Flashback...

Hello Friends,

We are slowly getting into some sort of routine in Hong Kong...what a fascinating city!  As we have more time to explore, we will share more things with you.

I recently met some new friends at a Thai curry cooking class (very yummy....come over any time and I will make you some!).  We decided to go over to Sham Shui Po in Kowloon to explore an immense shopping district over there.  This is what that neighbourhood looks like:

For blocks and blocks it looks like this, and is filled with tiny shops selling all kinds of things related to one industry.  Rumour has it that the 14 blocks makes this the largest market of this type.

As I entered the third or fourth store, I shuddered as I had a flashback to childhood.  Maybe you can relate to my memory:

Mom tells me to jump in the car because we are going to run a few errands.  I am too little to stay at home alone, so I go along (often with Laura, too).  There is always the hope that the errands will include an ice cream cone or cold pop.  I don't really pay attention to where we are going, and when the car stops I get out.  OH NO - NOT HERE!?!?  I very slowly shuffle my way to the store, open the door, and the familiar and feared smell wafts out.  Sigh...yes, the floors are still old wood and squeak; yes, the sales ladies are all a hundred years old or more; yes, there is still nothing here to interested a child for even a moment; and yes, the store is still so quiet I am afraid to walk in fear of making the floor squeak and the old ladies look at me.  Have you guessed?  Do you have the same memory?  Mom had taken us to a fabric store. Sigh....and yes, we stay in the store for at least a week....and no, we did not get ice cream (usually ran out of time).  At least, that is how I remember it.

Well, for those of you who like those stores, Sham Shui Po is like heaven for you!  The stores specialize in one item relating to the fashion industry...either fabric, buttons, lace, ribbons, beads, etc.  You get the idea.  This picture is from a button store and this was just one of 13 units like this in that store. For people like me, this was not heaven....it was interesting but not heaven...actually, almost the exact opposite.

However, life is what you make it, so I enjoyed getting to know some new friends, enjoyed the pace and variety of the neighbourhood and the people walking by.

Afterwards we hunted down a noodle shop one lady had the address of.  Picture this - a string of six ladies wandering the streets with the only one who spoke a bit of Cantonese asking store clerk after store clerk, and eventually a police man, where this place was.  I am sure the many store clerks we passed over and over again as we wandered spent the rest of the day talking about us. 

It was all worth it!  Here we are, ready to share an immense bowl of authentic noodles as an afternoon snack. An American, German, Hong Kong born Indian who lives in Los Angeles, her mother who still lives in HK, another American and myself.  To me, this was even better than ice cream at the end of the errands.  This was Chinese noodles with a little UN in HK.

May your explorations bring back some memories (hopefully more good than bad), and may you just embrace where you are....never know where you may end up!

Love you all,
Linda