Category: 旅のエッセイ / Travel Essay

When it comes to cities in East Asia, the ones that come to my mind are Hong Kong, Kaohsiung, and Busan. The reason they rank higher than Shanghai, Taipei, and Seoul is probably because they are port cities. Among these, Hong Kong stands out above the rest because of Star Ferry.

I do not consider myself so naive as to think Hong Kong has not fundamentally changed over the past few years. Still, the places I visit via the unchanging Star Ferry have not changed much either.

Those places are two dim sum restaurants and a bar at Mandarin Oriental Hotel. Strictly speaking, one of the dim sum restaurants had closed once but ex-staffs reopened at a different location; the other one is apparently deserted due to price hikes. Besides, the Mandarin Oriental has been renovated and made more stylish. Even so, both the dim sum restaurants and the bar still retain the charm of old-fashioned Hong Kong.

I think it is wonderful to keep going to places that have not changed much for about 15 years in the city where is changing so rapidly. Since all the places are in Central, I suppose I could just stay on Hong Kong Island, but I am deliberately staying at a hotel in Kowloon so I can ride the Star Ferry.

Since I am planning my trip focusing on the Star Ferry to ride it, the mistaken hotel booking that I discovered upon arrival really backfired. It was farther from the ferry terminal than I expected, and walking endlessly along the crowded seaside promenade was a hassle. Since I go out at dusk to photograph the Star Ferry, I rarely get a chance to see the ocean from the hotel anyway.

While I was taking photos of the Star Ferry against the Hong Kong’s evening skyline, a beautiful woman from mainland China struck up a conversation with me. I thought she was hitting on me, but that did not seem to be the case.

I used a translation app to figure out what she was saying, and it turned out that she was asking me how much I would charge to take her photo. There were many photographers targeting tourists in the area. Since their prices were probably exorbitant, she likely chose someone who might be willing to undercut them.

I remembered that I was also asked by a beautiful woman to take photo for a fee in Guanajuato, Mexico. It was an early morning on a hilltop and there were no other photographers around, so it was highly likely I was able to set my own price.

There is a Japanese saying, “there is nothing more expensive than free (that means nothing costs so much as what is given us),” but it is also true that “there is nothing cheaper than free.” If it is free, I do not have to haggle over the price, I do not have to put up with complaints if the quality is poor, and I do not have to pull out my wallet in front of strangers. She may be a beauty, but it was Mexico. It is best to avoid exchanging cash carelessly. I took a few shots with her iPhone and she seemed satisfied.

I had gotten up early in Guanajuato to photograph the sunrise, and during the magic hour, the color of the light changes rapidly. Besides, I am not good at taking portraits. Even a middle-aged guy like me has moments when I would rather be ignored by a beautiful woman.

The same situation arose during this sunset shoot. I did not feel the need to turn her down, but I wanted her to leave as soon as possible. When I tried to take her iPhone, she asked me to take the photo with my camera instead. On top of that, she started taking off her coat and handed me her handbag. For someone like me who did have a flash, this was too much to handle. After the shoot, we exchanged contact info on WeChat and she left.

I did not understand it since I am not comfortable having my own photo taken. Even if she is a beauty, why she would go that far. Maybe it was a massive honey trap. However, when I sent the photos late at night, I receive a thank-you reply but I was not “coincidentally” summoned to the bar where she was staying.

Come to think of it, I undercut the airfare to Hong Kong by choosing the Shenzhen route and I was undercut in Hong Kong. In other words, a middle-aged guy who flies to Hong Kong via Shenzhen just to save on airfare is not the kind of big guy who would lure into a honey trap. Rather, I am a kind of the person who would be trapped by “there is nothing cheaper than free,” so no need to worry about “there is nothing more expensive than free.”

Right at the start of the New Year, I was forced to realize that I am nothing more than a cheap, harmless middle-aged guy.

I love Macau. When a middle-aged man writes something like this, people usually look down on him. However, I cannot help it because I just love there. That said, I am not interested in the flashy, gaudy Macau that the middle-aged men tend to love, the kind that makes people look down. Nor do I have any interest in the glittering, glamorous Macau that ladies tend to love, the kind who look down on such middle-aged man.

