The Sister Trip Week 2.1

The second week Kane arrived on Saturday night. We decided to show them what the infamous LKF experience was like, and Kane was such a trooper going to bars and dancing like a fiend despite the jet lag. We started the night at our beloved Brickhouse and ended it at an amazing live cover band bar in Wan Chai. I would definitely go back to this bar again! It was like singing along with karaoke, except the person with the mic was really good!

On Sunday, I thought it would be fun to go to Cheung Chau, the nice island about a 30 minute ferry ride from us, with lots of local shops and great seafood. I didn't anticipate us being so incapacitated from the night before, so the ferry ride was a bit rocky. But we made it in one piece and ended up having a lovely day on the island, with a great seafood lunch at the end. Sichuan spiced crab anyone?

That night we meet up with Tiffany to see E.T. on a bar's veranda. It was a beautiful night, and, surprisingly it was the first time I ever watched E.T. As a kid I always thought he was too scary.

Monday we did the Bruce Lee celebration. We watched "The Way of the Dragon" in the morning, when went out to the Heritage Museum in the afternoon, where they have an exhibit about Bruce Lee, showing his journals, his workout equipment, wardrobe, and all sorts of collectable action figures. We also visited a massive temple in Sha Tin, honoring an ancient warrior known for his strength and military leadership. Biggest statue in a temple I have ever seen!

Stuart arrived that evening, so we made sure to get some dim sum to celebrate his arrival.

Tuesday we walked around Causeway Bay, checking out all of the wet markets, interesting dried food shops, and local eateries. It's funny because all of this stuff has now become normal to me. I loved seeing everyone's reactions as they noticed the weirdness that sometimes occurs here. I could never get tired of being a tour guide for that reason alone. Tuesday night we had about 20 people over for a potluck dinner party. It was really nice. We rented our building's large entertaining space, which worked perfectly for the party. We spent the afternoon cooking away some delectable dishes, then had fun with friends meeting family.

We of course, went out for dan dan noodles at our favorite Sichuan restaurant!

Kane found this little gem. We laughed for a while at that one.

This is a reflexology pathway you walk on to massage your feet. It hurts way more than Leah is letting on.

The Sister Visit, Week 1.2

We are now halfway through the sisters only week. On Tuesday, we treated ourselves to a spa day, including both sauna and steam room time, noodles and tea in the lounge room, and finally a pressure point massage. Apparently I am a wuss, because, again, I had to do mental exercises to keep myself from yelling out in pain, while Leah and Steph seemed to thoroughly enjoy their massages.

On Wednesday, we went over to Kowloon again to check out the Art Museum. Unfortunately, it was not completely open, as they were redoing some of the exhibits, but we still got to see lots of traditional scroll paintings, and many had poems attached. We then wandered through Kowloon, stopping at the Kowloon Park, which had its own aviary. Finally, we made our lunch break at the notorious TeaWood, a Taiwanese cafe known for beef noodles, fried chicken, and TOAST! Imagine Texas toast soaked in honey, toasted, then covered in ice cream and fruit. Delicious!

On Thursday we went to the Ladies Market with my friend Jenna to look for souvenirs. One silk bathrobe and two purses later, we had gotten some pretty good steals! We also walked over to the jade market, which was quite a sight. It was essentially a warehouse full of jade vendors. Some of the jade pieces were incredibly expensive. Others sold pearls, (no idea if they were real or fake) others sold antiques. Super interesting regardless. 

Friday included a walk through Central, through the Hong Kong Park and the Zoological Garden. Man is that Zoo hard to walk to. But we had a great time looking at the crazy monkeys that were swinging enthusiastically around their enclosures. Some were making circuits around the perimeter, while others were practicing their acrobatic flips in the middle. So funny. It was also clearly spring time, because we saw several twitterpated animals, including parrots, bull frogs, and even tortoises! The tortoises were the funniest. Let's just say they took their time! 

