Almost instantly Eugene and Natchi joined the "OMG I wanna go!" club.
Who cares about the ACG when you can catch a full-length concert? Plus the tickets were going cheap, around $50SGD. Coupled with a relatively good deal on Tiger Airways tickets and a reasonable hotel price - the decision was unanimous.
It was the first time a Japanese artist that I was following closely was going to perform so near to Singapore (Ayumi Hamasaki did hold a mega-tour in HK 2 years back, but I was in army then, her tickets were crazy expensive and impossible to get) and I wasn't going to miss the opportunity. Exchange trip to Japan won't be for another 2 years, and who knows what'll happen then?
And so after some planning and online bookings, we were all set to go.
Day 1
We reached HK at about 10.30am, after an ungodly take-off timing of 7am. We checked in at our hotel in Prince Edward, Kowloon, before heading off to explore the surrounding Mongkok shopping street areas.
Lunch was pork chop rice with ham and egg. Sinful, yes, but I was freakin' hungry :P
Ladies' Market
We wandered around, looking at random shops and stalls (perhaps still a little woozy from the lack of sleep), before heading down to Tsim Sha Tsui by MTR.
The famous view of Hong Kong Island as seen from Tsim Sha Tsui
The Avenue of Stars, where HK movie stars get their palm prints encased in concrete. And this here is arguably the biggest of them all
That famous pose
We planned to catch the Symphony of Lights at 8pm, so we took a little tea break at McDonald's (where else? :P). I've always been amused at finding non-halal food in overseas fast food restaurants, and here I found the mythical McPork.
Finally, as dusk fell across the harbour, the lights came on
The Symphony of Lights was a 15min light show involving the lights of those buildings you see in the previous pictures. Imagine those lights flashing along to techno and traditional Chinese music. That was about it, nothing spectacular, other than the green lasers shooting out from the roofs of certain towers.
We headed back to our hotel, stopping to have the best wonton mee in town for supper
The noodles were super springy and unique, the prawns in the wontons were huge and very fresh despite the time of the day, and the soup was very satisfying, not too salty and definitely not MSG-laden.
Of course we had to have dessert, and I found my favourite steamed milk
Day 2
Breakfast was century egg porridge
We ordered a plate of roast goose to try, and it was damn fatty and oily. I must say it tasted pretty good, if you ignored the feeling of having oil smeared all over your lips.
We then met Teo for lunch/tea break at a traditional HK "Char Chan Teng". We had assorted Bolo buns and some of the best milk tea I ever had. Teh peng super gao gao :P
Teo brought us around shopping in the Mongkok area, where I managed to find a nice pair of Puma sneakers for a meager $35SGD. It doesn't look fake to me, so I guess its a pretty good deal. We also went to Hong Kong's equivalent of Sim Lim Square where I spotted Starcraft 2 on sale for about $94SGD. I was very tempted, but I didn't buy it.
In one of the buildings we found a very old-school lift!
After some shopping we headed over to Central on HK island, via the Star Ferry, a surprisingly quick and cheap way to travel between Kowloon and HK island.
The glitzier feel of the "other side"
We had tea at another "char chan teng" before going up the mid-level escalators, which is a series of overhead walkways with very long escalators. After the short tour we bade Teo farewell and took a walk to the Peak Tram station for a ride to The Peak. Unfortunately, the tram was swamped with people, and the queue stretched as far as the eye could see. In the end we queued for nearly 2 hours for a 10min ride in the tram =.=
But the view at the top was worth it
Next day - SCANDAL live in Hong Kong!
