November 10 Tuesday China side: Well things were exciting for much of the rest of the day and mostly in ways I did not want it to be exciting. First, they could not find me in the airline system and sent me to a special customer service desk. The lady there was very helpful and was able to find that when I rescheduled the flight (which I had to do through Airtreks, I could not do it directly myself), the flight had been changed to November 6. Airtreks had sent me a confirmation email saying November 10. That was not a good feeling. Fortunately, she also said that when I had not shown up on the 6th the ticket was put in an open holding position and there were open seats on the flight that day so I could go after all. It took almost 40 minutes to get it straightened out and I let her know how much I appreciated her fixing it for me, especially since it took so long and that made some other customers behind me agitated (and rude). I got my main bag checked in right at the weight limit and things were looking better again. When I got to the screening area, they told me my carry on was too heavy (of course it was, I had it filled so the main bag was okay) and that I had the choice of throwing things out or returning to the check in desk and working with them on a solution. Well, my main bag was already at the limit so that was not much of an option, but I returned to the check in desk anyway. We went back and forth taking out items and weighing the bag to see what I could get away with. In the end (and this just shows the absurdity of our flight “safety” systems around the world) I had a bag that was acceptable to the screeners and I had an armload of books and every pocket in my jacket was stuffed with items. I went down to my gate and put all the things back into the bag, so the whole process was largely pointless. I did donate two items to a charity bin, but that was negligible as far as weight was concerned. The flight was fine, long enough to play some Bedazzle and watch three movies (Get Smart, Plastic City (a Japanese/Brazilian movie), and Wallander (a
Danish movie). Once in Hong Kong it went smoothly to get my bags and I found an ATM to get some cash. I got $HK2000 to get me started. That is about $258 US. The cheap way into the city is by bus, but since I was arriving late it would be quicker to take a train, which cost $HK100. I thought if this is how everything is, my money is not going to last long here. The airport train is the only expensive one though because they know people have to take it. Other routes are much cheaper, I happily discovered. The train (MTR) was fast and clean and everything is labeled in Chinese and English, so that was easy to deal with. I got to the Central Station and based on my directions from my Couchsurfing host, I found the #4 Pier with ferrys to Lamma Island, but just missed the 10:30 ferry, so I had to wait an hour for the next one. The ferry workers were helpful in showing me how the system works and it was easy after that (although the token machines were always reading the coins incorrectly and I had to overpay several times, but still it was literally pennies and not worth arguing over). After a half hour ferry ride we arrived on Lamma Island. There were a lot of people on the ferry given the time of night. The town of Yung Shue Wan has one main street and most of the people headed down that way. I was looking for a particular ice cream shop, but missed it and went much further down
the village before I stopped to ask for directions. Then it did not take long to find the stairs mentioned in my directions. My host had said there were 100 stairs and I thought it was probably just a number he threw out there, but there were just over one hundred stairs to the top. Just before the top was a split in the path and I followed the left branch which shortly came to a sign reading “End” and with two houses. This matched the directions I had, but one
house looked deserted and the other, after waking up some dogs, and their owner, was clearly not my destination. I left my bags at the deserted house and walked over to the right branch of the path. It led to a couple apartment buildings and the path continued on from there. This did not match the description I had in mind and I went back to where my bag was. My phone was almost dead battery wise and when I tried to send a text, it failed, so I was not sure if it was my phone not working in a new country or if the number was wrong, or what. I got out my netbook and could get a free wifi signal from somewhere in the neighborhood. I sent a message to my host, but it was nearly 1 am at this point and I expected him to have gone to bed. At the seemingly empty house there was a wicker couch thing in the side yard and I tried to get comfortable on that, but the mosquitoes were incessant and if I covered up it was so hot I was
quickly sticky with sweat. Neither option was pleasant and the time change being greater than I had realized meant I was getting very tired and miserable. I almost forgot one of the other things: with all the running around I was happy that there are public toilets open at all hours of the night and on Lamma the public toilets are squat toilets, so I had my first experience with one of those. Super exciting!!!! I'll continue the story tomorrow.

