By this point I’ve posted dozens of stories about various visitors to Hong Kong. Its kind of surprising really, that having visitors is still so much fun. But I like Hong Kong and I really like it when people are brave and adventurous enough to fly all of this way to see this city.
It was really special having Cody and Nicole here. It was the first time in a long time that the three of us got to hang out together for an extended period of time. It was fun to see how much they have really grown up. Neither of them are kids any more! It didn’t take them long to become confident Hong Kong tourists and conquer the public transportation system. Octopus cards in hand they ventured out by themselves into Lan Kwai Fong, Shek O Beach and the Night Market. It was gratifying to see!
Since most of the activities we did together have already been recorded in this blog in one form or another, I’ll just focus on two things we did that were new for me as well as them.
On one of the first truly sunny days we had we went to Ocean Park. Ocean Park is Hong Kong’s equivalent of Six Flags in the US. In fact it was built in around the same time frame, back in the 70’s. It’s located over in Aberdeen on the south side of Hong Kong Island, and like many things in Hong Kong, it’s on a very hilly site (hilly as usual being an inaccurate description – mountainous is more like it!). So, how do you build an amusement park on a mountain? Again, like most things in Hong Kong, you resort to escalators, in this case, a really CUTE cable car system!
I’ve wanted to go to Ocean Park ever since Sandy told me she liked it better than Disneyland. Besides just rides, Ocean Park has an aquarium and pandas. It’s not only fun, but educational! What more could you ask? Cody and Nicole, being young, adventuresome, and always ready for a good time, were perfect visitors to take to this park.
We took the public bus to the lower entrance to Ocean Park, bought our tickets and got oriented. It was a hot day, and even though it was a weekday, its summer break right now for most Hong Kong teenagers and the park was crowded. We had a little trouble deciding which rides to try first. I’m not big on most amusement park rides anymore; ever since morning sickness I just don’t like anything that brings back that “feeling”! They opted for something called the Space Wheel while I just looked around for awhile. The line for the Space Wheel moved slower than we expected, and the ride mainly made them both feel dizzy.
Next we decided to go get seats for the dolphin show. That was a much better choice! Sitting in a shady, breezy auditorium was nice. We even had amusement park hot dogs while we waited for the show to begin! The show itself was great. We got to see dolphins and seals perform with humans. They were SO intelligent, and leaped, jumped and played with the human performers in beautiful patterns. There was some sort of story line, but we couldn’t really follow it because the narrative was in Cantonese, but it didn’t really matter. There was one little dolphin that must have just been learning the routine. Sometimes he did what he was supposed to do, but most of the time he just swam around and tried to get a fish reward whether he had performed a particular trick or not! He was my favorite actually!
After the dolphin show we decided to go to the aquarium. Ocean Park has a very nice aquarium. It’s designed so that it has I think four different viewing levels and as you descend lower and lower you see different marine animals. The aquarium was very crowded, and the people were being very Asian, in all the ramifications of that term. The Japanese were taking photos, the Mainlanders were shoving their way to the front, the Hong Kongers were talking on their mobile phones. It was crowded, noisy…and just beautiful! The marine animals were amazing, and I guess I’ve been here long enough now that the behavior of the crowds didn’t faze me. I no longer feel like people are being rude. No one was acting angry or frustrated; they were just jockeying for the best view and trying to make sure that the little old ladies and little kids in their families could see the fish.
After the aquarium we went over to the “scary” rides. The roller coaster was closed for maintenance, but Cody and Nicole opted for something called “The Abyss” which basically was a giant bungee-cord type ride where you were strapped to a chair, hauled up to the top of a giant tower, and dropped straight down. It looked terrifying to me, but they loved it! I decided I had to go on at least ONE ride so I got in line for something called the Crazy Galleon, which was a giant swing, shaped like a boat. Little kids were going on it so I thought I would be okay…well I survived, but I DID think “what was I THINKING” at several points during the ride.
Our last activity at Ocean Park was riding their cute little cable car down the mountain to the other side of the park and visiting the pandas. Ocean Park has something like six pandas. The sanctuary is very well done. We could see the pandas very closely and watch them eat and play with each other. I took some videos but I think as usual I forgot and turned the camera sideways occasionally. We didn’t have to wait in line too long and the people in the viewing area were well-behaved. The Chinese love their pandas; they claim them as their own, as they should. I guess they were more raucous around the fish, since to them fish are just food, maybe pretty food, but still. But the pandas are a national treasure and they treated them as such.
The other thing I FINALLY got to do while Nicole and Cody were visiting was go to Balalaika’s. Balalaika’s is a Russian restaurant in Lan Kwai Fong. Its main draw is a “bar” in a freezer with fur coats and frozen vodka shots, but you can actually eat dinner there as well, listening to Russian folk music and being happily rowdy. EVERYONE has gotten to go to Balalaikas except me, so it was about time this omission was corrected.
We ordered all kinds of Russian dishes – blinis, borsht, shashlik…in general it was yummy in an exotic meat-and-potatoes sort of way. We also sampled various vodka drinks. Cody and Lee tried various Vodka shots, but Nicole stuck to beer at first. I had a Vodka Cosmo to start but THEN I tried something awesome – a Frozen Sour, which consisted of vodka, lime juice and grapefruit juice, frozen. It was AWESOME, and everyone agreed with me. Nicole and Cody told the waiters that it was Lee’s birthday, which was almost true (it was the day before). The musicians came over to our table and sang happy birthday in Russian. They brought Lee and little cake that was mostly filo dough and whipped cream. We applauded in appreciation.
While we were sitting there, hoards of very tall, skinny and beautiful young ladies started trooping through the restaurant. “Look! Super models!” Cody exclaimed. I don’t know if that’s what they really were, but they sure looked like it. It was really a show to watch them all. Each one was absolutely gorgeous, their clothes were beautiful and their figures were perfect. And yes, they were all very, very tall.
Of course the evening wouldn’t have been complete if we hadn’t donned some fur coats and went into the freezer bar. We all had a vodka shot, downed in one gulp. Whoo boy, I probably haven’t done something like that since the ‘70’s! Funny thing was it really didn’t have much effect on me. I don’t know if it was the cold in there or what. The cold, by the way, felt fantastic for a short period of time.
Now my visitors are gone and I think I’m finally going to get back to my normal life here. It’s turned hot, sunny and just beautiful. The sky is a bright, bright blue, and the heat is incredible. It’s the time of year when you run early in the morning or not at all. Going into Central means walking inside when possible, and walking in the shade and slowly when its not. I’m ready to get back to my usual activities, at least for awhile, until the next trip or set of visitors arrives.
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