Day 3 Hong Kong Trip

Day 3 Hong Kong Trip
We have packed so much into today! We went out to the New Territories to take in rural Hong Kong – actually there is quite a bit – but most of it is lush mountainside and forest. Our first port of call was a monastery up in the mountains – normally it is very quiet but August is what the Chinese call ‘Ghost Month’ when they worship their ancestors and family who have passed away. Ghoulish story for you here! Because there is so little burial land in HK most people are cremated, but if you are wealthy they bury you for 7 years (it costs £100,000.00 – yep!) after 7 years they dig you up – wash your bones and give them back to the family! So once a year in August the family goes to the monastery to wash the bones – or burn paper money for you in Heaven. They make quite an event of it – everyone was having bar b q’s and leaving food on gravesides to share with the dead.
We went up to the border with Mainland China – went past a Peoples Liberation Army Base that used to be the old RAF Base when the British oversaw HK. Went on to an old village up in the hills – well they say old! Built in the 1960’s – slums really – one room and they cook out in the street. There is nothing ‘Old’ in HK – the Government tore everything old down to make way for new high rise flats – even the temples and monasteries are new made to look old.
I can’t get over the amount of skyscrapers here – thousands - most 50 floors high with families sharing just one small apartment, there are 7 million people living in HK. That’s nearly twice the population of New Zealand!
We finished with a meal in a traditional Chinese restaurant on the outskirts of HK – good food but full of geriatric locals who thought we were the floor show when we first walked in. When everyone had finished eating a band suddenly appeared and it turned into a ‘Tea Dance’ and Karaoke. All the old dears jumped up and started to do the Tango! And fighting each other for the Karaoke mike! We left before Nigel started to think about doing his Frank Sinatra impression!
We were going out to Lama Island tonight but we were all absolutely bushed - its so hot and humid that it just drains you – and the last thing we all wanted to do was have a 5 course banquet. So the boys went off to buy a new camera while I enjoyed the view and air conditioning from our hotel room and admire my new ‘handbags’ and silk cushions!