5. Shanghainese Dishes in a Cantonese Town

Since we arrived in Hong Kong a week and a half ago, the food here has been great. Without any particular planning, we seemed to end up eating at all the Shanghainese food restaurants here. Guess what, even though Hong Kong is famous for Cantonese food, Shanghainese food has also come a long way - and our taste buds told us that this is not the old Shanghainese food.



So far, we've been to Xiao Nan Guo 小南国 on Hennessey Road, Lu Yang Chuen 禄杨春, and Xin Ji Si 新吉士 in Wanchai. The best dish so far is a 'dandelion wrapped in tofu skins' dish. Only the Shanghainese would eat dandelion leaves as a delicacy. In this dish, the leaves are boiled, seasoned delicately, and then wrapped in a very pure tofu skin. The whole thing is rolled up and then sliced into sections, very much like how sushi is cut. The whole thing tastes very clean and light, the look is appealing, white rolls interspersed with dark green. I was impressed. But I don't have a photo so you will just have to come here to enjoy it. (Since this post, we went to the restaurant again and I took a photo of the dandelion dish.)I understand that these restaurants all have branches in Shanghai (or really, I should say that these Shanghainese restaurants all have branches in Hong Kong). I do have one of the restaurant's entrance shot though.



Xin Gi Si is a very nicely decorated restaurant with great services, but at a price. We had lunch there with about 10 of our relatives and the bill totaled over $1500 HKD (~$200USD)! But for that, we got to taste interesting dishes such as 'drunken crab' (raw crab marinated in wine), salted vegetable with stirred-fried rice cake, and then 'June yellow crabs' (crabs that are only available in June of every year - sort of a soft-shelled crab, all cooked in a black bean sauce.) Then of course, there are the very juicy pan-fried buns (with pork stuffing) that when we bite into one, all the juices squirt out and almost ruined our shirts!

4. Star Ferry and Hong Kong Haze

We took the Star Ferry from Central to Tsim Sha Tsui last week. I was troubled by how run down the Start Ferry Terminal has become. (Later, I learned that the Star ferry will be closed in November 2006). Years ago, both sides of the ferry piers were the heart of the city, always crowded with people eager to get across as fast as possible. Now, it's not even one-tenth it's former self. Only a few us tourists with cameras now ride the ferry. Everyone now takes the subway to cross the harbor or drive through the 3 tunnels. Here is a photo from last week:




While the ferry looks pretty much the same, not so about the air quality in Hong Kong. I used to remember that the air was crisp, the sky was blue and the sea was green. Now all we have is that the sea is dirty green and there is a haze covering everything, it is almost as bad as the smog in LA. When I look up at the sky during the ferry ride, there is no sun, there is no sky, just a grey haze. Very sad.

We crossed the harbor again today and this time we went from Tsim Sha Tsui to Wanchai. The ride is still very pleasant with a gentle breeze slowly rocking the boat. But the haze is back today, and it's getting worse.




The very tall building is one of the newest office towers in Hong Kong, it's the International Finance Center 2 (IFC2, IFC1 is a smaller skyscraper just next to it). This photo was taken this afternoon at 1:11pm... I am really disappointed that the haze has ruined an otherwise most beautiful harbor. Our friends told us that most of the air pollution are blown over from ShengZhen and GuangZhou and there is precious little the Hong Kong government has done or can do. In his Letters to Hong Kong report yesterday, Hong Kong's Chief Executive Donald Tsang has not proposed any long term solution other than some minor remedies - a 3.2 billion HKD package to retro-fit old commercial diesel vehicles with liquid natural gas on a voluntary basis. Yes, that's a 3.2 billion with a 'b'! Makes you wonder what does the news item mean.

1. Mid-Autumn Festival in Hong Kong

We arrived in Hong Kong on Thursday, October 5. The next day, Friday, October 6 is the mid-autumn festival, the fifteenth day of the eighth month in the lunar calendar. In Chinese tradition, this is the time to celebrate by sitting outdoors, eating mooncakes and basking in the bright moon light. I have not been home to Hong Kong during mid-autumn in more than 39 years and so this is the first time I am spending mid-autumn festival in Hong Kong.


This is a photo I took of the moon outside of the Park Lane Hotel in Causeway Bay looking up from the front of the hotel. Supposedly this year, Hong Kong is experiencing the closest distance to the moon ever. But obviously it is still quite far!








For the first time ever, the Hong Kong government sponsored a free lantern festival in Victoria Park for all to enjoy. Since we are very close to the park, we walked there late at night on mid-autumn festival day. The park was crowed with people and there is an elaborate lantern display of Tang Dynasty poets in paper lanterns. The photo shows dragons made of paper lanterns.