Last of Hong Kong

Through the trees...

one last hike...
up towards Victoria Peak.
Was supposed to go up Mount Austin Rd., but only found Plantation Rd.
o, a residential road.
Through more trees...
past some monikers etched...from all over...
even the graffiti is cosmopolitan.
My water bottle has found its brethren.
Here is the mall that was at the end of my and Su's hike.  It was here I found Mount Austin...
and hiked up 30 more minutes to Victoria Peak
Alas...
and with the palms...
...and then back down, where the Brits hid as the Japanese were taking the island in 1941. From the end of the walk down Hattan Rd., you hit Kotewall, and soon Robinson Rd, which brings you to the Mid-Level Escalators. Another 15 minutes down the stairs and you're at the IFC.
Last trip towards the IFC--Sundays are when the maids are off, and the IFC and thereabouts is where the Filipino maids hang, chat, snack, play cards, kick off their shoes, relax.
The Oval Atrium of the IFC, where a live Chinese orchestra plays as prosperity-inspiring goldfish dwell...
gurgle...
hang...
Connecting corridors, from the IFC toward Exchange Square...
Britular vehicles (they drive left as well in HK)
Towards Landmark mall, more maids.
Off the corridors...
Granted, dear reader, my view of Hong Kong has been as if I just showed Beverly Hills as Los Angeles, or 5th Ave. as New York, except nature and urbanity is so closely and densely situated...
...but indulge me as I experience the privilege of my last bits of efficient and civil living.
Dolphins swim at the Landmark...so underwater, it all.
And now I wait at the Shenzhen airport...
A different feeling...
as I walk through the airport corridors...
...and wait to return to China proper.

Efficiency is a Privilege

A vacation in Hong Kong indeed. Where I could experience convenience and efficiency. I realize that patience is a huge Chinese virtue, and infinitely more required on the mainland than in Hong Kong (which is Chinese now, remember). But the mix of Chinese and European cosmopolitanism I kept gorging on, just taking the rides, walking the streets. Something about the feeling that a governing body thought through what might be the most convenient way for the traveler to move.

Pictured above is the Airport Express, which is at the bottom level of the IFC (International Finance Center) in Central Hong Kong. The IFC is two office towers and also a huge luxury mall. The Airport Express gets you to the airport in 30 minutes and leaves every 12 minutes. You can check in your bags before you board this train, so you need not carry anything. It is so organized that you need only arrive to your gate 30 minutes in advance. If you happen to take a taxi to the Airport Express, the taxi door automatically opens and closes (as controlled by the driver) so if your hands are full you don't need to worry about the door whatsoever. As soon as you get out of the taxi, someone pushes a baggage cart your way, so you don't have to carry it all the way 100 meters to the check-in counter. When the cart first came my way, I was shocked. I might have been in China for too long.

And maybe even used to the U.S. ways. At LAX, there is not only no one there to push a baggage cart your way, it also must be extracted from a machine to the tune of $3.00.

As I might have mentioned, Hong Kong is very steep, very vertical. It is also very high density living, so goes the urban design to keep pedestrian traffic moving consistently. The densest part of the city has what is known as the Mid-Level Escalators.
Downhill, you take the steps as the escalators are ascending for the majority of time.
There are these cool corridors that link the escalators. At the end of this corridor is a yellow machine where, if you put your Octopus (transit) card atop, you automatically get a $2.00 discount on your next subway or bus ride. For no reason, except to boost mass transit incentive and also everyone loves a discount (one way the city can make the citizen happy).
Taking these steps downward has a 'doing hurdles' like rhythm to it. You step down, take three steps, step down, take three steps... hurdles or dancing.
Because there is so much foot traffic going towards the IFC and other office centers in the morning, from 7 --10am, the escalators go downward.
If you get tired of seeing the mod corridors, you have plenty of chance to see the streetlife below.
Now going up, you can just stand to the right and hang out, or you can walk up the stairs for extra exercise and/or speed. Universal escalator protocol.
From the IFC (where I'd go work out) to where I was staying, I counted 15 escalators.
The first 3 escalators are stairless, and then the steps start appearing, though at first more shallow than the usual steps, and then it becomes full on stairs.
As you go higher, there are streets to cross between the escalators.
This is the longest escalator, the one off of Mosque Street. At the top just before the Robinson Road escalator is the entrance to a grocery store. The Park n' Shop between two escalators, how convenient.
Here's proof that Hong Kong is Chinese, no longer British, although China has a long way to go before it has the efficiency of Hong Kong. It was nice to be able to walk with a smile and not be greeted with a sour face--in fact there was much smiling in return. I guess I'm kind of California that way, and I join my warm-weather friends in friendly walking disposition.
Even the road signs are generous in tone.