November 11 Wednesday I only slept a few hours, then because of the time differential combined with the uncomfortable sleeping surface in the garden, I stayed up. I read for a couple hours and watched the sunrise. Since I had not made contact with Adrian, my phone was low on battery, and he would be out all day working, I decided to take the ferry back to Hong Kong Central and look for hostels. I still had the address written down for YesInn, one of the better
rated hostels and took the subway to the nearest station to it. I found the place after a few minutes searching, but they were booked up for the night and tomorrow night. Bummer. The reception man did not know of any other hostels nearby, but he said I could use their wireless to find out where some others in Causeway Bay (not too far from YesInn) were. While looking, I got two emails, one from Adrian and another from Daniel, the guy staying with Adrian at the moment. I could go back to the island and meet Daniel who would let me into the flat. I still made a booking at YesInn and put a 5 dollar deposit down for 5 nights. Then lugging all my belongings, I retraced my route back to the subway, then to the ferry, then through Yung Shue Wan on Lamma Island. I texted Daniel that I was on the island again, but my phone is having issues and it told me the text failed. Here we go again, I started thinking. I hiked up the stairs to the place I had been last night and looked around. Nobody. I walked over to the other side where the path had forked. Nobody there either that I could see. I got out the netbook and it showed Adrian's wifi network giving off a signal from one of the buildings, so I knew I was at the right place at least. I left my backpack in a relatively safe spot and walked back down to Emily's Ice Cream Parlor to wait a bit and see if Daniel had gotten my text anyway. I read while I waited, but after twenty minutes, I headed back up the hill. This time there was someone on the deck and I
asked if he was Daniel. He was and he quickly let me in. Daniel is from the UK and his girlfriend Florine is from France. They are just finishing up a five month stint in China and head to India tomorrow. We talked quite a bit about our respective trips. They have been traveling for 8 months, came overland through Russia from Estonia, before entering China. They visited Taiwan and said it was easy to go there. That is something I'll have to look into because I would really like to visit Derek if I can.

Adrian's flat is actually quite nice. It has two bedrooms (Daniel and Florine have the second bedroom til they leave tomorrow, so I get the couch in the living room. The kitchen is VERY small, but the bathroom is really nice and there are two walkin closets, so there is a decent amount of space. Later Adrian told me he pays around $1500 US dollars a month for it and that is about a third of what it would cost in Hong Kong proper. He used to stay in a 9th floor flat
there that cost US$4000 per month (more than HK$30,000) and was smaller. The flat here has a nice view of one of the hills/mountains on the island and also of the harbor and ferry terminal. You do not see the city lights of Honk Kong at all, so you really do not feel like you are in a city, which is great.

Now that I was in the right place and had a chance to sit down for a bit, my first priority was to take a shower. Then I slept for a few hours until Adrian arrived home. Daniel and I went down to the village to buy some pasta sauce and a few other items for a dinner of spaghetti with pesto that we all ate together, then I went to bed shortly thereafter.

November 12 Thursday Adrian left for work quite early, I made some of my remaining oatmeal for breakfast, with an apple I purchased last night. Daniel and Florine got up and were finishing up their packing to go to India. They gave me a banana, some bread, a little peanut butter, some raisins and sunflower seeds since they did not want to take those things with them on the plane. That helps me out for sure. They left close to 11 and I worked on the computer for a bit. Later I walked around the village some, went to the two small temples and a couple other 'landmarks'. I did a bit of grocery shopping, got some soy milk and cereal, more peanut butter, some tomato sauce, corn and eggs.

November 13 Friday I wandered some more on Lamma, but stayed close to the village. With the good internet connection, I have been uploading my photographs and videos to Scott's server. It will still take a few days to get it all backed up, but then I'll have the added safety of knowing the pictures are secure.

In my version of a blog filibuster here is a list of the books I have read on the trip so far: (NonFiction) Last Chance to See by Douglas Adams, Abolition of Man by CS Lewis, Istanbul: Memories of a City by Orhan Pahuk, Are You Somebody? By Nuala O'Faolain, Dave Gorman's GoogleWhack Adventure!, A Walk In The Woods by Bill Bryson, Born on a Blue Day by Daniel Tammet, Marching Powder by Rusty Young, (Fiction) Seeker by Jack McDevitt, Past Watch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus by Orson Scott Card, The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer, The World According to Garp by John Irving, The Last Juror/The Chamber/The Runaway Jury/The Appeal by John Grisham, Tess of D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, 1984 by George Orwell, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, Skinny Legs & All by Tom Robbins, The Great Pursuit by Tom Sharpe, Voices From The Street by Philip K Dick, Toad Triumphant by William Horwood, Dolphin Island by Arthur C Clarke, A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian by Marina Lewycka, The Dark Room by Rachel Seiffert, The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac, Prey by Michael Crichton, Perfume by Peter Susskind, In The Woods by Tana French, The Distance Between Us by Maggie Ofarrell, The Anatomist by Federico Andahazi, Breakheart Hill by Thomas H Cook, The Catcher In The Rye by JD Salinger, plus three compilations of short
stories: Ep;phany, McSweeney's Massive Treasury of Thrilling Tales, and It's All Good: How Do You Like It Here Now?

The book by Nuala O'Faolain was interesting enough that when I saw another book by her in a New Zealand hostel I was at, I grabbed it. That is what I am reading currently: My Dream Of You. I also have three others: Consider the Lobster by David Foster Wallace, Metro by Alasdair Duncan, and I Have Fun Everywhere I Go by Mike Edison. The last one I picked up just for the title alone. I have no idea what it is about.

