Hong Kong?!! Oh Boy!!!!

"Hong Kong? Oh boy!" is what the three big siblings on my family's side used to say when we were hitting the ketchup bottle to get the ketchup to come out. This line, which we thought incredibly clever in our immaturity, came from an episode of the Brady Bunch where they found out they were going to Hong Kong, whereupon one of the brothers smacked the ketchup bottle and ketchup exploded out all over the place. (Guffaw, guffaw, guffaw.) Maybe we thought this phrase had ketchup-hastening powers.

Anyway, that is about the extend to which we thought of Hong Kong in our youth.

Now I'm MATURE, I only sometimes think of the Brady Bunch or ketchup when someone says Hong Kong. And after yesterday, I might just mentally reference a pleasant 5 hours spent there!

That's right, we went to Hong Kong! Well, to be more precise, we went to the Hong Kong airport. Not by choice, really. A person, or family, may enter Taiwan visa-free for 90 days. BUT if a person, or family, THEN decides to stay LONGER than 90 days, there is simply no way to get an extension on that visa-free time. This being our situation, we needed to physically LEAVE Taiwan, which, instead of producing an extension, gave us another 90 days.

Had we planned on this from the beginning, we might have done it less expensively. We CERTAINLY could have accomplished it with less trauma. The story of buying the tickets is a painful, drawn-out one. I will say two things about it. The first is that it took me more time to buy the tickets ON THE CONVENIENT INTERNET, than we actually spent IN Hong Kong. The second thing I will say is, if you can find the right combo of technology glitches, interaction in a foreign tongue (which taxes me), AND unresponsive and unempowered airline customer service, and toss in time restraints and the pressure to save money, you will likely bring this grown woman to cry like a two-year old in frustration. Yes, I did. I'm not proud of it, but it was the perfect storm of all my personal hells.

Blessedly, the trauma occurred weeks before our trip, so I could get over the exhaustion of BUYING the tickets. And given that we were NOT spending the night or going anywhere IN Hong Kong, packing and preparation was a breeze! It felt a little bizarre to plan and take a day trip in a NEW foreign country. And it felt a little against some unspoken family code of making the most of our time, diving in deep, and drinking deeply from the cultural cup to not even leave the airport.

BUT any venture outside the airport would just increase the money spent (when our digs here were already payed for), and the demands on our energy, which perhaps wasn't at any sort of sustainable, "adventure within the adventure" level - at least not for maneuvering 4 kids in a tight time-frame through a COMPLETELY unfamiliar city, which happens to be one of the world's largest and craziest. Even justifying this now just seems wrong, but trust me, it FELT and feels RIGHT that we handled this in this way.

Basking in Hello Kitty scent.

So we were picked up by a driver whom Sammi had helped us arrange at 8 am. It was lovely to be taken in comfort and peace through the heading-off-to-work, Taipei traffic all the way out of Taipei and on to the international airport. Once there, we had time to kill - we still had the 2 hour advance check-in for international travel. But airports and malls these days have a lot in common, so we were able to spend some serious time and not a cent in the Hello Kitty store a few doors down from our gate. The girls and I got a kick out of ALL the Hello Kitty products - she has her own perfume line! - while Arthur played on the store's slide and Kai junked on a Hello Kitty cartoon playing on a TV.

The kids were pretty pumped about the airplane ride too, especially once they heard it was just an hour and a half instead of 14 hours! We got lunch. Ordering Hindu vegan this time was a miss - I guess you win some and lose some. And the kids and I watched the Minion movie. At the airport, Q didn't miss a chance to add to his yoga world tour album, and on the plane, mostly he meditated. (My favorite part of the whole day was listening to Arthur giggle at the Minion movie. The movie wasn't my cup of tea, but hearing his giggles made every minute watching worth it.)

Neither Q nor I sat near a window there OR on the way back, and the kids were too engrossed in their viewing to look out at all. So we didn't even really SEE Hong Kong. But the airport was nice. I had done some research before going, and apparently it has a high ranking among the airports of the world, for travelers. Of course, being an airport, we set our expectations pretty low, so we were pleased it wasn't torture.

