Okay... so how to begin? Hong Kong,
i definately can’t say i have been to another place like it. This is not really
praise but it’s not really a condemnation either. Lets just say it’s not the
type of place for everyone, Eve included. She’s not been a very happy chappy
and the introduction to HK that we had today was amusing.
So we arrived yeterday afternoon,
first impressions were of intense wet heat and a vague Hawaian feel due to the
green encroaching landscape. Upon arrival at our hotel in the urban sprawl of
high density housing and rundown chinese apartments, the illusion is shattered.
This place has nothing to do with Hawaii aside from the greenery, identical
cookie cutter style housing blocks soar into the sky looking like entropy has
exerted some extreme force in the world, you can almost see them decaying
before your eyes. Twisting roads and general chaos makes the city appear less
constructed than vomited onto the landscape in some messy spaghetti like expulsion,
add to this the wicked heat and humidity and things start to feel like the
begining of ‘Dante’s Inferno’.
Upon seeing all this certain cogs
started to turn and a kind of whinge started to come out mixed with an evil
cackle, akin to bemusement and masochistic glee. “Wow, what the fuck is
mainland China goin to be like?”
First on the agenda we get pumped by
the hotel deciding they are going to charge us extra, some sort of retainer or
something that will be refunded after... yeah the same hotel bullshit the world
over. Truthfully i didn’t care, it was the annoyance of no forewarning coupled
with the fact that i had withdrawn only a certain amount of money that made me
feel like i was getting what Noel would refer to as the “cactus” treatment. ‘And so it begins’, these words seemed to be
echoing in my head for awhile, not an entirely auspicious beginning but at
least the hotel room turned out to be exactly what i was hoping, so some good
news.
Anyway after settling in we hit the
streets, deciding to get the lay of the land so to speak or cracks of the
concrete, whatever term works best. Into the humidity we swam... er walked. I
felt like some blubbering porpoise freshly beached exuding moisture from every
pore and gasping from the shock of the bludgeoning heat. Rundown air-conditioners
leaked condensation onto the sidewalks, fumes arose from passing vehicles and
into this passed shoals of people. It really is like a large version of China
Town. I was going to use a certain description but my girlfriend TM’ed it...
yeah go figure.
So anyway this is the daily whine.
Things really aren’t bad at all, it is interesting in it’s own way though i
couldn’t really say that it has any charm either. Mind you this is a first
impression though, as at this point we really haven’t gotten out of the hustle
and bustle.
