Suffering a great jet-lag, we got on a cultural tour of Hong Kong, organized by Stephen. I found it on the couch surfing events and was very excited to learn something new. The huge guide was sitting on the coffe table and was waiting to be picked up. I always like to hear a human voice rather than get digital or written information, and Stephen was just excellent. He showed us his city with a lot of emotion and answered every question.
So, let me try to show you the beauties that we saw.
We met Stephen at the Sheung Wan train station, where he explained the old city centre was. For the Chinese at time of the Opium war, it was hard to live in the very city centre where all the fighting has been done, so they started to move at the close area near by - Sheung Wan. Even today, those two areas are close to each other- just a station away by metro, but you could really see the difference. While the centre is modern, full of shopping malls, new age buildings, in the olden part the charming ancient spirit rules the streets: colorful signs advertising everything from foot massages to dry fish, enchanting smells of delicious food coming from everywhere, as the local tiny food shops are very visited. Cars honking, lots of people chatting while rushing the streets in an unorderly manner, here I really felt welcomed to Asia. It's not that we didn't enjoy the central part, where we ran for delicious French made burgers the very second day (jet lag food), I really liked Hong Kong in the parts where the tall buildings ground themselves, at the very bottom where the colors, smells and people are.
Stephen later took us through the dry fish street, that's of course the local name for it, I forgot the actual name :). It got its name for all the shops that sell dry products to make a soup, which funnily is as important as in Croatian culture- as a child you are not allowed to eat anything else before you finish the soup. Just the ingredients are a bit different: everything is dried or smoked for preservation and judging by the smell, the taste of it is amazing (still haven't had the opportunity to taste it). All the mushrooms, dried fish stomachs, nuts, noodles was so neatly stacked away and some of it still drying on the streets and had its own place in this seamed chaos.
Later we went to discover other wonders, but I don't think it would be fair to Stephen to revile everything, so I will stop there, and invite everyone who is once in Hong Kong to find him on couch surfing.
The group later went to sightsee the Central part, but jet lag was sneaking up from behind, so I had to go take a nap.
The evening was spent just walking around the street unsuccessfully trying to find the dumplings place, but found a cute little restaurant and afterwards a bar. A little heads up: the beer in restaurants is way cheaper than in bars, so if you are on a budget, just stay wherever you were eating to drink the beer.
Me being first time in Asia, I came with a lot of prejudice (just finished readin Jules Verne: Around the world in 80 days IN FRENCH!!), but Hong Kong's beauty and soul blew me away. Sadly, the three days have passed and we have to leave this beautiful view on the harbor
And go.
There are some photogrammas for you to see the city the way I saw it:
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