Mike & the Monk and other Hong Kong adventures

More pictures from our room window. Cloudy and dreary, but still beautiful.

Because I am married to my wonderful hubby, it is necessary to take a picture of all emergency vehicles while traveling in other countries. See below for Hong Kong fire truck :)

And, don't forget the Hong Kong police wagon.

This beautiful Christmas tree is right next to our hotel. The shopping center is so pretty.

So, as I am taking pictures of the tree I wonder where Mike is. When I turn around, this is what I see. Umm, is he giving the monk an autograph?

Oh great, this is the typical Mike questioning and explaining look. So, I rushed over to find that Mike was actual bargaining for a bracelet he was selling. We are now the happy owners of a wooden bead bracelet.

Hong Kong Dec 15th

Today was rainy and cloudy, but look how beautiful the Harbour is? This is across the water from us and it looks like something out of a magazine. Just stunning.

The Harbour has tons of ferries, but then we stumbled across this little boat. The water was getting rough and they were just hanging out.

This is one of the trees that I mention below (I could not get the pictures to move). Look how the roots grow into the side of the wall. Harrison and I think they look like octopus tentacles.

The picture below is walking by a back street in TST, the section of Hong Kong that we are staying in. Notice how everything at street level is colorful, then as you go up it is all gray. Most of this area is very new and sparkly so I figured this must be an older building that reflects what the area looked like before the glitz and glamour showed up. And, there is TONS of glitz and glimmer - apparently Tiffany & Co needs to be on every corner in case you missed the previous store.

I love this picture below because it shows what the streets look like when you peer down.

Here is another tree picture from Kowloon Park. We say several artists drawing pictures of the trees.

We had to stop and take a picture of the scaffolding. Piper is too young to really appreciate the difference between here and the US for these sorts of things, but Harrison thought it was so neat that they were holding up the building with sticks.

The top of one of the trees at Kowloon Park.

Today was a rainy day in Hong Kong. We woke up and headed down to the hotel restaurant for breakfast, which was really good, and then went to explore the area. We had planned to take a tour at 1:30, but because of the weather we skipped it. The kids really enjoyed going through some local shops and a local grocery store. We tried to go to the Space Museum, but it did not open until later so we just walked around until we stumbled onto Kowloon park.

The park had some amazing trees. Harrison and I were fascinated by the roots of the trees and how massive they are. The park also had a bird aviary that we walked through. While at the park, a local class walked by and we started to hear "English" over and over so I said, hello. Well the kids got so excited, they said "hello" and one older child stopped and said, "It is nice to meet you." When I said, "It is nice to meet you too" she started jumping up and down and clapping. By the time they got to Mike, who was a bit down the path, they were talking and waiving like he was someone famous. So cute!

PS - The Tradition

Just cannot break traditions ---the Nikon just broke! Can you believe that? CRAZY!!!

The Salisbury

The top two pictures are from our living room window. Great views! You can see the kids immediately destroyed their room unpacking all the crafts I had packed. The last picture is my room. An awesome hard and comfy bed. I swear I must be the only one that loves a hard bed!

We are off to go see Hong Kong. Have a great night everyone!

Hong Kong Airport and Cathay Pacific

We arrived safely at Hong Kong not withstanding some crying hysterics from me on the plane. We had a bunch of turbulence and that, mixed with the emotions of leaving Jack, were just too much. So, while I would rate Cathay Pacific LOWER than Korean Air for overall rating, for psychological services they are #1. We were excited to see what Cathay Pacific was like because they are ranked in the top 5 airlines in the world for services, etc. The conclusion is that they are nicer than our US carriers, in our opinion, fall short of the spectacular service on Korean Air.

The "Clubhouse" at JFK

Jack

As most of you know, my step-dad Jack suffered a serious injury Saturday night. This was the morning of his accident. The kids were so thrilled that he came with us. We had to leave Jack as we could not change our departing tickets because the airlines were filled. This was so incredibly hard for us, but knowing that so many friends and family are looking after him has made it so much easier.