The day after arriving in Hong Kong, I took the ferry to Macau. The main purpose of the Macau visit was a local dim sum restaurant called “Lung Wah Tea House” located near Red Market in the old town. I love the retro atmosphere of this place, the kind of place I would think it is no longer exists in Hong Kong.

Since the dim sum restaurant was my main purpose of visit, I booked the first ferry of the morning in order to arrive before it gets crowded. Given that I went to such lengths, it would have been a smarter choice to go to Macau directly from Shenzhen Airport, stay in Macau for one night, and then head to Hong Kong. By the time I realized this, I already noticed that I had booked wrong hotel in Hong Kong, and I could not help but conclude that I really was not very smart.

Even someone as clueless as me could tell that it could be a waste to go all the way to Macau early in the morning just for dim sum and head back. After breakfast at Lung Wah Tea House, I decided to go sightseeing in Macau’s old town.

When it comes to tourist spots in Macau’s Old Town, the church with only its wall remaining and the Portuguese-style streetscape are famous, but it was just way too crowded. After looking at the church wall, I headed to an egg tart shop collaborating with Snoopy. Just these two visits made me completely exhausted. Maybe I just visit at bad times, but I only have the impression that Macau is always crowded.

Setting the crowds aside, the biggest issue for travelers in Macau is probably the currency. Macau has its own local currency called Pataca. While you cannot use Macau Patacas in Hong Kong, you can use Hong Kong Dollars in Macau just like the local Patacas. The exact exchange rate favors the Pataca slightly, but even for public system like buses, using Hong Kong Dollars as equivalent currency works just fine.

Therefore, for a short stay from Hong Kong, you should be able to go without any worries. Indeed, I thought so. However, in Hong Kong, I rely on its Octopus card for cashless travel. Furthermore, taxi apps did not work in Macau, so I needed cash to pay for the taxi fare. I went to Macau without much cash and nearly ran out of it.

Since Macau’s old town was crowded and I had almost no cash, I decided to go back to Hong Kong after visits to 2 locations. I had a 50-pataca note left, I made a small shopping at Macau City Hall gift shop and made sure to have coins exactly enough for the return bus fare. All I had to do was take the bus to the ferry terminal.

A common mistake in this situation is getting on the wrong bus. It is the mistake I, not being the brightest, tend to make.

By the time I left the City Hall building, I had my left and right mixed up, so I ended up taking a bus going opposite direction. To make the matter worse, I was sitting facing backward on the bus, which made it even harder to notice the mistake. Feeling utterly defeated, I started checking the route. I then realized the bus was passing near a hotel I had stayed at before, so I got off there. I remembered where the ATM was located in that area.

The ATM was a smart one that allowed withdrawals in both Hong Kong Dollars and Macau Patacas. The minimum withdrawal amount for Patacas was 100 Patacas. Since the bus fare for my wife and me was 10 to 15 Patacas, 100 Patacas was too much for me, as I was about to leave Macau.

After thinking for a moment, I came to an idea to withdraw a larger amount in Hong Kong Dollars since I was out of cash. Maybe I am as smart as this ATM. I withdrew 500 Hong Kong dollars and walked away calmly. I thought of buying a souvenir I had given up at the City Hall gift shop with cash, getting some change, and then catching the right bus.

There is a Japanese saying, “a chicken forgets after taking three steps,” but I realized something after three steps.

Even though you can use Hong Kong Dollars in Macau just like the local Macau Patacas at the 1-to-1 rate, it only applies at the time of payment. Since the Macau Pataca is weaker than the Hong Kong Dollar, change is generally given in Patacas. Even if I asked for the change in Hong Kong Dollars, since I only had a 500-dollar note, there was a very high chance that it would be mixed with Patacas. Even someone as clueless as me could tell that this might be a high-risk transaction. I had no choice but to go back to the ATM and withdraw 100 patacas for the second time.

I suppose this is a benchmark of my intelligence: Smarter than a chicken but not as smart as a multi-currency ATM. If so, I would only hope that I am as smart as normal single-currency ATM.

