Our Journey to Hong Kong began at very early at 5:15am when we woke up to get ready for our 45minute ride to the Taipei International Airport. We arrived early and figured out how to get our tickets. When I went through immigration I waited at the booth while the lady swiped my passport. Then she got on the phone and this man came. He didn't explain what was going on, he just took my passport and motioned that I follow him. I was really nervous because my Mandarin is terrible and Alan was already through. I was super confused because I got into the country just fine so what was the problem now with me leaving? They took me into this back room and photocopied my passport then we went to this other booth where I stood for 10 minutes while this old man tried to figure out how to do something on the computer. Then this younger guy came and helped him and I got my passport back and the ok to go. We were on our way to Hong Kong!!!
The Taipei international Airport has tons of Hello Kitty.
This is a Hello Kitty display by the restrooms. Below is a Hello Kitty painting. There were several more of these through out the airport. There was a Hello Kitty play area, a Hello Kitty store (not as surprising), Hello Kitty plastic statue and even Hello Kitty airport chairs in one of the waiting areas. I was so stoked. Alan was embarrassed that I made us look like the other Asian Tourists taking pictures. yes I did wait in a line to take my picture there.
We exchanged our Taiwanese money for Hong Kong money. I think the Hong Kong money below is so pretty looking.
So after we landed in Hong Kong we had the difficult task of locating our Hotel. I found it on the map. We asked the information desk people which bus we should take and we hopped on. The ride took a long time, about an hour. The bus driver said he would tell us when our stop was....but he forgot. I was trying to follow along on the map, but I got distracted by the super tall buildings and all the cute shops. So we actually went past our stop. When we got off we had to walk back. It took us about 20-25 minutes to walk back to our hotel and we both so tired from waking up early that morning. Let's just say we were a bit cranky carrying all our stuff down the streets of Kowloon. To top it off it was raining a little bit, but when we got to our hotel it was almost pouring. The first thing we bought in Hong Kong was two umbrellas for our stay there. (Don't worry, they were cheap. It was also worth it because it rained everyday almost nonstop while we were there.) We finally made it to our Hotel the Kings de Nathan.
When we checked in they let us know about the deposit. Deposit? What deposit? Nobody told us we had to pay a deposit? They told us we needed to pay $500 Hong Kong dollars which we could pick up when we checked out. This is about $80USD and about half the money we brought with us. We were wet and tired, not the happiest thing for us to hear. So we decided that we would wait til after we checked out to buy the things we wanted. The lobby people were nice enough to check out a power converter so we could charge our computers. (I don't care if they have a deposit thing or not, but I wish someone would have told us that was to be expected or maybe I should have looked it up on the internet, but I just didn't think about that.)
Our hotel room was equipped with two twin beds which we pushed together and it felt just like we were back home in Taiwan. hehe. The room was a bit small as Alan could reach from wall to wall. But it was not like we were throwing a dance party or anything so it was fun.
In case you were ever planning on going to Hong Kong I am going to honest about the hotel we stayed in. Staying at the Kings de Nathan was interesting. The first morning we woke up to the sound of knocking on our door, "house keeping." I thought to myself, didn't I put up the "do not disturb sign"? I yelled NO THANK YOU! I didn't not want to get out of bed. Then she knocked again and opened the door, the chain was up and again I said no thank you. (Alan was there, but he was sleepy and really confused and didn't say a word.) She closed the door and left. Then I just had to know. I got up and looked outside our door and sure enough....there was our Do Not Disturb sign written in English and Chinese and on the wall to the right of our door was a second electronic, Do Not Disturb sign that I had turned on after we got to the hotel. So why did she insist on coming in? (This experience reminds me of an experience one of my brothers told me about, but this was slightly less awkward.)
Later after we were home for an afternoon nap the knock at the door came again and there was the lady this time there was a problem with the phone and they had to fix it. Then later that day they came and changed the entire lock/handle on our door. I've never had the house keeping people so often in my hotel room. It almost felt like they were there as much as we were. (exaggeration) But hey, we are cool people so I can totally understand why. jk.
I was still kind of in a bad mood from the lack of sleep the night before and so I am sure all of this has tainted the light in which I viewed these events. One plus was the beds were so soft. Alan and I haven't slept that good in a long time. The thing interesting about this hotel is its energy saving methods. The lights and air conditioning will only stay on if the key card is a metal electronic slot on the wall. You only have one key card so when you leave the room you have to take the card with you. So you take the card out of the slot and then everything turns off. (lights air conditioning.) I thought it was pretty neat. I could complain about several more problems I had with this hotel, but I won't. In my defense usually I don't care and am pretty easy to please, but so you understand, I was so happy to get back to our one room bathroom/toilet combo apartment in Taiwan.
When we were in Hong Kong we went and got cheap massages, we went shopping and we went to the night market in Kowloon on Temple street and we ate and we slept and watched movies in our hotel. Not super adventurous, but it was fun.
Because our Hotel made us check out at 12:00p we had to leave for the airport early even though our flight didn't leave till 7:00pm.
About one hour later we arrived at the airport.
The Hong Kong International Airport is beautiful. It was designed by a famous architect Foster and Company. According to Wikipedia, The Hong Kong International Airport was voted as one of the Top 10 Construction Achievements of the 20th Century at the ConExpo conference in 1999. I have to write about it for one of the independent study classes I am taking right now.
But lucky for us our flight was delayed and we didn't end up leaving the airport until around 9:30p! So we got to stay in this beautiful airport EXTRA long. At this point we were wishing we had brought more money with us to exchange. We hadn't planned on being in the Airport so long and since we have neglected to inform the bank about our move credit cards were no good. We didn't want to bring too much cash...just to be safe. So it was a long wait at the airport with a very hungry Crys. Alan was such a good sport. But we were not without entertainment....
It was funny to see this crazy American in the middle of the Hong Kong Airport, pull out his Yoga mat and get to salutating. Haha. Anyways, the Chinese family sitting by us kept pointing and asking, what is he doing? We overheard and we started a conversation. Found out they actually speak pretty good English. There was a couple and the girlfriend's parents. They had traveled to Hong Kong from Northern China just to go shopping. Apparently, Hong Kong is cheaper. They were surprised, like every other person in Taiwan, by how young we were and being married. They translated a bag I bought at the night market in Hong Kong. It says, "Serve the people wholeheartedly" It is a saying from Chairman Mao. They laughed and suggested I not wear it around Taiwan. Eh, I suspected it said something like that... it is still a cool bag. Besides it is written in cursive Chinese...hardly legible. After they left to catch the plane it was just Alan and I. We walked around the mall area a few times and headed to our gate as soon as it was posted....remember our flight was delayed. Oh and the internet was not working! It was so slow! So we just had our iPod and iPhone to play on. Alan and I played a game of Chinese Chess on the board he bought in Hong Kong.
Finally we boarded the plane and flew back to Taiwan.
When we got into the car with our ride back missed our exit and it took us an extra 40 minutes to get home. She laughed and said, it's ok, we'll just take the scenic route. She had no idea how we were feeling. A scenic route is not very scenic at 12:00am when you are hungry and tired. I was pretty frustrated with all the delays it took us to get home. But now I can laugh and think wow that was a ridiculous trip.
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