Living the Hong Kong Dream!!

Everyone is expected to put a lot of effort into their work in HK............but that also means they can party hard too. Friday evenings may wife described me as " a caged tiger- waiting to get out" . I was the only bread winner at this point so it was all down to me. When the week finished well almost - the pressure had to be released somehow. I did three main things. 1. night out with the lads usually in Tsim Sha Tsui but most of the time away from the girlie bars.

TST was developing lots of theme 'English style pubs' - nothing on the outside of course - just a concrete stree full of cars but once inside typical London pubs and all owned by rich Chinese business men! and they stayed open until the wee hrs of the morning - no harsh opening and closing regulations as in UK.

Although UK does have its own night club scene of course - and as does HK. I have been taken to Chinese only strip clubs with our wives too at times just for a laugh but without our Chinese counterparts there would have been no way to get past the sliding peep hole in the door!!

I would say they are less sleezy as they once were during the earlier "suzy wong" era of the colony. But must admit have had no one I know sampling them these days are reporting back across the SE China Sea! I expect if you want sleaze then you can get it anywhere you may be in the world?
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Friday nights of course would often spill over to 2 am saturday morning - as I recalled elsewhere to be standing on the 3/4 level of a high rise car park at that time and looking across at HK still lit up was always magical. You always needed to stop and take it in otherwise you DID forget it existed sometimes!!



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and that was 365 days a year so you could get quite blase about it all!
 

literal translation - Sharp sandspit - fanscinating it was all built on sand!! - lot of weight to withstand there!!

Yeah.....HK has had a lot of land reclamation as they call it. The harbor's shoreline has extended out into the water over and over again. The old shorelines are now well inland. I haven't seen the place in 56 years and my old friends who revisit our home or who never left, now jokingly refer to the harbor as the Hong Kong river. Aerial views confirm this. The old Hong Kong that I knew and loved and grew up in is now long gone.
At least the Peninsula Hotel is still there...used to be you could could walk in and be served tea and crumpets or whatever....now tourists have to wait for hours to be seated. I once asked for a root beer and the waiter brought me real beer......it was my first beer, San Miguel...I was 12 years old....in the world famous Peninsula Hotel. Where the English formally surrendered to the Japanese in 1941.
 
Once the friday night letting off steam had been done the rest of the w/end was for families/friends and kids and because we mixed with a "mixed cultural group" we went to places that many others never saw in their time there. Of course whether it was a barbecue affair [and there are plenty of beaches still in HK] of restaurant sit down food was never far off in the course of the day.

We travelled all over the "new Territories" for recreation and food but to have 'locals' who could speak the language and find those often quieter sort after places was a wonderment. And whenever we could we would try to return the favour.

I remember one of my chinese friends asking me if I would be his guest speaker at one of his business mens clubs and just talk about anything really. I dutifully obliged of course - he spent much more time spending his money on me and family at the many restaurants of HK! - His daughter decided she wanted to play the flute - could I give her some lessons and tips as I played the clarinet and saxaphone...........again I dutifully obliged. This is often the liqueur franca of Hong Kong..........................or as we say in europe " you scratch mine and I'll scratch yours""!!
 
One night we caught a large ferry with a hoard of people which sailed to Lantau for the evening - everything had been prepared and we sat in a restaurant garden listening to a lone guitar player as we ate our uninteresting food. One of the low moments - in fact the only one I can remember.A few clever arses had thought up the idea to make a quid or two and stuffed up badly. Even HK gets it wrong sometimes.

Oh know I tell a lie - some flashy business deal involved bringing out a 'glen miller 'style band with tyler dancing and kicking girls and that didn't last either. The HK chinese can smell a badun!!

nb: recapturing some British/London type entertainment and importing it into HK doesn't always work with the locals.
 
Apologies 唔好意思,剩返七碼咋。!! been off sick for a while - wow this is a fast moving site heh!! - Our favorite beach in HK was beautiful for many reasons! - it was hidden away from the maddening crowd. How we found it remained a mystery - and we called it "black sand beach " - it took about 30 drive into the coastline to find and was on the Kowloon mainland.

Just a few villages surrounded it and the traditional chinese don't usually go to the beach to sit in the sun!! - but we were a mixed crowd and our chinese friends were very european focused and married and had kids that loved beaches.

