October 6, 2012

Our flight is not until 11pm but the ticket says to be there 3 hours before.  So - Laurie picked me up at about 7.  Very kind of her to take me.  Turns out we didn't need to be there nearly that early.  Oh well.....  Our bags are checked through to Hong Kong so we don't have to fuss about them in Vancouver.  The downside of starting to travel at 11pm is that we've already put in a full day and are just starting the discomfort of travelling just as we should be heading to bed.  Our flights were on time from Calgary and Vancouver.  We left Vancouver at 2:45am PDT and had a 13-hour flight to Hong Kong.  We got in there about 7:15am on Monday Hong Kong time (we left Calgary on Saturday).  I slept a bit in transit but not a lot; I never do.  We flew a lot of the time in the dark and they kept the cabin dark & quiet so conditions for rest were as good as possible.  I had a middle aisle seat right behind a bulkhead so could put my feet up on the wall and/or get up and walk as much as I wanted.  Odd to be fed dinner at 4am....  Then we also had breakfast just before landing.  In Vancouver we had a long walk to our international gate.  Lots of lovely Inuit carvings on display en route.  There were also many, many duty free shops including some very upscale ones.  Who shops here??  We saw one with single bottles of whiskey selling for more than $30,000.  Not my kind of neighbourhood........

We landed at a nice new-ish airport in Hong Kong.  It is well set up - a short train ride to immigration and luggage retrieval.  We were fortunate to be able to recheck our bags immediately to Dragon Air to Kathmandu.  That way we don't need to haul them to our hotel and back - yay!  We then sat at a Starbucks for a while to look at maps and plot our day, and eventually boarded bus A21 bound for Kowloon.  Once there we were looking for the Women's Market, but it was before noon and they were just setting up.  We walked north to the flower market - beautiful flower arrangements!  

Then a few more blocks to the bird market.  The noise!  Lots of birds of all kinds in cages and vendors in individual stalls.  Also lots of bird food for sale.  Bags of live grasshoppers and other insects; yuck!  

I encountered my first hole-in-the-ground toilet.  Hmmm....  

Liba & I set out to walk back through the Women's Market.  Paule and Dennis took their own route.  I found it absolutely amazing that blocks of vendor stalls were set up within hours.  It had the look of a pretty permanent structure.  Liba bought a few small things for gifts.  We wandered on to the Jade Market.  At the first stall I bought two necklaces - green and amber coloured jade.  Round - means money will come back to me.  Liba bought some nice earrings and then a necklace to match.  The woman at that stall then talked me into buying one as well ("happiness").  She was very persistant...  Then she appeared in the next aisle and sold me a "good luck" necklace.  "Persistant" is a very mild description of her sales technique!  Kinda fun, though.  

We got to the hotel, reviewed our purchases and decided we needed some purple stuff too.  So - back to the market and we each got a set of earrings + necklace.  We browsed through the Night Market on the way back but didn't buy anything.  It was a lot like the Women's Market in that all these stalls and merchandise just appeared out of thin air.  

The districts we went through today were interesting - everything from very modern, sleek buildings to older, run-down structures.  Most had open windows and laundry hanging from racks outside.

  

Wandering through the streets was interesting - like shops were often grouped together in one area.  Smells varied depending on what was for sale - eg. fish.  Nathan Road had more up-scale, name-brand stores.  Just a block away were real hole-in-the-wall shops.  

Despite the masses of humanity and endless shops and apartments, there were places of respite and tranquility which were amazing in their ability to shield noise.  

After dinner, Paule & Dennis walked down to the waterfront while Liba & I headed for bed by about 8pm where I promptly sleep for about 11 hours!