Hong Kong Hiking

Here is my cousin Paul. He is Hong Kong hiking.  Looks pretty rough, huh? A paved trail. Wrought iron rails. Gosh if you happened to be in spiky boots, a fitted blazer, your do done just right, face full of makeup and a big Gucci purse, real or fake, you could still Hong Kong hike. How egalitarian, right?
What would a Hong Kong hike be without taking the tram uphill first?  The second day I was here, out of the Shanghai cold, a week after the Nanjing chill, Paul and Tom accompanied me Hong Kong hiking by first taking the Victoria Peak Tram. Here we are on the ascent of our hike.
Can you tell we're hiking upwards because of the slight tilt? At one point, hike/tram feels like everyone is at a 45 degree angle. You really have to hold onto something during this part of the hike.
And once we make it to the top of the hike, we arrived in time for our 12:45 pm lunch reservation at the Peak Outlook restaurant. We had to rest after that grueling hike upward. It was a perfect day.
Here's one of the many trees with red envelops found all over the restaurant (and the whole city for that matter) for the new year. The oranges represent nuggets of gold. The Hong Kong folks are super superstitious but for this year, they are gonna have to turn up the lucky talismans (talismen?) a few billion megawatts.
You can see the orange bushes in the background of our perfect lunch. Tom kept telling me how lucky I was to be here during perfect weather. I'm thinking Hong Kong is always like this, just like back home in LA. I already feel more like myself here, with Hong Kong being super mod and polite and civilized and efficient. China proper is another frame of mind. I guess I was thinking that Shanghai would be more like Hong Kong. Paul says give it another 15 years.
And so, exiting the Peak Outlook, with all its good new year's tidings, Paul and I continued to hike--downward, back home toward the Mid-levels.
Here's proof that I put in the Hong Kong hiking time.  The worst part was, I forgot my canteen. Good thing we were mostly in the shade.

Now when my sister Su came to visit a week later, the hike became more--mysterious. Shrouded in fog and cloud, it gave off an eerie delight. So now I understood what Tom meant. Last Saturday was perfect and this is what Hong Kong is usually like--gray like Shanghai, but with less hackspitting. Now, Su and I would take a fresh hike for Chinese New Year day.

My sister Su is unique. She is one who would rather walk uphill and then take the tram downhill. Because of her knees, she says. So Su and I do the reverse of my original Hong Kong hike. And on this particular day, it is fortunate that it is cooler, even on the brink of raining, because going uphill, no matter how well it's paved, requires some good cardio conditioning, particularly at the pace we were going. A sunny day would have taken the Hong and the Kong out of this more athletic version of the hike.

We went a good thirty minutes uphill, by foot yes, and arrived to our destination much sooner than we expected. Su is used to hiking in Los Angeles, where you hike dirt trails, step atop rocks, and when you arrive to the top, it continues to be nature. Well on this Hong Kong hike, imagine her surprise when we arrived to the top and she saw the Peak Lookout restaurant with all of its lucky orange bushes, and also saw that it was across from a huge mall that was then connected to the Victoria Peak tram where folks lined up like a Disneyland ride, with lots of cantopop blaring and happy people eating Haggen Dasz. Su was puzzled. It's safe to say that it was anti-climactic for her. But hey, that's Hong Kong hiking for ya.
Here we are at the top.