light rail ride was pretty quick, it was also pretty crowded, a lot of people were taking it.  Since we took the MTR to get to the light rail, the ride to the park was free.  We got out of the light rail and went up onto the overpass to get across the street and walk to the park.  As we were walking you could see all of the trees and plants that are part of the wetlands, and they are right next to the road and big apartment buildings.  It was an interesting contrast to see the natural area and then see all of the man-made structures and road.  There were quite a few people at the Wetlands Park.  It has a lot of indoor exhibits, a fish tank near the entrance and then exhibits about different types of wetlands.  They also had other animals that are found in the various types of wetlands.  

After we walked through the indoor exhibits we started to go outside but it was raining pretty hard so we decided to eat first instead.  We ate at the little cafe inside, Samantha and I both had soup with fish balls and pork chop.  After we ate we walked through the gift shop and then went outside.  Right outside the building there is a display with a salt water crocodile that was found in the wetlands (they think she may have been a pet that was dumped in the river).  We couldn’t really see her because she was down in a little hole type of thing or something, so all we saw was a tail.  

We walked through all of the wetlands area, they have walkways, and you can walk over the marsh and ponds.  There are different ponds and streams too.  The plants are really neat and there were some really pretty flowers and pods on the plants.  It was still raining as we were walking so it was kind of hard to take pictures, but I was able to get a few good ones.  We saw a few dragon flies, and there were quite a few fish and other water animals.  The dragon flies were right next to the path, and I took some neat pictures of those.  There is also a fish called “Mud Skipper” that there were a bunch of at one point in the walk through the wetlands.  These are really funny looking fish, they hop around on the mud with their front fins, which is really odd looking.  I took a video of it and you can kind of see what they look like.

The wetlands closes at 5, so the employees start telling everyone to get ready to leave around 4:30.  We walked back out to the visitors center where we started, and they were all there telling us that it was closing.  We then walked over to the light rail and took it back to Tin Shui Wai.  From there we took the MTR to Mei Foo to get on the Tsuen Wan Line to head over to Mong Kok and the ladies market.  We walked through the ladies market, I bought a few things, including a panda on a knotted string to hang in my room.  We ate at a restaurant down in Mong Kok, I had tom yum soup with noodles and king prawns for dinner.  The soup was really good, and made me crave Thai food, the broth was so good.  The noodles were spaghetti noodles, but tasted good, and the shrimp was cooked perfectly.  We then went over to wait for a mini-bus to head back to the house.  

Porridge and donuts

Pagoda

Hong Kong Day 41 - Hanging out with Samantha. Temples and yummy food

Today was moving day.  I woke up and finished packing up my stuff.  Samantha came out to Causeway to pick me up and head back to her grandma’s in To Kwa Wan.  We took the bus from Causeway to To Kwa Wan and then walked the block or so to the apartment.  We got to the apartment a a little after 11.  We were at the apartment for a bit and then headed out to get food and do some sight seeing.

We went to get Dim Sum for lunch/brunch.  We walked over to a mall near the apartment, there was a dim sum restaurant inside that I think she goes to quite often.  She is also going next week with 50 other people.  At dim sum here they don’t walk around with carts of food like they do at dim sum places at home.  They used to but stopped doing it because it can waste a lot of food if it is something that people don’t like or want.  We ordered a few things off of the menu.  We had radish cake, fried tofu skin with shrimp and vegetables, pork ribs, shrimp dumplings, a ginger and orange/tangerine gelatin, flat noodles with filling, and meatballs and a bun with custard inside.  It was all really good, only the third time that I’ve had dim sum since we’ve been here I think, so it was nice to have it one last time before leaving.  

After eating, we headed to the bus stop to go down to some temples.  We went to the Sik Sik Yuen Temple in Won Tai Sin.  It is a very large temple and has many buildings on the grounds.  There is also a “good wish garden” that is accessed through the temple.  The Sik Sik temple has areas for three religions, Taoism, Buddhism and Confucianism.  The entire temple is very elaborately decorated.  It is all very colorful and had decorations that stand out quite a bit.  There were a lot of people there, with many there for worship.  It is also a popular tourist destination so there were a lot of tourists there.  We walked around the entire temple, looking at the halls, shrines, fountains, and other items.  We went through the Good Wish garden, it was really pretty, had a lot of large ponds with paths and bridges over and around the ponds.  There were turtles and koi in all of the ponds, and also areas of lotus plants.  

