January 2: Exploring Paternal Haunts in Hong Kong

We liked the fish congee (rice porridge) flavored with scallions and ginger so much at our dim sum breakfast yesterday, that we skipped the fancy stuff and just stuck with a big bowl of that each today. Then Pollo went off to ride again, and I crouched by the pier with my laptop on a low wall to type some photo captions into picasaweb. I’ve been slow to accept all this technology into my life, preferring touch-and-turn-the-page paper albums, but I think it will end up being very valuable. I’ve mentioned my terrible memory, and although I rebel sometimes at the thought of all the work going into creating a record of my memories, I know that in the future I’ll be grateful for having done it.

Pollo having returned, we rallied ourselves for another ferry trip into Central (Hong Kong), with the idea of seeing some of the places on the list my dad wrote out for me. We started with a trip to HSBC headquarters, nearly unrecognizable as the location of the first stage’s race start without all the paraphernalia of the opening day festivities. I stood in a long line to cash one of my mom’s thirty-five year old cheques from her HSBC account. The relic-like nature of this specimen caused some gentle consternation in the young, polite clerk assisting me, but with a minimum of fuss, and a maximum of respectful solicitude, he got the job done.

Pollo hungry as usual, we walked up to the midlevels to find some cheap lunch. Hong Kong, a city constructed on a very hilly island, has skyscraping buildings built nearly all the way up to “The Peak” (whose green dome reigns over the city). So the main part is divided, as far as I understand, into Central, the Midlevels, and the Upper Levels. After climbing a bit, we had lunch in a midlevel alley (nameless as far as I could see). We started out in a small restaurant, which we found out later, thanks to our waitress’s quite good English, was serving Taiwanese-style food. It was decent but unextraordinary; I was satisfied with the meal, but by the time I exited the restaurant’s restroom after eating, Pollo was intently examining some very fresh fish being cleaned by a woman just outside the restaurant door. Her labor belonged to an outdoor cooking stand: from a gas-fired grill and giant bamboo steamers issued delightful odors and delicious-looking plates of food, served to diners seated on plastic stools at wobbly folding tables. He had bargained successfully to pay $40HK (about $5USD) for a filet of a very large fish, and furthermore was able to communicate his desire that it be steamed. So we sat at our wobbly table and awaited the fish. This was no porcelein-teapot establishment; the tea came in an aluminum thermos with a wooden cork, and tasted like woody water. The fish, though, was absolutely delicious, and I managed a few chopsticks-full despite my fullness from lunch #1.

We continued moving up, this time via the Escalator – the world’s largest covered moving walkway, which connects Central to the Upper Levels. We got off at Robinson Road, which is where my mom and dad met in their apartment building (in the elevator! No joke!). After a long walk, we managed to find the correct number. It was a gated building, but I thought it was possible it had been built in the 70s and therefore may be the actual building in which they’d met. It was tough to communicate with the gate guard, and I wasn’t able to find out any hard information on the building. I was pretending to be an interested buyer (there was a sign outside about units for sale/lease), and so the guard found another guard, who told me he thought (though wasn’t sure) that the building was built in 1992. Hmm. Probably not the same one, then.

I had the brilliant idea of walking up to the Peak. It didn’t look far on the map, and indeed I could look up and see the green-shrouded bulge above. The catch was finding a through way. We walked up lots and lots of steps, only to be finally stymied by “Private” roads impassable to the non-resident. At that point we were both quite exhausted, so we hailed a taxi to get to the Peak. It took quite a long time going the roundabout way there; further frustrating my inner mountaineer’s urge.

The plan was to take the Peak Tram down the 27 degree descent back to Central, which we did. However, like I suppose a lot of other transportation icons of times past (such as the San Francisco cable cars), it had the feel of an entirely tourist attraction, which spoiled it somewhat for me. Also, it was dark by that time, and although the lights of the city were brilliant, maybe it would have been more interesting to see it in daytime.

By the time we walked from the tram stop back to the pier, we were both totally exhausted, so we caught the next boat back to Lantau. I think I could even have skipped dinner, but one of the places we walked past on the way back to our room had a picture of a pigeon on one of the signs outside, and Pollo’s a sucker for pigeon. So we stopped to inquire about the price, which was reasonable, and sat down to eat. I was glad we did; I asked for “something vegetable” and was brought a delicious hot pot of eggplant with a type of green the name of which I’ve sadly forgotten. Our server had told me it is a seasonal delicacy; I’ll have to try and remember what it’s called.

Dogs’ fighting barks composed the music of the night. There are a lot of dogs here on Lantau – many, many more than I’ve seen anywhere else in Hong Kong or China. We’ve seen some pet dogs in the cities, mostly small ones of indeterminate breed, even dressed in little shirts and sweaters. Not many; and certainly no street dogs like I’ve seen elsewhere in the developing (and even developed) world. But Lantau is a dog’s paradise; few roads and cars, beaches, mountains, a small year-round population. Whether for these reasons or others, there are lots of dogs here! They mostly resemble chow-type mongrels of varying colors, around 40-60 pounds, and all with curly tails. They look well-fed, but not exactly like house-pets either. I wonder if they are street dogs that get by on generous leavings, or sort of communal pets; maybe they belong to individual dwellings or families, but wander and mingle more freely than they would be allowed in other parts of China (say those parts where dog meat is commonly consumed).

Anyway, once again, I was so tired from the day of big city sights that even the chorus of growls, barks, and squeals didn’t keep me from dreamland.