I managed to find a low-cost ticket to Taiwan for the last New Year’s holiday. However, for this year, the days passed by without finding a good plan. I thought departing on December 31 or January 1 would be best to avoid the year-end peak, but due to my work schedule, I had no choice but to return on January 4. The schedule was a bit tight, but it was too long to laze around at home. I knew I should do something, but I did not know what to do. In other words, I knew that I knew nothing. This may be Knowledge of Ignorance according to Socrates.

After returning from a trip to Uzbekistan in late September of last year, I noticed that All Nippon Airways (ANA) was running a campaign offering award tickets at half of the usual mileage. Since New Year’s holiday was a peak season, I assumed it would be excluded from the campaign, but mainland China routes were actually eligible even during the period. However, I had visited Sichuan in August and was planning to go to Guilin in November. I had a feeling that I should find a place other than mainland China.

That was when Hong Kong came to mind.

That said, the Hong Kong route was excluded from the campaign during the New Year holiday period. However, Guangzhou in Guangdong Province, where is also serves as a gateway to Guilin, is surely in mainland China. Taking a high-speed rail from Guangzhou to Hong Kong takes just over an hour. The award ticket was on the waiting list, but on the campaign’s final day, I decided to take a chance on Guangzhou route.

When I looked into it again afterwards, I found that ANA also flies to Shenzhen, right next to Hong Kong. I remembered that I had taken a high-speed boat from Hong Kong International Airport when I went on a business trip to Shenzhen few years ago, so it was an unexpected airport option. Moreover, the Shenzhen route, operated by Boeing 787, likely had more available seats than the Guangzhou route, which used Boeing 767. Shenzhen may be a better workaround for getting to Hong Kong than Guangzhou. Unfortunately, by the time I realized this, the promotion had already ended an hour before. Since it was just a spur-of-the-moment idea, I suppose that’s all it was.

There was no point in fretting, so I decided to just wait and see what happened.

It is said that good things come to those who wait, but there was no way I could do that. On the next day, I found a way to check the number of people on the award ticket wait lists. According to that, there were only two people on the outbound flight, apparently just my wife and me. The problem was the return flight, which had over 25 people on the waiting list.

I did not think things would go that well, so I decided to buy a ticket to/from Shenzhen while prices were still low. It was about half the price of direct Hong Kong ticket. Since January is the dry season in Hong Kong, I would say I found a real bargain.

In any case, this is the exact opposite of “good things come to those who wait.” In a way, though, it was exactly as I expected.

My last stay in Hong Kong was on my way back from a tough business trip to Shenzhen, so I treated the air ticket as a freebie and stayed at the InterContinental. It was a hotel with a convenient location and stunning views of Hong Kong skyline. This time, I checked a booking site without giving it much thought and found that rates seemed to reflect Hong Kong’s economic slowdown was offsetting the impact of the weak Japanese yen. I decided to stay there.

As expected, the hotel on December 31 was expensive, so booking a flight on New Year’s Day was probably the right call. My flight departed from Terminal 2 at Haneda Airport in Tokyo. There was a temporary “Akafuku” shop in the domestic departure hall, I bought some. Since I love Akafuku sweets, this was a good omen right at the start of the new year.

Although many flights including mine were delayed due to congestion of boarding gates, it did not have a serious impact and arrived at Shenzhen Airport. I entered China at the airport and cross into Hong Kong by land. The itinerary to Hong Kong was set up like a package tour, so I got off designated bus at Tsim Sha Tsui and took an Uber to the InterContinental.

I felt something was off when the car pulled up to the hotel entrance. The front desk where I checked-in also felt different somehow. Once I entered the room, I found it was clearly diffrent. I felt like I would make a mistake right at the start of the new year. Was my feeling of good fortune at Haneda Airport just an illusion?

Digging into my memory, I realized I had previously stayed at the InterContinental Hong Kong, but this hotel was the InterContinental Grand Stanford Hong Kong. Just as I remembered that there were two InterContinental hotels on the Tsim Sha Tsui side of Hong Kong, it was already too late.

For the time being, I went for a walk along the seaside promenade. After walking for a while, I finally found the hotel I initially had thought. It had been rebranded as the Regent Hong Kong, and when I checked later, I found out that the rates had been rebranded as well.

Had I known this, I might have decided not to go to Hong Kong. It was the power of I knew nothing. Although I may be interpreting differently from Socrates, I suppose my theme for this year is the Knowledge of Ignorance.