hong kong
As a public school teacher in Korea, I have almost 6 weeks off teaching in January and February. During this time, D and I decided to take two weeks of holiday and head south. Hoping to add to my list of 'cities I could live in', we took advantage of a cheap flight from Seoul to Bangkok, via Hong Kong. It seems a lot of international flights around Asia have stop overs in cities like Hong Kong, Taipai, and Tokyo, and with many tickets, you can extend your stay in the stop-over city for several days without an extra fee. Thus, we decided to spent three days in the former British colony before flying to Thailand.
I could definitely live in Hong Kong. Though it's a bit too civilized for D's taste, I loved being in such a modern city that still offered traditional Chinese culture. Sure, it's more expensive than Seoul, but it's also cleaner! You can get any kind of food, electronic, or clothing you can imagine. It has the outdoor markets, and street food of all Asia cities, but you can hop on the subway for a few stops and find yourself in a road that could easily be mistaken for NYC. I can easily say that Hong Kong is the most international city I've been to. We heard dozens of langauges being spoken, and saw people from all over the world. It's full of vibrancy, colour, and culture. I especially liked the odd mixture of architectural styles and shapes. Examples, here.
I was happy to simply wander around Kowloon for hours, but there were some stand out things we had to do before we left. My favourite parts of Hong Kong were the ones that gave me a view. We took a tram up to "The Peak", which is a small tourist village at the top of Victoria mountain on Hong Kong Island. It gives you the quintessential view of the city, and gets your heart beating with excitement. It was almost as good as the shots from "The Dark Knight". The other place I loved was the Tian Tan Buddha on Lantau Island. To get there, you can either take a bus (boring!) or take a gondola on a 20 minute trip up and into the mountains. We decided to splurge (which happened a lot in Hong Kong) and took the gondola on the way up. We made the trip near the end of the day, as the sun was starting to set, and it was one of the best moments of the whole trip. Sadly, the gondola windows do not make for good photographs. But, I love that you can travel for 30 minutes from the city center and then find yourself out in the mountains.
