Day 2: Exploration... Where's the Food?

Woke up fairly early, got dressed, and went down to find myself some breakfast. Across the street I found a place called "Starbucks," where I discovered an interesting variety of coffee known as "Espresso." Apparently, it's of Italian origin, but made popular by a company in Seattle, of all places! These Chinese are always surprising me.

Called home (it was yesterday afternoon there), and again heard the much-missed voices of my Margie and Nicole. Someday soon, I'm going to have to figure out how much those calls are costing me... but right now, it doesn't matter, because I'd pay any price for them. I can't call my son, because his only hour in which he can receive phone calls is (to me) 3am. Any other hour, and he's either in class or at work or sleeping. Or misbehaving.

I had an hour or so before the lady was going to show up to show me around, so I walked around the local neighborhood, and was astounded by so many things... For one thing, it turns out that my apartment building

is located between a Kentucky Fried Chicken and a 7-11 with a communist bookstore over it. Across the street is a California Pizza Kitchen. I wasn't expecting that.

Also across the street is a multi-story mall,

 a grocery store, and a subway station. It's hard to imagine a more modern location. But the really cool thing is that if you go around the block the other way, you see these streets.

As scheduled, at 10:00 Connie Francis (her maiden name; she then married a guy named Bob Barker!) called to say that she was downstairs in the office on the 7th floor. She was hired by Crown Relocations, who were in turn hired by DreamWorks. Her job was to make sure that I was convinced that I had chosen the best place to live, and that I felt comfortable with my surroundings, and that I knew my way around Hong Kong. She did a great job; I do feel that I understand where things are now. Connie has a distinct upper-class British tinge to her accent; between that and her facial features, it was like being shown around by a Eurasian version of Tracey Ullman.

We took the MTR (subway) over to the first of the other apartments, then another... they were okay, but then she showed me one that used to be a hotel room in a very large, modern hotel... nice view, but the carpet was green and pink, in one of those horrible patterns that must be designed to distract from whatever disgusting stains have accumulated. It had that cheesy "hotel" look, feel & smell. It could have been any hotel in any city in the world. Not for me. I want to feel like I'm in China when I'm in China.

We also walked through some of the local open-air markets,

filled with what could only have been fruits from other planets, exotic roots and vegetables and, surprisingly, given the stifling heat, huge sides of rotting pork. We also walked around the antique district.

Then she showed me another ex-hotel room, which was far classier, and ritzier, but still felt like a hotel anywhere. We ate lunch at a fancy schmancy buffet at that hotel, and I was impressed by how everyone who worked there seemed to know her. Turns out her husband runs that hotel, so I'm glad I didn't bag on it too much.

After lunch, she "stole" her husband's car, and we drove all around the island: to the beaches on the south side of the island (we stopped at a bar where, again, everyone knew her)... to Aberdeen,

 where the people live on their boats... to the best hospital, where they do everything including dentistry... to The Peak, the only place I've ever been where you can stand on a mountaintop and look almost straight down at a city...

We looked at another place or two, then met Shaila (from Crown Relocations) for a drink in Wanchai. I walked to the nearest MTR station, and took the subway home. I still hadn't had dinner, though, so I wandered back out onto the street, and found a fairly innocuous-looking noodle house on my block. Sat down and expected to find some sort of chicken & noodle dishes, but instead found nightmarish combinations of words I simply don't identify as food items. I was faced with a choice between (I'm not making this up):

• Beef Tendon Noodles
• Pork Knuckle Noodles
• Fish Ball Noodles
• Cuttle Fish Ball Rice Noodles
• Congee with Squid, Pork & Fish
• Congee with Meat and Thousand-year Egg, and
• Plain Noodles

What would you choose? I chose Plain Noodles. Stuff came, and I still couldn't eat it. The broth tasted like everything I just listed, plus extra fish. So I slapped a twenty down, walked right out and bought a microwave pizza at 7-11. I guess I don't want it to taste like China when I'm in China.