On Saturday, we hiked the Twins, a pretty brutal hike that crosses the island from north to south, eventually ending in Stanley. Drew had dragon boating practice in Stanley, so we timed it to meet him there for lunch. We also got to see Tristan, the new baby of our friends Mike and Tina. So cute!

The Sister Visit, Week 1.1

I am several months behind now on my blog postings, but I am going to be diligent in the next few months to get us caught back up to current time. In April, my sisters made the grand gesture of coming to visit us here for several weeks. The outline of the trip went something like this. For the first week, Stephanie and Leah visited solo, and we spent our time doing more cultural kooky things around Hong Kong. The second week, both Kane and Stuart arrived, and we toured Hong Kong from more of a foodie and nature perspective. The third week of the trip, which was around Easter, all 6 of us went to the Philippines for a scuba diving and beach adventure. Overall, it was a wonderful trip, and I can't thank my family enough for spending so much hard earned money and vacation to come here and see us.

This first blog will focus on the first half of the first week, where it was just us girls. On Saturday, we went to the same Chi Lin Nunnery and Park that we discovered with Grandma Pat and Kelli. It happened to be a particularly nice day, so we also went to the Avenue of Stars to see the view of the Hong Kong waterfront and skyline.

On Sunday, we spiced things up (hehe, you'll get that pun in a second) by having a cooking competition with our good friends Andrew and Tiffany. We split into three teams of two, and each team was responsible for an app, a salad, or a main. Each course had a secret ingredient and a budget. I tried to make this competition very official. We all met at a giant grocery store, which happens to be a madhouse on the weekends, to shop for our ingredients, then went back to our place to cook. We assumed that we could each have about 30-45 minutes to make our dishes, but from the competition side of things, it fell apart here. First, Andrew and Tiffany made a crab cake that was so filling and delicious that we barely had room for anything else. By the time we got to Steph and my mushroom and green bean salad we were too full to go for Drew and Leah's fish tacos. So Andrew and Tiffany were declared the winners, because we all knew we wouldn't have been able to match their tastiness even if we had tried. Andrew won us over even further by presenting a decadent chocolate cake for dessert. (There is always room for dessert). This might have been the best chocolate cake I have ever had in my life, incredibly moist and, well, chocolately. It was heaven. Top the evening off with a showing of "Steel Magnolias" and you have one hell of a rainy Hong Kong day.

On Monday, we went to the History Museum, where we got to see pictures of old Hong Kong. It was really really neat to see how much the city has changed over the years, in particular the land reclamation. Because Hong Kong has so many hills, flat ground is a rare thing. So, over the years, they have reclaimed land from the harbor, slowly shrinking the waterway. In the pic below, the red, green, and light blue areas are what have been reclaimed in the past 150 years. Amazing huh? 

The museum also had lots of life size displays of a Chinese Temple, a Cheung Chau bun tower, a Cantonese Opera House, all sorts of things. It was actually a super interesting museum. I will admit, the beginning section on Geology was a bit slow, and we all know Stephie isn't the biggest museum goer. She was getting a bit bored in this section when another British couple walked by and the wife uttered the following. "I didn't fly half-way around the world to stare at rocks. I REALLY didn't." We all burst out laughing at that, and Stephie agreed. After speeding through the geology section, however, the rest of the museum was really fantastic. After the museum we stopped for a well deserved cuppa. We also stopped by 1881 Heritage Square to a quick look around. The had it decorated with a giant bouquet of purple roses. No idea why. 

           

Bali Quick Trip

We have a good friend in Hong Kong who happened to have tipsily purchased a three bedroom villa in Bali at a silent auction for a charity ball. This occurred several months ago, and somehow, one by one, all of his friends who were originally planned to accompany him on the trip dropped out, until he no longer had any companions. He was telling me this story, and I was thinking, "Well, I have a very flexible schedule, and I would love a few days in Bali, and I'm not the best company, but I'm sure better than no company at all so...Pick me! Pick me! Luckily this friend is an incredibly generous soul, so he did in fact invite me along. While it was too last minute of a trip for Drew to also go, he whole-heartedly supported me going to have a few relaxing days in the sun at a free villa. Plus, I'm not exactly this friend's type, so no worries there.



