Port Call Hong Kong

Hong Kong was my number one port call choice, and it didn't disappoint.

The government advises against telling people you're going to a port call because then they can figure out when you and your service member are traveling and to where. It was the hardest rule to follow ever. I wanted to tell my entire family and all of Facebook that I was going to Hong Kong. So now, I'm telling you all. Blake and I went to Hong Kong.

I have to break up this trip into more than one post, so I thought this may be a good place to start: Golden Bauhinia Square. That sculpture behind Blake is a bauhinia, a flower that represents Hong Kong. The expo building in the square is the actual place where the British turned Hong Kong back over to China.

They also have this gigantic thing:

It also commemorates Hong Kong's return.

The plaque that accompanies this has lots of allusions to how happy Hong Kong was to be returned to China, with words like "glorious" sprinkled liberally throughout. That beautiful golden bauhinia statue? What you can't really see in the picture is that they put a symbol for China itself in that sculpture, a little great wall around the entire bauhinia. Kind of creepy when you think about it. A symbol around another symbol. 

Here's the thing about Hong Kong. It's part of China, but it's not really China. It's like its own country within a country. It has its own money. Its own license plates. Its own mentality. Hong Kong residents have to get visas to visit mainland China, just like any other foreigners.

All that stuff aside... there's a lot of delicious dim sum there. Really, really good stuff. So even though it may not be real "China," the food at least has more Chinese than anything else, and the people do speak Cantonese. And let me tell you something about Cantonese. If the romance languages are so named because they sound so beautiful, then Cantonese must roughly translate to "angry." It's a language with lots of sharp points, and it makes people sound aggressive.

We didn't, however, meet one unfriendly person while we were there. The food was delicious. The shopping was amazing, and I can't wait to tell you more!