Back in HK

I'm about to run out of batteries so I'll make a really quick post. This evening I arrived back in Hong Kong. Originally I was planning to take the train again, but then I realized that would entail spending more time on the train than in Hong Kong proper (if you consider the train out of and into Hong Kong an extension of Hong Kong's essence). So I flew. The flight was only a little over two hours (compared to 30 hours!) but it still felt like a long journey after the cab, the delay at the gate, the long bus ride from the Shenzhen airport to the train station, and then the long train ride from the border to Hong Kong. For old time's sake I had dinner at that "tea house" in Shenzhen where I whiled away the night a couple months ago. This time ordering was a lot easier.

In the bathroom at the train station while I was relieving myself I looked down and saw two small pink things on the floor next to me. On closer inspection I realized that they were fingers. It made me think of all the other scandalous and/or horrific things that may have happened in places where I have been, before I arrived.

When I got to Hong Kong the things that struck me most were the narrowness of the streets and the abundance of bright signs sticking out from the buildings. Next to Chengdu's wide, perpetually-under-construction boulevards and relative drabness, Hong Kong feels both venerable and vibrant. But then after you've been offered your 15th hand-tailored shirt this vibrancy can start to get a little bit annoying (though this only seems to happen in Kowloon). The first thing I did after checking into the guest house (the same one as last time in Mirador Mansions, although I got a different room; the last one was 160 HKD a night for what I thought of at the time as "four walls and a bed" and a bathroom the size of a closet. This new room is 120 HKD and is literally four walls and a bed, and the bathroom is shared this time. But that's OK.), and after stocking up on bottled water and tea and having a second dinner at the vegetarian Indian restaurant nearby, was try to log onto Facebook for the first time in two months. Unfortunately, the internet wasn't working in my room. Fortunately, there is an internet cafe two floors down that has good internet (which is where I am now). Unfortunately, my battery has run out so this is the end of this post.