It took me 5 years because illnesses kept me from flying back to Hong Kong. First was Covid (2020-2022) and then Twin A was in the hospital last year so I cancelled all travel until October. Again I was asked to come back in November but I was iffy about it since my daughters just had amoebiasis, as well as my cats.
The last time I was here was Feb 2019, at the tailend of the spring festival/Lunar New Year celebrations. Timed it for Valentine’s Day and it was just that J needed to get out of the country for visa purposes. I created reasons to fly out here so he didn’t have to pay for hotel and food. I think we used my miles to keep the costs down.
Ah, the stupid things I did…
I overestimated my arrival at the airport this morning because I anticipated a long queue at ParkNFly. I also drove fast—it just took me an hour to get there.
When I checked in my baggage, the guy at the Cathay Pacific desk told me he can move me to the earlier flight since there was plenty of room and I could still make it. I did ask Immigrations to bypass the queue because I was bumped up to the earlier flight and it was already 20 mins before boarding.
I did make it, 10 mins before boarding. 🫠 I initially planned to sleep but the movie selection was too good to pass up.
I encountered this movie again, which was soul-crushing when I watched it in 2009 I think.
I remember being so heartbroken by this movie that I couldn’t help myself from blogging about it at 4 am. It really hurt me to the core.
Meanwhile, I chose Oppenheimer because I missed it in the theaters.
I was only halfway through the movie when plane passengers started to disembark. I’ll just finish this en route back to Manila on Saturday.
To make my life easier, I booked Klook online for Octopus card + 4G SIM. I also booked discounted rountrip Airport Express via my Cathay Pacific booking. The last time I was here, we had to search for Octopus cards, etc.
I’m not exactly sure whether this practice of camping out on streets and walkways was caused by the government’s effort to drive out people and keep them from assembling in public spaces like Victoria Park. Now Filipino domestic workers have nowhere to go to spend their day off. It’s costly to hang out in malls and every HKD counts—they have families to feed back home. I feel sad for them; they can’t have some dignity even on their days off, which are supposed to be a respite from the drudgery of everyday life as a servant.
I went to Mongkok for skincare shopping because that’s what my girls had been asking for since we don’t have Sasa in Manila. They’re very concerned about their pimples and frizzy hair (they took after their dad). I didn’t have that kind of problem when I was their age because I never had pimple breakouts and my hair was the super straight kind that I inherited from my Chinese forebears.
After Mongkok, I took a really hot bath because my plantar fasciitis was killing me. Once I entered my room, I never left.
