HK: Temple Street 庙街 and Sport Shoes Street 波鞋街

This post continues from my previous post. So apparently, I went to Wong Tai Sin Temple in the morning/afternoon and I turned up at Yau Ma Dei (油麻地) and Mong Kok (旺角). I did make a small wrong decision by going Ocean Park at 4.45pm and ended up nobody wanna sell us ticket because the park closes at 8pm. Hmmm... Another kind soul I met in Hong Kong. 

When we reach Yau Ma Dei MTR station, it was about 6pm in the evening. I'm so thankful that there's super convenient public transport in Hong Kong that allows me to make a wrong turn and still didn't waste much time. 

Once we reach Yau Ma Dei, we start to hunt for food! We were walking passed a shop selling claypot rice (煲仔饭) with a super long queue. The restaurant didn't seem fancy but the queue is 2 shop lots away. Since I'm a tourist, I decided to follow the crowd and queued for 1 hour. It's winter and I queued outside to challenge my cold rash. XD

The queue!!! Crazy isn't it!

We ordered our food while queuing. I ordered claypot rice with pork ribs and sausage (排骨腊肠煲仔饭) and my friend ordered claypot rice with eel and pork ribs (白鳝排骨煲仔饭). We ordered another side dish because it sounds delicious -- fried oyster with flour (煎蠔饼). They turned out to be...........

ermm.....

ermmm....

ermmmmmm.......

Very delicious fried oyster with flour. It is biscuit-like and hence super crunchy! They are quite 豪 with their 蠔. 

But the claypot rice is too speechless... Look at my pork ribs and sausage. Nothing much but just pork ribs, sausage, rice and claypot. I was really WTH when I see my food. Queues are misleading. Haihhhhh....

My friend wanna cheer me up and introduced me cream soda! Look at the metal container that the store owner keep all these soft drinks. So traditional! love it!! 

Temple street is just a night market street. LOL

After having our dinner and walk along Temple Street, we decided to walk to Mong Kok to get me a pair of comfy shoes. My boots are killing me badly after 2 days and I have to wear my friend's brother's New Balance out to continue my journey. Walked along the street and hardly find a pair of women shoes to fit my giant feet. Oh man.... Luckily I got a pair of striking red nike shoes after 1 1/2 hour of shopping. Phewww.... 

Mong Kok Sport Shoes Street. Seriously, the whole street is full of shoes shop. Nike, Adidas, New Balance, Asics, You name it they have it. The price is dirt cheap also! My pair of nike is just RM200+. =D

Before heading to cinema for our midnight movie, we walked around Mong Kok and found this Mobile Softee Car. I've seen it in drama and I have to try it! Winter? Don't care. The soft serve is really nice! Too bad it camouflaged with my scarf in this pic. 

Mong Kok is really happening and I shall talk about it in coming post. Till then...... Cheers!!

HK Wong Tai Sin 黄大仙

Went Wong Tai Sin (黄大仙) on the 3rd day of my HK trip. I always thought Wong Tai Sin is the name of the temple but I was wrong. It is the name of the place (district) and the temple is known as Wong Tai Sin Temple (黄大仙祠). The temple is just 5 minutes walk from Wong Tai Sin MTR station. I went there from Hong Hum (红磡), hence I took bus instead of MTR. But well, the walking distance to the temple isn't far from bus stop. HK is so convenient if you can walk like a HK ppl. =)

The main entrance to the temple. Me and a bunch of aunty uncle tourists. It looks really grand and I can't wait to go in to pray and get my fortune stick (kau qim)!! XD

Every tourist touches this statue from it's "butt" to head and back to it's "butt". Look wrong and sound wrong but as a tourist, I followed what they did. hahaha.... =) Follow the crowd and hope for the best!

Inside the temple, there are many statues and I find this very interesting. Everyone is allowed to get 9 incenses to do prayers in the temple. This statue is holding the candle for people to lit their incenses up. Such a creative and beautiful idea. 

Ta-Daaa!!! The most happening part of the temple where people bring fruits, food and/or wine/tea and kneel down to pray. Some of them were just praying and some were trying to shake out their fortune stick. The praying area is incense-free, so you have to go round the temple to do your praying before you kneel down here. 

And of course, me and my fortune stick!! Tried to ask about work and relationship (姻缘).. hoho.. get pretty interesting fortune stick for my relationship after asking a guy to "gai qim" (解签) (read out the meaning of the stick). What is it about?? Secret. ;)

Before we leave the temple, me and my friend went to tie a string at yue lao's (月老) place. They have pretty special way for you to hold the string, walk toward the statue of your opposite gender and tie your string on the big strand. 

I just spent about 2 hours in the temple, with 1 hour spent finding a right stall to "gai qim". They have 100+ stalls available for you to choose. As I have problem making a choice and also some of the names of the stall sound too god-like, I used up 1 hour just to find a stall to enter. To avoid wasting time, read blogs to get an idea which stall is good =)

To know more information about the temple, you can visit this website: http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/see-do/highlight-attractions/top-10/sik-sik-yuen-wong-tai-sin-temple.jsp

Cheers!! =)

HK Yee Shun Dairy Company 港澳義順牛奶公司：Awesome Steamed Milk 超正的双皮奶

I always heard about steamed milk from TVB drama and also some food blogs. I wondered what is steamed milk and how it tastes like. Steamed milk is called 双皮奶 in Chinese and it does comes in different flavour in Yee Shun Dairy Company, such as ginger and chocolate steamed milk. The restaurant is like normal char Chan teng where you can order some macaroni or sandwiches. 

