Hong Kong - Weeks 2 and 3

I hadn't posted in a while it seems. Over the past two weeks, I have started to get settled in. I ordered some furniture for my apartment (including a 37 inch full HD tv) and was involved in a two day Global Capital Markets meeting. During the two days I had dinner with Randy Anstine from the Columbus, OH office, who is currently in the middle of a three year rotation in Tokyo. I also met some new people from South Korea, Singapore, China, and the Philippines.

Outside of work, I continued to do a little sightseeing. I went to Victoria Peak two weeks ago, which is the tallest mountain on Hong Kong Island (but second tallest in Hong Kong). From here I took multiple pictures of the mountain side and the Hong Kong skyline. (I went to the Kowloon side and took some pictures of the night time skyline later in the day) I took a bus up the mountain, which was considerably easy to figure out which one I needed. However, there was a lot of traffic on the way up. (big torist attraction) There was a big shopping center with an overlook of the south side of the Island and then the huge observation tower for viewing the downtown side and the Harbor. Within the observation tower was a shopping mall, restaurants, and a Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum, which I went to. On the way down, I took the mountain tram, which is a cable car running up the side of the mountain.

One week ago I went to Stanley. Stanley is on the south east side of the Island and is a big ex-pat area as well. (I took a bus through a tunnel and across mountain sides) It is not as crowded there, which I liked, but had many things to see. I went through the Stanley Market first, where one can purchase a bunch of chinese memorabillia or other items for a haggled price. Then I walked alongside the coast, to the pier. I went to the mari-time museum, which was supposed to be the nicest in Hong Kong. Well, it was nice, but small. There were a lot of model wooden ships, and history of colonization, the Olympics, and commercial freight carriers.

After the museum I went to a German restaurant with authentic German food, cooked by authentic chinese. :-) I got the all you can eat lunch buffet and it was great! Following lunch I visited three small temples and then headed to the beach. I didn't go swimming as this was more of an exploratory trip, but I was excited to see it. One girl from the office had said it was like Miami Beach, so I was pumped. Of course when I got there, I saw that the beach itself was small, probably about that of which you would find at Dillon Lake near Zanesville. The people were not as good looking as those you might see on Miami beach either. (just average people) and the sand looked pretty course as well. However, there were a lot of people wind surfing, which seemed like fun. (maybe another day) Needless-to-say, I have made note not to listen to anything that girl has to say int he future.