Sunday, February 28, 2016

2016 Asia Mega Tour - Starting to Explore Hong Kong

With another good night's sleep behind us, we were ready to start getting our feel for this place called Hong Kong. As my son-in-law likes to say, Hong Kong is not so much a Chinese city but an international city in the same vein as New York or London. So you will see all kinds of incongruities such as a street of bars and restaurants with an eclectic variety of cuisines  that would look totally at home at any large western city perpendicular to a street that is pure Chinese street market.

Our day got off to a difficult beginning. There was some error in putting through our credit card charge for our room so I was forced to work in the kitchen doing prep work for brunch until things were cleared up.

Evidently the child labor laws here are not strict

Fortunately that was straightened out  so we were then able to walk down to toward Hong Kong Harbor.
I find the urban architecture very stimulating.




We were taken to the 49th floor of a building with a private club that had some great views.







An interesting cultural aspect of Hong Kong is since there is not day care to speak of any family of any means whatsoever has a nanny or other live in help. The vast majority of these are from the Philippines. All have the family back in their home country. They have one day off a week by law, Sunday. So on Sunday the public spaces are filled with these workers taking their day of rest.




We went out to a late lunch as a family. As it was an Italian restaurant I won't go through the gastronomy except for grandson 2.3 who had this creation called a pizza with caramel cooked in a dough, banana with caramelized sugar, ice cream and Nutella. 



Then it was off into on of the Chinese market streets

To your right is a little Buddhist Shrine (according to daughter found all over the city).
And inside were these large coils of incense burning.
And on to the market street



And finally a relaxing evening view from the patio of the Kitty Suite