This is my second visit to Hong Kong. The last time I was there was in 2008. Hong Kong, ever changing and a jumble of awe inspiring skyscrappers and hills, never ceased to fascinate me. (The peaks in Hong Kong – including the one at Lantau island, ranged from 400 ~ 900 over meters compared with the pathetic 176 meters of Bukit Timah.)

Mongkok, is probably more populated than any part of Singapore. I am surprised to find hotels – one which I stayed for the first 3 nights, smacked right in the corner of a street of hardware shops. It is also just a stone’s throw away from a ‘wet market’ street where one can find living seafood being sold. The hotel is even more dodgy looking than those Hotel 81s we find in Geylang because the concierge is no bigger than an information counter at any of our shopping centers. However, I don’t really complain since it was relatively comfortable and even at low levels I don’t get people coming in for hourly bookings and a quick bang. Other than the irritating door that doesn’t close on its own (which we have to make an effort to close), there is really nothing more for me to complain about.

There were small open spaces – which probably pass off as small parks for old folks to do their morning exercise in the most unexpected places. As it is past the September equinox, the sun sets early in Hong Kong and darkness would set by 6:30pm. By then the shops will be closed and human activities along the streets would almost cease. Other than the occasional taxi or pedestrian, the streets would appear deserted. In fact, at some streets the pink lights indicating the vices would come on and one can see hastily set up, handwritten posters on stairways advertising the girls to those who are interested. In some cases, pimps would ‘waylay’ unsuspecting pedestrians and tout the unseen girls in the levels above. My friend and I took a look at one of the posters and it was touting ‘fair skinned’ Malay girls. We hurried along when a pimp approached us though I suspect these ‘fair skinned’ Malay girls may actually just be darker skinned Malaysian Chinese women or perhaps fairer aborigines from Sabah or Sarawak who can speak Malay.

Yet just a few more streets away would be one of the busiest shopping districts of Mongkok and Mongkok MTR station itself, where Portland street and the Langham Place Shopping Mall is, bustling with life and night activity. And that isn’t very far away when you see just how narrow the streets are and how closely the buildings are packed together.

Food is aplenty and one would be spoiled for choices because an eatery is found every few streets. The food by Singapore dollar standards is not cheap (probably costs 2 times as much at times), but they taste far better than most in Singapore. In general it is not difficult to get a sumptuous meal between HK$30 ~ HK$45 per person (approx S$5 ~ S$8 at present exchange rate) depending on where and what you eat. Anyway, the portion on one plate is good enough for a long time – and the food definitely taste waaaaaaay better. Slices of Char Siew – way thicker than what hawkers would serve here in Singapore – seems to melt in the mouth, and fish balls are spongy and somewhat crispy. That’s not mentioning the soup that comes with the noodles don’t make me feel thirsty nor leave that feeling of MSG in the throat. I would have to blame the increasingly unpalatable food on the replacement of the Singaporean / Malaysian helpers and cooks at our local eateries with cheaper ones from mainland China. It’s not so much about their cooking skills but rather the food they made are not to our taste. If one would consider the food in Hong Kong to be expensive in terms of Singapore dollar terms, then at least it is value for money unlike the pathetic portions our hawkers are giving us while they whine about rental and difficult times. That said, unless the owners of these Hong Kong eateries already owned whatever place they have set up, it makes me wonder how they managed since property prices in Hong Kong and thus rental is way higher.

Transportation is far more superior. One almost never need to take the cab unless absolutely necessary. While the train frequency of the MTR (Mass Transit Railway) is higher, the trains are packed most of the time. Even so, getting a seat is far easier as passenger turnover is way better than Singapore. I noticed that the commuters don’t use their phones as much on the trains and moving displays were displaying news and vital information. On top of that, the station distances are closer and large number of commuters would alight every 3 to 5 stations which unlike Singapore, you get that only when the MRT trains arrive at major stations like Jurong East, Bishan, Ang Mo Kio or Tampines (which is easily 8 ~ 10 stations), not to mention that our stations seems to be place further apart. The Octopus card is way superior than our EZLink since I can use it to purchase at the convenient stores, and even some vending machines beside taking public transportation. In fact, I only need to tap once on buses (on boarding) unlike in Singapore where I have to tap on exit as well or charged with the maximum fare.

