hong kong part one




our hotel is on nathan road, so on the first day after arriving and settling in we walked along nathan road first. the air was pollution-hazy but it wasan't dust-in-your-eye kind of hazy. we had dinner at a chinese restaurant near our place. oh, lunch was at a charsiew eatery along a lane on nathan road. the char siew and soup was absolutely salty. at night we walked along the smaller street stalls. today we went to the hong kong side and went to uniqlo near times square. the season's not so fantastic as when i was there in nyc last autumn. but it was still quite fun going there. and mingyao got a cool bag. he went to visit his office at IFC 2 building and i walked around while waiting for him and got myself a massimo dutti shirt - i just love their shirts and the details and fabric. this IFC building is like an ORQ + paragon on a larger scale. lots of mid-high range shops. i think there are a lot of shops in singapore that are here, the usual labels. we bought some egg tarts outside a restaurant, still piping hot but decided to bring it back to the hotel and keep it for supper because we didn't want to spoil dinner. the whole day we were looking for dan tart but we didn't see ideal ones - either the crust wasn't the flaky kind or the egg wasn't slightly burnt like it should be. so we were duly rewarded by waiting till we saw this perfect one. we had dinner at another chinese restaurant, opposite our hotel. the roast duck and char siew hanging at the window called to us from across the road and indeed the roast duck was gorgeous. beautiful, mingyao said. we got a set meal that consisted of shark's fin, a piece of abalone and some scallops with broccoli. by dessert, which meant a platter of fruits we were stuffed. it's really funny how the salespeople/waiters keep talking to mingyao in cantonese and i just smile and nod along. we've got cable at the hotel so it's cool. we can eat egg tarts later and watch discovery channel or whatever's on.