Hong Kong: Shop til you drop.

Hong Kong, seen from the Regent Hotel in Kowloon.

View Photos (5) Image © 2001 Albert Wen

A good friend and I were having coffee one swelteringly hot March afternoon when we decided that we had to go to Hong Kong. It wasn't as if we had much of a choice. If we chose not to go, our lives in Singapore probably would eat us up, spitting our bones out with a burp, like the ravenous monster that it is.

Without even finishing our half-drunk coffees, we crossed the street, where a travel agent was conveniently located. We bought one of those 3 day 2 nights, free and easy packages that included frills like airport transfer, daily breakfast, etc. And we were leaving the very next day.

The flight was leaving at 7 am in the morning. We had to be at the airport by 5.30 am. To save myself the trauma of waking up late, I simply didn't go to bed at all.

We landed at Chek Lap Kok airport at 10.30 am. CLK airport greeted us with a never-ending trail of travellators. When we finally reached baggage claims, it was already 11.30 am. Since we had no baggage checked in, we walked straight out and began the search for our airport bus. The waiting area for buses was so long that I nearly could not see the end of it. By the time we found our bus, it was 12.30 pm. And we thought we could have dim sum for breakfast once we reached Hong Kong. I was silently cursing whomever it was who decided to do away with lovely Kai Tak airport for this torture chamber.

When we entered our hotel room, it was almost 2 pm. I was pissed off, dead tired and incredibly cranky. All I could think of doing was to plop onto the lovely white bed and just sleep. But oh no, Nicky, my friend, had other ideas. She was bursting with energy and bent on going out, not after a nap, not after a bath, but NOW.

And so we took the MTR to Tsimsatsui, where I was dragged into one shop after another. I swear I nearly fell asleep while Nicky was trying some clothes on. She came out of the fitting room in dull green sweater, which was really quite unflattering. Not wanting to hurt her feelings, I told her that green wasn't her colour. "It's brown." she said, with a deadly look in her eyes. I looked at the sweater closely and indeed, it was brown. Could the lack of sleep make one colour blind? Leaving that for further deliberation later, I proclaimed, "It's brownish green, so it's technically green." Nicky inspected the sweater again and put it back on the rack, giving me suspicious looks.

In my semi state of consciousness, I had a brilliant idea. I suggested to Nicky that we sit down and have something to eat before shopping some more. It was close to 6, after all. She, tired out from squeezing herself in and out of about a thousand different outfits, agreed.

We went to one of those small eateries, the kind that has ducks or chickens hanging on display in the shop front. I tried to sneak some sleep behind my menu, but alas, Nicky was too smart for that and made me study my menu with it flat on the table. Knowing I had no choice, I decided to light up a cigarette. Now, perhaps that could keep me awake. Cigarette between my lips, I was still digging into my bag for my lighter when I saw the waiter sprint from the other end of the room, sliding suavely next to me poising his gold lighter just beneath my cigarette.

With the lighting of my cigarette done, he started quizzing us. Nicky, not understanding a word of Cantonese, giggled while I tried my best to field his questions with my pidgin command of the dialect.

I diverted all his small talk by placing my order of Fried Rice and decided that Nicky shall have Beef Brisket with Noodles. Nicky, had absolutely no idea that her order was already placed and when her majesty finally decided to order, her beef brisket noodles had arrived. She protested and ordered the waiter to take it away. He of course did not understand what she was talking about. He simply told her in English, "Hong Kong Style, very nice." Nicky gave up and ate her noodles quietly, staring daggers in my direction.

For her revenge, we had to go to Ladies Market after dinner. We had gotten ourselves quite lost in Tsimsatsui and had to ask for directions. I entered an Optical shop to ask where the MRT station was. The 2 salesmen in the shop began laughing hysterically. They even had tears running down their cheeks. When one of them finally managed to speak, all he could say was "MRT MRT! It's MTR!" To that I replied, "Whatever, just point me the way." I held my head high and looked straight at him. (Bear in mind this conversation was held in Cantonese) I was pleasantly surprised that he actually gave us the right direction.

On the MTR, I caught 2 minutes of sleep and was rudely awakened by Nicky when we reached Mongkok station. She suddenly gave a short sharp scream when we reached Ladies' Street Market. "What? What?" I was looking around for the source of her terror.

"Prada Bags!!" She shrieked and ran towards them.

We walked from one end of the street to the other, stopping at every stall to ask at what price were they selling their imitation Prada bags. As Murphy's Law would have it, the stall with the lowest prices was located at the other end of the street, where we started. I resisted a very strong urge to pound the floor with my fists and start wailing.