I am also happy both hotels provided free WIFI which allows me to stay in contact with my friends in Singapore in the evening. I have to say the Internet connectivity is outstanding, since I was able to upload a whole lot of photos to Facebook (several hundred megabytes of them at times) without break and pretty quickly. I would think if you are a Hong Konger, then there is probably no issue with Internet connectivity anywhere since WIFI hotspots are everywhere. Unfortunately for a visitor I don’t have the accounts to login at most places (other than the rare ones with SSID ‘freegovwifi-e’) so they are as good as not available. In comparison, WirelessSG is a total disgrace because I often end up connecting to a ‘full strength’ node that is either slower than a snail or dead while I never had that problem in Hong Kong. As for roaming charges, they are at $22 per megabyte on SingTel. My suggestion is to sign up for a daily or 3 day Bridge DataRoam plan so you don’t have to be overly concerned with using your 3G / GRPS usage in Hong Kong. I had mine off but a short use of 3G on my phone to get a fix of my location and find my way to Lan Kwai Fong busted 6MB in data usage and costs me a good S$130+ in roaming charges. (I came home to Singapore just in time to see it in the bill! Ouch!)

The planned expansion of the MTR

I didn’t spend a lot of time in Mongkok other than those time I spent looking for food. For the duration I was staying in one of Mongkok’s hotel, I was off to Lantau Island and Macau. I would talk about Macau in another post but even on Lantau Island, the immediate area after the showcase Ngong Ping village at the foot of the bronze Buddha statute has gone through some changes. Not to mention I certainly noticed more people than the last time I was there – due to the influx of the ever present and ever more irritating tourists from China.

After which, I relocated to another hotel at Aberdeen (on Hong Kong island itself) and it was an entirely different world. The hotel room was way bigger and more luxurious though the only drawback was the lack of the MTR. The hotel made it up by providing a shuttle service to Hong Kong MTR Station almost hourly. There seem to be a lack of customers at the hotel (which I don’t mind) but I suspect most of them to be business travelers who are already off to work whenever we are leaving the hotel. Even if ‘business is really bad’ for this particular hotel, I’ll expect it to change with the completion of the South Island Line East & West Section in the near future.

We didn’t really do much in the next few days, other than going to the Peak to get some photos, a walk around Sheung Wan, to the escalators leading up the Mid Levels, the Dr Sun Yat-Sen Museum and Ocean Park. On the way up the escalator to the Mid Levels, we noticed how packed the houses were and also the large expatriate population congregated at the many pubs to watch the Rugby world cup live telecast. It was something I thought I would only see at Lan Kwai Fong. I gave up trying to find the end of the escalators but I can’t help but consider the great difference between the high end residential area further up and the old buildings along the way between them and the dazzling business district further down at Central Hong Kong along the way. It’s sort of like heaven and perdition though I am also reminded that I am in no position to think that way without knowing the thoughts of the people themselves.

There is also an impending district councils elections since I noticed posters of candidates around different parts of Kowloon and even on Hong Kong island itself. The campaigning period is way longer than those we have in Singapore and I wondered why Singapore is always in such a hurry. There is also some level of mudslinging on the television between candidates, though I suspect that is nothing compared to those in Taiwan. This made me compare the governance between Hong Kong and Singapore.

As we all know, Hong Kong has not done well in providing public housing for the average Hong Konger. It’s a little puzzling why that is so since I believe Hong Kong would have a bigger budget to work with to provide more public housing (even when we consider the impact on the Hong Kong dollar as a result of the America’s Quantitative Easing). The reason is that with China as the hinterland (and without the political and historical burdens that Singapore bear with regard to Malaysia), Hong Kong is economically less vulnerable than Singapore. On top of which, Hong Kong also does not have a large defense overhead to be concerned with since the burden of National Defense falls on the central government in Beijing and the People’s Liberation Army contingent stationed in Hong Kong. Social mobility is also another issue, and in fact, the news on TV showed one of the candidates for next year’s Chief Executive elections being questioned on the difficulty of upward social mobility in Hong Kong by an undergrad. That said, social mobility is also an issue here in Singapore because our vaunted ‘meritocracy’ is nothing more than a sham when it is usually the children of the elite getting the bursaries while the children of those who are not so well off continued to end up at the bottom of the social ladder.

I am not singing the Singapore government’s praises here, but I must say Singapore has done way better in the department of public housing compared to Hong Kong. But that brings me to ask what exactly is causing the high rental that our hawkers are complaining about which leaves us with the pathetic portions? Singapore’s success in public housing is eroded with the small portions of bad tasting food and with filling one’s stomach (survival) being at the lowest rung of the Maslow Hierarchy of needs, I must say that translates into a lower quality of life (though not necessarily any impact of the standard of living) than Hong Kong. The privatisation of markets and hawker centers combined with the as yet still out of control property prices will not bode well for us.

I think I have written an overly lengthly post on my little travel so here’s some photos, and a video of the musical fountain at Ocean Park. Enjoy!