Hong Kong: Where is your shoes boy?

So before we jump into the day, I took some pictures of where we stay.

Entrance to our front door

Stairs - lots of them

On the way down

Going down some more

Finally some level ground

Now we can just see the street

From the bus shelter looking back

Our main drag - South Lantau Rd

Waiting for the bus to arrive we were also treated to a little local festival thingy.

So where were we going today? To Ngong Ping Cable Car to take the trip up to the Big Buddha.

Arriving in Tung Chung (yes our world begins and ends there), we walked towards the Cable Car Station to just see masses of people. Looking around we were approached by Locust (its a real person and she was quite helpful, my take on it is if you want to call your child after an insect why not juts cover the whole spectrum and call them Insect for short?).

So we decided to enhance the economy a bit, pay a little more and not stand in the cue but rather pass cue and go straight to the front. Our rough estimation was that we would have had to wait for about 90mins just standing - which is no fun and even less so with a child.

The cable cars are quite something - makes Table Mountain look like a Mickey Mouse operation - the total ride takes 25mins and we turn through a station type set up at least 3 times and then it just keeps on going. One can see the whole Lantau island from up there, even the airport.

Some idea of how it all looks

Buildings buildings and this is not a main island

Pretty

Hong Kong International

As we got disembarked from the cable car, the question was posed for the 1st time that day: Where is your shoes? The people harassed Caleb silly as he was going around the place without any shoes on. Every time we went somewhere, he was asked: Where is your shoes? We have no idea how many times he was asked by people when we were not looking - as it seems like people talk to him while he sits in his push chair or sometimes looks at something a little distance away from us.

We are still puzzled why it seemed to distress the people so much.

The landlady did tell me that sometimes kids come to Lantau to deal with bio-phobia (fear of dirt basically). Maybe that was it - they can't believe that his feet is not falling off.

Anyway this is what we saw when we got off.

The whole set up of Ngong Ping is around a celebration of Lantau and then obviously the gateway to the Big Buddha and the Po Lin Monastery.

Took the walk towards it - but something kept on bugging me and when i voiced it Ingrid agreed - there is a certain spirituality lacking. In Japan and India (which if there is any place they are out to cheat you is India) you could feel the air is filled with something more, something deeper.

Here it is almost plastic and the feeling is that it is commercially driven. Doesn't help that they try and confuse you (?) into buying something that is not a good deal!

Anyway, it is pretty as you can see from the pictures, so one can then take time to look at the scenery and forget about the underlying tone.

Entrance to Big Buddha

Speaks for itself

Distance indicator to other places of interest, Cape of Good Hope 11881km

250 Steps to the top

Few from top of steps

In the immediate space around the Buddha

On way back down

Walk way lined with the Zodiac Warriors

Back down in the village, Caleb amused himself by playing with the bubbles they were blowing outside one of the shops. We stood in a line for a free picture, where you can apparently choose your own background. So they do this elaborate photo shoot, just to tell you which picture you can take (no choice then!) and then try and force the others down your throat. We left.