The End of Days (in Hong Kong)

The last day. Considering how long it took me to get this uploaded, you would think it was the most epic day I had. But it really wasn't. It wasn't bad, though.

Side street. With some side people.

I had only one destination left that I wanted to catch before heading back to Houston on Sunday. Some of the most mesmerizing images from Hong Kong that I had seen before my trip were of the apartment buildings in Quarry Bay. And I had to see them.

Like most other days, this one began with a bit of research on getting around. Each day was different depending on how tired or sore I was, the distance I would need to travel, and the time of day. I figured that I hadn't given the bus system its fair shot, so that's how I decided to get around for the day. And that was a disaster.

At was at this moment, I knew I fucked up.

The blame for my dismay is hard to pin down. Google, the all-knowing and all-seeing overlord we have all come to depend on, had informed me to take bus A12. When A12 arrived, I got on. I sat and enjoyed the view, until I noticed that the view was changing from the harbor to the buildings of Mong Kok. I was not supposed to be anywhere near Mong Kok. As it turned out, this particular A12 I was riding was heading directly to the airport. It also happened to be the last run of the bus driver, so it would not be swinging back around to my original stop so I could catch the correct bus. Perfect!

Luckily for me, the bus driver spoke fluent Chinese. I mean, I am not really sure how that made me lucky. Why did I even say that? She spoke no English. Not even enough to ask where the bathroom was. I guess it wasn't important considering the bus had no bathrooms, which is not uncommon among Hong Kong buses I hear. But I digress. I tried to communicate that I was on the wrong bus, and wanted to know how to get on the right bus. The lucky part for me came in the form of a passenger who was kind enough to play the role of translator. The second lucky part was when the driver finished her shift, and pulled me along with her to another bus, where she spoke to that driver, told him where I was going, and got me a free ride to my destination. All of this was great news, because the ride there had cost me HK$40 and drained my transit card - a card that can only be filled in increments of $50, and I was there on my last day without any hope of making use of that much transportation. Summary: I got where I needed to go.

That window. No, that one.

I came to see a specific building, though I really could have gone to any in the area as they all had similarly intriguing construction. And it is in areas like these that you fully understand how such a small city could be so densely populated. Many apartment buildings appear to shoot from the ground like needles pointing to the sky. These sky straws filled with families equally filled me with concern that the first hard gust would come along and end the lives of enough people to actually impact the economy. But they never fell. And if they haven't by now, they likely never will.

As if there weren't enough stairs in this city.

But the thing that fascinates me is the sheer number of them. Coupled with their size, the quantity of these buildings helps as a visual aid to understanding how many people really live here. And by "here", I mean Hong Kong, but could just as easily mean this planet. It's humbling to know that in all of these outwardly identical housing units live individual people, living completely different lives. If they each wrote an autobiography, the only thing they would have in common would be that they all lived in Hong Kong at the same time. Am I reading too deep into this? Maybe you're not reading deep enough into it. Maybe you need to stay woke. I may or may not have made a reference to my or your woke status in a previous installment of this journey. And I can neither confirm nor deny that I don't care. The agent on the other side of my ear piece is now telling me to move on. I shall.

Every resident missed a perfect opportunity to photobomb.

After blowing my own mind through over thinking the mundane, I caught a cab back to Central to try and catch a bite to eat. What I wanted to do was eat at Noodle & Dog. As I am sure you are unable to ascertain from their name, they combine hot dogs and noodles. Not like those pictures of the diced up hot dogs skewered by spaghetti floating around the internet. I'd love to include a photo for reference, but that's where the word "wanted" used a few sentences ago becomes very important. They were closed. So I went to Okra instead.

Okra is a Japanese izakaya, or gastropub, or basically a diner with nicer food that serves alcohol. I'm not a food blogger. What do you expect from me? It was across the street from my apartment and I was hungry. And I made the right choice. The place was great.

The owner, I was told by one of the chefs. was a New Orleans local. And that chef who told me was from Lafayette. I should have known they were from Louisiana with a name like Okra, instead of just blaming in on more of that small world nonsense.

Don't tell anyone I took this photo with my phone.

I didn't order the okra, partly because I don't like okra, but mostly because they don't serve it. What I did order can easily be described as "roast beef" and "sake", though the descriptions on their menu would do much more justice to what they actually were. The roast beef was black Angus prime chuck tail flap and the sake was Kaze No Mori Kinuhikari followed by five Japanese descriptive words denoting the ways in which it was made. My mouth translated all of that as simply delicious. As with most restaurants where I don't entirely understand the menu, it was my most expensive meal relative to everything else I had eaten that week. But it was worth it.

That seemed like a perfect note to end that trip on. The first half of my stay was very hectic and left me overwhelmed by my own expectations. But the last two days gave me more perspective on my purpose there. Seeing the temples and taking in the quieter parts of the city gave me time to reflect on more than just what I was going to do in the next hour. The hours of time spent riding the bus in the wrong direction and back presented me with the opportunity to relax while seeing much more of the city than I would have seen otherwise. The apartments of Quarry Bay reminded me that there are so many people in this world, with so many of their own problems, along with so many of their own personal blessings. I don't know if I will ever go back to Hong Kong, but I don't regret going there.

This is a composite. It's not real. But what is? I'm not. What?

Maybe I'll go to the moon next.