Yes, I have been remiss this past little while in not posting an update. I apologize. However, I will try to make up for that by posting today (along with a lot of photos)and again early next week. Hopefully that will appease the angry masses who clamor for more news of my adventures in SE Asia.
While I can't really talk much about work - and you would be bored to hear about it - I can say that things seem to be going pretty well. I will be having my first delivery, if all goes well, tomorrow afternoon. Then I will have the next two weeks to finish up the second delivery before heading home and doing a major overhaul of the underlying framework. It should be interesting and should prove to keep me very, very busy.
I ended my last work week on an interesting note by heading out to a local bar called "Stormies" with a bunch of the other people who really work here. Stormies is a popular Expat bar that plays a bunch of 80's music and has decent prices on beer. We stayed there for a while and then four of the people I was with decided they wanted to head to Wan Chai to troll the bars there for more activity as Stormies was too dull for them. So in a cab we hopped (all five of us, four uncomfortably wedged in the back seat) and we headed to Wan Chai.
I had been warned about Wan Chai not only being the seat of some exciting bar/dance action but also as the home of the Hong Kong island Red Light District. Now, I have been to a few different seedy locations in my time but I wasn't fully prepared for the aggressive onslaught of the prostitutes of Hong Kong. I would guess that few of them were actually Chinese - they appeared to be more Indonesian or Filipino. Some were even very, very attractive; however the overall overbearing nature of the legions of prostitutes was really just too much. It got old very fast. However, I was the only sober one of the five of us and I had told the others, before we left, I would look out for them. Eventually, I just got too tired to wait for the last of the bunch to decide to call it a night so I hailed a cab at 3am.
It turns out over the course of the night I had actually drank quite a bit of gin so I wasn't as sober as I thought by the time I got back to the hotel. I went to bed pretty quickly and then woke up a few times before finally falling into a restful slumber at about 7am. I woke up at 11am when the hotel called and told me they wanted to deliver my laundry and again at 2pm when they called to ask when they could clean my room. Clearly the "Do Not Disturb" sign on my doorknob wasn't very effective. Finally I got out of bed, showered, and headed out for some food. I didn't really do much of note on Saturday except walk around some new parts of Hong Kong near my hotel.
Sunday was a more typical weekend day for me here. I decided to do two things. The first was to visit Stanley which is a town on the south side of the island that is sort of famous for it's market and some beaches nearby. In order to get to Stanley I headed downtown and hopped a double-decker bus and rode up on the top in the very front which proved to be a great place to sit and get some photos.
It took a while but eventually I reached Stanley and for the first time since I have been here it was very sunny - no clouds at all. Of course I don't own sunglasses and I hadn't brought sunscreen to Stanley so I had to stop off and buy both. You can't buy cheap-o knock of sunglasses where I was at - at least I couldn't find any (until later) so I ended up buying some ridiculously expensive sunglasses - I think the most I had ever paid for sunglasses before was about $15 - these were ten times that. It was stupid. The pharmacy where I bought the sunscreen was a little local thing and after I bought it the clerk gave me a free sample bottle of the same sunscreen. Why did I have to buy the bottle then? Of course I couldn't return it.
With unnecessary expenses out of the way I started to walk around Stanley and one of the first places I visited was the Hong Kong Maritime Museum. It was pretty cool and they had some amazing scale models of various ships throughout the history of Hong Kong. Another cool feature was this screen that displayed the Hong Kong harbor from way back in the early 1900's all the way to today sort of morphing gradually between different periods. I actually managed to take a few photos in the museum before someone there told me I wasn't allowed to take photos. That seems to be a pretty normal restriction around here - heck I couldn't even take a photo of a neat lobby in an office building I walked through. It is crazy.
After the museum I headed over to the market and the coast line. First I walked out on some rocky outcroppings (almost killing myself in the process thanks to some being exceptionally slippery) and then I headed down the alleys that make up the market. I was unimpressed so I worked my way back to the bus station for a ride to stop number 2 of the day - The Peak.
Before I could get to the Peak let me just remind you how rich people here are. As I was riding around on the bus I saw one Bentley drive by, 4 Ferrari's and a Lamborghini. I have now seen around 10 distinct Ferrari's, 4 Bentleys, and on Lamborghini. I think I also saw an Aston Martin but it was a little far away so I'm not sure. The Lamborghini was the first I have ever seen in person. I actually managed to get two photos of it as it drove away from me.
On the way to the Peak I again sat on the top level but someone beat me to the front seat. About halfway there the couple in the front had to go downstairs because the girl had gotten sick (motion is very exaggerated on the second floor) so I took her seat. True, there was some vomit on the floor next to it but the view was substantially better. Finally I arrived at the Peak and had a nice middle-aged Canadian woman give me some guidance when I arrived so I wouldn't waste too much time wandering around looking for the lookout points. The Peak, by the way, is the highest point on the island (I'm not sure it is the absolute highest but it is the highest point I could get to on this side of the island and still have a great view).
The view from the peak is very nice - however almost as soon as I arrived a cloud bank did as well - I had clearly left the sunny skies back in Stanley with the $150 I dropped on sunglasses that I probably won't wear again while I'm here (sensing buyers remorse? good!). I took a bunch of photos from the Peak and even a little bit of video of the clouds sweeping around me. It was cool it was just like I was walking in the clouds.
Finally I rode the tram (a cable supported box) back down the mountain to the main part of Hong Kong (but a part I hadn't been in before) and then I walked back to my hotel stopping on the way for dinner (and some more of that Death By Chocolate dessert - yum!).
Last night three of the guys I work with and I headed out across the harbor to Tsim Shai Tsui (TST) for sushi. I have had sushi just about twice before (once a long time ago in California with my friend Chuck) and the second time on a cruise with Lisa. Neither time really prepared me for the sushi joint we ate at last night. First off the sushi was far more varied and secondly it seemed expensive because of the HK pricing. In the end the four of us combined ate for just around $100 so it wasn't bad at all - but it seemed like it was as we went. I ate a lot of salmon, eel, and a little bit of shrimp. I also had some "Fatty tuna" which is supposed to be really good but I thought it was over powered by the soy sauce and wasabi.
After separating from the other three after dinner I wandered around TST for a bit and encountered yet another of the thousands of tailors in the area. This time, however, I actually ordered a custom shirt be made. I paid in advance (apx $44 US) and it is a french cuff shirt, with a pretty nice blue/white checkered pattern (I normally don't like checks as they are too busy but this one is more calm). It has a standard "italian style" collar so I can use my fancy collar stays, and a front pocket. I also had the guy install a little innovation I thought of between the top two buttons. Basically, I don't like how a non-buttoned down collar shirt flares open enough to show my t-shirt. So I had him install a little hook that should be invisible when it is in use halfway between those buttons that will control the collar flare. He will be delivering the shirt to my hotel tomorrow morning so I'm pretty anxious to see how it works out. I'll take a photo for you.
This weekend I plan on going to see the Giant Buddha which is on a small island near here and trying to visit the China Visa office to get a tourist Visa so I can go to Beijing the following weekend. Keep your fingers crossed for me because I would love to see the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, and the Summer Palace to name a few things. I think it is a 3 hour flight from here to there so I will end up spending a night. I really hope I can do it.