Next we took the MTR to Diamond Hill to go check out the nunnery and gardens.  The same nunnery that Ciara and I went to last weekend, but we went in through the Western Lotus Pond Garden instead of through the gardens.  It was neat to see it all again, especially to contrast the nunnery to the Sik Sik temple.  The nunnery is so natural and peaceful looking compared to the Sik Sik temple.  I also found out that there is not a single nail in the nunnery, it is built using wooden pegs and brackets.  We finished with the nunnery and then walked out through the gardens.

We went back to the mall at the MTR station to get something to drink and rest in the air conditioning for a bit.  It was really warm out and we were walking around a lot.  Samantha and I got lime juice with aloe.  It was nice and cold and tasted really good.  After we finished our drinks, we went down to the bus station, which is next to the MTR station and the mall, to head over to Sai Kung for a seafood dinner.  

There were a lot of people in Sai Kung, it looks like a very popular swimming and boating area.  There are a lot of boats anchored around there, from fishing boats to fancy yachts.  It is a big seafood area, there are many shops along the water with big tanks of seafood.  There was shrimp, fish, crab, lobsters, abalone, clams, and just about anything else you can think of.  Each restaurant has a set of tanks in front, and has people standing outside trying to get people to stop and eat.  Most have tables inside the building and outside with a view of the harbour.  

The food was really good, it was so fresh, it was fairly similar to what we had on the junk ride the other day.  We had soup with crab; mantis shrimp (called “pissing shrimp” here); scallop, broccoli and mushroom stir-fry, steamed scallops with vermicelli noodles and garlic; sautéed/stir-fried vegetables;  lobster with pasta; fried rice; abalone; and steamed fish.  It tasted so good, and we ate so much.  After we finished eating we walked around the little town a bit and then took a bus back to To Kwa Wan.

Hong Kong Day 40 - Last day of work and lunch at the Crown Wine Cellars

Today was officially our last day of work, presentation day.  We went into work a bit early and finished  the final touches for our presentation.  The presentations were in the AOT building, and started at 9:30, so we headed over to there from the Mass Mutual Tower.  Kathy and Yan presented first, then Ciara and I presented, and Evelyn finished off the day.  Ken Madrid, Shen Kong, Magali Delafosse, and all of our sponsors were there for our presentation and also for Kathy and Yan's.  Shen left before Evelyn presented, and Norah Franchetti and a couple of other people joined in via WebEx.  Professor Sawyer was also there via WebEx for all three presentations.  The presentations went well, and we were all relieved when we were done.

After all of the presentations, we went downstairs and got cabs to go to the Crown Wine Cellars in Shouson Hill for dinner.  It is up on a hill about 15 minutes from Wanchai, our cab hit a lot of traffic so it took quite a bit longer, it took 25 minutes to go just a couple of miles, but once we were outside Wanchai it only took a few minutes to get to the wine cellars.  Once there, we walked through the dining rooms to the library.  The general manager came in and talked about the history of the Wine Cellars, and then we started eating.  The Wine Cellars use World War II bunkers, so they are pretty far underground and have 1 meter thick walls and ceilings.  They were used as ammunition storage, so they were made to be very secure.

They had a little buffet set up for us for lunch, it had fruit, salad, steak of some kind, and pasta.  There were also mini sandwiches on the table.  The food was really good, the steak was super tender, and the other things were pretty flavorful.  After eating, we headed back out to the conservatory and took a few pictures and then headed back to the office.  We finished off anything that we had left for our projects and said good bye to people and then went back to Causeway to change and drop things off.

We went back down to Wanchai for happy hour and dinner.  There were a few people who wanted to go out, so we went to Splash for a little while.  Alena, Laurent, Maria, Ana, and Josh were at happy hour with us.  We stayed there for a couple of hours and then went out for dinner.  Ana wanted to take us out one last time, so we went back to the Korean restaurant and she treated us to dinner, which was really nice.  We had fun eating and just talking and then we walked back to our apartments to pack up.  Ciara and Evelyn are leaving Hong Kong tomorrow, Yan's mom came so she will spend a few days with her here and then go to her home in China.  Kathy is going to a hotel and her boyfriend will be joining her to travel for a while.  I will go spend a few days with Samantha Ma before heading home. Apparently we can't see each other in California, so we have to meet up in Hong Kong!!  Looking forward to the next few days.

Crown Wine Cellars

Lunch

In the library

One dining room. One room of a set of two bunkers

Magali, Me, Yan, Ken, Evelyn, Kathy, Ciara, Ana, Louis, Chris 

Last day at Crown