Ferries between Macau and Hong Kong run about every 30 minutes so there is no need to reserve in advance or plan ahead even. Just show up and purchase the ticket. The trip takes about an hour and the views nothing to speak of. Most people just nod off, including me. I had slept for no more than four hours for about a week and it was catching up with me. I arrived in HK with the intention of catching another ferry to Lamma Island to return to my Couch Surfing host's place. However, as soon as I landed I realized that the ferry from Macau that I took did not return to Hong Kong Island but rather to Kowloon, the part of Hong Kong that is part of the mainland of Asia. I took this opportunity to do some of the things I wanted to do in Kowloon. First I went through Kowloon Park, which is nice but small and commercialized. Then I went to a bespoke tailor I heard about from my family friend that I stayed with in Osaka, Japan. Sam's Tailor is famous. They have made suits for kings, queens, presidents, the richest businessmen, etc. They also serve people like me and everybody in between. I only wanted one suit and the price started off at HK$3000, which is a ton of money. We eventually agreed on a price of HK$750, which is actually considerably less than I was willing to pay. However, I learned that it would take 10-14 days to make the suit, not 3 as I was expecting, so all the negotiating was for naught and I left the store frustrated and disappointed.
I made my way to the ferry to head to Lamma Island, where I promptly went to sleep because I had a full day ahead of me. The next day me and another couch surfer tried to go up Victoria's Peak. The trouble was not with actually climbing it but with finding where to go up. We failed and he had to leave to have lunch with a friend. I walked around and ended up on the Hong Kong tram. The HK tram is probably the cheapest way to get around Hong Kong Island other than foot, but it moves slowly. It offers a very interesting perspective of the city, however, it should be done by all visitors. You move from very wealthy, up-scale areas to poor, depressed neighborhoods as fast as you can on a slow-moving tram. The poorer areas have no tourists and thus no signs in English and even more authentic (read: disgusting) food than you find elsewhere. It was nice to see and experience but part of the reason tourists do not normally visits these areas is because there is not much there.
On my way back to Central to catch a ferry to Lamma I stopped to get some dinner. In doing so, I missed the 8:30 ferry and had to wait an hour until the next one departed. I decided not to wander to far to ensure I make the 9:30 ferry so I just went across the street to the mall, IFC. Inside I went into what is obviously and over-priced, up-scale grocery just to walk around and laugh at the prices. I was just wandering around when I saw my holy grail: real pretzels. I did not even look at the price because I knew I was buying them no matter what. I opened them before I got the register and got several funny looks as I was inhaling the simple snack food.
For those that do not know, I love pretzels. I once saw a Discovery Channel show about pretzels that said the average person from Pennsylvania, the state that consumes more pretzels per-capita than any other in America, eats about 2 pounds a pretzels a year. I do that in a month, often a week, with regularity. In high school, about 50% of my diet was pretzels. I eat a lot of pretzels, but outside of America and Germany, pretzels are hard to find. So, not buying them was just not a consideration and devouring them was inevitable.
On the ferry I (reluctantly) offered the pretzels to the woman, Peta (pronounced PETE) that lent me her newspaper the previous night. Soon I was offering them to all the English-speaking people in the back of the ferry plus some little Chinese kid that would not stop starring at me (he did not accept.) Lamma Island is known as an expatriate haven. This, combined with the fact that on these ferry trips, as with any common but not massive transport system (as in, the Metra in Chicago but not the CTA), you get to know the people you travel with. I just kind of happens because you are with the same people every day, often twice a day, for 25 minutes each trip and you just sort of end up talking to each other. So, on this particular trip, I was deeply ingrained in the expat-Lamma-sub-culture.
Once the ferry landed the Peta insisted she buy me a beer in exchange for the pretzels. I accepted and was soon even deeper in the expat-Lamma-sub-culture. The bar was nothing special. I was the youngest person there by about 10 years. The drinks were absurdly over-priced and watered-down. Some people were interesting others never stopped talking about themselves and were constantly looking for yo to reinforce their egos. The night went on, people were fascinated about the couch surfing. Nothing exciting.
The following day I did not leave Lamma and barely left my host's apartment. I just took care of administrative things like laundry, planning, and writing blog posts that are way too long.
The next day I was determined to finally climb Victoria's Peak. Before doing so I finally went of the Star Ferry, which is the "original" way to travel between the mainland of Kowloon and Hong Kong Island. Cool, but nothing out of the ordinary. From there I went to the Bird Market and Flower Market. Nothing interesting, really. Seeing all of both takes about 20 minutes. After an uneventful and disappointing start of the day I headed to the Peak with full of excitement. Of course, I was disappointed. Though not a waste of time, the Peak is not what I was expecting. The view of the city at night from the mountain and from the Peak Tram (I took it down because I could not see the path) are stunning but that is pretty much it. I may have done something wrong because getting to the top is a challenge (not physically, just finding it is complicated).
I returned to Lamma and prepared to leave HK the next day and return to China.
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