Day 130: Exploring Kowloon

First day in Hong Kong, and we were both pretty excited to get out and explore the city. That annoyingly didn't stop us from sleeping in though, and by the time we were breakfasted and ready to roll it was nearly 11am. Our hotel has a free shuttle bus that goes around the downtown of Kowloon, so we hopped onto the 11am bus and caught it down to the waterfront.

Our first destination was Kowloon Park, a large landscaped area in the middle of the city. It's on the site of the old notorious Kowloon Walled City, which was a densely packed (even by HK standards) slum complex where crime, prostitution and gambling were rife. It was demolished in the early 90s and is now a park, and very nice it was too.

Next stop was the Hong Kong History Museum, which had a series of displays about Hong Kong through history, starting with the geological formation of the islands and then moving through stone age settlements, the history with China, the British conquest during the Opium Wars of the 1880s (it's worth noting that Britain fought a war in favour of opium!), the Japanese occupation during WW2, modernisation and development after WW2, up to the eventual handover to China in 1997 where the displays ended abruptly. The displays were fantastic, very immersive (there was a whole section dressed up to look like early 20th century Hong Kong, with shops, houses and so on) and with excellent detail and context. We were both very impressed; the only issue was that it was enormous! After 2 hours we'd only made it halfway, so we ducked out to find a bakery for lunch where we had some savoury buns. Lunch consumed, we went back inside and continued for another 2 hours - thankfully it was free entry!

By the time we finished it was 4pm, so we wandered down to the Kowloon waterfront via some of the shopping centres. There's a few old heritage buildings down here, but not as much as one might expect. As it was approaching evening we waited around and watch the sun set over the Peak of Hong Kong Island across the harbour. Nice environment, and as it was Sunday evening there were lots of people about. Apparently all of the domestic "helpers" (read: servants) get Sundays off, and most of them spend it sitting around in public squares downtown.

After nightfall it was time for dinner, so we headed back north on the MTR (the train system which definitely isn't a subway as large parts of it are above ground!) to an area called Mong Kok. This area is much older and grittier than the waterfront or clean, modern Hong Kong Island across the harbour. This area is like the classic mental picture of Hong Kong, with glitting neon signs in Chinese sprawled out above narrow streets, endless crowds of people, everywhere above you is at least 12 storeys of concrete and air conditioners. This area is also home to Hong Kong's largest street market, known as the Ladies' Market because that's traditionally where women did their shopping. It's now mostly tourist junk and fake products - I was constantly getting hassled by subcontinental gentlemen offering tailored suits and "copy watches". There were also large areas of streets blocked off where older folk were singing karaoke and dancing in the street which looked quite fun (though we didn't partake).

Lots of street food stalls around as well, which we decided to nibble at for dinner. I couldn't find anywhere selling genuine Cantonese street food, so first settled for a huge Korean-style fried chicken. This was basically just a large piece of chicken schnitzel, though it had a few bones at one end which was a little surprising and startling. Later on I found a shop selling takoyaki (Japanese octopus balls) and fries with topping, so I had a bowl of fries with cheese and bolognaise. Interesting combo but very tasty!

Last stop for the night was the nearby Goldfish Market, which is a well-known local highlight. It's exactly what the name suggests - a market for the selling of goldfish. Everything basically happens in side alleys which makes it feel rather shady, though I suppose it's at least reasonably above board. All the fish are sold in little plastic bags, and there are hundreds of these bags hanging off the walls in each stall. Not a great life for the fish, but one hopes they weren't there for too long as lots of the stores were quite busy. A few other marine creatures for sale too, including crabs, turtles, cold water and warm water fish. Even saw a Nemo (clownfish) in one tank, though it was very expensive!

Finally once we'd finished here it was back to the hotel around 10pm after an exhausting day of exploring with lots of walking. I have a feeling we're going to do a lot of walking this week!Read more