Lantau

Before I write about today, which was Lantau, I'll just write a little bit about last night. I went back to the night markets at Mongkok with Thomas and Juho, which was fun. I really like Mongkok, I will probably end up going there just whenever I'm bored and need some shopping therapy/bubble tea and waffle thing snack. Soooo tasty. I can already tell what I will miss about Hong Kong when I leave and I think that is it, Mongkok is kind of unique. This morning I woke up early to meet Anski and Kirsi to head to Lantau. Lantau is Hong Kong's biggest island, location of the airport and Disneyland, but we were going to go see the famous giant buddha. We took the ferry over to the island, it was a pretty nice scenic ride, and then we reached Lantau and took a bus up to the buddha. Lantau is very beautiful, a lot different from the city on HK Island- the air is cleaner and the mountains and the ocean are sooo scenic. We walked up the stairs to the buddha (I definitely thought there were more stairs, all those people who'd been scared me a little). It was for once, a clear day, and there was a great view. Also you can go inside the buddha for this little museum sort of thing. After, we went back down to the monastery and had a vegetarian lunch there, which was really good, one of my better meals here. We checked out the monastery, which was really colorful of course and quite beautiful. After, Anski and Kirsi needed to head back for their Finnish people party, so I met up with my guy friends (who copied our idea to go to Lantau and then beat us there despite the fact that WE left earlier, grrr) and we headed to Tai O, which is this little fishing village. It was fun, we walked around and there were all these dried fish and giant sharkskins hanging, and some sort of festival with people singing on a stage. The boys needed to eat so we grabbed food at this sketchy place with plastic kiddie sort of chairs in what looked like a storage room. but the food seemed to be good at any rate. So then we took this boat tour, this guy's little boat. He said we would see the rare pink dolphins, but since there are only like 200 left we doubted that was true for a short tour. But it was worth the cheap ride, we got out into the ocean and then we saw a bit of the village, the houses on stilts over the water. It was cool. Then we headed back to the area where we caught the ferry, and rented some bikes (also super cheap) and rode to the beach. Although my long legs on a bike for a Chinese person was a bit awkward. By now it was sunset and it was very nice out, pretty pretty. Graham and Justin went for a swim, and soon enough I was convinced to strip down to my sports bra and jump in as well. The water is pretty warm, it was really fun. Then since I had no clothes to change into, I wore Graham's boardshorts which looked absolutely ridiculous on me, hopefully no pictures will be published of me wearing them. We rode a little bit more and then headed back to turn in our bikes. I bought a pair of cheap boardshorts but I sort of forgot that in Asia I am a LARGE and that chinese people are tiny. How depressing. So they were kind of skanky and tight on me but at least they were dry. We rode the ferry back home, and there were some good views of the lights from the skyline. I really love the colorful flashing lights here, sooo cool. Overall it was one of my favorite days, a lot of fun with my friends and a lot of sightseeing. Probably will have to go back sometime.