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nighttime skyline view from Harbour City
We just got back from my trip to Hong Kong & China, & our bags are all unpacked; the clothes are all washed, folded, & put away. I thought I would have time to blog during my trip, well, at least write a little each day, but I was so very wrong. Each day was packed full, & my sleep schedule was so out of whack. Every night I wouldn’t go to bed until close to 4am, & every morning I would wake up around 9am-ish & not be able to fall back to sleep. I was running on a minimum of 5 hours of sleep each night, & I would run myself ragged in that dreaded high humidity & nearly unbearable heat during the waking hours of the day. Well, at least I was able to keep up-to-date on my travels through Instagram & Facebook check-ins.
Thank God for free Wi-Fi & phone card SIM cards with data plans! I was able to use my smartphone in Hong Kong by purchasing a phone card-like SIM card with a reasonable data plan for one flat fee at the airport. These SIM cards allow you to make local calls & surf the Internet using an LTE data plan, & when you run out of data you can just purchase a new SIM card at a participating store. It’s very disappointing that these SIM cards can only be used in Hong Kong & not in China. In China, if you want to buy one of these types of SIM cards for your smartphone, you have to go through a strict process (including showing your ID or passport), & they are quite expensive. Our hotel in China offered to help us secure a SIM card for our smartphones, but we declined on the basis that we didn’t want to spend that kind of money & we most certainly did not want to have to submit our identification. In other words, it was just too much hassle. In order for us to communicate daily with Jian’s relatives, Jian took one for the team & used the International roaming plan his company set up on his company smartphone. He was conscious not to over-use his data, so as not to give his company’s accounting department a heart attack.
Hong Kong airport express train
So, let me tell you that arriving in Hong Kong at 6 o’clock in the morning is great, but at the same time, it sucks! Nothing, & I mean NOTHING is open at 6 in the morning except a few breakfast restaurants & some coffee shops. What can a person do when it only takes him/her 20 minutes to unpack their bags & get settled into their hotel room, & it’s still early as hell? Well, we just made a go of it, & proceeded to start our day with the rest of the crowds heading off to work in their office finery. Why did we even think it would be a good idea to grab breakfast at 8 o’clock in the morning in the near sweltering heat? Who knows, but we had a great time nonetheless.
Could this be our mantra?
an enticing front entrance
Get off your phones!
cool, artsy signage
a great spot for coffee & a breakfast plate
cool industrial interior decor
As per my usual forgetfulness, I completely forgot to take my own pictures of our hotel room. We stayed at the Marriott Renaissance Harbour View Hotel in the Wan Chai district. Our hotel room was small (if you think in terms of American standards), but it was extremely functional & practical. I absolutely loved our hotel room & all its tiny glory. I felt right at home in all of its Asian compactness & sensibility. Of course there is the age-old notion of “a hotel room is only meant for you to shower, sleep & store your luggage”, but we fully utilized our hotel room, taking rest breaks in the afternoon so we could recharge our batteries & head out for a night of eating, drinking, & shopping.
Please excuse my terrible lack of hotel photos. I really wanted to show you a glimpse of what our room looked like, so I had to unfortunately borrow a few stock photos from Trip Advisor. A quick disclaimer: ALL IMAGE CREDITS BELONG TO TRIP ADVISOR.
Well, that’s all the time I have left for today. I’m trying to gather even more photos from Jian’s smartphone. I will try to update again sometime within this week. Until then, cheers!
Today’s song of the day:
Remember when I said that I went to San Diego for my mom’s 70th birthday? No? Well, I did do that, & I mentioned in a previous post that I got sick (as usual). Why am I so prone to getting sick when I’m on vacation? (Don’t answer that. It was a rhetorical question.) Anyway, my sister’s kids are my most favorite people in the whole world, & they know just how to comfort their auntie when she is sick. My nephew gave me plenty of hugs, & sat in bed with me while we both played on our iPads. My niece played nurse,& helped me get plenty of water & juice. She also bought me a stuffed animal at the hotel’s gift shop. She specifically said that I needed something to snuggle while I’m laying in bed. Isn’t she just the cutest niece in the whole world? Yes, she is.
