I finally take a holiday! After 4 months of no days off, at the end of a project, and looking forward to meeting my sister, it was ideal timing to take a long weekend in Hong Kong. Only one and a half hours away by plane, it was an incredible feeling leaving for the airport and reliving some memories of my arrival. I planned to arrive the evening before Ele to give me some extra time to look around.

I landed on Friday night and went straight to Chung King Mansions and checked into one of the multitude of guest houses in the crumbling fire risk which makes up the most vibrant, multi-cultural area I have seen in Asia – south Kowloon. Landing late on a Friday felt a mite edgy, with plenty of friendly neighbourhood drugs dealers and hustlers floating around. However, I managed to make it over to the dock side and one of the most impressive urban views I have ever seen – possibly out city-ing Manhattan from the Statten Island ferry.

The delightful Chung King Mansions

The astonishing views of Hong Kong Island from Kowloon

After an hour or two of street drinking (the new urban sport) with the locals I departed back for the hotel. However, I got distracted – as I often am prone to – by the bright lights and sounds of an Irish pub, so I descended the stairs back into something utterly reminscent of Glasgow on a Friday night… and was even more pleasantly surprised to find Greene King IPA beer and Walkers Cheese & Onion crisps – my local poison and fave snack! Waves of satisfaction / alcohol spread through my body and I wandered ( a liitle less steadily) to bed.