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The Hong Kong Experience Getting Around The trains are all electric and excellent, but crowded - usually standing room only, especially at rush hour. They arrive at intervals of no more than 5 minutes until midnight. Many shopping centres are built right above the train stations, so it’s really convenient. There are about 7 different lines which cover Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories, and they each have interchange stations where you can change from one to the other. Taxis are convenient and fast too. Taxi drivers are pretty honest. Many don’t speak English well. Tipping isn’t really expected. Red taxis can go anywhere but are slightly more expensive than the green taxis, but green taxis can’t travel within Kowloon and Hong Kong. Buses aren’t bad, but we found that it was hard to decipher destinations and timetables, so ride these with caution. There are minibuses too, that only take off from a stop when they have enough passengers! For trains and buses, buying tickets from the vending machines is a lot slower than using Octopus cards. If you get these pre-pay cards, keep the receipt as you can get a refund on the unspent amount and your deposit back. Taxis use cash (we never tried credit cards). General Tips Most shops don’t open until at least 10am and don’t close until at least 10pm. Big shops don’t bargain, but you can dicker with the street stalls. Apparently, many shops charge a surcharge for credit cards. I compared prices for computers and found they were between 0% – 15% cheaper than New Zealand prices, but didn’t buy much of this as I was worried about the warranty. Prices for mobile phones and mp3 players are spotty – some are cheaper, some more expensive. It pays to know your specs and prices before you go, or have access to the internet to compare NZ prices (the Dick Smith site is pretty good for comparison – www.dse.co.nz). Some things which are obviously cheaper are parallel imported into Hong Kong. Some branded items from street stalls may be fakes, although the bigger shops are quite reliable nowadays. We went during the massive sales period, approximately Christmas to Chinese New Year, so the mark downs in clothing and shoes were enormous – from 20% to 70% off the label price, but I’m not sure if there are sales on all year round (see Esprit Outlet Store below). Aside from the Jumbo Restaurant, we didn’t eat at anywhere particularly expensive or noteworthy. We just stopped at whatever small restaurant was handy and ordered ‘local’ food. Way cheaper than the flash restaurants, and just as nice although they were always very crowded with locals (you have to wait for seats). Most shopping centres and malls have food halls or clean and tidy restaurants too. Not all places will have English menus though! Plenty of MacDonalds…
International Finance Centre, Hong Kong island This is a lovely shopping mall, but things are quite pricey. The Lanes, Hong Kong Island Two parallel streets in Central known as "The Lanes", Li Yuen Street East and Li Yuen Street West (between Queen's Road Central and Des Voeux Road Central) are probably the cheapest stalls in Hong Kong island with everything from inexpensive clothing, watches and costume jewellery to luggage and shoes. Stanley Market This is on the south side of the island in Stanley Bay. It’s a bit ‘touristy’ but we still found excellent bargains here too. Great atmosphere as well. You have to take either a bus, minibus or taxi since the trains don’t go there. Jumbo Floating Restaurant, Hong Kong Island Candy mentioned this as an experience. It is touristy and therefore expensive. Might be worthwhile if you love seafood in a fairly opulent atmosphere. Restaurants on each of 3 levels. You get to the restaurant by a little water ferry but once you’re there, you can’t tell you’re on the water. They have a ‘throne’ where you can dress as a Chinese emperor or empress and have your picture taken. You have to pay for this though! Tsim Sha Tsui District, Kowloon There are a number of lovely shops and centres here, such as Ocean Terminal and Sogo department store, but they all tend to be quite expensive. I think there’s a Toys’R’Us here. Nathan Road and the Golden Mile is supposed to be a good area to shop, but apparently there are more complaints from tourists about these streets than anywhere else. Be careful about prices! Mong Kok District, Kowloon There at least 2 street markets (or market streets!!!) which I think are ‘must-sees’ here. The closest English translation I can get is ‘The Ladies Market’ and ‘Fa Yuen Street’. Both of them is a whole street, both sides and the middle, very crowded (watch your wallet or purse) and filled with bargains, such as cancelled export orders, big name brands with the labels cut off. There is also quite a nice, large shopping centre just above the KCR train station. Prices are cheaper than the malls on HK island or Tsim Sha Tsui, although not as cheap