Grabbing my arm excitedly, now that her research was done, Nicky pulled me all the way back to that stall and instructed me to start bargaining with the stall-keeper. I tried my best, but she refused to lower the price. Even the tactic of pretending to walk away did not work. She only agreed to lower the price if Nicky bought two. I translated this to Nicky, and she agreed. The stall-keeper sent an errand boy to collect the second one from somewhere else. While we were waiting, Nicky was patiently examining her new Prada bag. (What she intended to do with both the bags was really beyond me.) All of a sudden, she grabbed my arm and whispered into my ear, telling me that she had found a misprint. She wanted her money back. And I, the designated translator of the evening, was to tell the stall-keeper that and get Nicky's money back. Commanding all the words I knew in my shaky Cantonese, I passed along Nicky's sentiments to the stall-keeper. She took the money out and threw it into my hands, asking about my parents at the same time and wishing them dead. She also bade me bon voyage, and to please have an accident on the way home.

I walked away quickly and Nicky ran to catch up. She wanted to know what the stall-keeper was saying. I gave her a direct translation. Nicky turned back and yelled "same to you!" in the direction of the stall. But we were already too far-gone for the stall-keeper to hear anything. It wasn't as if she would have understood, anyway.

We took a cab back to the hotel. Sensing my foul mood, Nicky kept quiet all the way.

I had a strange dream that night, of watching a movie and the finding that I was the only one in the theatre. The box office lady then came into the theatre and demanded that I gave her my ticket.

I woke up feeling disoriented, something I seldom experienced while travelling. I woke Nicky up to break the silence of the room. She immediately switched on the TV and became instantly fixated on the programme. It was one of the drama serials that ran for at least 99 episodes. I took a shower as she carried on watching the programme. When I stepped out of the bathroom, she actually had tears in her eyes. Good grief! As if she understood a word they were saying.

We went out for dim sum after I succeeded in ungluing her from the TV set. Over siew mai and char siew pau, I made Nicky promise that we wouldn't do anymore shopping today. I was pretty sure she gave me her word even though I couldn't quite hear her with the man at the next table yelling excitedly as he listened to his radio. He then consulted his racing manual and gave a holler. Over at another table, a man looking dapper in his suit was cursing into his mobile phone, pressing a button over and over again. To make the picture complete, there was a table of tai-tai's, decked in gold and diamonds, discussing property prices while checking each other out from behind their Versace shades.

As we were paying our bill, I was almost reluctant to leave this menagerie.

I had full say of the itinerary, so we took the star ferry across to Hong Kong Island, getting off at Central. We walked about in the financial district, finding it strange that everyone was dressed in a 3-piece suit, when the temperature was approaching 30 degrees Celsius. We found an alley where there was tiny flea market bustling. Unable to control herself, Nicky combed through all that was for sale while I had a lovely chat with an old man who was selling socks. He spoke slowly, unlike all other Hong Kongers, so I understood him fine. He didn't find anything funny in my Cantonese, and understood every word I said. When Nicky came back, I bade farewell to my delightful new friend.

Next, we took the escalators all the way up to the mid levels, trying to find Christopher Doyle's flat, that one that Chunking Express was filmed in. All the flats looked like the same to us, so we gave up. Then, we bent down and waved at the people in the flats, a la Chungking Express: Stewardess scene.

When we reached the point where there were no more escalators going up, we realised that we were so high up that it was quite difficult to breathe. Knowing that dusk approaching, we made our way down. The journey to the bottom was much quicker than the way up. Newton's law of gravity, I suppose.

On the ferry ride back to Kowloon, we were so awe-struck by the view of the harbour that we decided to adjourn to the Regent Hotel for coffee. If I had a say as to where the best view of the Hong Kong harbour was, it would definitely be from the Regent Hotel. The view there was honest-to-god, breathtakingly stunning. Nicky and I faced the tall glass windows the whole time, even when we were speaking to each other.

We finally left at 1 am, taking a slow walk back to our hotel.

I woke up the next morning to the blaring television set. Nicky had woken up early in the morning to catch the latest episode of whatever drama serial it was that she was watching. As per our routine, I dragged her away from the TV set to catch the tram up the Peak.

The tram ride was fun, but honestly, I didn't quite like the peak. Everything was outrageously expensive and there wasn't anything there that caught my interest at all. We took the tram back down and went to an eating house to have char siew rice. Nicky and I ordered char siew, roasted pork and soya chicken, plus a bowl of chicken feet and peanut soup each. And we actually finished everything. Some guys from the next table were staring at us the whole time and when we were drinking chinese tea after the meal, they couldn't curb their curiosity any longer. One of them came over and asked us how come we could eat so much. Were we gay, they wanted to know. Feeling too full to get insulted, I asked them how come he thinks that girls don't have the capacity to eat as much as men. They laughed at me, as if I was a lunatic who was sprouting nonsense. It then dawned on me that I have not seen a single fat girl on the streets of Hong Kong. Either every girl was slim, or the fat girls were too ashamed to step out of their door.

We waddled back to the hotel to get ready for our flight which was leaving at 7.30 pm. As we were boarding the plane, I graciously offered Nicky the window seat, knowing that I'll be travelling alone from now on.

Published on 5/16/01