They have several branches and I visited the one at Tai Zi (太子). I ordered a bowl of macaroni with ham (火腿通粉), which isn't too fascinating. It is a nice bowl of macaroni, but I won't crave for it. Maybe because I am not a fan of instant noodles. Of course, I ordered their famous original hot steamed milk. It is very smooth and the milk tastes great! It has tau fu fa texture but because it is milk, it is much smoother. Thinking about it I'm craving for a bowl now. Haha!! Photos are shown below, don't drip too much saliva on your keyboard ya!! 

Hong Kong Cheung Chau: 允升甜品店

Continue from my Cheung Chau Day Trip post. This post will be about the dessert I've tried in Cheung Chau. We found this shop from food review website and it was a nice try. 

When we arrived at the shop, there were a group of teenagers queuing outside and they insist to wait for seats when the boss asked them to go another shop owned by his son. The shop is quite small, which is normal for shops in Hong Kong. We were lucky coz we are just 2 persons and seats are more likely to be available for us.

Notice the empty table on the left? Yes, that's our seat XD

Mango Cheung Fun (芒果肠粉) (HKD 21) -- white one is coconut and the black one is some seaweed thingy. Honestly, the white one is good but the black one isn't my type of cheung fun. But the mango is really nice. The boss is quite generous with the mango portion (yes, real mango, not paste)

This is called 芒果糯米糍 (like me try to translate -- Mango wrapped with glutinous ball-like skin) (HKD8). This is so good and I do regret for ordering the Cheung Fun. Should have ordered 2 of this. But well, never try never know. Arghhh.... I miss the mango now. 

The shop is located at 長洲新興街3號 and it is not far from the shop that I'm gonna introduce in the coming post. Hope you enjoy the dessert post and stay tuned for more!

Hong Kong Cheung Chau (长洲) Day Trip

I have this precious opportunity to step into Cheung Chau (长洲) during my Hong Kong trip. A day trip to this island is totally worth the time as it is a very relaxing small town. To travel to Cheung Chau, we took ferry from Central Ferry Piers (中环码头), which took us about 45 minutes. We chosen First Class seats to explore how is it look like. First Class seat is about HKD6 more than economy class, but nothing to be fancy about unless you have a group of friends. They have long tables for people to either play card games, eat, or chit-chat. 

Why I want to explore Cheung Chau?? Hmm... One of the answer would be I love sea, relaxing places and good food. The other reason would be I am a TVB fans and Cheung Chau is the main shooting spot for the drama "Slow Boat Home" a.k.a. 情越海岸線 in Chinese. The drama introduced a festival in Cheung Chau which seems pretty interesting but it is held around May each year. The festival is called Cheung Chau Bun Festival 長洲太平清醮 and the drama showed how the people in Cheung Chau celebrate this festival. I would definitely be back one day if I have the chance to experience this special festival. 

The poster of the drama "Slow Boat Home". 

So back to my travel experience to Cheung Chau.

The view of Cheung Chau from the ferry. I was very excited to see the island. TVB drama comes to reality. hohohoho..... 

Walked out the ferry pier and I can see plenty of stalls by the road, selling souvenirs and also room rental services. (Exactly as shown in the drama XD) Also, there are plenty of stalls renting out bicycles for tourists. Of course, we are tourist and we rented bicycles to cycle around the island. Glad that bicycles exist because my feet was too pain during my visit to Cheung Chau due to my boots. (Tips to travel: NEVER WEAR NEW SHOES)

 The souvenir shops. The umbrellas are all the same! notice that? 

Bicycles for rent! We rented the bike for HKD10 per hour. Not too bad as it can save my life!

Cheung Chau is a fishing village and hence you can see fishing boats' "parking lot". Good thing about this fishing village is that it does not has the typical fishing village "fishy" smell. So don't have to worry about cycling here. You will get fresh air. =)

The shop lots around are very old/traditional. They are mostly food stalls, boutiques or gift shop. 

We wanted to visit the beach and with my poor sense of direction, we end up here! Read the words. We saw the building and quickly ran away. LOL

Finally here at Tung Wan Beach (东湾海滩). Saw a lot of kids playing sands building castles. Feel so old but I still have to take pictures. Love the sand but too bad it is winter and I have my boots on. I wanna jump into the sea!!! But look at my OOTD, how can I jump? @.@

Spent about 6 hours in Cheung Chau exploring the food and enjoy the breeze while cycling. Holiday is awesome! Blue sky, kind people, nice food, cold weather and awesome companion, what else I can ask for? 

If you are looking for a getaway during your Hong Kong Trip, do consider Cheung Chau. And please watch the drama to understand more about the culture. Food posts will be up soon as I don't want to ruin this relaxing post with food.