24 Hours in Hong Kong.

Guangzhou and Hong Kong was never part of the plan in China backpacking route, I usually have a general route to follow and allows for some minor detours along the way such as Fenghuang and Nanyue but they usually come at a cost of some other places or shorten days at some place. These two cost me Tongren, Fangxin mountain but I was more or less done with mountains after Zhangjiajie.

Hong Kong

China announced in late Nov that to boost tourism to China, five countries would be up for a 1 year trial where they do not have to apply for Visa prior to visiting China and Malaysia was one of the 5 countries. 15 days visa free entry and that sparked a whole new plan in my head when I found out about it.

So the plan had change slightly, instead of going from Guilin to Nanning and exiting to Vietnam directly, I now had the option to go to Guangzhou then Hong Kong and turn back into China and get a 15 day visa free extension. That would allow me to travel slowly along the coast towards Nanning instead of a big skip from Guilin to Nanning.

Me & Ling ... 

In addition to that, a friend was in Hong Kong. A quick message to Ling just to check if he was around made the decision easy, a visit to old travelling friends is always a happy detour. Initially I had not consider Hong Kong due to Visa as I would be stuck there due to no more China visa, but the announcement changed the plan and the detour was form.

I stayed at Chunking Mansion, a very old building in the heart of Tsim Sha Shui which was like a little India in Hong Kong. For any tourist to Hong Kong wanting to see actual Hong Kong, I would say this is a small part of real Hong Kong that most wont acknoledge. The immigrants that lives revolved around Hong Kong. There was like a few dozen hostel inside the building but by chance I found a single private room for the same price. The room as per Hong Kong standard was an experience in itself.

Checked in and reset well in Hong Kong, I messaged Ling and soon he was waiting for me at the entrance of Chunking Mansion. He looked older ... it has been 8 years since Rio and just seeing him reminded me so much of the fun times we had in Rio exploring the city.

A late tea time snack and coffee was in order and stories was exchange. I kept bugging Ling to visit me in Malaysia one day. Soon it was evening and Ling had to go home to family so I was now alone in Hong Kong for one night. Walked around Tsim Sha Shui and I found rolling tobacco. 

The tobacco I brought from Malaysia was running out and here I saw the same tobacco going for a crazy price the same as Singapore. Tried to buy with Alipay, failed. Tried to pay with credit card ... failed ... tried to pay with TouchNGo linked Alipay ... failed ... HK seams to be running of different payment system from China it seams.

With all my access to payment cut off, there was only the cold hard cash option which means exchanging some more RMB to HKD or withdrawing from ATM. I dun have much RMB in cash which is used primarily for emergencies if digital payment fails such as bus or metro or sometimes deposits for hotel keys. 

The HKD 200 which I exchanged initially was left with HKD 130 after buying lunch for the day. I roughly knew that the HMZB shuttle was HKD 65 but then there was the MTR and bus to the HMZB port as well which I have no idea how much it was going to cost.

It as lucky thing that Ling treated me to tea break, with that I devourerd my emergency biscut ration for the night and determined not to spend any more money in Hong Kong. Walk around and enjoy the breeze and left the next day.

Traveled on: Dec 2023