Dancing in (the eve of) September

A few nights ago I was chatting up Mike, one of Jesse's friends from Toronto who conveniently (for me) moved to Hong Kong a few years ago, and was more than slightly miffed when he told me that Hong Kong isn't really known for it's dance club scene.  Lounges, apparently, are a dime a dozen, but rumour was that locals just didn't like getting down and dirty on the dance floor.  Luckily,  this rumour was partially dispelled on Monday night when we happened to stumble upon a proper funk band playing at a club in LKF, covering Al Green, Earth Wind and Fire and other disco-era r&b classics.  It didn't take long before the crowd made its way to the dance floor.  

Admittedly, "crowd" might be a bit of an overstatement.  In fact, the dance floor was pretty much held down all night by one lone soldier- a flamboyantly gay middle aged asian man with a pocket-sized paper fan that played a leading role in most of his dance moves.  We did get up and join him for a few songs, but our western moves paled in comparison to his well-rehearsed fan-heavy routines.  And so the search continues for a proper dance club...

Yesterday, I made my way across Victoria Harbour to Kowloon with Jesse, Nicole and Kora.  If Hong Kong Island left any doubt about whether or not I was truly living in an asian city, Kowloon more than settled it.  If you're looking for an authentic Chinese experience (viz. crowded markets, abundant noodle shops, neon signs and cupboard-sized restaurants proudly displaying whole boiled geese and serving up miscellaneous fried organs) then Kowloon is definitely your destination.  With a population density of roughly 43,000 per square kilometer (approximately 2.5 times that of Hong Kong Island), Kowloon is hot and crowded.  Luckily, it is also relatively flat which made our marathon walk through the area slightly less exhausting.

Neon signs by day along Nathan Street

Goose is a special at a lot of the Kowloon Restaurants

If you take the star ferry across to Kowloon, you arrive on the Tsim Sha Tsui promenade surrounded by luxury retailers, ritzy hotels and Michelin Starred restaurants.   A great area to explore if you have CAD$4 million to drop on  hand carved Mammoth Tusks (a luxury commodity that has filled the gap in the ivory market ever since the trade ban on elephant ivory) or if you want to peruse the racks at Vivienne Tam before heading for high tea at the Lobby at the Penninsula, but we decided to go a little deeper into the heart of Kowloon and rode the MTR all the way to Prince Edward Station.

Our first stop was Flower Market Road:  two or three blocks of open-fronted shops selling bunches of exotic flowers at rock bottom prices (a dozen roses ran about CAD$3 and a live orchid plant cost about CAD$4-7).  Fresh flowers are thought to bring good luck and are therefore a staple in most Hong Kong households.  They also apparently improve Feng Shui, but I think the real draw is that the fragrant bouquets of lilies and freesia likely mask some of the more pungent odors which are known to violently burst forth from unknown sources and catch your nostrils quite off guard.

A little further down the road, we came to the Yuen Po Street Bird Market, a fascinating and thoroughly disturbing open-air courtyard where vendors sell all types of song birds and related paraphernalia including intricately fashioned bird cages, delicate porcelain water dishes and bags of live crickets.  

On display were everything from small parakeets and cockatiels to African Grey parrots, green parrots and one very grumpy macaw.  Most of the birds seemed happy enough, but some bounced psychotically off the walls of their cages every time you walked near, no doubt as a result of severe claustrophobia and bird anxiety.  One poor guy had lost his tail, likely in a failed escape attempt.

The Market is not only a popular destination for tourists and bird fanciers, it is also a place where local Kowlooners (mostly older men) can come with their birds for an afternoon outing.  Quite a strange site.

By the time we had done a full loop around the courtyard, I had seen just about as many caged birds as I could handle for one day, and after the giant macaw nearly took off my finger with his beak as I took his photo, I got the sense that they had had just about enough of us snap-happy tourists as well.

Live Food!

Friendly Cockatiels

This macaw was not interested in being friends

From the Bird Market, we headed toward the next logical destination: the Goldfish Market.  Equally as fascinating and not quite as terrifying as the Bird Market.  All along Tung Choi Street between Prince Edward and Bute, store fronts were lined with bags and bags of live aquarium fish.  Everything from Neon Tetras (about 8 for a dollar) to angel fish to tiny turtles to albino frogs.  One store even carried miniature red, white and blue lobsters.  Aquariums are also considered to bring good luck and are excellent for feng shui (sensing a theme yet?).  The brightly hued exotic fish and hypnotizing live coral aquariums were almost enough to convince me to invest in a new pet, but for now I think the geckos in the Patrick Manson bathrooms are just about all the residence wildlife I can handle.

To date, I have been pleasantly surprised at how laid back all of the local vendors seem to be in Hong Kong.  Having spent a fair amount of time negotiating my way through street markets in Central America and Europe, I came to Kowloon expecting to have to fight the entrepreneurs of the informal sector off with sticks.  I was pleasantly shocked to find that most of the vendors in the Ladies Market seemed to take a very low-pressure sales approach in comparison to their Mexican counterparts.  The sales dialogue typically unfolds in a generic manner as follows:

Jesse and Nicole stroll through the market

Me: (Point to an item) How Much?

Vendor: 100 (insert price).

Me: (looking shocked then suddenly uninterested) Oh, no thanks.

Vendor: Okay, how much?

Me: 25 (I like to start at about a quarter of the quoted price).

Vendor: No, no too low.

At this point the vendor will highlight various features depending on the product like "real silver", "like Chanel" or "Good for boyfriend" and then make a counteroffer which will take one of two forms: either a 2 for 1 offer at the original price or an immediate jump to half-price.  Following this, I will either restate my initial offer of 1/4 the price, or meet somewhere in the middle depending on how much I want whatever junky treasure it is I am bargaining for.  Most often, I am pretty bored by this time and have seen something in another stall that has caught my eye so I walk away.  Have yet to see anything here that I can't live without.

After the ladies market, we picked up our pace a little bit and made our way along Temple Street where the night market was just starting to set up.  A warning to anyone planning on taking a leisurely stroll through the night market with kids: this public market seems to be the proper location to load up on novelty lingerie and adult toys.  At first we shared a few chuckles as we passed by fairly benign-looking back massagers and nighties, but only a few tables in, our laughs turned into wide-eyed, open mouthed bewilderment as we not-so-bashfully surveyed the many interesting silicone and battery-operated options available to customers who liked a little impropriety along with their open-air shopping.

Finally we made our way down the south end of Nathan Road to the Tsim Sha Tsui promenade where we set up shop (and tripods) to watch the famous Symphony of Lights illuminate Victoria Harbour.  Lasers and light fixtures on more than 40 buildings on both sides of the harbour light up the night sky for 20 minutes every night in a dazzling display set to music.  We were glad we got their early since there was a sizable crowd by the time the show started.  The "hurry up and wait" element of Hong Kong's attractions is made far more tolerable thanks to the city's acceptance of public alcohol consumption.  We were all parched after a full day of walking around in the heat and a couple of TsingTaos courtesy of the nearest 7-Eleven really hit the spot!  We capped the night off at Gaylord- an unfortunately named but tasty Indian food restaurant complete with its own live tabla band.  The hype for this restaurant was well-deserved.