Hong Kong

iterinary for HK trip.

day 1 sat: reached Ting's house at 1pm. Had lunch 4 pax, + maid and baby. went to the "botanical gardens" just 2 escalator stops below the condo. why " "? cos it's really a ZOO! i was really amazed cos it's free of charge and there were a lot of beautiful birds and monkeys. There was supposed to be a jaguar as well, but we didn't see it. Ting, husband and baby then went home for baby to sleep while meow and i proceeded down the escalators to ride the MTR. ended up just shopping at the IFC. Bought something for mum. dinner with Ting and James at a restaurant in central.

after dinner, all 3 of them went home and i met Sampson for desert and KTV. good fun. checking into KTV was amazingly quick! I thought SG KTV people were already very quick, but in HK, the time between "Hi" and "room 16" was barely a minute. The small room we had included a personal bathroom. i'm impressed. A lot of cantonese songs and Sampson sang a lot of them that i've never heard before.

day 2 sun: went to eat wan ton noodles, which weren't very good, in my opinion, and caused minor allergic reaction in me... too much msg? Finally reached MRT and went to Disneyland. wow quite expensive. Good fun. will post some pictures later. Dinner at home with Ting and James.

day 3 mon: went to office. met doris, kathryn, sampson, dexter, gary cheng and team, grace kim and team, hkdeqs folks briefly, Andy and his cute girl colleagues, Vivian from SCB and almost Simon SCB in Kow loon.
Went for dinner with Andy and Vivian (intentional.. cos she's really cute). Could see that Andy was quite impressed and she was no less impressed by him. Oh well, smirk smirk.

day 4 tues: went to Edinburgh office to meet Ahmad. Went to LV shop had a really bad experience trying to spend 1500 SGD on a bag. Sales girl thought i was too cheap and didn't want to serve me, preferring to serve the mainland Chinese who showed more promise. i'm ignorant... 1500SGD too cheap? what is that bag made of anyway? GOLD?
Took a cab, trying to get to Mong Kok... cab driver accepted me as passenger, but was evidently very reluctant. Asked him why - in English, he murmured something incoherant. Asked him again in Chinese, he ignored me completely, pretending that i was talking to his chair. Gave up... had to reiterate in my bad bad Cantonese and he suddenly became very chatty. What The...! Apparently, he didn't like to "cross the sea" cos it's very time consuming. Ok Fine! I got off and took the ferry.
Met a Chinese guy from Dong Bei and he, more than any HKers i met, was actually helpful, and was charitable to me, (wanting to beep me onto the ferry, thinking that i didn't have a ferry card). Not only did he helped me to get onto the ferry, he showed me the right bus to take from his little book of HK maps. Very fatherly and kind. think he's about 45.
walked my little legs off in Mong Kok, bought a lot of dog and cat stuff.. saw a lot of pet shops, bought a packet of yarn (i HAVE to buy something to remember my trip right! sulk) but didn't find the legendary yarn street that sells all the cheap cheap yarn.
had lunch at a Cha Can Ting (Tea house) and the chef was so kind to poor me, who must have looked like a drench kitten with the rain in my hair and bags of shopping (hiak hiak hiak), and gave me an extra bowl of soup which was really yummy. My first experience of nice HK stranger!
Was almost dead by the time i got home at 3, legs protesting with big billboards and red banners tied on the head. packed while waiting for meow to come back from conference and managed to find sometime to play with baby. for some reason, baby was very active, climbing up and down and wanting to crawl all over and finally.... he puked out all his milk, drenching both of us. *guilty* don't ever trust me with ANY baby.

Alright! phew... that's my summary of the trip. Will write thoughts and feelings in more details when inspiration hits me.