Well... after what can certainly be called a great 4 months in Taiwan it was finally time for me to move on.  China will be my place of residence for the next month, and for those of you who didn't know it already, there is no travel possible between Taiwan and China (due to long lasting conflicts over Taiwan's political status) so what better place to cross over than Hong Kong!!! 

Arriving here feels like moving into a new world.  It's asia, but not quite the asia (esp china) that i'm used to.  After having gotten used to the Taiwanese standards of relatively little english, and few tourists, Hong Kong is the complete opposite.  It is beautiful to see all the "english" features of this place left over from the english colonial rule of the place until 1997.  Buses are dubbel decker, fire departments often have these old fashion red folding doors, there are red fire hydrants all over the place.  Western food, fork and knife, annoying pakistanis on each corner, and finally english english english...  Wonder how much chinese i'll remember by the time i leave here, i keep persuading myself to try and use it as whenever I get the possibility but english is just so convenient.

 

After having fully settled into the new style of living that they have here it's possible to fully appreciate the beauty of this city.  All the sky scrapers are amazing to look at, a deffinate must is walking the star avenue by night, looking across the water at the wonderfully lit up buildings of Hong Kong Island, most now also have christmas decorations.

 It's difficult to say anything specific about this place, the first words that I got ffrom friends when i asked how this place was, was " lot's of people"  and there is no turning around that fact, it's extremely busy, which, fortunately, i learned to love while working in London.  The only difference here, which at first doesn't quite hit, but as you stay longer does become a big point of comparison, is that they don't rush like they do in London.  In London, getting from A to B can be done very quickly despite the enormous amounts of people, but here, I've now switched to taking back roads in the busy hours, as the main roads (Nathan Road in Particular) are just full of people walking at snail pace.

 

I plan to spend Xmas here, enjoying the great english christmas feeling, before leaving into the mainland china.  If all things go according to plan, I'll be in Shanghai before New Year's Eve, to see what a Chinese City is like when there is not such a considerable influence from old english rule.  After that... well that's when i'll be saying goodbye to my english and really entering china... land inwards.

 

For now, Merry Christmas everyone