We spent 5 days in a gorgeous resort on the very southern coast of Bali, an area known for dramatic cliffs and Indian Ocean views. We had our own three bedroom villa with a private pool, plus access to an incredible beach outfitted with a great bar, cabanas, gorgeous white sand, and crystal blue waters. The resort was perched up on a cliff, so to get down to the beach, you had to take an inclinator. What a funny experience. Essentially, we never left the resort, one because it had everything we needed, including a library to borrow movies, boardgames etc., but also there wasn't much nearby the resort, so getting outside of it would have been a challenge.

The inclinator!

The view from breakfast.

Since we traveled in the off-season, we had the place to ourselves. The restaurants were never full, the lounge chairs were always available, and our secret cocktail spot overlooking the whole resort was always empty, so the mango daiquiris were plentiful.

Ceviche by the beach

Every day consisted of exactly the same thing. We'd get up at 7:45am, go work out from 8-9, have breakfast from 9-10, lay by our pool from 10-2, go down to the beach and layout there while munching on snacks from the bar until 4 or 5, go up to our villa and change, go have dinner at one of the resort restaurants, then go have mango daiquiris at the lookout spot. Now THAT is a routine I could stick to.

Beach time!

Of course, we did shake things up sometimes. One day we went to the spa, for massages and facials. The spa literally perched on the endue of the cliff, so the views were stunning. If only I could look out while having a massage instead of staring down at the masseuses' toes. The resort also tried to spice things up by showing Titanic one night down on the beach under the stars. I'll never let go Jack...

The resort was called Karma Resorts, so there was the K monogram everywhere. I just pretended it stood for Kirchner....

The monkeys were probably the most exciting part. When we first arrived, there was a note on the kitchen table saying, "please keep the doors locked at all times. The monkeys will try to enter the villas searching for fruit and shiny objects." Another sign on the way to breakfast warned us of "Grumpy, fat monkeys beware" Of course, we expected to see them right away, but it wasn't until our third day that I woke up at 6am to the sound of screaming and fighting. I look outside my second story window and see a troupe of 20 monkeys on the wall of the neighboring villa, acting like monkeys do. I race downstairs to our friend's room "They're here! They're here!" His response was full of shock and horror "What!?! INSIDE!!!?? "No, outside, but they're here!" So we race back upstairs and peep out of the window like we are in a horror movie, hoping the monkeys don't notice us. Eventually they move on through the other villas, and that was that! We never saw the troupe again! But imagine if they did get inside one of the villas! Go bananas, go go bananas.....

My bedroom!

Thank you friend for letting me tag along on this wonderful trip!

Birthday Celebrations

Somehow what should have been a very average birthday celebration (I mean it's only 26, not like the big 3-0 that a few special people will be celebrating soon....) has turned into a multi-weekend extravaganza. Two Hong Kong friends here also have birthdays close to mine, so we piggy-backed on several celebrations, and things grew continuously from there. Thanks to my loving husband for putting so much of this together, helping to mask the fact that this is really the first birthday ever I celebrated without my immediate family in some way. But, seeing as Steph and Leah are coming in April, meaning we can all celebrate our March birthdays together in one go, I guess I'm just a lucky girl.

The festivities started with a dinner at a cooked food center in North Point. Cooked food centers are normally very local, family oriented cafeterias attached to a neighborhood wet market. The food is cheap but delicious. The middle of the room is filled with family-style tables, and the shop owners harass you to sit in their section of tables, ensuring you order from their food stall. This food center was a bit different. First, it was packed, and I mean PACKED, with people. Second, a lot of those people were businessmen, out for a company outing. Third, those said businessmen were wasted, prompting them to blast clubbing music and dance provocatively on table (Not kidding). The end result was a really fun, exciting dinner with great food, great company (not the businessmen), and great entertainment (the businessmen). This dinner was actually a joint birthday celebration for myself and my friend Jill from Chicago. She is the pretty lady in pink in the second photo.

