26 March 2011
Mong Kok
I have been to Mong Kok many times before, but on a Saturday night its the place to go if you want to see lots of people.
Theres distinct areas, gold fish trapped in plastic balloons and kittens that look too cute to be real in pet street, realistic 'replica' machine guns and radio controlled everything in hobby street, every kind of electronics good imaginable in nerd street etc.
I also had to find dinner, and was determined to find a place to sit down and eat rather than having octopus balls on a stick like most other people.
Of course if you cram 3 million people into the space of a few streets, all looking for somewhere to sit down and eat, the chance of them wanting to seat 1 guy at tables made to take 10 people is slim.
So I wandered a bit further, and some Phillipino girls (I think they were girls anyway) were very determined to tell me how they were my friend. Its easy to make friends in Hong Kong! Earlier in the day a very friendly Indian man followed me for 2 streets explaining how he could find me the best tailor in the world at the best price, and that he was telling me only because he didnt want me to miss out as he could see I was a wealthy business man who clearly needs a suit.
Eventually I got far enough away from the action to find restaurants with spare seats, sort of.
Voltron / Power Rangers were busy collecting money for I have no idea what. Chinese only characters on their box prevented a donation from me. For all I know they were collecting money to excute Falun Gong, improve the harvesting of bear bile and tiger penises and to import a few more Cambodian sex slaves to drive down prices.
This is the ladies market. Theres really not much there you would want, even if you are a Lady. I think people are coming to this realisation generally as its the quietest part of Mong Kok despite having the highest density of stuff for sale.
Heres where I had my dinner. They showed me to a table, then showed a group of 3 other people to my table after me. Didnt bother me, but they really did not seem to like this, and argued a lot with the waitress.
I wish I could understand what they were saying.
'You sit us at our own table, we wont eat with this guy. He has ridiculous pony tail. Hes wearing shorts and a t-shirt, hes crazy, its freezing outside'.
Shortly after my meal arrived, another table became available and they promptly moved.
And heres what I ate. Boneless Hainan chicken with Taro Milk tea.
The chicken was ok, pretty fatty tasting. The rice was really good though, had been cooked in some very flavourful stock, probably made from ox intestines and blood worms or something.
My drink wasnt on the list of acceptable drinks as part of the free drink with meal deal, so it cost me about 40 cents extra. The waitress went to great lengths to explain this to me.
So the grand total of my meal was $4.50 in Australian dollars.