The Clan's China Adventure, Episode 19: Winter Holiday 2015 - Hong Kong Fooey

Another year, another holiday season gone by. This year's winter holiday really flew by. Cherry has started teaching at a local learning center, and due to the long hours, it does seem like the days fly by more than they already were. Before we knew it, Christmas had come and gone!

For our holiday this year, we decided to hit Asia's other (for now - Shanghai's is coming later in 2016!) Disneyland, in Hong Kong!

Unfortunately, the days leading up to our trip were plagued by Mommy being quite sick... and it would only get worse as Daddy got sick as well on the first day of the trip...

We flew into Hong Kong on Monday and made our way to the hotel.

Overlooking Tsuen Wan from our room

L'Hotel at night

Hong Kong Observation #1: For a former British colony for over a century, the level of English spoken in Hong Kong is strikingly low...

As you may or may not know, the primary language spoken in Hong Kong is Cantonese, which is quite different from Mandarin. In my previous experiences in Hong Kong (over a decade ago), I felt that I was able to get by fairly well using mostly English. However, in this latest trip, this did not seem to be the case. While there were several people who could speak English at major hotels, most restaurants and markets were markedly devoid of any English. In fact, as it turns out, a lot of people were able to speak Mandarin instead, but this led to our second major Hong Kong observation:

Hong Kong Observation #2: Hong Kongers really, really, REALLY, dislike Mainland Chinese.

I was somewhat aware of the current political situation between Hong Kong and China, but I really did not expect it to project on me so personally. Although we tried to use English to help distinguish ourselves from China, what we found was, not unlike in Japan, the level of English spoken was simply not high enough to effectively be able to communicate in Hong Kong. But reverting to Mandarin (and with our somewhat mainland-y accents), must have "given us away" as "Chinese tourists", which opened us up to the wrath of the Hong Kong service industry personnel. At the very first restaurants and fruit stands we visited, we got the "top layer" service (where the first cuts/selections that are visible to the customer are good, but the ones underneath are not). Granted, this has sort of become expected for me when I'm in China, but for all the noise that Hong Kongers make about how much better they are than Mainlanders, well, let's just say that this did not inspire my confidence in their level of service.

Unfortunately, this continued through much of our trip. At the first restaurant we visited, the staff refused to provide proper place settings for the kids, and more than one restaurant didn't serve hot water for free (something that I have never seen in China before). But the worst experience was at the fourth restaurant we visited. Ignoring the fact that they essentially forgot (and tried to pass it off as our mistake in ordering) the order of noodles for the kids, the manager of the restaurant passed by our table no fewer than four times, announcing the amount we owed for the meal - as if she was afraid I wasn't going to pay! And, when I counted the exact change (in hopes of reducing the number of loose coins in my pocket and not having to have them provide me with more change), I got the "poor Mainland Chinese bumpkin" look from the staff. Finally, upon leaving the restaurant, not only did we not receive the customary "Thank you for your patronage" blessing from the staff that I've gotten at just about any restaurant, large or small, in China, I caught the manager muttering under her breath as we left. Simply intolerable.

The trip was not entirely without any fun, however. The main goal of the trip was to visit Disneyland, and we did so on the second day despite our raging illnesses.

Hong Kong Observation #3: Hong Kong Disneyland is actually pretty good, but the food is way too expensive there. And not very good.

Hong Kong Disneyland is probably the smallest of the Disneylands. It's admission is on the same level as that of Tokyo Disneyland, but in general, I found the experience to be a bit more pleasant. A big part of it is because, at least when we went, it wasn't nearly as crowded. Whereas you could nary find an attraction with a wait time of under an hour in Tokyo, there were quite a few attractions in the 20-minute wait range at Hong Kong Disneyland.

Getting to Disneyland was a breeze thanks to the Express train!

Another huge benefit of Hong Kong Disneyland is its multiple-language service. Unlike Tokyo Disneyland, which gave zero f*cks about whether or not you spoke any language other than Japanese, most attractions at Hong Kong Disney were delivered in English, Cantonese, and Mandarin, which I suspect covered the majority of its clientele. It made shows such as the "Legend of the Lion King" show much more enjoyable for these "poor country bumpkin mainlanders"...

There were a number of unique attractions as well, such as "Mystic Manor" and "Fairytale Forest":

Fifi saw all of her favorite Disney Princesses at Fairytale Forest!

Fifi even rode Space Mountain with me! She's smiling now... :D But she was really brave through the whole roller coaster ride!

Closing out the day in Animation class!

So, the attractions were quite nice, and the size of the park was really just right for two little ones. But the food... eight bucks for a small popcorn? $9 for cotton candy?!?! Or a craptastic hot dog? I don't remember either Tokyo or Orlando being that expensive!!

Hong Kong Observation #4: Public transportation in Hong Kong is really convenient. But they should think about putting in a few bathrooms in the subway stations...

Somewhat to my dismay, our hotel was a bit further from the attractions than I expected. However, this was largely mitigated by Hong Kong's quite excellent and relatively inexpensive public transportation system, as well as their walkways. The entire path from our hotel to the subway station can be made entirely above ground via these skyways:

This picture would have been a lot nicer if the sky wasn't so blown out...

The subway is quite a bit more expensive than in Shanghai (about 2 to 3 times), plus Fifi had to pay as well, but buses and the ferry were about the same price (roughly 3 HKD, or 25 cents, per ride) as in Shanghai. And you could generally get within a half mile of most anywhere using public transport. The major downfall of Hong Kong public transport is its severe lack of bathrooms in the massive subway station. We had to walk over a mile to find one!

In any case, the next day, we felt a little better and we decided to make our way to Victoria's Peak, considered widely to be "the" Hong Kong attraction. After waiting over an hour to get tickets to the tram, we finally made our way up:

One of the old trams

Tram pulling in

I love Fifi's face in this picture!

The views at the top were... okay. To be honest, we had pretty shoddy weather all trip:

We had some Pho for dinner:

Then we met and kicked Bruce Lee's butt!

Finally, we went back down and took the ferry to Tsim Sha Tsui before heading back to rest our sick bodies for the night:

For our last day in Hong Kong, we attempted to go up Ngong Ping 360 to see the Giant Buddha, only to find that the lines to the cable cars would take over 2 hours, causing us to quite possibly miss our flight... So, we just hung out in the mall at Tung Chung and headed back to Shanghai to quietly end the trip.

All in all, the trip was not particularly enjoyable, but we can check it off of our "Clan's China Adventure" bucket list!