Culture Club Gallery

Friday night I discovered this nice-relaxed atmosphere club in Soho. My co-workers had been there before, and had always said how cool it was. The place is quite unique in Hong Kong. Not many bars are very chilled out and quiet, and they are usually all crammed. We were the only ones inside for about 3 hours. The music is interesting, but not so loud you need to shout at anyone to communicate.

The other neat thing about this place is that it functions as a small art gallery as well. There were black and white prints lining the walls. All in all a great place, great atmosphere, and it's not too expensive either.

...and the wine kept coming.

Lei Yue Mun - Seafood 'Bizarre'

Sunday we 'tried' to go for seafood at one of the popular local seafood places. Lei Yue Mun is right across the harbour from HK Island on the Far-East side of Kowloon. We took a short ferry ride over and then the fun began.

The look of the fishing village was pretty much what I expected, but it was a little more crowded than I thought it might be. Also it was very smelly, like fish - big surprise! The idea of Lei Yue Mun is that you go look at the large tanks of sea creatures and pick out what you want to eat. I had read that you didn't 'need' to do this, but it was popular. I don't know a whole lot about how to choose anything from the ocean, so I was thinking we could just order off a menu. Wrong! The place we went had menus, but no prices, and it didn't clearly explain the cooking fees if you did bring food. Our waiter spoke zero English when we asked about how we were supposed to bring our own fish. Feeling a little out of place and knowing I was going to get badly ripped off most likely, we decided to eat somewhere else. Although we didn't end up eating in Lei Yue Mun, the experience was interesting. Huge tanks line the sides of a very narrow alley-like pathway of seafood stalls. Again, not knowing how to buy fresh seafood, and given most people spoke no English didn't exactly make me too comfortable.

I'm sure regularly it's a great place to eat, but I'd only go again if my friend(s) spoke some Cantonese to help out. It was interesting that the seafood hawkers were only talking to me whilst ignoring the locals. That really made me feel like I would get totally ripped on the price. Oh well, next time, next time...

Lots and lots of fish. Some small, some massive. If you like creepy crawlies, this is the place for you.

Local transportation/housing.

Bangkok 'Rugby'

Backtracking a little here, I haven't reported on the events from Bangkok back in February.

I was in BK for 4 days with my rugby team, The Typhoons, posing as Mockingbirds under our touring name. I think it's a means of covering up our identity so charges can't be laid upon our return to the Big Lychee. Not that anything out of the ordinary happened...

This tour was all about 'rugby' ... ahem.... I said rugby... We arrived late Thursday night the last weekend of February. Getting to the hotel at 1am sure didn't mean we were going to sleep. We found a club close to our hotel and partied a good part of the morning. Friday wasn't a play day so we didn't need any energy for hitting and smashing the opposition. The majority of the 'birds slept till noon, then it was off to go-carting. Lucky us, it was indoors! The weather was about +30 during the day, not ideal for playing rugby. The indoor track was quite well done. The cars were fast, the track was a decent length with at least 6 turns, and it was dirt cheap for 10 minutes of racing. I managed to break the steering column on my cart the first time out and brilliant Thai design meant that I almost blew myself up by cutting the gas line. The 2nd race was much safer, and my car did not falter.

Friday night was the opening party for all the teams competing in the rugby on the weekend. It was also a chance for us to get a look at who would be dishing out the pain. The tournament was apparently of a higher standard than what we are used to, with such players as the ex-captain of South Africa suiting up for once team. So much for the winning part of the weekend. With our new found realization that we were probably going to get pounded anyway, the 'birds went out to all hours again around various parts of Bangkok.

The Bangkok International Rugby 10s (aka Slaughtering of the 'Birds) commenced sometime in the morning, and I think we made it on time for our first game. It just happened to be against the New Zealand Legends. I think we touched the ball, or at least made a lunge at it once or twice. Final score was 5000-something to nothing. The rest of the weekend we played 4 more games, and no, we didn't win any of them. None of us cared much as were has consumed more beer than air. We did however manage to score once.

Went for a stroll at night, through Tiananmen Square

Tiananmen Sqaure is pretty quiet at night. The gates shut around 5pm, and then it gets dark and the light go on. It was a very foggy night, which added to the atmosphere. There weren't too many people out and about other than policemen and rickshaws.