I'm back from 2 weeks in Hong Kong, quite a fun town. It's very international and English is very common so there's less culture shock as compared to mainland China. Shanghai is considered international for China, but it has nothing on Hong Kong.
The terrain is very hilly, which allows for lush green hills leading right up to the crowded, vertical metropolis. Although the streets were narrower and the buildings taller, the city didn't seem any more crowded than Shanghai.
Every evening at 8pm the buildings on either side of the bay put on a show, which I was able to observe a few times...
My days were busy with work, but that still gave me a free weekend to see some sights. Anna and I were working on the same project, and since she had been to Hong Kong before, she had some ideas. When she told me there are monkeys in the hills, I insisted we check them out. I was afraid that we wouldn't spot any, but it turns out I had nothing to be afraid of. Unless lots and lots of monkeys are something to be afraid of, which they kind of are.
This one is trying out Will's air guitar move.
At one point, we started photographing a stream of monkeys that were passing us on the path from behind.
Moments later we discovered that they were all joining a feeding frenzy going on in the parking lot just ahead of us. A minivan full of locals were throwing bunches of bananas and handfuls of peanuts out of their open windows. Of course, a sign not more than 50 feet away prohibited this behavior. It was shameless, but made for quite a scene.
(Yes, another sign was also shown in Chinese, so that's no excuse.)
The terrain is very hilly, which allows for lush green hills leading right up to the crowded, vertical metropolis. Although the streets were narrower and the buildings taller, the city didn't seem any more crowded than Shanghai.
Every evening at 8pm the buildings on either side of the bay put on a show, which I was able to observe a few times...
My days were busy with work, but that still gave me a free weekend to see some sights. Anna and I were working on the same project, and since she had been to Hong Kong before, she had some ideas. When she told me there are monkeys in the hills, I insisted we check them out. I was afraid that we wouldn't spot any, but it turns out I had nothing to be afraid of. Unless lots and lots of monkeys are something to be afraid of, which they kind of are.
The first monkey I spotted was sitting on a railing as we started down the trail. I approached it so Anna could photograph me and my new buddy, but the feelings were not mutual. He bared his teeth and flattened his ears, so I decided to keep my space after that.
That just the primer. We weren't more than a quarter of a mile down the path before we started seeing monkeys everywhere. As I told Anna repeatedly, I was thoroughly amused.
This one is trying out Will's air guitar move.
At one point, we started photographing a stream of monkeys that were passing us on the path from behind.
Moments later we discovered that they were all joining a feeding frenzy going on in the parking lot just ahead of us. A minivan full of locals were throwing bunches of bananas and handfuls of peanuts out of their open windows. Of course, a sign not more than 50 feet away prohibited this behavior. It was shameless, but made for quite a scene.
(Yes, another sign was also shown in Chinese, so that's no excuse.)
That evening we went to a rugby championship game for a couple of local teams. This was a good primer for next weekend, when we return to Hong Kong for a huge rugby tournament, Hong Kong Sevens. Apparently it's a pretty big deal, and we aren't likely to get tickets unless we're willing to pony up. Oh well, if it comes to that there are plenty of other things to do in Hong Kong.
The next day Anna and I took the bus to Sai Kung, a former fishing town. We met up with a friend of hers and hiked for hours through the steep hills. Oddly enough many of the trails were paved, even when we were far from any dense population. We were very fortunate to get warm 75 degree weather and clear skies, and I'm hoping our luck holds out again next weekend for our return.
We hiked on the MacLehose Trail, leg 5 I believe. In the above pic, you can see the trail snake down the hill and back up again in the distance. This was the end of our hike so we caught a bus in the valley below.
And this gave me a chuckle when I saw it near a downtown shopping center. How does she explain this to her great grandchildren?
The monkees take the cake man... I was just hoping to see some poo flinging action.
ReplyDeleteI really couldn't get enough of those monkeys. I don't recall who told me, but I heard a story of monkeys leaping onto a person's backpack and unzipping it to seek out treats while clinging to the person. That would have been cool to see.
ReplyDeleteBefore we came across most of these critters, a couple of older ladies were walking towards us on the path with sun umbrellas poised like shields, and walking sticks wielded like monkey-be-good sticks. They warned us that the monkeys were aggressive, but I didn't experience that. Maybe those little primates were able to smell their fear.
I'm sure glad I didn't get poo flinged.