Hong Kong 2016- Vancouver to Hong Kong Day 1

In the beginning of May, I finally got to go on a vacation. I don’t get to go very often and I usually only get to go every five to ten years.  The last time I went on any type of vacation overseas was 5 years ago and was also back to Hong Kong.  This year i decided I didn’t want to spend my 3 weeks just lazying at home and do nothing.  I managed to score an awesome deal for my plane ticket, $600 round trip.  I was actually planning to go to Taiwan with my best friend but she backed out four days after I bought the ticket since she got into medical school to be a doctor.  So in the end, plans changed and I ended up in Hong Kong for 3 weeks.  Let’s start the adventure! (/^▽^)/

3:00 am
I couldn’t sleep the night before from excitement, sadness and nervousness.  This would be the first time ever I was going to travel completely alone, with no family, no nobody.  Me, myself and I.

9:30 am
Got out of bed, got dressed. Flight was at 1:30 pm, boarding time was 12:30 pm. For some reason, my family likes to be two to three hours early.  I wore my superdry windbreaker jacket, mickey mouse t-shirt, joggers and the hat I got at Daiso for $2.  This might be the only comfortable hat that actually fits my head without squeezing it to death.

A quick tip, make sure to snap a picture of your luggages and backpacks before you get them checked in.  If it ever goes missing, you’d have a easier time describing your luggage then telling them “Uhh the purple and black suitcase”.  Do you know how many black suitcases there are out there?
*Excuse the crappy picture, I had to use my iPhone since I was in a hurry*

I remembered this one time where my family and I were heading to Florida but got stuck at the Seattle airport. Our luggage was all the way in Florida and we had a hard ass time trying to tell the what our suitcase looks like, what material it was and such.  So take a picture of it and it will save you a whole lot of salvia and frustration.

I got the airport around 10:15 am with everything ready.  I also made sure check in online but sadly couldn’t pick the seat I wanted so I ended up with the seat with the washroom right behind me. I prayed for the whole flight that no one would take a fat poop or I’d have to kill someone.  Just saying…

Had to be a tourism in my own town because, well I don’t get to go past the airport gates often and… well POLAR BEARS!!

I also never noticed there are actually huge aquariums in the Vancouver airport.  So pretty!

1.5 hours until i have to board.  A little bittersweet with a sprinkle of nervousness.

I don’t have a lot of selfies on my camera.  This might be the only one.  Bare face, mismatching black brows HAHA.

So Canadian.

Power rangers was actually filming during the time I was in the airport but I didn’t bump into them.  Instead, I think I bumped into an “Amazing race” taping since there was a ton of crew filming vlog style and the contestants were sitting in the seats right in front of me.  So if you see me chillin in the background at the Vancouver airport, that is most likely me.

30 minutes before I had to board, I made sure to go to the washroom.  While I was there, I actually bumped into my co-workers who was also flying that exact same day but they were going to travel throughout Southeast Asia for 4 months.  DAMNNNN 4 months is a long long time.  We said our goodbyes and I headed for my zone to line up and get onto the plane.  You don’t know how hard I prayed for the plane to land safely and not go missing.  Paranoid as f***.

This is another thing I don’t get to hold much, boarding pass!

Okay, time to go!  13 hour flight in economy might be one of the most painful things.  I’m 5’3, medium sized human.  I can’t even imagine those who are taller or larger then me, how would you be able to bear with it.

Two hours into the flight, we got fed.  YEY!  I was kinda getting hungry, so smelling meal time was exciting for me.  I mean what else am I going to look forward to being stuck on a plane for 13 hours other then peeing, meal time and the occasional nap.  The options were either pork noodles or chicken and rice.  I picked chicken and rice which was actually not half bad.  But then again, when you are in the air, the high altitude numbs your taste buds so you can’t really taste anything anyways.  The coleslaw was a little too chilled to the point of being frozen, so I just mixed it with the rice.  There was also a small bun with butter and for dessert, chocolate cake.  Along with the bottled water, they offered drinks such as juice (apple, orange, grapefruit I think?), soft drinks and mini bottles of WINE?  WHAT?  I don’t drink but I kind of wanted to take one with me.

I didn’t really sleep much since it was super uncomfortable with little to no leg space. For some odd reason, my bum was hurting sooo much.  Maybe it is because I have little to no junk in my trunk but I had to constantly move around to keep my tailbone from bruising LOL.

Within the five hours, all I did was watch whatever movies they had on.  Luckily there was a couple of movies I had been meaning to watch but always forget to hit the theater when it is released.  One of them was Hunger games, that last two ones (I forgot the name).  Sadly there was no subtitles, nor did I bring my noise cancelling headphones so I couldn’t really hear anything throughout the whole movie HAHA. Oh well.  And I couldn’t find the first part to the movie, so i just watched the second part with no clue of what was going on.  I also didn’t read the books, so…. LOL

Other ones I watched were Minions, Sisters, Alvin and the Chipmunks and the whole season 6 of Big Bang theory.  Needless to say, I was bored out of my mind.

