Today, we flew from Sydney to Hong Kong. Our trip was a bit of a lucky bonus. After we booked our flights two and from Australia, we realized we had a bit of a visa issue. The easy-to-get tourist visa only lasts for 90 days, but our flights had me staying in Australia for well more than 100. We could have gotten a longer visa, but it would have required us to jump through too many bureaucratic hoops. So, we decided instead to leave Australia for a couple of weeks and visit Korea. When we went to book flights, Cathay Pacific offered to knock 10% off the ticket if we spent a couple of days in Hong Kong. Two places for the price of one? Sign us up!

We left our Bondi Beach Airbnb and headed to the airport. It was a long, but uneventful flight. After about 10 hours, we landed in Hong Kong.

(Truth be told, we landed at night. The picture above is from when we left. But c’mon! I need to set the stage.)

Upon arrival in the airport, we immediately started seeing some signs that Hong Kong is only partly part of China. To start, when we got cash, it was Hong Kong Dollars, the local currency. Getting SIM cards was surprisingly unsophisticated. I bought cards in the airport 7-11 and was directed to a woman hanging out by the counter for set up. She didn’t have a sign or a counter. She looked just like another customer. In every other country – New Zealand, Australia, and even Vanuatu – there has been a booth or store for a major mobile provider. I couldn’t help but wonder if Hong Kong is reluctant to integrate into a larger communications system.

From the airport, we took the metro and schlepped our stuff to our hotel (including hauling our luggage up quite a few stairs), checked in, and then immediately headed out to the Temple Street Night Market, which is located in Kowloon. Hong Kong stretches across dozens of islands, the largest of which is Hong Kong Island. Hong Kong also spills over onto the mainland, including the area of Kowloon. We hopped on the subway and were soon at the market, where we had a celebratory drink in a tiny bar looking out on the street.

After poking around the market stalls, for a bit, we went back to our hotel and went to sleep.

The next morning, we got up and set off to explore Hong Kong. We decided to start by walking to the Man Mo Temple, a Buddhist temple that’s distinctive in part because it’s dedicated to both a civil god and a martial god. One of the smaller roads is known as “cat street,” and along the way we started seeing signs of feline love.

The temple was beautiful, and filled with both tourists and practicing Buddhists.

Larger spirals of insense lined the ceiling, and the smoke drifting down was enchanting.

Outside of the temple, we saw a more impressive cat.

From the temple, we continued to meander, finding more little cats as we went.

We soon reached an area that was part antiques and part flea market. Inside we found all sorts of oddities, including large carved tusks of wooly mammoths.

After antiquing Asian-style a bit, we walked through a variety of food markets, where we found all sorts of exotic ingredients.

There was a huge variety of dried seafood.

There was also live fish, crabs, and clams in tanks. The toads came as a bit of a surprise, though.

We continued to wander, relying on a random walk to help us soak up the atmosphere of Hong Kong. I was particularly impressed by the use of bamboo as scaffolding around large, modern buildings.

Even the building in the background used bamboo for scaffolding underneath the green cloth. By now, it was raining lightly, and the many umbrellas added to the charm.

Food is clearly a big part of life in this part of Hong Kong, and we saw quite a few enticing restaurants.

In some areas, the sides of the narrow streets became small restaurants.

Given the crowds of happy customers, we were sure that the food was tasty.

But we had another plan for lunch. Julie had read online about a great noodle bar that was close by. When we arrived, there was a line out of the door, which we took as a good sign. We were soon seated at a small 4-person table that we shared with a couple of other patrons. The menu was simple containing only about 5 options for noodles. We ordered the noodles with fishballs and dumplings.

It was incredible! The huge fishballs and dumplings were tasty, but the best part was definitely the fresh noodles, which the restaurant made by hand in bulk.

Our bellies full, we snapped a quick pic on our way out of the restaurant. The lunchtime rush was over, but a steady stream of customers was still arriving.

We walked around for the rest of the day, poking in shops. We stopped at a couple of showrooms for BYD (biggest electric vehicle manufacturer in the world, Chinese made, not available in the US). They were very nice and discussed with me the strengths of their company and their cars.

Every now and then, we saw little reminders that Hong Kong exists in a very different political space than many of the countries we’ve visited, such as this large sign basically encouraging people to snitch on each other. I decided to watch myself around Julie just in case.

Around 4:30, we walked down to the main ferry terminal, where we boarded a high-speed ferry to Macau. In case you’re not familiar with Macau, it’s basically the Portuguese version of Hong Kong — a former colony that’s now in the process of being returned to China. It’s also the only place in China where gambling is legal, and it’s become the China’s version of Las Vegas. Following on the heels of the economic explosion in China in the past 20 years, Macau has grown by leaps and bounds. The cash revenues are 7 to 10 times those of Las Vegas. The casinos there are massive, new, and luxurious. Julie’s friend, Bob, works in one of the big casinos, so we headed to Macau to meet up with him for the night.

After about an hour of rough seas, we reached Macau and took a cab to the Hotel Okura, where met up with Bob, who took us up to our room, where there were some amazing snacks, including dried okra.

More impressively, the suite had two bathrooms, both of which were equipped with fancy electronic toilets.

It’s things like this that really make me worry that we’re living in the past while Asia is living in the future.

We had a wonderful time with Bob, including drinks and a great dinner. Our first full day in Asia was a huge success!

-Will