Hong Kong- Things to do
A long awaited trip to the 'Fragrant Harbour', Hong Kong. I would call it a weekend visit. The place has a mountainous terrain with vertical buildings and often described as where "East meets West" because of it's cultural influences in different time periods. I wouldn't be surprise if you visualized colonial type of architectural buildings among those mountainous terrain, but to accommodate the influx of people in there, vertical high risers seems inevitable. Travel from HK International Airport to our Hotel at Causeway Bay was by the Airport Express and all travelling within HK was done using the Octopus card purchased from the Airport Customer Care Centre. The Great George Street at Causeway Bay houses many Restaurants at Island Beverly and a must try is at Saigon Saigon, Vietnamese Cuisine.
 |
| Vietnamese Food at Saigon |
 |
| Great George Street |
The malls, Lane Crawford and Hysan Avenue were all lit up for the Chinese New Year. It was Saturday and a nice way to spend the day was at Stanley. We took MTR to Chai Wan and green mini bus 16M to Stanley Market. On the drive up, we saw some narrow terraced cremation sites on the hills. Just as the land is scarce for the living, so is for the dead too. At the Stanley market, lots of articles from the Mainland and Thailand are available. Some of them are a good buy, however, I doubt the quality of semi-precious jewellery items in shops there. Exit from there leads to the bay where you can take beautiful clicks of sea and land.
 |
| View from Stanley |
Stanley Main Street has many eateries of Western and Asian cuisines. After our lunch at Stanley, we went to Wan Chai, believe me, I have never seen such a crowd in shopping spree. Most shops had 'Sale' for CNY and the crowd was immense. The two main things I looked forward to do in HK, was to take photos of Victoria Harbour at night and to visit the Big Buddha. From Tsim Sha Tsui we went to 'Avenue of Stars'. Avenue of Stars honours the celebrities of Hong Kong Film Industry. My spouse had taken a picture with his all-time favourite star- Bruce Lee, that too in a Karate pose. It was a nice walk there, taking photos of Victoria Harbour during twilight and nightfall.
 |
| Victoria Harbour |
 |
| Cable Ride to Ngong Ping Village |
There is a circular open space termed as "Di Tan" on the map of the village, below the steps to Big Buddha, where you can hear your sound resonating while you speak. It a good acoustic experience. It is about 260 steps climb to reach the Big Buddha. The Tian Tan, as Big Buddha is known, is 34 meters high (112 feet), made of bronze and was unveiled in 1993.
 |
| Big Buddha |
On the way to Tian Tan, both sides of the path are flanked with Twelve Divine General with particular arms, who represents the animal of Chinese Zodiac and two hours of a day. Like General Makura is armed with axe, represents Rabbit and 5 am to 7 am of the day. General Andhira is armed with a mallet, represents Monkey of Chinese 12 Zodiac and 3 pm to 5 pm of the day. On the first level of the podium, six Bodhisattwas are seen, three on either sides of the stairs. Second level houses museum with paintings and articles depicting Buddha's Life and Teachings. On the third level is Tian Tan seated on lotus flower. According to Buddhism, mind of a pure person is like a lotus which is surrounded by murky water but never adhere to it. It was almost dusk and the last Cable Car to leave for Tung Chung would be at 18:30 hrs. On our way back, another interesting thing to do at IB was to make a mini figurine at 'QMinime@Unusually Creations'. It takes about two weeks to collect it or you could get it couriered to most places. On the last night at Causeway Bay, we had a delicious dinner at Mirch Masala at IB.
 |
| At Mirch Masala, Causeway Bay |
Comments
Post a Comment