For those of you on the crazy Aussie kick, I met one within minutes of checking into my hostel here. His name is Ivan, and he's actually quite a nice guy. Until he had me clinging to a fence on the edge of a cliff. More about that in a bit...
We headed out early yesterday morning and went to the local fresh foods market. One of the very first things we saw was a woman killing and skinning six frogs with a butcher knife, and she barely touched them. They were mere froglegs in about a minute flat. I was tweaking a bit, and the guy who had purchase them just laughed and laughed at me. The market was incredible - but the meat just hangs out. And it's freaking 90 degrees and 87% humidity here. Blech. I guess if enough people had died of e coli, they might decide to refridgerate by now, so maybe we mericuns are just super paranoid by world standards, but I won't take my chances.
From there we went down to hong kong island and up the tram to victoria peak. It's really somewhat of a tourist trap. There's a big shopping mall at the top where they charge three times as much for a bottle of water as down in hong kong. We started walking up a hill until the path turned into an old concrete staircase mostly covered by grasses that ended at a green fence surrounding a power station. We wanted to get to the other side of the hill where the better view was, so Ivan set out inching his way along a 4 inch concrete ledge, hanging onto the fence...and I followed. It actually wasn't so bad because the dense brush beneath us would have quickly broken a fall. But what a view! You can see all of hong kong from up there - well what's visible through the polution at least. The shipping years here make seattle look itsy bitsy, too. And those amazing butterflies with bright turqious wing spots and white cockatoos really do exist. They're fantastic to see for real in the wild - where cockatoos are practically pidgeons.
We caught the ferry back in time to see the laser show in downtown hong kong. Every night at about 8 pm, the lights on the buildings start going off in cool patterns, and there are green lasers that shoot off the tops of the tallest buildings. Hong Kong has got to have the most amazing skyline of any city - no offense to you new yorkers ;)
2 comments:
Hola little Kimmy (Josh in England here). Hope you have a great trip! looking forward to seeing and hearing about the adventures.
Ah Kimee, so soon you forget your basic chemistry. Those frog legs are fine - the near saturation levels of heavy metals in the frog meat will inhibit bacterial growth. Duh!
So I hope you snapped some great pictures - as Ivan dangled you one-handed over the precipice! Cause that's what crazy Aussies are for!
And I see the adventure begins ....
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