Hong Kong was one of my favorite stops during our Asia trip. It reminded me so much of New York city but with its own completely different flair: A huge modern, bustling city in which I felt very welcomed. Before we traveled to Asia I had no idea what to expect. Yes, to be honest I guess I had a lot of prejudices, like most humans do. After our trip I felt relieved – most of them where actually not true. I’m just grateful for all the amazing memories I made there. I learned so much about different cultures, backgrounds and history and I enjoyed every single second. Hong Kong was our last stop in China, yes I know Hong Kong is a Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China and we didn’t need a visa for this city but I wanted to reflect on a couple of highlights first: I remember the warm, welcoming and open art which we experienced from the beginning of our journey in Beijing all the way to Hong Kong, the taste of real Asian cuisines, all of the different accents they speak, very clean and modern transportation systems and an incredible feeling to be a part of this foreign world. At least to be part of it for a few weeks.

As mentioned above Hong Kong was different compared to Beijing and Shanghai. The buildings sky-high, modern and clean, it looked a little bit like a future western city. This was my first trip to Hong Kong and as several online articles suggested we decided to give it a try and booked our hotel in Kowloon, which encompasses the northern part of Hong Kong, on the mainland across Victoria Harbour. WOW! I think this was the first time I had a cultural shock. I was overwhelmed, didn’t know where to look, where to stand because it was so crowded. If you think Times Square in NYC is crowded you should reconsider the meaning of something being really crowded. Kowloon was a whole new level. It was so overwhelming at first so we decided to have coffee inside our hotel. After a big cup of coffee the outside was not as bad as I thought and we just followed the crowd of people down to the harbor. The view was breathtaking and the sunset amazing. The whole city changed its light. We sat by the water for at least an hour until we headed back for dinner and found a small, nice looking restaurant. The inside was almost as busy as the outside, which was no longer a big thing. After a really huge dinner we went back to our hotel, set our alarms super early and fell asleep right away. So many memories, so much more to see. It felt surreal.

The next day we got up at around 5:30 AM, got dressed and had breakfast on the go. We went to the harbor again and took the train from there to get to Victoria Peak or just known as “The Peak” with breathtaking views overlooking the city. We took the first tram up there and yes, we really were one of the first visitors on that day. On top of the Peak you can enjoy a 360 degrees view over Hong Kong and also a glimpse on a very green side of Hong Kong and a few beaches. We took a couple of pictures and enjoyed the views before we took the tram back down. Yes, I do prefer walking but due to our short amount of time we had to take it. Right after we decided to grab a real breakfast in a nice restaurant and ended at a small place called Tea Company. The next thing on our bucket list was the Ferry Wheel. It was a fun experience and you can enjoy a different view of the city. Right after that we got Hop-on-Hop-off Bus tickets and drove around the island, including the green side of Hong Kong and a boat ride. This was incredible!! We saw so many more things during this tour and felt “free” because we were able to leave the bus on the green side of the island. You get a very different feeling , the area looked so surreal compared to the rest of Hong Kong. After the boat ride and a quick coffee stop we took the bus back to Hong Kong and ended our tour right where we started: at the harbor. We took a boat back to Kowloon and explored a little bit more of this unique area, took more pictures because the light was perfect and headed back to the hotel. After we had changed our outfit we went out for dinner and had another incredible meal but this time more of the traditional food. Around noon the next day we left Hong Kong for another country: Cambodia was our next stop and I was super excited about it, because this was my favorite part of the whole trip.