Flowers, Fish, & Food (and haggling!)

Every week we have "buddy dates," which are one-on-ones within the UNC batch. Yesterday Ashley and I explored Mongkok!

Here I am happy in Hong Kong!! :)

"Anything that walks, swims, crawls, or flies with its back to heaven is edible."

You'll see why I chose that quote if you keep reading ~~teehee!~~

Ashley and I first went to the flower market, which consists of street after street of flowers. Since Chinese New Year is right around the corner, we were overwhelmed with options.

It's a custom to put little bushes with orange fruit outside for good fortune, so we saw tons and tons of them available for purchase everywhere.

Thought these things looked cool! Symbol for good fortune in the new year:

And I've never seen anything like these:

Orchids are also very popular but they were more expensive so I just stuck with a few plants and a bouquet of flowers. We ended up coming back at the end of the night to actually buy stuff so we didn't have to carry it around all day.

The vibes were amazing: sunshine, fresh flowers, families with their kids, sweet smell of flowers and we smelled wisps of nearby street food. I was so happy with all the colors and pretty views!! I was taking it all in--haven't seen this many people in a HOT minute because of covid. Next we walked to the bird market, where I saw parrots j chilling out of their cages.

Birds were chirping all around---there were even random birds not for sale that wanted to join in on the song. They also were selling bugs too---HUGE crickets, meal worms, etc. Walking through, Ashley was like "I'm surprised you're not as squeamish as me," and I remarked "HA! You thought! I keep wiping my arms down like those creepy crawlies are on me."

Yummy! Jk hahaha.

Next we walked to a fish market---the ENTIRE street (both ways too) is reserved for any type of aquatic things: fish, equipment, fish tanks, etc. We must've walked in a dozen different shops and took in the sights of the fish. I was in awe the entire time--I felt like it would be a good Amazing Race challenge to navigate this street. This is what I pictured when Ashley said "wanna check out the fish market?" :

But woahhh was I in for a surprise haha. Of course we did see beta fish and the like, but we alsooooo saw a BUNCH of other things, like these dudes:

Whenever we would walk back outside my eyes had to adjust to the sunlight and haze since the inside of the shops were dark and mainly lit with neon fish/their tanks.

Look at this big guy:

But it wasn't even just fish---we saw turtles, jellyfish, seahorses, axolotls, you name it.

We even found Master Oogway!

As if that wasn't enough, I also found that I love walking up the sketchy staircase alleys with people that lead to random shops. We ended up at a parrot shop haha.

Lookin' like Loulou from that Nancy Drew game (if you know you know). After we got tired of looking at animals, we decided to get some boba from a super cute shop. They were playing Justin Bieber music so I was HERE for it!

All that sugar made us regain our appetites (even after the crickets...crazy, I know) so I got a pineapple bun and we chilled outside for a bit. I wanted to walk into a church we found and it ended up leading to a Christian book store, so cute and they had some nice stuff.

After that we walked a little further and came across one of the many Chinese New Year stores. The picture is blurry but you can get a sense of how all-out they go for New Years here!! Ashley and I bought a few decorations for our suite. It's about to be the year of the ox so we chose a cute cow thingy.

This probably day sounds like it was going on forever if you're reading haha, but it was only lunch time now! We went inside a mall, saw a picture for dim sum, and rode the elevator to the floor with a restaurant. Since everything was in Cantonese, we snuck a look at the menu and unsuccessfully got a glimpse of the options. A lady came over and was like "come sit!!:)" and before we could protest she was walking us over to a table. We were the only non-locals here so that's a good sign it's gonna be amazing. White tablecloths, a pot of jasmine tea, you already KNOW it was a great place! It was hilarious because she led us to a table without a tablecloth, and I was like oof this is kinda rachet... But then she set the table and the waitress came over and said we were both so beautiful and gave us a menu in English. Everyone has been sooooo sweet here I love it!

We ordered a bunch of things (only ~$10 usd each!!) and I FEASTED haha. Dim sum is definitely my favorite thing to eat here! We got an egg pancake (crispy, with green onion, delicious), creamy custard bao (my FAVEEEE), xiao long bao (Shanghai soup dumplings, super yummy), & shrimp (had to peel it yourself, no napkins and we made a messsss omg haha, she had to bring us a wipe). The whole meal was amazing, and let me tell you, I kept filling up my teacup with that jasmine tea. They always give you two sets of chopsticks--one for grabbing food to put it on your plate, and one for your own personal use. Phone didn't eat first this time haha.

After we ate, we walked to the Ladies Market. It has everything you could imagine, not just clothes for women. IT'S MY TIME TO HAGGLE. I HAGGLED LIKE AN ABSOLUTE BOSS IN MANDARIN! I saw a stand with headbands and bracelets and went crazy. The lady was soooo sweet and wanted me to try on everything. Here's me trying on a pink headband:

She was like "so beautiful!! You like?" She would put bracelets and headbands on me and come by with two mirrors so I could see which ones I liked. I bought two headbands, a bracelet, and a hair pin. Ended up negotiating the price super super cheap for all of them (literally paid less than 1 hair bow clip from Sha Tin that I bought the first day). "Tai gui le!" ("too expensive!") is the best phrase to use, plus others. We chatted like old friends and my Mandarin confidence increased. I saw a cute hair pin and she said that would look great and I was like I don't even know how to use one, so she put it in my hair and then put one in her hair to show me how to do it. So of course I bought one hahaha.

I think I'd be a great saleswoman here---most of the shop owners follow the same tactics. They see a customer walk by, ask "which one you like?" then hand you stuff, compliment you, say "for you, cheap" to make you think you're getting a discount, and then get sad if you try to lower the price. Don't worry, I'm a business major so I didn't let them fool me🤪😉💁🔥😂 I went all out and bought a dim sum key chain, several bracelets, a stuffed animal, a kimono, and more.

Then we walked in a few super super super cheap (we're talking less than $1-3USD) clothing shops where you can't haggle but you can get a good deal. I ended up with a super cute entire outfit (headband too) for like 5 bucks.

Here's me trying it on when I got back:

Looove it. Next stop, visiting my quarantine hotel!!! I filled out a Trip Advisor review of my stay and never received the "free gift" I was supposed to get, so I asked the manager and SAM THE MAN came out (he was the guy who called us each week to check in on us). He gave me a stuffed animal :')

Literally the closer we got to the Dorsett hotel, the more my lungs and throat were degrading thanks to approaching the industrial sector and more smokers. One guy we walked by had me coughing for a straight minute (whatever he was smoking haaaad to been illegal omg it was terrible). After a long day, we capped it off by splitting a pizza at the mall. Surprisingly we ran into a bunch of Globe people throughout the day. Such a fun time!! I became a BOSS at 3 things:

1) speaking Mandarin to haggle and get things super cheap (at one point I ran into Akul and saw someone was trying to charge him 118 hkd for something and I spoke to the lady and negotiated it down to 6o hkd)

2) jaywalking and weaving through crowds speed-walk style

3) pursuing my love of spontaneity

Some of the haul ^ Love my plants teehee. An amazing day!! My feet are gonna be feeling it tomorrow after all that walking!

xoxo