THE LAND OF ROLEX’S

If I could walk for five minutes in Hong Kong without someone offering to sell me a Rolex, it would me a minor miracle. There must be a surplus of them here. It’s absurd. I mean, how many times must a man turn his head, and pretend that he just doesn’t hear the Rolex salesmen?

So I woke up at 5:45 after a few hours of sleep to begin my Hong Kong journey. I was downstairs at 6:30 and waiting for the custodian guy whose name I learned but now forget. It got to 6:45 and he hadn’t shown and I was starting to panic. Then he appears just walking up to my building. Apparently he’d been there before 6:30 but fell asleep in his car somewhere in the parking lot.

I flew Cathay Pacific which is a new airlines for me. The flight to Hong Kong was 3 hours and I had the bulkhead with no one sitting beside me. Therefore, it was a pleasant flight. I had breakfast at the airport which consisted of a sandwich, a donut, and a coffee. I couldn’t find the Starbucks so I made do with Dunkin Donuts coffee and I was surprised. It wasn’t bad.

Getting through Hong Kong customs was no problem. It’s quite a large airport. When I got through, I called the agency and they had my visa issuance number which was good news. It means I can go back to Korea on Monday. I bought a ticket for the shuttle to take me to the hotel and off we went.

It’s hot here. It’s about 90 degrees and humid as hell. I’m not used to it so it seems a lot worse than Texas. It was a real shock to the system. Hong Kong itself is a small area but there should be plenty to do to keep me occupied. It seems I won’t be going to Macau because you need your passport to go, and I had to give mine to the Korean consulate for my visa which I pick up on Monday.

Here’s a street in the daytime. (It’s just as busy at night).


The first thing I did after dropping my bag at the hotel was to go to the consulate to get that squared away. There is a one day turnaround time for the visa. The subway was packed. The streets are packed. There are a lot of people here. Here are some people riding the subway.


Even the ATM’s in the subway’s have lines.


After the consulate I headed back to the hotel, but first I made a Starbucks stop (of course). There’s no point in taking pictures of them anymore because they’re everywhere. It’s not special to see them in any country. My hotel is right beside one.


This hotel charges for the Internet and the connection is lousy. It’s quite the ripoff and it’s been a long time since I’ve had to pay for Internet access in a hotel.

I spent a lot of time debating whether to sign up for tours of just wing it. I’m going with the ‘wing it’ option. I went for a walk in the night time market that doesn’t open until 5PM. It’s junk, junk, and more junk. However, I did make a purchase. I broke down and bought a pocket watch for about $4. I’m such a big spender.


After that I headed down to the harbor and walked around. I hit the walk of stars which has handprints and names of Asian stars and some statues and a nice harbor view. It reminds me of a poor man’s Shanghai. The harbor view there was fantastic. This was nice and I felt there was no comparison.

Here is a dynamite photo of Kwan San’s handprint on the walk of stars.


If you’re ever alone, it’s kind of depressing to do the harbor cruise at night. Actually, they are always bad, but alone they are worse. As I believe I’ve mentioned before, sometimes you can feel really lonely when seeing new things by yourself. I felt that today in Hong Kong. I don’t know why I went on the Harbor cruise. It sucked.

Here are some harbor view pictures at dusk.



I had a decent lasagna for dinner tonight. Only I come to Hong Kong and get Italian food. I’m such an adventurer. I’ve mapped out a full couple of days for myself for Saturday and Sunday. I’ve even found where a good English bookstore is so I can spend even more money. I brought my 2 pairs of shorts with me so I’m pleased about that.

I will be here all weekend in case anyone cares to join me. And I’m disappointed that no one commented on my short video clip of the string performance. Did anyone watch it?

Something I forgot to mention is that earlier this week I received a lovely email from one of my former students. She’s the middle school girl who has the great vocabulary and asked me what horny meant and bought me the pen in Seoul. I was quite touched by her email and I wrote her back telling her that if she’s ever in Seoul to call me and I’ll buy her lunch. (I gave her my number).

I’m copying the email and putting it here. Forget the grammar because it’s awful. It’s just about the sentiment and actually being able to make a connection with a student. I miss Jo Yeun.

i'm jo yeun!! why did you ieave?
i didn' know you will leave ..
i was so surprised ㅜㅜ
i want you back !!!!
where are you now??
are you still here??
out cast said to you forget what kelly said to you
and be happy!! everythings gonna be alright haha!!
and i want so
anyway! i can't leave the massege
if i leave the massege she'll think i'm crazy
becouse i'm no longer your studentㅜㅜ
kelly was bad!! i don't like her
maybe i'll quit the accademy
my purpose was talk to you!!
every student was so sad
even if you will back to the america
i want touch base with you^^
my phone number is 010-9487-7549
if you want call me
you can call me any time~~
i miss you