OK, so now I'm going to try to run down the weekend in Hong Kong in a concise and understandable fashion - here goes!
FRIDAY - I had a really busy morning at school so when 12:00 hit, I booked out the door so fast and headed straight to Aarons place. We immediately stocked up our backpacks with the booze from his fridge and got a taxi to Tsubame Sanjo. Once we got on the Shinkansen we cracked open our chu his and officially started a weekend of international googality.
When in Tokyo station, we stopped into a random international food and cheese store to get a bottle opener - we had overlooked the need for one while sipping on chu his and canned Asahi - and we were pleasantly surprised to find SAM ADAMS in the fridge.
So despite the fact that we still had 2 drinks and only an hour train ride to get through, we bought them. While waiting for the Narita Express we cracked them open and fulfilled our roles as obnoxious, drunk, foreign backpackers.
By the time we got to Narita, we were hamered and I had lost all my Northeastern travel tension and we cruised into the airport with only an hour and a half before our flight. Ooops. We had to cut in front of like 6 million people at security and immigration, but we managed to make it to the bar across from our gate where Emily was waiting patiently. We ordered celebratory Heinekens and chugged while the flight was boarding. Yosh!
On the plane we all had to sit separately, so I immediately passed out and woke up only to hear the dude say we were landing. That's my dream come true - now if only I could do that between Tokyo and the States!
We got into Hong Kong pretty late and took a bus to the hotel (it took ages!) then pretty much just passed out - the three of us in one bed - how cozy!
SATURDAY - We managed to get out of bed and shower and walk out the door by around 11:30, which was slightly after our ETD, but no worries. We hopped on the subway to Admirality where we were gonna eat lunch then negotiate our way to Victoria Peak for some stunning city views.
We ate lunch at the food court of Pacific Place - this crazy upscale mall with all these weird teeny bopper white girls running around in mini skirts and heels (Staaaaaabucks is over theeeeere!) - I was super confused by this considering we were in Hong Kong... I kinda thought I was in Winter Park again! Barf!
We hailed a taxi to the Peak Tram then took it up to the top where we got awesome views of the city and pictures like this:
Then we decided we'd take a hint from the Lonely Planet and go to the Shangri La hotel bar on the 28th floor to watch the sunset and have a few vacation cocktails. So we made our way to the Shangri La right above Pacific Place. We located the elevator and zoomed up to the 28th. When we got up there we kinda wandered around a bit till some employee noticed the shabbily dressed Americans and asked if we needed help. So, no qualms about it, Emily goes, "Uh, is there a bar here?" and the lady goes, "Um, no... the bar closed two years ago."
AWESOME! Never taking tips from the Lonely Planet again!
So we get back into the elevator and on the 17th floor a wealthy woman in a bathrobe (on her way to the spa, dahhhling) joins us. She immediately turned her back to us and I decided to bust out with, "So, what time we have to meet Dad for cocktails?" Emily's face turned a voilent shade of red as she tried not to laugh, but Aaron spit out "Oh, not till 7, we still have time." Emily: "Oh yeah, I need to change first." Aaron: "Definitely we can't look like this while he's entertaining the bankers."
The woman definitely snuck a peak at us in the mirrors of the elevator and must have been wondering how the hell these three could be related... when she got out of the elevator, we all died of laughter, like this:
This inevitably became THE joke of the trip - making up our crazy lives and different weirdo moms - all the same dad though!
Then we attempted to get into the bar at the Peninsula (THE Hong Kong Hotel, if you know what I mean) but we got dissed cause Aaron had shorts on...
After that we went to TGIFridays for Happy Hour (I know, I know, just get over it), figuring we'd fit in there...
Then back to the hotel to get dolled up and go to the Sky Bar on the top of the Sheraton - right across from the Peninsula -- same view, idiots! Here's a shot of Nathan Road at the bottom of Kowloon:
We got into the Sky Bar and enjoyed more vacation cocktails and a stunning view of Hong Kong Island all lit up.
(PS - Will you look at those beautiful American teeth??)
Then we went to another Martini Bar and when I started hiccupping at 1am, we realized we hadn't had dinner! Oops.
So then, with every intention of going out after dinner, we went to an Italian (?) place with outdoor seating. We ate pizzas and drank (but didn't finish) Strongbows and talked about those things that you really only talk about when drinking (a lot) with good friends.
We didn't end up making it out again, but when we got back to the hotel we took weird pictures like this:
SUNDAY - Aaron and Emily slept in pretty late and since I'm a granny, I was up and at em real early. So I read the newspaper on the roof of the hotel and walked a couple blocks down to a cafe where I ate a muffin, had a coffee and people-watched. Eventually they got up and we hit up another shopping haven since Emily had yet to find a dress for a wedding and Aaron and I didn't buy anything the day before cause Dad didn't give us his Gold Card, duh. We managed to have some shopping success and eventually wandered back to the hotel to rest a little.
We had decided we were going to get into the Peninsula, so we got all fancy.
But first, we had dinner at a Malaysian/Singapor(ian?) restaurant which was fantastic - we got chicken in coconut sauce, barbequed beef, noodles and peanut sauce, roasted veggies, fried rice and a bottle of white to wash it down. Yum! (Enter rant about Japan's "foreign" food restaurants, which are few and far between and pretty much suck - everything is Japanese-ized - oy!)
Anyway, we went up to the Peninsula and got in this time (yay!) but the bar (rather, the area for cheapskates who don't want to get dinner but want an awesome view) was so cramped and full of crappy people that we decided that we were out of there before we even ordered. Take that! Instead we went to the Intercontinental which offered a really awesome view from the ground level - it was located directly on the harbor with nothing in the way. So we had more vacation cocktails and watched the ferries pass and chatted about our weird lives in Japan and realized how freakin lucky we are.
Nothing like a great vacation to put life back into perspective, huh?