There was also the option of beach fishing! No one else during our whole stay used the beach at the weekend except ourselves and a Guerka camp!! They were posted out there watching for illegal entries from China [usually on floating plastic bags sewn together to produce a floating barge!!

so for one day of the weekend we met there and barbecued and fished and played cricket and just hang around in peace and quiet - we could even drive in close to the beach which had a rock entrance that hid it from view. We felt so privileged to loan it for a while - no drinking and driving laws meant we could risk being over the limit and no one drove too fast there anyway.

The Guerka lads just watched us and wouldn't join in - not permitted to fraternize with to many aliens!! but we felt safer with them around and did find a few discarded plastic 'barges' This also was a time when many Vietnamese were also fleeing their own country and being 'housed' in HK camps for refugees.

so the w/end phone around was often " blacksand beach today?" we could accept and decline and sometimes believe it or not we just wanted a day lazing about at home!!

something like this!

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I got to see Hong Kong in 1966 courtesy of the U.S. Navy. It was British week and Princess Margaret was visiting. I bought a gold pocket watch that stopped running a week later and a custom made wool suit that fell apart after wearing a couple times. It was overcast the whole time but a fun visit.

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nice pics GD - sorry to hear about your watch!- weren't you warned at all by navy personnel? I was working with HK nationals - of the chinese variety who reminded me - when you wanna by a watch let me know and I'll come with you - I have an uncle he sells good ones and he did! yes all that twinkles is not gold as they say? it's a bit like being a kid in a candy store heh? the real clue is " if it's $$ cheap then it IS cheap! hope you gave it to the grandkids!

One of my chinese colleagues wife wouldn't let him shop with her at the markets cause he was always criticizing the quality and prices of things.

next time remind me to tell you about the expensive weekend adventure we nearly all [males] went on once which was gonna cost $HK7000 [70's prices] and we all backed out of for different reasons?

a $7000 clue below? - my wife put her foot down!!
 

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Very much enjoying this thread. I only had an overnight stopover in H.K. , but was very impressed with the
level of service everywhere.

I knew a Brit who lived and worked in H.K. for a good 20 yrs. He loved the people, the work, and especially
hiking. For all I know, he's still there.
 
yesd P we could have lived there for ever we thought but the dreaded Chinese from the mainland were breathing down our knecks to take HK back and then there was the "localization" policy which simply said if we have a local chinese with same quals then they will replace you after your contract has finished and who could argue with that??

but living there meant we could go as far as the fence that separated us from mainland China and pass through the duck farms and spend a quiet peaceful lunchtime in Fanling which housed a fancy golf course. HK was not just about the 'concrete 'jungle - but you have reminded me I once wrote a poem about HK.

My son often says to me - let's go back for a quick holiday Da and I always refuse - it is no longer the HK I knew and loved - some of my HK chinese friends have died ; some of their kids have emigrated ; the buildings are demolished and replaced at such rapid paces that it is now a "new HK" - not "my HK" any longer - I left when it was still a British colony - I may get imprisoned for some non- event going back now!!
 
I had a great time in Hong Kong. I took a tour around the island, had lunch in a floating restaurant, rode to the top of Victoria Peak, saw Tiger Balm Gardens, Visited Kowloon, and made friends with some British sailors. I went to a beer party with them at the China Fleet Club, toured their boat, and got to sample the Queen's rum ration full strength. Here are a couple of my buddies with one of them.

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HK was often felt like being on a film set - magical all the time - especially at night when it all lit up! - and of course somewhere I always have a copy of "the world of suzie wong" the movie! . I often wandered around the streets of old Wanchai.

I was there also when they completed the building of the tunnel under the harbour from HK to Kpwloon. That was a little scary for a while with tonnes of water over the top of you as you drove across.

A mate of mine was driving back one night from the island to Kowloon worst for booze and fell asleep at the wheel - his car then veered into the steel barriers at the side and he awoke to sparks coming from the side of the car. That kept him awake for the remainder of the journey and he arrived home safely with some paint removed from the drivers side!!
 
I could re-tell many many other wonderful tales - but my tears are never far away and here is the final reason why I could never go back and try and relive the past - the past is being violently dismembered before our very eyes!

 
If I could choose a place and time to live and grow up in it would be here.....my old hometown from 1958 to 1967.
 

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Hi just browsing and came across the magical interlude about the 'old Hong Kong' - on Lantau island actually and it involves an American novelist his chinese wife and 2/3 kids - his wife caught the ferry to HK island each day for her work and the kids would have gone to school on the mainland also - but Larry paints this magical picture of life in a lost world - how it used to be - I saw it in the 70's and it was still magical wonder what it is like now?

The Toilet Bar
 

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