as the street markets. Yau Ma Tei, Kowloon This is famous for the Temple Street night market and the Jade Market. I don’t quite remember going to either of these, but I may be confused. They are meant to be somewhat like the Mong Kok ones, only different! Hung Hom District, Kowloon Lots of shops here too, geared more towards locals than tourists – therefore not exceptionally expensive or cheap! There are apparently quite a lot of factory outlet stores here, although we were never taken (and never found our way) to them. More information can be found in the free leaflet, Factory Outlets for Locally Made Fashion and Jewellery, available from Hong Kong Tourism Board Visitor Information & Services Centres in Hong Kong. Sham Shui Po, Kowloon This is famous for computer gear, but as I said before, the price differential wasn’t enough to tempt me, compared to the warranty issues. Might be worth a look, especially for Gameboy and PSP games (if you know your prices). The games in the smaller rectangular boxes are Japanese-language only, parallel-imported games. There are very few pirated games now, as almost all have been closed down by the authorities. Lai Chi Kok, outskirts of Kowloon This is a stop on the KCR West Rail line, which takes you to an industrial district. I’m not sure you could find it, but there was a huge complex of tiny stalls inside a building, which sold ‘direct from factory’ womenswear by the planet-load (no mens or childrens). Cheap. Maritime Square Mall,
Tsing Yi Shatin, New Territories This isn’t a famous mall, and very few tourists come here, but we liked it. It’s big and sprawls through several different apartment buildings via skybridges. There’s a Marks and Spencer here, plus all the usual Hong Kong chain stores. There’s also a Toy’R’Us and a MicroPlanet. The KCR train station stops directly underneath. Espirit Outlet Store, Yuen Long, New Territories This is in the a shopping centre in the New Territories called either the New Yuen Long Centre or the Sun Yuen Long Centre, in a town called Yuen Long. Way off the beaten tourist track but well worth the trip if you like the label. Has mens and childrens wear too. Usually a season or two behind current fashion, but way cheaper, with permanent discounts! Other places of interest : Disneyland Disneyland is small but we thought it was great. Spent 2 days here, with one night at the Disneyland Hollywood Hotel. You could do this in 1 day I guess, but you would need to start early and rush around. There are big rides and smaller side attractions, the best 3D theatre I’ve ever seen and 2 live stage shows. The fireworks display that closes the park at night is worth staying for. Ocean Park Ocean Park is like Rainbow’s End, only a lot bigger. The rides were good, if you like that sort of thing (roller coasters, vertical drops etc.) but we spent a lot of time just walking between attractions. There’s a mini-marineland and dolphin and seal show. Opens at 10, closes at 6. Statue of Buddha The largest sitting Buddha in the world is on Lantau Island (same island as Disneyland and the airport). We took a day-trip tour that included a vegetarian restaurant and a side-trip to a ‘traditional’ fishing village. Macau The ferry ride takes about an hour and you can usually get tickets at the ferry terminal on Hong Kong Island. Bring your passports. Well worth a look for sightseeing (casinos and Portugese architecture) and food but not much else and you can do this trip in a day (if you don’t gamble too much!). The atmosphere is very different from HK. The sky tower is a copy of Auckland’s. Lo Wu, China This is the Chinese city closest to Hong Kong and you can get to it by the KCR rail line, which takes you right to the city. It is full of cheap goods (clothes and shoes mostly) and mostly knock-offs of famous brands. However, if you didn’t get a Visa in NZ, then you can spend hours queuing to get one, before they’ll let you out of the train station. We never went. Victoria Peak by tram On Hong Kong island, you can ride an old-fashioned tram (possibly the steepest gradient in the world) to the peak of Mt. Victoria. The tram is always crowded, but civilised, cheap and take Octopus cards. Pretty good views of HK island and Kowloon across the water. There's an expensive shopping centre too, and a separate fancy-shaped building, supposedly with a restaurant and shops inside, but this was being renovated and closed to the public when we went. Escalators to the Mid-Levels There are a set of open-air escalators on Hong Kong Island, which together form the longest escalators in the world, which takes you from Queens Road (the start of them is rather obscure though) up to Conduit Road. You can get off between each one (usually at road intersections) and stairs run beside them so you can still walk up or down. There are a lot of shops, restaurants and bars frequented by locals and ex-pats. A slice of local life, Hong Kong style.
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