Day 1 - 4 Aug 06

I had to wake up at an ungodly hour 4am in order to catch the 6 45am jetstar flight to HK. Complaints aside, its exhilarating to travel out of the country after a good half a year of yearning for it. Plus the early flight meant that we get to spend extra time in HK!

Upon check-in, perhaps it was the insane early hours, my exhilaration died down and my focus was to get a good sleep on board the plane. The jetstar flight was a-ok, my first at taking a budget airline. As I was asleep more than half the time, the no-food/drinks-unless-u-buy-from-the-stewardess wasn't a bother.

So here I was at the Chek Lap Kok Airport , ready to blaze the city streets. But silly-me, forgot to fill up the disembarkment form, got held up at the counters. This is retribution for making fun of the other nationalities for holding up the queue.

We managed to meet PengYong, my cuz at the airport. Our timing is so perfect! Coz we're staying at his place while he's leaving for S'pore. So we've his whole place to ourselves till he returns.

To get to PengYong's place, we took the MTR instead of the cab, in our bid to save some money for HK shopping. So like freaking tourists, Mich and I dragged our oversized luggage across the financial district of HK. We looked like imported maids in our shabby clothes amongs the corporate-looking Hongkongers in their powersuits, branded briefcases and fashionable togs.

After the embarrasing stroll with our cubersome luggage through the poshness of IFC building, which is more than equivalent to S'pore's paragon, Mich & I wasted no time exploring the streets for some serious shopping damage.

Our first stop - Tsim Tsa Tsui. The weather was sweltering hot. We stop by a popular desert chain to grab a refreshing drink - some mango concoction and they've got a zillion permutations of them - definitely a must try!

We walked till our legs cried out for desperate rest. I guess the lack of good sleep on the plane also din help. We stop to rest at one of the coffeeshop ate our dinner there. HK is populated by these so called 'coffeeshops' or 'tsa tsa teng' and its where the locals get their grub of wanton mee, pork rice, innards, milk tea, etc.. ranges from HK$8-$15 per portion.

With our tummies filled, and legs rested, we continued to hit the streets. We walked past this shop - 'Me & George', we ransacked the entire store. It was like a flea market/salvation army haven, where everything was priced between HK$10-$50, and u had to dig into their mountains of clothes to find the gems. It was just like that movie scene from 'The Sweetest Thing' where Cameron Diaz & Christina Applegate chanced upon this vintage store. Mich and I found retro madonna tops, grease lightning leather jackets, pretty woman shoulder-pad blazers. Amongst these, I bought a vintage le coq sportif t-shirt for less than 10 sing dollars!

Another HK trademark, their streets are filled with health & beauty shops! SaSa is everywhere, and when u step out of one, just a couple of blocks away, is a Watson's or Bonjour or some other beauty store. So to celebrate my long awaited holiday, I bought black nail polish at just HK$7.

We went back to my cuz's service appartment to paint our nails goth and watch a bit of telly. To our horror, the HK news just reported that there was a typhoon going on! The weather forecast showed the next 6 days - rain and stormy clouds! What a way to start a vacation!