HKSAR

The first few days of our trip were spent in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.  That's actually its full name.  It was leased (yes, really!) to Great Britain from China and the lease expired in 1997, at which point the Brits said their farewells and Hong Kong became an official region of China.

The view from our hotel room.  Could you die or what?

Although it "belongs" to China and definitely feels it, Hong Kong operates essentially on its own.  It is run by an elected legislature; this legislature used to be elected by the Brits and is now elected by China.  There are over 7 million citizens living in Hong Kong and of all of those, only 1,200 people can vote.  The votes obviously don't make that much of a difference and I asked our tour guide, Katie, a Hong Kong native, if this bothered her.  She shrugged and said no.  To Hong Kong'ers, what is the difference in being told what to do by England or China?  No difference.  And Hong Kong is so vital as an economic powerhouse and port in Asia that no country is going to step in and make too big a change to their daily life.  So, all is well that ends well I guess.

These are groups of apartment buildings.  The scale of them is too large to describe.

Hong Kong is a series of more than 260 islands off the coast of mainland China.  We visited Lantau (where the airport currently is), Kowloon (where our hotel was), and Hong Kong island.  We chose Hong Kong as our introduction to Asia because while it is definitely and without a doubt Chinese, it is also Western-friendly and has been allowed to prosper under Western administration in a way that its communist "mother" has not been.  This is what we expected and this turned out to be true.  Being around Hong Kong'ers was kind of like running into a very distant 3rd cousin: you would never have recognized him on the street, but after spending some time with him you can see your shared family traits.

Our very awesome tour guide for the entire time, Katie.  Of course that's not her Chinese name, but it's what she told us to call her.  :)

Hong Kong is all about the night life.  In fact, most businesses do not open before 9:30 or 10:00 a.m.  This was a shock to our system.  The first morning we were there, we were bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at like 5:00 a.m. (sooooo unlike real life) and walked around town later that morning.

It's the weirdest thing in the world to pass a Starbuck's that is still closed at 8:00 in the morning.  Just sayin'.  But it's true!

Hong Kong'ers work very, very hard.  Regardless of one's profession, it is standard to work 6 days a week, usually 12-14 hours a day.  The "common" day off is Sunday and Katie said most people literally sleep all day in order to prepare for another hard work week.  I nodded enthusiastically; that's what I'd do!  {Here is where I swallow all complaints I have ever made about work in my life.}

The city is wide awake all night.

Hong Kong is a bustling, overtly in-your-face, neon-lights kind of beautiful.  It is loud noises and Cantonese and ringing gongs and incense and Hermes at great prices! and dim sum and a million red taxis and smiles all around.  It is crowds and shuffling and spinning and sweating.  Always sweating.

More to come, including:
--gods
--food
--touristy stuff

Time to unpack!