8:00 pm
Finally it was dinner time!  You don’t know how happy I am to smell and see food.  This time around, we got the choice of beef + rice or chicken pasta.  I choose beef since I already had chicken the first time around.  I was expecting the beef to be tough and gross but surprisingly, it was tender and not half bad.  Along with the main course, the meal also came with bread and butter, fruit salad with half ripe melons and a bottled of water.  Again, there were beverages to choose from as well.  I do have to say, Air Canada’s food portions are a little small, even for me!  And I don’t have a big appetite.  They also don’t really have much snacks, only pretzels, cookies and lukewarm orange juice if your lucky.

One thing I was really happy I wore was my hat surprisingly!  Not only does it block the view of strangers, it also block the light up above.  It also doubles as a sleeping mask!

After 13 hours, we finally arrived to Hong Kong, local time 5;30 pm.  My butt hurt SO bad.  I’m pretty sure my tailbone was slightly bruised from sitting on those uncomfortable seats.  Walking out of the plane and into the terminal, the humidity already kicked in.  How is already so humid in the airport!!!!!!!

Remember I told you about the taping of Amazing race (I think it is, don’t quote me), I see this getting off the plane.  LOL  I kind of wanted to join them in the stretching, my ass seriously was hurting real bad.

Getting through customs, now my mission was to find where the heck are my luggage!  I didn’t see any rotating belts?!?!  I finally figured it out.  You actually have to take two escalators down and ride the build in subway.  You won’t really get lost since it just takes you one stop down, which would be where the luggage is.  I think this is the first time I had to take a subway to get to my luggage haha.

I finally found it!!!  Asia truly is different.  There is even a staff member making sure the luggage doesn’t stack on top of each other and is nice and organized.  Even on the ground, there is a yellow line to leave some space so people don’t get hurt when you have to lug your bags off.  This took about 20 minutes for both my bags to appear.  Sadly one of my luggage tags came off which was a slight bummer but life goes on.

Excuse the crappy photos.  I had to use my iPhone while walking LOL.  What can you do…

Met up with my uncle and headed to the bus terminal.  Transportation out of the airport is super convenient with the subway built right into the airport, taxis waiting right outside and a bus terminals to take you everywhere.  Transportation in Hong Kong is so affordable, you don’t ever need a car here.  I believe the express bus we took was about $40 HKD ($5 USD) to get to the other side of Hong Kong.  It’s awesomeee!!  But of course, SO HUMID!  My hair was literally converting back to my natural afro. NOOOO, it has begun.

Oh and buses here are DOUBLE DECKER.  Not sure where else in the world there are double decked buses, but I’ve only been on double deckers in Hong Kong.  It is also air conditioned to the right temperature, not too cold, just right.  Along with that, there were actually monitors to show you your luggage on the first level, just in case someone wants to run away with your stuff.  Aw HELL NO.  Weird enough, this bus didn’t turn it on.  So SHADY! Just kidding haha.  The bus ride took almost an hour, but it was nice to look out the window and see my homeland.

My uncle and I were getting a little hungry, so we ended up at the cafe just downstairs.  We ordered “salted fish and chicken fried rice” which is one of my favourite and my go to when I have no clue what to eat.  Sadly this one lacked flavour and salt HAHAHA.  Like really… there was maybe five pieces of salted fish.  The heck man!

We also got “Singaporean style fried noodles” which is a curry flavoured fried rice noodle with ham, shrimp, onion, green onion and eggs.  This one was tasty, I don’t know what the heck happened to the damn fried rice.  Both dishes were $40 HKD ($5 USD), almost the same price as Canada.  People here don’t really do take out since it cost extra to get a doggie bag.  We had to since we couldn’t finish the food and I wanted to take the leftover fried rice home.  I’m too Canadian haha.  Don’t want to waste food.

9:00 pm
On the way, there was a 7-11 that we stopped at to ask about the phone cards.  As my uncle was talking to the staff member, all I could see was this. THE GUDETAMA SHRINE!  I sat on a 13 hour flight for this moment, this GLORIOUS MOMENT!  LOOK AT ALL THAT GUDETAMA STUFF!!  I didn’t want to get into it right then and there since I didn’t want to waste my uncles time, but for sure the next day I’m going to come down and SLAY.  I turned around to walk to the apartment, praying no one crazy for gudetama were to buy everything on that shelf.

We got to the apartment in about five minutes.  I’m completely pooped but had to unpack as fast as I could so I could brush my teeth and go to bed.  I also met my twin nieces for the first time.  11 month old babies, so energetic.  Too much for me right now HAHA.  I’m too tired for you guys.  Luckily they were already heading to bed.  After I got everything organized, I knocked out.  First day in Hong Kong, complete.  Good night world, hello Hong Kong.

So tell me, do your country have double decker buses?  What is it like in your airport?  Is it as organized as Hong Kong’s?  Let me know in the comments.  I love hearing about your guys’ stories!  Please do share :).

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