Hong Kong - Day One

Balls. Just managed to delete my post. What was I saying?

Oh, yeah - the hostel has free internet access so I thought I'd update the blog before crashing.

Dragon Airlines are stingy: When I asked for a vodka and diet coke they gave me a 3/4 glass full of diet coke and HALF a miniature vodka. We got little menu cards from them, but by the time they got to my row, the chicken was all gone. I did get three glasses of wine from them though and the dessert was haagen dasz, so it wasn't all bad. Plus I didn't get a fidgetty chatty person next to me and I got to see The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - which I did find a bit of a let down.

The flight was a bit choppy and we landed to steamy greyness. By the time I'd faffed and fiddled with putting contact lenses back in, going through passport, etc, it was chucking it down. By the time I got off the bus, it had stopped. The weather forecast for the next few days is hot and wet. Oh well. Less chance of getting burnt, but shame for the photos.

Found the bus and the hostel really easily. I do like travelling alone. The hostel, The Dragon Hostel, is pretty basic but it's nice and clean and there's tv in the rooms, free internet, etc. My room isn't en suite (I'm a cheap skate), but there's only about 5 rooms sharing the 'bathroom'. I use this term extremely loosely. It's a toilet and a sink and above the toilet is a shower attachment. It's got a pretty strong jet though, but it's weird all the same. It's nice and clean though, so I'm not complaining!

The hostel is in Mong Kok, in Kowloon, and I went for a long wander to get food and figure out what was around here. I know this is a really obvious thing to say, but it seems much more like Taiwan than Tokyo. I'm not sure what I was expecting. There's a buzz I really like and lots of people wandering around and vendors selling foods and drinks and magazines and all sorts on the streets.

My greatest surprise was stumbling across The Goldfish Market. Oh my goodness! Dozens and dozens of shops all selling goldfish! Some of the luckier ones were in large tanks, the not so lucky ones were cooped up in tiny bags. And all sorts of colours. It was amazing to look at - if it wasn't for the part of me that was screaming cruel! cruel! traumatised fish! There was also an assortment of terrapins, turtles, crabs and all sorts waiting to be taken away to be auspicious in someones house (apparantly). I also saw a few nasty nasty pet shops that had poor little (but extremely cute) traumatised bunnies, puppies and kitties cooped up going mad. I hate pet shops but the animals are so cute - but it's SO wrong. I saw one bunny that had gnawed it's leg down to the bone. I felt truly sick. Poor thing.

Of course, I now want to go home and buy lots of fish and have a beautiful tank. I'd never get around to it though. And, if I did, I'd never clean it and they'd probably die. The few times I've had plants they've died as I've forgotten about them.

Had a lovely meal in some restaurant or other that I stumbled across - I love pushing myself to go into restaurants where I know I maybe can't communicate, rather than taking the easy options....

And then checked out some of the many, many, many shops around.

Anyway, there's other people (bastards!) waiting for the internet, so that's it from me for today.