This is the stuffed animal my niece picked out for me, that Jian helped her pay for. My niece & I have this running joke going on where we each buy the same stuffed animals, except I will buy the smaller versions of her regular sized stuffed toys. My niece has this same stuffed rabbit (made by Jelly Cat), except hers is in the powder blue color. The stuffed rabbit toy comes in various sizes (from XS to XL) & in various pastel colors (eg. powder pink, dark pink/magenta-ish, mint green, coffee brown, powder blue, yellow, & white). My niece picked this white one out for me, which adds to my new & growing collection of stuffed toys.
I’m not sure what name I should give it. I like to name my possessions, so it’s only natural that I give this little guy a name. I like picking male names, so I’m thinking of something with a royal flair. My niece already decided that she’s going to call it Snow Bunny. I have another mini version of this stuffed rabbit in the same powder blue as my niece’s toy. She was so confused when I first showed her my blue toy. She couldn’t comprehend, at first, how her stuffed animal shrank to such a small size. I had to explain to her that I bought one for myself, & that’s when it dawned on her that we had matching stuffed rabbit toys. She got a huge kick out of it….so, from then on, we turned it into a running gag gift.
This past March, for my niece’s 6th birthday, I bought her the Large size of this white stuffed rabbit. She freaked out with happiness when she opened her present. She didn’t really pay attention to the other gifts that also came in the box. She pretty much focused all of her attention on her new stuffed toy. She loved it so much, & she really liked how I got her the even bigger version of all our stuffed rabbit toys. It was supposed to be a gag gift, but it actually turned out to be a great idea because she told me she gave her blue stuffed rabbit to her brother so he would have something to sleep with at night. That really touched my heart to the core. This Christmas, I’m going to get my niece another one of these stuffed rabbit toys, but in the even larger size (XL).
Hmm, what name should I give this toy of mine? I’m thinking about naming him Albert. I’ve already named my mini rabbit toy Irving. I’m not sure why I give all of my objects masculine names. I just like the way those names sound. Also, I just get along with males more than females. No, I’m not a tomboy, but I like a lot of the same things guys like, like: cars, watching sports, building plastic model kits, car racing, etc.. So, I think I’ve decided to name this guy Albert after all. The name has to just come to me naturally, not forced in thought. This name popped into my head just as I was writing this blog, & I am in love with the name.
On another note, this is going to be the latest post on my blog for a while, at least until I get settled at my hotel in Hong Kong. That’s right. I’m leaving for my planned vacation in a few days. I’m in a frantic mode of packing & trying to locate my over-sized “Asia suitcase”…that’s what I call my XL luggage that mysteriously disappeared. The hassle of visiting Asia, is that you gotta visit tons of relatives (aunties, uncles, distant cousins), & with visiting relatives comes the task of bringing tons of gifts. I have to bring a second separate suitcase just to pack all of the gifts. So, here I leave you until I am once again in the Orient. 乾杯! Cheers!
Today’s song of the day:
“Oh, Cheese it!” is a new slang phrase that I made up for myself. I use this phrase in negative situations, rather than using my usual dirty longshoreman cuss words because 1. it sounds cute, & 2. because it’s safe to use around children and prudes. Instead of saying “Goddammit!” or “Shit!”, like when you stub your toe really hard, or when you drop something important, I would say “Oh, Cheese it!”. It’s cheesy (pun intended), I know, but I like using this phrase. I think it’s fun.
Now, I’m using this phrase because something negative happened. For the first time in a long while, I finally made a bad stationery purchase. How could this have happened? I am usually so picky & choosy when it comes to buying stationery. I can browse the store for hours trying to look for the perfect notepad, pen, sticker, or other office supply item. I used to be the type of person who had to buy everything “cute” at the stationery goods store, but that quickly turned me into more hoarder than collector, so I gave away a lot of things I either had no use for or grew disinterested in. That groomed me to become more selective in the types of stationery goods I buy & use.
