official member of the silly hats club

It's been about two months from my last post and I have MUCH to update. I've been back in Taiwan for over a month now and have yet to describe my African adventures. An unfortunate pipe bursting incident left me computer-less for a few weeks and though I actually really enjoyed being disconnected from the internet, I was not able to catch up on the bazillion things I need to write about. 


First up: HONG KONG.


Tuesday, July 26th
As the Taipei to Ghana route is clearly not a popular one, I had to fly to HK first and decided to crash there for a few days by myself. Hong Kong is like Taiwan in where it's technically part of China but acts as if it's its own country so I didn't need a visa (WOOHOO no getting kicked out like I did in India). They speak Cantonese, not Mandarin, but luckily basically everyone speaks English there. I didn't arrive in the city until later in the night so I didn't do much the first day. I checked into my hostel in ChungKing Mansions which is WAYY sketch. There were lots of Indians that worked there who harassed me everywhere I went - sometimes even grabbing my hand and trying to pull me into their shops. No thank you. According to a guidebook, the area I stayed in was the most crowded place in the entire world (can that really be true?) Once I got up into my hostel, it was pretty nice for how cheap it was. The workers thought someone named Robin was a dude though so they put me in a room with another guy, whoops. I went out to get some late dinner but most of the restaurants and shops cost at least 10$ a meal, even the cheap places, so I ended up buying some microwaveable frozen dinner in 7-11. And they didn't even microwave it for me like they do in Taipei. Wahhh.


Wednesday, July 27th
I woke up early, determined to see as much as I could on my only full day in Hong Kong. I started off first on the MTR to Lantau Island, a super touristy place where the biggest outside Buddha in the world is located. Biggest Buddha in the world?! CAN'T MISS THAT.


I took a gondola up to the island and had some GORGEOUS views.

I wandered around and saw some cool Asian-y buildings.

THEN CAME THE NINJAS.

After the kick ass ninjas, I made of the best decisions in my entire life. I BOUGHT THIS HAT.

BEST IDEA EVER. AND YES, I WORE IT AROUND LOOKING LIKE A FOOL.

Travelling alone is not so bad except when you want to buy silly hats and have to ask random people to take pictures of you looking like a tool. Still worth it.

Then came giant Buddha in all his glory.

I stopped for some Hong Kongian (Hong Kongonese? Hong Kongican? Hong Konger?) cuisine.

I tried to look for places to shop, but every mall I found was filled with Prada and Gucci and designers. No gracias. I gave up and headed toward Victoria's Peak, a cool place that overlooks the city. You take a tram that has some historical significance that took about 2 hours to get on because there were so many damn people.  I made it right as night fell so I got to see the sun set over the mountains and the city lights at night. 

Then I did the most logical thing one does when in Hong Kong, which is go to Bubba Gump Shrimp (from the Forrest Gump movie) bar. This drink cost 11$ and contained about 4 drops of alcohol but was SO worth it because they let me keep the cup. I'm pretty sure I've achieved Nirvana, or Maslow's hierarchy of needs or something with the accumulation of the hat and my Bubba Gump shrimp cup in my life. I have used both the hat and cup 0 times since returning BUT I DON'T CARE BEST IDEAS EVER.

Thursday July 28th
I woke up for my last day in Hong Kong with only one thing on my mind - shopping. I asked the hostel worker where I could find non-designer clothes and discovered clothing heaven - aka H&M. I spent almost half of what I brought for my entire trip at that store, not that I brought much considering Ghana is quite cheap. Still, high quality, low cost, fashionable clothes that fit all 5 feet 9.5 inches of me are a rare find in Taipei so I went a little crazy. Left with no spare cash, I chilled in a park until I had to leave for my flight.


I went back to the HK airport early, fortunately, since I nearly wasn't allowed on my flight (WHY DO I HAVE THESE PROBLEMS?!). Ethiopian Airlines demanded to see the credit card I purchased my ticket with. But, oh wait, I lost my wallet 3 months back in a seedy night club in Taipei. I don't understand why they needed to see it, since the name on the ticket and passport matched up. There's only one other girl with my first and last name I've found through google - she apparently knits and sells her designs online (definitely not me). So unless the United Knitters of the World conference was held in Hong Kong this year and this other Robin chick was like, hey, I'd really just love to visit Ethiopia, and she broke into hostels (probs with her knitting needles) searching for other Robins who were also flying to Ethiopia, I'm pretty sure you don't need to see my credit card. After a painful hour of waiting, calls to the managers, and screen shots of my online bank account, they let me through.


Once on the plane, I squished into my tiny seat - literally couldn't fit my knees behind the seat. The in flight entertainment starting promisingly enough with an episode of the Office, but not even Dwight and Jim shenanigans could save me from the stuffy temperature that amplified the spicy stench of the dude next to me. Then they played one of those awful 80s Chinese movies that was in Mandarin Chinese with no subtitles. Great choice Ethiopian Airlines, when flying from HK (where people speak Cantonese and English) to Ethiopia (where I don't know what they speak and I'm too lazy to google it but I'm pretty damn sure it's not Mandarin).


Friday July 29th
After approximately 152 hours of flight, we arrived in Addis Ababa at some crazy hour in the morning. This airport was quite possibly the most jank airport of all time. People were smoking inside and there was trash everywhere. I tried to go through the carry-on scanner machines and sit at my gate, but the worker shooed me away because he was napping. When flying back, I came through at peak hours and the people flying were pushing and shoving and yelling at the about 8 workers in the entire airport. It reminded me of Lord of the Flies when the kids went ape-shit crazy and raped pigs or whatever. Well, ok, no pig rape-age happened in the airport, but same thing. If Golding is still alive, I should e-mail him and suggest a Lord of the Flies part 2 that takes place in the Addis Ababa airport.


The Ethiopia to Ghana flight was more bearable but still effing long. I finally arrived to a poster saying, I kid you not, "Ghana welcomes you! Except pedophiles and sexual deviants." Wow. Katie later told me it's illegal to be gay in Ghana. Filled with adrenaline of being in a new country (and continent) I ran my sleep deprived body to pick up my bag. Except, oh wait, it's not there. Fuck. I started crying because I've gone 36 hours without sleep and my whiny privileged butt is appalled by the jank that is the 3rd world. My backpack with EVERYTHING was gone - including my money for Ghana. I had Taiwanese and Hong Kong dollars with me, but Ghanian banks unsurprisingly don't transfer those money types, only American dollars.




OMG CLIFFHANGER. 
I'll write part 2 later about the rest of Ghana.