The second birthday celebration occurred the following evening, when Drew and I joined our friend Frank and lots of his friends for all-you-can-eat hot pot. Hot Pot is essentially the meat part of fondue, where you cook your own food in broth, but this was a much larger scale, as you can tell from the picture below. They had everything, meat, seafood, dumplings, veggies, everything.. We were S-T-U-F-F-E-D. 

But, of course, there is always room for dessert. This dinner wasn't actually supposed to be birthday related, but Frank surprised me by getting a chocolate truffle cake from the Mandarin Cafe, a very famous cake shop in Hong Kong. It was better than it sounds! Thanks Frank!

And finally, on Sunday, Drew and I went to our friend Andrew's flat for a Sunday roast dinner followed by a double feature. This actually wasn't birthday related either, but Andrew did such a wonderful job cooking, I wanted to show off our feast. Apparently celebrating for us means eating. We started with appetizers of all sorts of dips, olives, aged beef slices, bree, etc. Then came dinner with roast chicken, roast sweet potatoes, homemade bread!, a greens salad, a couscous salad, gravy, and mozz-basil tomatoes. Wow. Finally, dessert with berry crumble with vanilla ice cream and chocolate chip cookies. It was a blessing we were watching movies afterwards, as I don't think we could have managed anything else. Andrew's apartment is located as close to the water as possible, so his view is stunning.

Better Homes and Gardens, here we come!

G & K: Day 12 & 13

Day 12 & 13 - Kirchner stuffing and Korean BBQ

Thursday after the horse races was a pretty laid back day. We had Mo's language partner over for an American style breakfast that included omelets, bacon, pancakes, orange juice, and coffee. Lisa was really nice and tried all the food. She admitted to Mo later that the bacon was too salty for her. Man I love bacon though. We also played a game that she brought with her while her and Mo practiced their language skills.

During the afternoon Drew wanted to learn how to make the famous Kirchner stuffing from Grandma. It's best not to say what does into the stuffing, but I promise that it is delicious. We had to get a chicken with its head attached and they cut its head off. Weird. But delicious!

Friday was sushi day! I had been looking forward to getting sushi. It was a pretty neat restaurant because you could order from the menu and there was a conveyer belt with sushi going around. Each of the plates had a different color that corresponds to a price on it so when you were done eating the waitresses could just add up the total.

After lunch we made another trip out to Stanley so I could finally get the gifts for people that I hadn't yet. I finally managed to figure out what to get for everyone and bought a painting for myself! I really love it, it's hanging up in my bedroom now.

Dinner on Friday was possibly my favorite of the entire trip. We went to a Korean BBQ place that was down an alley and I never would have guessed was there. The table had a grill in the center that was covered by a grate. We ordered marinated meat that we then cooked ourselves over the grill in the center. In addition to our potstickers appetizer we ordered, they give you 8 sides that included kimchi, lotus root, potatoes, and other delicious cold dishes. We also ordered two different traditional alcohols, one of which tasted like vodka but you drank straight called Soju (not a fan) and another milky looking one called makgeolli (I think) that was sweet and actually pretty tasty.

Seriously it was amazing. The meat was flavored so well and since you can cook it when you want you're always getting it when it's fresh. They changed the grate on our grill halfway through since they are very concerned about the negative effects of the char. If I could go back to Hong Kong for one day I would have dumplings for lunch and Korean BBQ for dinner. Or maybe I should actually go to South Korea. That would be neat!

After dinner we went to a bar on the top of a building with a wonderful view of the city. We just relaxed, had some drinks, and ate a lot of bar peanuts. Plus Mo got to act like the Mother of Dragons with the neat lamp on the table.

After that we headed back to the apartment to get some sleep before our big trip to Macau!