Well, I fell back into old habits again. I got caught up in the razzle-dazzle of the Japanese discount store Ichiban Kan. I was picking out some things to fill a stationery care package I was making for my younger cousin. (We have been very close ever since she was in diapers.) We both share a love for Japanese stationery & Japanese culture, & I just felt like spoiling her a little bit, since she never asks for anything. I saw so many pretty & cute, yet ridiculous goods at the discount store. I just couldn’t help myself. While I was picking out things for my cousin, I was also picking out extra things for myself. I must have been running on some sort of endorphin high, or perhaps something in the air fried my brain because I just grabbed whatever I thought looked cool without properly giving it my thorough, self-perfectionist examination.
Compared to some of the other times I’ve walked out of stationery stores, I think this purchase was quite modest. For my cousin, I only bought a Mount Fuji sticky notepad & a pad of animal shaped notecards. For myself, I bought a few sets of stickers & washi tape rolls. Let me lay it out straight for you. I.WAS. KIND OF. DISAPPOINTED. This was the first time I’ve ever been disappointed in my stationery goods purchase. Well, hold on a minute. I wasn’t completely disappointed with my purchase. The stickers were okay, but it was the washi tapes that really bummed me out.
This was the first thing I picked out, a roll of dog stickers. First of all, I really like how the roll is perforated, so you can tear off individual stickers, or if you’re like me…to shorten the used end of the roll to make it look neater/tidier. I really like the breeds of dogs used for these stickers. I’m so happy that there’s a Shiba Inu in the mix, as well as a Pomeranian that looks like the famous super pup Boo. Mostly, I couldn’t say no to the oh-so-adorable pug! Sorry for my lack of photography skills; my photos don’t do these items any justice. These stickers look matte in my photo, but they’re actually semi-glossy.
The next few things I picked were these sets of stickers. The first sheet says “和ものシール” (wamo no shiiru) which means “traditional seal”. The word “seal” is how the Japanese use to describe the word “sticker”. I was initially drawn to these stickers because of the rabbits! How could you deny those cute little bunnies? Plus, I really liked the traditional design & the rice paper texture of the stickers. As you can see, I’ve already used one of the rabbits. The other two sets are “flake seals”, which in Japanese “flake” is used to describe die-cut stickers. The set on the top has a forrest theme, while the set on the bottom are all kinds of birds. I really like these stickers because they are thin stickers, but I’d say they are pretty durable. I’ve already used one of the flower stickers, & I like how the stickers are slightly transparent. These stickers also have a rice paper texture, but a more smooth feeling. I haven’t tried any of the bird stickers yet. They look a little bit too soft in color for my taste, but I guess we’ll see how it all turns out.
Here’s where things take a sour turn. I was so excited to see so many different patterns of washi tapes at the Japanese discount store. Washi tape rolls can get very expensive (especially if you get ones with metallic foil accents). I try not to buy washi tape unless they’re on sale or at the discount store. Of course, I wanted to buy all of the tapes, but I forced myself to pick & choose only the select ones I knew I’d purposefully use. I got these three washi tape rolls. The first roll says “Thank You” in various languages. The gold lettering is supposed to have a slightly metallic shine, but my bad photography skills strike yet again, & you can’t really see it here. The second roll says “ありがとう” (Arigatou) which means “Thank You” & “ほんの気持ちです。” (Hon’ no kimochi desu.) which means “A feeling of gratitude”. I really liked the third washi tape roll because it looked quite Scandinavian & will look nice on wrapped gifts. Boy, oh boy. I can’t even with these damn washi tapes! Sure, they look pretty, but their looks are so deceiving! These tapes feel like every other washi tape out on the market, but they are far from the same quality. They don’t even stick to anything you use them on (not even plain white paper). I tried using the flower pattern tape on an envelope I was going to mail to my sister, but the ends kept curling up off the envelope, & no matter how many times I tried to really press down on the tape, it would just peel its ends off of the envelope. I’m pretty bummed right now that I bought these duds. There goes $4.50 USD right down the drain.
Well, that’s a lesson learned for me. Cheap is cheap, I guess. You better believe that the next time I won’t be so quick to buy everything off the shelves, & I will carefully inspect the items before I buy them. Until then, cheers!
Today’s song of the day:
Rabbits & Foxes 
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