One of the longer journeys of the trip today. So long in fact that I’m not sure if it was yesterday, today, both or indeed which one I’m currently on. I got up on Thursday morning and it’s now some time on Friday evening but I was only travelling for around 24 1/2 hours.

In that time I’ve driven myself, been chauffeured (for which I am grateful, thank you), done a reasonable amount of walking, flown 6000 miles, caught a train and gone over some lovely bridges in a bus.

The flight went ok. I didn’t get upgraded to a higher class but I did get allocated an economy seat with more legroom than business class.

For entertainment I had a shoe designer on my left and an elderly Chinese gentleman with tuberculosis on my right. At multiple parts of the journey I had to focus on not using my elbow to silence him permanently, his coughing fits became just obnoxious. The shoe designer travelling to China for work predicted they’d serve wine with dinner then turn the lights down and the heating up to encourage everybody to go to sleep. She had wine with her dinner then slept for the next 7 hours.

So instead I finished reading two books I’d already started, and watched two and a half films. It should have been three films but they kept interrupting the third with announcements from the pilot, a repeat in Chinese, a repeat from the cabin crew and a repeat of that repeat in Chinese. Then they found a new announcement to announce.  So we landed before I could finish the film, which is irritating.

What I didn’t do much is sleep on the flight. Maybe two hours total since getting up, so I’m a tad sleepy even though it’s still only early evening here.

First impressions of Hong Kong are all in the dark, and.. there’s a lot of water and it’s tall. Plenty of nice bridges, too much light and in many ways it feels quite British. Certainly all the signs are dual language.

Except that it turns out that I’m not in Hong Kong, I’m in Kowloon. Which counts as Hong Kong but clearly isn’t Hong Kong. This is irritating, and something I shall address tomorrow, by going to, erm, Hong Kong. Still, at least they let me in.

i decided to at least pop down and take a look at Hong Kong. It’s meant to be an iconic skyline. Maybe, if there aren’t building works and tourists in the way and you can’t get to the water’s edge.

I actually went the other way first, to find a famous market. It was closed but I found streets of market stalls nearby, all clustered around individual themes. The tourist tat in one street, adult clothes in another, adult toys (yes, those sort) in a third and children’s clothes in another. I fled the commercial parts and found a residential area, full of Indians.

Two streets further down there were just Chinese people, small eateries with only Chinese people in them. I found one with no tables spare and English on the menu, ordered diced beef steak and potato in a black pepper sauce for $88, with another $22 for coffee, and they delivered a small plate with some nondescript meat on it.

It tasted superb. Whatever they’d cooked the meat, potatoes, peppers and onions in it worked superbly, and the rice was proper sticky fluffy stuff. The staff didn’t speak any English and refused to make eye contact with me, the young waitresses looking away even as they placed the food on the table before fleeing. Despite or maybe because of this the manager only charged me $95, so I left a tenner as a tip.

Walking from there to the edge of the water to admire Hong Kong was easiest by rejoining the road my hotel is on. Half a kilometre south it turned into Kowloon’s equivalent of Bond Street. Every Swiss watch brand I could think of had a shop there, except Rolex. That wasn’t a problem, I was offered the opportunity to buy one several times by curiously honest street sellers.

“Hey, watches? You want a fake Rolex?”
“Watches, fake watches..”
“Fake Rolex?”
“Rado watches?”

That last one seemed a bit hopeless, not least because he was 40 yards from the Rado watch shop. Maybe he was actually just trying to drum up trade for them, would’ve sent me in there.

I was also offered the opportunity to order bespoke shirts. I’m aware that this is a thing here, but would hunt down a good tailor if I wanted that option. I have enough shirts with me already, and I’m not toting a suit around the world.

Kowloon is a lot like London. Too loud, too bright, too many people and most of them Chinese. It’s a dangerous place for sad old men with a liking for slim Chinese women in their 20s wearing short skirts too, so I have to recommend it.

9.45pm at night the day after you got up is perhaps though not the best time to be receptive to other cultures. I took photographs.

It’s not all about getting fooked though.

I can confirm that I’m not the tallest person in Kowloon. After a few thousand people from all parts of the world I finally found a man that’s taller than me. One. I wont be clothes shopping while I’m here.

Just over ten kilometres walked since I last went to bed. I’m expecting to sleep well.

Tonight’s hotel is one of two that the travel agent booked for me, so I didn’t get to choose. I’d have chosen one that doesn’t charge you a thousand dollar deposit when you check in, having already prepaid the hotel bill. I picked a card I can check online so the hotel has until I reach Singapore to reverse that charge or I’ll be doing it for them.

The lifts are a bit weird too. You have to leave the hotel to use them.