OGGI HO FATTO

On the first night that I decided to venture out after dark I ended up at the ICC (http://www.shkp-icc.com/) the tallest building in Hong Kong! We went up to the 108th floor to admire the view and have a drink. There is a fancy design bar on the top floor, with viewing terrace and everything. it was truly beautiful and awe-inspiring. the second photo is me in the bathroom. i was slightly intimidated by how fancy it was. there were actual fresh towels to dry your hands on, then you had to throw them into a basket. the other exchange students i was seemed quite unfazed, also by the very high drink prices. i won't be hanging out in high-level bars every night that's for sure! but it was an amazing place to spend my first night in hong kong. looking down on the beautiful Victoria harbour, kowloon and hong kong island and ferries going back and forth.

The next day (Sunday) I decided to take a long walk through the city, heading for the Mong Kok area. it's a very vibrant market area, definitely not fancy and not westernized.

market stalls all over the place, impossibly high and crowded buildings. bustling with people selling, buying, walking, running, eating, chewing, sitting on the pavement.

my photographs aren't that good because it truly is impossible to capture the whole scene in a tiny LCD screen of a camera. i tried to soak it up as much as possible and take just a few snapshots. i'm sure in my 5 months here i'll gradually document it better and better... i loved Mong Kok, i'll be going back for sure. it was about a 1-hour walk from HKBU. i really felt like I needed to walk it instead of taking the MTR (mass transit railway, underground trains) so i could get a feel for the distances of the city. plus, i wanted to walk off the INSANE amount of food i had eaten since i arrived. it's not likely i'll be signing up to the all-girls netball team so walking remains my favourite sport.

after Mong Kok we decided we might as well walk all the way down to the tip of Kowloon, to Victoria Harbour. once we got there it seemed logical to take the famous Star Ferry across the harbour to Hong Kong island. i'd been wanting to do this ever since i read about it in the guidebook back in italy. there are no bridges over the harbour, just underground tunnels. so the ferry is the only way to cross it across the water. it only takes about 5 minutes and is very cheap (2.3 HK$ = 0.23 EU). and beautiful of course. it was foggy so again my photos are terrible. the skyline of HK is just too strange. I am used to high skyscrapers in cities like london or NYC, but to see these hundreds of buildings clustered together with a backdrop of untouched, steep green hills is unlike anything i've ever seen. the city is absolutely bombarded with construction but the hills are green, leafy and lush. and very, very high.. and with a beautiful shape that makes me understand a lot more about all the asian art i've ever seen.