Lunch - Thai and Japanese from the food court - was hot, affordable, and delicious. We probably landed around 12:30. Got off the plane pretty much LAST waited another 20 minutes for China Air to get our gate-checked stroller to us, got through customs, into the other terminal, and had ordered food by 1:30. We ate at about 2, and at 2:30 had only another hour to kill before we needed to get to that two hour international flight check-in deadline. My mind kept functioning in lay-over mode and feeling like we could just saunter back to our gate. But it was like two whole separate trips squashed in one day, and I had to keep reminding myself of that to not skip any steps.

Beauties, bug-splatted on the plane.

In that hour, we checked out a aviation display area that might have been cool in it's day - less than a decade ago. I don't know how long everything had been busted for, but the place was a ghost town. Seeing that it was just us, and that things were broken anyway, it was nice to let the kids go free and play in, around, and on the broken displays. If the one or two workers behind the Imax theater desk noticed, they didn't care. (We didn't catch an Imax showing. As I mentioned, things were pretty deserted, so I assumed we'd missed a time, and all that was showing from what I could read and understand, was a James Bond film anyway. NOT one for the kids.)

The fun continues: Everybody pretend to not have neck! THIS is exciting!

After hitting this, we headed back to check-in. Though the lines were non-existent, the gal processing our tickets and passports was having some sort of issue made worse by the two travelers in our party with the same first name. So we stood there and amused ourselves for a full half hour!

If the plane had been on time, we would have barely made it through security and customs in time to board! But like the flight here, it was delayed. Thankfully, in THIS airport there was a whole children's playground a few gates down from ours and the kids finally got in play time with PEERS! And Q checked off another stop on his Yoga World Tour.

AND Q's Yoga world tour is finally gaining a following of devotees, albeit tiny ones.

Eloise and her 3.5 yr old little budy on her way from Australia to India
for the funeral of a grandpa she never knew. How can I complain about MY
travel conditions, when my fellow travelers are
traveling with conditions like this!

Right as they were getting nice and sweaty, and bonded to their playground friends, it was time to board and we went to get on the plane. We always try and get on LAST so there is less sitting-around-in-cramped-quarters plane time. It was a miracle that we didn't board first when we were supposed to! Once on the plane, we sat at the gate for maybe another 20 minutes. I don't know what that delay was about, but the in-flight entertainment wasn't running (as we had been told at the gate it WOULD be) so I fielded a lot of energy from Arthur about why he couldn't watch the Minion Movie AGAIN yet.

Finally, we pulled away from the gate, the entertainment began, and.... we sat for maybe another 30 minutes waiting for our turn to take off. But the kids were into their movies once again, so all was well. This time I watched a romantic comedy - 27 Dresses. Boo. The flight was only supposed to be about an hour and 15 minutes, so I had warned the kids they might not get to finish their movies.

Well, we got a big, fat chunk of extra time at the gate, AND because of our late arrival, we were again delayed by almost 20 minutes in the air! We had to circle around for a while before we were cleared to land! So everyone finished their movies - Q speed watched two! And we were fed dinner (they were out of Hindu vegetarian so we ate what everyone else got, whatever that was).

We were supposed to arrive just before 7pm, but didn't get out of the airport (no pausing for luggage, obviously) 'til nearly 9pm! I was so glad to have a cheerful driver and space to spread out in again on our way home! And the driver took us home by heading north, passing through Bali where we'd gone biking instead of driving all the way through Taipei, so it was a peaceful and interesting drive.

I know this is small pleasure, but a big van for the six of us, with everyone in his or her own seat, just feels delightful after cramped taxi rides or in the cars of friends. This was a shot on the way there. Arthur slept in my lap on the way home - another small pleasure!

Despite the CRAZY delays, all in all, it was a nice day. I was thrilled to be traveling simply to travel. There wasn't anywhere to BE, no one to meet, and nothing to do. It was all about the journey and we could just experience it for what it was. It was a far cry from being relaxing - in fact, the 14 hours return trip was exhausting and my neck was in a bad way the following morning. But we survived, and we got a new legal lease on life here in Taiwan, literally, so the journey was a success!

Farewell, Hong Kong! In the future we may find ourselves saying, quite as accurately as I once said of Texas, "We sometimes think of Hong Kong." And at least we won't be really thinking of the Brady Bunch. What a legacy I've given my children! Ha!