This afternoon another couchsurfer arrived at Adrian's place. He is from Spain, but going to school in the Philippines studying anthropology. He was interested in hearing about PNG and we talked quite a bit about that and many other things. He is partly in Hong Kong to buy a computer, something Adrian told him was rather foolish. Hong Kong is not the place to get good deals on electronics. There are too many knockoffs and the only discounts you will get are due
to the lack of warranties on the products.

November 14 Sabbath I got up early and had breakfast. Mario and I left on the ferry together. He was headed for Mong Kok, where one of the bigger electronics markets is. I was going to the address I had for the Kowloon SDA church, near the Prince Edward MTR station. I arrived just before 9:30 and they had not started yet, but the greeter said they only have services in Cantonese. He gave me a map for another church that had bilingual services. I walked down following the directions and found it quite quickly. My path had taken me by Austin Road, so I had made a small stop there for some pictures. Sabbath school was just starting when I made it to the church. The english class was made up mostly of Filipinos, with a couple other nationalities also represented. We went over the lesson and then there was a discussion for a while about work and Sabbath, which is apparently a big issue here. Many of the Filipinos come through work agencies and while they request placement into jobs where they can have sabbath off, when they arrive that is often not the case. So they were talking about what they can do to be true to their beliefs in circumstances like this. It is definitely a challenge and one I have not had to deal with fortunately. For church everything was translated through headphones. After, there was a good potluck and an energetic Indian lady named Katy invited me to the Clearwater Bay church for next Sabbath. That is where the Hong Kong Adventist College is. I got my picture taken with some of the people at potluck including Maris from Indonesia, Babu from India, and Nori from the Philippines. Nori and Maris took me to the Kowloon Park, just a couple blocks away, to walk after eating. We went through the aviary and by some interesting fountains. At 3pm was a prayer meeting, so I went back to the church with Maris for that. I was supposed to contact Adrian about a dinner he had with some of his friends and that he had invited me to. The prayer meeting was scheduled to go until 6 I realized after it had begun. At five during a break between speakers I left to get in touch with Adrian. It turns out I could have stayed because the dinner is actually next weekend, but by the time I had worked that out I did not go back to the prayer meeting.

I walked down to the Kowloon harbor side where the Space Museum, Hong Kong Cultural Center, and the HK Museum of Art are located. The Cultural Center is apparently controversial because it is a large building with no windows facing the harbor (one of the better views in the city). I had read something about a nightly light show, but in my mind I had transformed that into a fireworks show and I did not remember the time it was supposed to occur. I wandered along the piers and through the Avenue of Stars (like the Hollywood one), then wandered back into the city interior. I never did see a show. Many of the buildings are rigged with lights and do their own displays, but they are random and this was supposed to be a coordinated show. After a while I headed back to Hong Kong central and caught a ferry back to Lamma.

November 15 Sunday Mario and I set out together with the plan of going to the Peak and then the Giant Buddha on Lantau Island. He was going to catch a plane back to the Philippines in the evening, having successfully purchased a computer yesterday. But things went awry right from the beginning. The weather was not great to start with, but as soon as we were halfway to Hong Kong Central, Mario could not find his cell phone. He was quite sure he had left it at Adrian's
and so we went back. I continued on to the Peak on my own. Turns out he must have had the phone with him anyway, so he wasted some money on ferry rides, because Adrian said he never came back to the flat. Hopefully, everything worked out for him. There are directions on my city map for how to get to the Peak tram, but they are silent on how to walk up. I know there are several roads leading up and so I just went in the general direction of the Peak. My path went through the Botanical Gardens, where I did not spend much time. They also have an aviary with many of the same birds as on the Kowloon side. I passed the tram station and began following Old Peak Road, which I figured had to go in the right direction. It does and after a good workout I emerged from just below the tram station at the Peak. The bad thing was the weather, which had not been nice anyway, had decided to get very windy and descend on the Peak in the form of a dense fog/cloud. I could not see anything. I still took a few pictures of Lions Pavilion and so on, but I will really have to come back on a better weather day. Going down the same way I went up I passed a house that I should have gotten a picture of (I did later, but it was not the same). In the driveway in front of the triple car garage were a Porsche, a BMW SUV, and a Ferrari. That may sound incredible, but I have actually seen quite a few Ferrari's and Lambourghini's on the roads here, alongside many many Mercedes, BMW, and other luxury cars. Nice cars seem to be the standard here if you are going to own a car at all. Once I was back down from the Peak I walked east to Causeway Bay, partly looking for a specific music shop (which happened to be closed when I found it even though it was still during the time it should have been open). I had a vegetable and egg fried noodle dinner in a small restaurant. I should have gotten pictures of another restaurant I passed that had 'Vegetarian soup with goose neck' and 'Vegetarian noodles with pork dumplings' on the menu.