Not much. One day I went for a walk before my exam and found a temple (that I didn’t enter because lots of school-aged children were exiting) and a park with a “pebble path” that beginners could only walk on for five minutes at a time. Another day I really really really wanted french fries so I bought some from McDonald’s along with a shrimp burger. Also: I ate more than usual quantities of fish ball soup and absorbed more than usual quantities of information (since forgotten). I had conversations with people I’d never talked to before and never will again. Probably. I folded every single article of clothing in my drawers. I gave away three textbooks, a small quantity of laundry detergent, two bags of brown sugar, cinnamon, and a beach ball.
Part II: Last day in
I ate pig brains.
I needed to because two months ago I’d said I would. Also, I was curious.
I’d found the restaurant online, on the website for one of those travel book companies. Fodor’s, maybe? Or Frommer’s? Anyway, I’ll have to go back and post a comment because they neglected to mention that the name of the restaurant is, in fact, displayed in Chinese characters.
First, however, we needed to leave campus, and as I am recording my absolute (almost) last day in
And for the first, only, and last time left my Octopus inside the printer. I discovered this when attempting to board the bus. Luckily, we phoned a friend (hah—like on “Who Wants to be a Millionaire”) who said it would be his pleasure to rescue my forgotten card.
We left the bus outside the Prince Edward MTR station—I’d looked at googlemaps and falsely concluded that this would be the fastest station. I need to learn to read the scales on maps. We were walking FOREVER. However, in our exhausted and starving state the food couldn't be anything but delicious.
Mmm...pig brain omelette. I always imagined brains as squishy and soft but they were almost crunchy. Like radishes.
And frogs. Which I also ate even though I love frogs and even though some of the pieces of meat very clearly contained portions of spine. Actually, the menu said "frog" but I'm 99% positive they were formerly the brown toads I always see in cages near the chopped-up fish.
We also ate victory. In melon form.
After lunch we headed back to campus—we ended up having to walk all the way back to the East Mong Kok MTR station (ten minutes closer than the Prince Edward Station) to find the bus that would take us back. Maybe there hadn’t been a faster route of arriving at the restaurant after all.
So as it was we arrived on campus with a little less than an hour before our plan to meet up with more friends for sushi. I went to Fu Tai to buy snacks for the airplane, breakfast for tomorrow and chewing gum.
Then, after some delays and miscommunications and losing people and finding people we entered the sushi restaurant. I liked this place best of the ones I’d been to (even if I’d only been to two others) because we took off our shoes before stepping up on a low platform where a bench with individual cushions wrapped nearly all the way around a table. We left most of the ordering to my local friend—I ate sushi with salmon and crab and a sweet-tasting tofu, and I forget what else. And we had a salad that was really more like cole slaw, except better because I don’t like cole slaw. And dumplings that needed a name other than "dumplings" because, well, they weren’t dumplings. They were fried and stuffed with chicken and would possibly have been really tasty if I’d been in the mood for fried chicken. Which I’m generally not while eating sushi.
We returned to campus and sat in front of the main entrance for as long as possible. In other words, until the next day. So:
Part III: In reality a continuation of Part II because I never slept
However, eventually my friends needed to go to sleep so most of them headed back except a couple who hung around to wait for two more friends and my Octopus to return (he'd gone to the Mainland).
And the rest of the night/morning proceeded as follows:
- friends returned, said goodbye
- packed up a few more odds and ends
- watched You’ve Got Mail
- watched some random television show with evil horse-race gamblers
- watched the sunrise
- discovered chopsticks I’d forgotten in the sink
- stuffed bedding into garbage bag and turned in to the security guards
- and every once and a while sobbed hysterically
- brought down stuff (with help from friends)
- turned in room key
- walked to bus stop and waited and waited
- said more goodbyes
- stuffed stuff into bus
- rode to airport
- unloaded stuff
- confirmed that stuff wouldn't wind up in Baltimore
- said final goodbye
- read text message and dropped boarding pass
- bought bag of Toblerone chocolate and Tiger Balm with remaining Octopus money
- accidentally spent $18HK more than remaining Octopus money
- survived the most miserable plane ride of my existence
- crunched through the crispy snow of the airport parking lot
- and now I’m no longer in Hong Kong, so:
The End.
