The most important way to get to know a city is to travel at "people speed". If you only stay at resorts and travel only by car you never get to know a city. Doing so is like saying that you've been to Chicago, when in reality you've only had a layover at OHare. I'll call shenanigans on that every time.The term "people speed" comes from Neil Peart's (my hero) book on his travels in Africa. On a two week cycling trip up the coast, he learned about the people in a way that he never could have otherwise. I won't review the whole book, but I've had a bunch of those kind of experiences in HK because I've been traveling by foot, bus and train. Not a bicycle as my hero prefers, but still "people speed".
I think my favorite such event came after a trip to Victoria's Peak. Just before sunset I wandered down one of the paths (Findlay) near the peak, and found a clearing from which to watch the city light up. Just as the lights were going down a couple in their late forties wandered down the path.
They were a pair of charming British expatriates who moved here eight years ago. Even though he had an office high on one of the tallest building, they still liked to come up to the peak once in a while. Before they parted, he told me I should go down from the peak on the double-decker bus, then take the Star Ferry across the water (which I had done in the morning). He said they were the two cheapest tourist attractions you were likely to find anywhere, and he would turn out to be right. You couldn't help but like them, so I disregarded my pre-purchased pass down on the tram and went to the bus.
The bus ride down was no less hair raising than last year's white water rafting trip in Colorado. To be fair, the rafting trip was tamer than the one I did with my old man when he took me for my high school graduation. What a memorable gift that has been, but I digress.
The adventure really began when I got off the bus too early and had to walk down to the pier. After wandering through a largely quiet financial area I saw a group of people. To my thinking, a populous place would likely be a safer place to travel so I went closer.
What I came to was Chater Garden; a large, paved open area where clusters of people filled the area. Once amongst them, I noticed that at least 19 out f 20 people here were women. Weird! Did I finally figure out where women hang out? Well, actually, I kinda did. Jackpot? No. They were all a little old for me for starters, but there were almost no men here. Weird!These women were sitting around playing cards, dice, bingo, and just generally bullshitting with each other. Not that I understood their speech, but the tone of things suggested that they were in clusters of friends.
I thought to myself, I'll have to ask one of my friends who know about HK what was going on - which was stupid since I was in the midst of it all. But I didn't hear anything that made me think that anyone spoke English. I'd been more outgoing than usual for the whole trip, why the hesitance now?Damn, the Sox just lost! Sorry, I was watching game 7 as I write. I don't even like baseball, why am I into this game?
Like I was saying, I was being stupid, but at least I knew it. As I progressed through the crowd, the clusters spilled past the park into Admiralty St., which was closed down. I popped into a high end clothing store just as it was closing. Considering I was dressed more like a backpacking slob than his usual clientele, the clerk told me these were all "domestic workers". As I walked away, I thought they must be gathering to look for work.
So as normal, I'm lost, but rather enjoying it. Everyone seemed so genuinely happy and relaxed, I couldn't help but smile along as I walked. Finally I heard an English word, so I stopped to ask for directions! I ended up approaching someone who didn't speak English, but she indicated for me to stay there and went to get her friend.
A Philipino lady named Laura came over and I asked her directions, I was about to go the wrong way. Which would have been bad, because that's never happened before.
She explained to me that Sunday was everyone's day off for them. She had been at the beach in the morning and had come here to hang out. They just normally get together on Sundays to hang out on a street in the financial area. In retrospect I wonder how this sort of thing gets started.
For some reason these women loved me, they all did introductions and took pictures with me before I realized I too had a camera. Unfortunately I only got this one picture. Blurry as it is, it will be one of my favorites. If I wasn't concerned about getting back to the Shenzhen border too late, I would have enjoyed a little more time here I think.
The ferry ride was pretty nice too.
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When we were bored, my friends and I used to just ride the Star Ferry back and forth. It's really fun in the rain. As for the buses, did you get to experience two double-decker buses passing each other on a really sharp curve? And did you get to tower over all the people crowded on the MTR?
Sadly, the Filipino women you saw were "ah ma" or maids. When I was in HK, you could always see them hanging out in their circles on Sundays. We actually had a live-in Filipino maid as well for a bit, but it was just too creepy after a while. The reason I say "sadly" is that the economy in the Philippines used to be so bad that a woman could earn more as a maid in Hong Kong than as an accountant in their own country. So, a lot of the Filipino 'domestic workers' account for much of Hong Kong's illegal immigrants and are ususally treated as a lower caste, while I suppose the British expats used to consider themselves a step above the rest. Of course, I don't really know how things stand now; you'll have to tell me. ;)
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