HK Day 5: Central and HKIA

 

Back to Mickey's arms someday, shall we?

We proudly made the most out of our last day, with D banging happily on our door at 8-ish in the morning. “J2′s friend wants to show us around,” she said. We had a good four hours before the agreed pick-up time for the airport, so we ditched plans of returning to Argyle Street (the famous Mong Kok) and instead ventured to Central during “crunch time.”

HK Day 4: Ocean Park

Defying budget constraints and all, we booked for an Ocean Park tour at the last minute for 330 dollars each. But I suggest you just go directly to the amusement park — a day pass is available at 250 dollars, which means our 80 dollars went to the tour arrangements. Unadventurous, I know, but exhaustion had started setting in, so we preferred the tour bus to commuting through the traffic-stricken city on a Monday.

HK Day 2: Kowloon and Disneyland

Go home without an underwear, but never without a Bruce Lee shirt!

Waking up at 7 a.m. didn’t sound like a vacation to us, but we were comforted by breakfast at the Dorsett Cafe. We helped ourselves to a buffet of rice, dumplings, and other breakfast staples like ham and sausages, bread and pastries, and an array of cereals — what we practically had in the next three mornings.

We were picked up at 8 a.m. by Jo, our tour guide for the day. Jo was the typical HK local with her cute fall/winter outfit (it was March, but the weather wasn’t indicative of spring yet), and she was generous with her travel stories. She’s been to Cebu, Japan (where she claimed to devoting her gut to noodles), Europe, and other places, and she urged us to buy things for ourselves — not just pasalubong. “Be kind to yourselves,” flailing her mid-length, curly hair, “because no one else will.”

HK Day 1: Stranded, and Ironing Out the Kinks

Would have loved to take the 20-minute train to downtown

With its efficiency staring you in the face, Hong Kong definitely makes for a good first experience. Ours was a trip far from perfect — I’m still bitter about not taking advantage of the forex rates at the local money changer, which is way better than what we settled for in Kowloon — but it was surely fun. First-day adventures as follows.