I kick started the new year holidaying. This time round, it was to the Las Vegas of the East. Tiger Airways had this airfare promotion to Macau @ S$290 including taxes. So one fine day, S called me and asked if we were keen to go to Macau. The next thing i knew, we had booked the tickets within the next hour. Talk about being spontaneous!! I think this is the most spontaneous trip i've ever been to.
On New Year's eve, rather than staying up late and counting down to the new year (as i would every year), I slept early to get enough rest before our 6am flight. K and I woke up at 350am, met EK and S at our void deck, and headed straight to the budget terminal.
We hit Macau around 10am, took a bus from the airport to the ferry terminal, where a 45 minute ferry ride took us to HongKong. From there, we walked to our accomodation for 2 days - Chung King Mansions. When i saw our room, i nearly fainted. It was super small.. as with most houses in HongKong. But i guess i am just not used to it. Our door didn't even have a proper room number plate. There was just a piece of paper stuck to our door with a piece of scotch tape and our room number scribbled on it. And minimal walking space. Just two single beds, and a small bathroom. The bathroom was so small there was no separate space for the shower and toilet bowl. The width of the bathroom was just about the length of my outstretched arms.
Nonetheless, after the first night, i was actually quite impressed with the room. The hot water shower was shiok, and the bed was super comfortable, and the blanket was so warm it didn't feel like it was 14 degrees celcius outside. There was even free internet access.
Our 2 days in Hongkong was pretty much just eating and shopping.. We went to this famous and very traditional tim sum shop house, where we had an adventure squeezing and pushing our way through crowds of people just to get our food. There was no way we could order what we want. Basically, an employee will push out a push cart from the kitchen. Nobody knows what's on the push cart, but everyone just follows the cart with their pieces of paper. When the push cart stops, and the dishes are revealed, everyone just starts to push their pieces of paper to the employee for him / her to stamp on and serve the dish. It was really the fastest fingers first. If you're slow, you will get nothing. Totally screwed up process, but fun. Despite the fact that I got scalded by the hot soup of a dim sum dish when someone pushed me while i was getting out, and i didn't get to eat any of the dim sum dishes i wanted, I still think it was quite an interesting experience!!
On New Year's eve, rather than staying up late and counting down to the new year (as i would every year), I slept early to get enough rest before our 6am flight. K and I woke up at 350am, met EK and S at our void deck, and headed straight to the budget terminal.
We hit Macau around 10am, took a bus from the airport to the ferry terminal, where a 45 minute ferry ride took us to HongKong. From there, we walked to our accomodation for 2 days - Chung King Mansions. When i saw our room, i nearly fainted. It was super small.. as with most houses in HongKong. But i guess i am just not used to it. Our door didn't even have a proper room number plate. There was just a piece of paper stuck to our door with a piece of scotch tape and our room number scribbled on it. And minimal walking space. Just two single beds, and a small bathroom. The bathroom was so small there was no separate space for the shower and toilet bowl. The width of the bathroom was just about the length of my outstretched arms.
Nonetheless, after the first night, i was actually quite impressed with the room. The hot water shower was shiok, and the bed was super comfortable, and the blanket was so warm it didn't feel like it was 14 degrees celcius outside. There was even free internet access.
Our 2 days in Hongkong was pretty much just eating and shopping.. We went to this famous and very traditional tim sum shop house, where we had an adventure squeezing and pushing our way through crowds of people just to get our food. There was no way we could order what we want. Basically, an employee will push out a push cart from the kitchen. Nobody knows what's on the push cart, but everyone just follows the cart with their pieces of paper. When the push cart stops, and the dishes are revealed, everyone just starts to push their pieces of paper to the employee for him / her to stamp on and serve the dish. It was really the fastest fingers first. If you're slow, you will get nothing. Totally screwed up process, but fun. Despite the fact that I got scalded by the hot soup of a dim sum dish when someone pushed me while i was getting out, and i didn't get to eat any of the dim sum dishes i wanted, I still think it was quite an interesting experience!!
Besides dim sum, we also had quite a few street side food. Bought a couple of work blouses on sale from H&M and G2000, and a cute tee-shirt from the famous ladies market. We also went to the must see tourist attraction in Hong Kong : The Peak. Took the tram, had dinner on top of the hill, and took plenty of pictures.. we even saw the moon REALLY upclose ("pimples" and all) through this super powerful telescope. It was an amazing view.. I stared at it for a long long time.. I've never seen the moon so so close before..
On the 3rd day, we took the ferry back to Macau and checked into our hotel for the night. As there was no free shuttle to our hotel (since it was a budget one), we had to take a free shuttle from the ferry terminal to a big casino hotel nearest to our hotel. Unfortunately, EK read the map wrongly the first time, and we took the wrong hotel shuttle. So we had to ride the bus all the way back to the terminal again and take the correct shuttle for the second time. We reached our hotel around 4pm, checked in and headed straight to the border
for Zhu Hai, China. Our room was pretty decent. Nice big bed, LCD TV, and free internet. The bathroom even comes with a rain shower. Impressive.
We did plenty of shopping in Zhu Hai. I bought a bag and 2 watches, and K bought 2 watches. There was so much more i wanted to see, but we had no time. = (
On our last day, we went to the Venetian to look see and take pictures. Macau is quite a sad place compared to Las Vegas. No life at all, pretty much like a ghost town to me. Then again, i'm not sure if it's due to the recession. Even the casino in Venetian looks empty. Also, i wished we had more time to do some sight seeing.. heard there are a lot of nice churches and architectural buildings in Macau. What a waste. Don't think i will go back there anytime soon though..
Overall, i would say this trip was quite disappointing. I think we tried to squeeze too many places within the short period of time. 3 countries in 4 days!! K also complained that he didn't really get to try the street side food much. And i walked so much i've had a super bad backache for the past 2 days. Worse than those i get during my period!! After this trip, i kinda realize that most trips are about eating and shopping.. What i really love are those trips where i can do more sight seeing of historical buildings or places of architectural wonder. Or do things that provide memorable experiences. So far i seem to only get these in the Western countries..
My Cantonese speaking skills were put to the test during this trip, cause among the 4 of us, only I could speak Cantonese, me being Cantonese and all. Nonetheless, i think i failed terribly.. haha!!
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