Stop off in Shopping Central.

I’m back in Hong Kong again for six days before finally coming back to Blighty. It was very hot and humid on the day after I arrived. I hadn’t been here for more than 12 hours before I was bitten a dozen times by whatever insects are here. Mainly mosquitos and midge like things I hope. The weather has turned much colder recently and it even rained quite a lot last night. It’s probably good preparation for my return to even colder climates later this month. Going straight from sunny Manly beach on the pacific to not so sunny Bristol mud flats in the English channel would be too much of a shock to my system.

Unfortunately I can’t really do too much shopping over here. My backpack is much too full to be able to carry anymore back to the UK. It weighed in at a hefty 22kg at the airport. Fortunately I could stuff as much into my coat and laptop bag without them being weighed which helped. Unfortunately that does mean I end up with monkey arms.

I’m always amazed by the public transport system in Hong Kong. Well I suppose most of the population does use it here to get around. There are TV’s on just about every train and bus. Probably to take your mind off the fact that you’re more than likely stuck in the terrible traffic jams that they have here. Their general solution to the traffic problems here is to build more and more roads. The roads appear to be ever wider and ever higher up each time I come back here.

The housing is continually growing to cope with the ever-expanding population as well. There are always new high-rise flats going up to house people. This shot was taken from the 15th floor of one of my auntie’s flats. She lives in a one-bed apartment that is probably about a third the size of my Sydney place. I had problems turning around to close the door in her bathroom it was such a space saver. If you can imagine a shower, toilet, washbasin and in swinging door all in the space of a metre square space you can get the idea.

I’ve been to see my mum’s side of the family who mostly live on Llama Island. It’s a very nice island that is just off the Hong Kong mainland. It’s much quieter there as there aren’t any roads and hence no cars. There are also much less people on the island and it’s roughly divided up into four sections. One with a coal power station and the others being general communities. I believe that there’s a hippy section but I’ve only been to the area where my relatives live.

Here’s a photo of my mum, one of her brothers and an older cousin. I’m sure you can see where my family good looks come from. ☺ My mum was telling me about how she used to be quite a good swimmer when she was younger. She once almost drowned when she was chasing a inflatable ball out to sea and she didn’t think about how far she was swimming out only about trying to get the ball. Once she caught up with it she then looked back and realised how far she had swam out. Then she forgot about the ball and just concentrated on trying to swim back to the shore.

Just behind one of my uncle’s house there are some small hills. Apparently just last weekend there was a mountain biking event up and around the hills. It’s a shame that I missed that because I would have really liked to see where they rode and how difficult it would have been. I suspect that because there aren’t any trails going up to the mountains they have to either make their own way up there or they mark out a rough course. I think I’ll have to try to make my own way up there the next time I’m back here. Everyone is quite impressed with my skydiving and mountain biking exploits, probably less impressed with my scars from my mistakes!