Hong Kong, Part I: 15 minutes of Fame

 
The flight to Hong Kong was uneventful; we were delayed a little bit leaving Okinawa, but Wyatt made friends with a Japanese boy and they took turns giving each other their precious little toys.  The little boy made the first move, giving Wyatt some of his Japanese action figure trading cards.  Wyatt gave him a matchbox car.  The boy reciprocated in kind with an action figure mask; Wyatt gave him two sheets of Scooby Doo stickers.  Finally, as we were about to depart, the boy gave him his actual action figure!  Wyatt gave him another Matchbox car.  It was so sweet - these two little boys, who couldn't converse in each other's languages but so sweetly shared the most important language to them both: Toys. :)

We had a hard time juggling Olivia on the flight (doesn't she look so happy???).  She just wants to go, go, go everywhere and not sit still, but all in all, arrived in Hong Kong no worse for the wear.  We marched our way over to immigration, and I was bent over in line filling out our immigration cards and only vaguely aware that Wyatt was sort of acting up.  Not in a bad way, just being silly. When I finally looked up, it turns out he was actually putting on a show for the 20+ Asian people surrounding us, who were all busy laughing at and admiring our children while whipping out their cameras to take picture after picture of them.  I was confused as to why all the attention, and then I remembered....we were Americans. Americans with small children.  In fact, we had an American baby girl. 

For the remainder of the trip, we were hounded by Chinese people taking pictures of our kids.  Especially Olivia, but they liked Wyatt too because he was so charismatic.  They would follow them around, taking 5-10 pictures at a time, sticking cameras directly in their faces, just to capture an American baby or child on film.  By the end of Day 2, I seriously felt like we had paparazzi following us!!  It actually crossed my mind that they MUST think we were movie stars of some sort.  I honestly could not believe the insane amount of attention our kids were drawing! 

 

We took a shared bus to the hotel and this turned out to be a great way to see the city at night - we were able to witness the hustle and bustle of the crowded walkways, the MILLIONS of shipping containers at the ports, and the night markets full of "copy" purses, souveniers and the like without having to drag the kids through it. We got to our room at the Salisbury YMCA Hotel and tried to get settled, but by the time we set up shop, found our pajamas and brushed our teeth, it was almost 11 p.m.!

Olivia had a rough night.  I guess it was sleeping in someplace new, I don't know, but I only got about 4 hours of sleep.  Nonetheless, we got up bright and early with the kids, ready to take on Hong Kong.  Except that we couldn't. Olivia was pretty much inconsolable.  She wanted to be held, but when you held her, she wanted down.  So you put her down, and she burst into tears.  I think she was just pretty much exhausted, so we eventually got her to sleep and hoped she would wake up in a better mood.  In the meantime, I took Wyatt down to see a water fountain he had spied out of our window.  We walked through the Heritage Museum area and to the pier where the ferrys leave from Kowloon (the islet we were staying on) to Hong Kong Island and Lantau Island.

2011 is the Year of the Rabbit - there were rabbits all over Hong Kong!!


We saw the famous Clock Tower down by the pier.

Another display for the Chinese New Year starting February 3...definitely a big deal!

Looking toward Hong Kong Island from Kowloon islet.




After Livy awoke, we took off for Victoria's Peak.  Hong Kong has one of the world's best subway systems, so we took it to Hong Kong Island and then walked to the Peak entrance.  Wyatt had fun pushing Livy through the Subway tunnels - actually they both loved it!

 
Holding onto the Subway pole!!



It was an absolutely beautiful day, sunny and 70 degrees.  We waited in a crowded line for quite awhile, cameras snapping all around us at the kids, and finally boarded the train to take to the top of Victoria's Peak.  From there, we could see views of most of Hong Kong. 


It was beautiful, but the kids were having none of it.  Once we got to the top, it was Wyatt's turn to have a meltdown.  It was then that I got really frustrated with people taking pictures of my kids.  The last thing I needed while my kid was kicking and screaming at the top of a mountain were people capturing it on film!Finally we got out of there and hit up Bubba Gumps.  Let me tell you how excited I was to find this restaurant there.... SO EXCITED!  Keep in mind that I haven't eaten "American" food in one year and almost four months.  WOOHOO!  I probably consumed 3,000 calories.  But that's ok. We walked a lot on this trip! :)

 

Back to the hotel for naps all around.... then we walked through the streets of Hong Kong to Temple Street Market.  Hong Kong is renowned for its bargain shopping.  They have markets and markets and more markets full of stuff.  I didn't buy much, but it was fun to look!

That pretty much wrapped up our first full day in Hong Kong.  Part II of the adventure later!