Old Home Week

Dec. 3-4

Joanna called John, one of her friends from the old neighborhood who joined the group for dim sum. He had offered to help us find our way around, and Joanna thought it would be fun to visit the place where she used to live as a girl.

The place as she remembers it is gone, replaced by new and larger projects, so we needed a guide.

John met us on Nathan Road. We took the metro to the Prince Edward station and changed to another line for a few stops to Shek Kip Mei, the area of the great fire that prompted the construction of the resettlement blocks and the inadvertent discovery of the ancient Han Tomb. 

This isn’t anywhere near the New Territories, but when Joanna lived here things were pretty rustic. Her family moved after the fire to another neighborhood of wooden dwellings and then moved again to a less-flammable bungalow in the district known as Tai Hang Sai.

The Tai Hang was a large drainage canal. There’s a paved street now where there used to be a couple of country roads and an open ditch. Her family lived in a one-story bungalow on the ninth lane west (sai) from the Tai Hang.

It was here, Joanna said, that she saw the police responding to a murder. A man had killed his wife and her lover. 

Joanna was a youngster in the crowd that had gathered as the police brought the bloody bodies out.

The lanes have gone the way of the Tai Hang, and so have the bungalows. Now a high-rise apartment block covers the entire site.

John led us up a hill to a mall, where we went to a dim sum restaurant called Baat Yeud Faa, literally “Eighth Month Flower.” The English equivalent is “Jasmine.” 

The menu had something I haven’t had in a long time, snake soup. It had strips of snake meat and vegetables in a hazy broth. And it was delicious—savory, not too salty—and besides, I was getting to eat snake.

There were seafood dumplings and a few other dim sum offerings, too, which the three of us shared.

The tea was new to me, a green tea called Sau Mei, which had a good, surprisingly full flavor for a green. I usually think of green tea as milder than this one.

By the time we got back to the hotel, Joanna was tired and generally under the weather. Literally. The air quality isn’t great in Hong Kong and probably no better in Taipei.

After three weeks, it’s finally getting to us. I wound up running out for some wonton soup and a couple of appetizers (as well as a cheap bottle of red for me).

The soup was good. So were the pork dumplings and the chicken wraps. 

Joanna gave me a useful warning about the dumplings. They’re very juicy. You have pop the whole thing in your mouth before you bite it, like sushi. The sushi because it falls apart; the dumplings because they burst with gravy.

The wine, a blend of Shiraz and Cabernet Sauvignon from Australia, I think, was pretty rough, very sharp and acidic. The food helped, and after a couple of glasses, it tasted better.

Tuesday, the fourth, we went across the harbor on the ferry again. It’s a beautiful ride, and four years ago it lasted for about half an hour. The ferry terminals on the Hong Kong side have been moved, so now you get there in maybe five minutes.

Still quite a spectacle though, like almost any ride on the water by a city.

We had some sketchy Google Maps directions to follow to get a bus. Somehow, we managed to find Harbour Road and a stop for the 18P bus to Kennedy Town. That’s the eastern end of the Hong Kong cross-island tram. 

The bus driver put us down at a spot on Belcher Road, which is where Google said we should go. We were to walk a half block back to Smithfield Road and turn left.

Only it wasn’t Smithfield. We saw a metro station, and I decided to give it a try. It probably wasn’t the tram stop, but we might find a human being who could give us directions.

Before we got to the station, though, Joanna saw a woman selling a savory treat that she has been trying to find since we got here. It’s sticky rice wrapped in a bamboo leaf. It is flavored with pork and mung beans.

She asked the lady for directions to the tram. Two blocks in the other directions.

For some reason, I had expected some kind of cable car. But the tram is an old-fashioned electric trolley that runs on tracks in the middle of the street.

We boarded a trolley for the far side of the island around 4:30. The entire trip takes about an hour and a half. We didn’t ride all the way, but did go from late afternoon into early evening on some of the most varied commercial streets I have seen. 

The route started in an area that caters to the locals. Lots of food stores selling preserved seafood, dried herbs, 

There is no air conditioning on the old trolleys, so the windows were open. It’s still hot in Hong Kong in early December. 

We could smell the dried and salted fish as the trolley rolled past the stores.

A few minutes later, we were in fat city. The road was lined on both sides by stores hawking luxe goods for tourists and top local earners.

We weren’t far from the end of the line when we realized we were tired and hungry. So we stepped off the trolley and crossed the track to head back.

We had seen a couple of metro stations on the ride east, so we looked for one as we rode the other way. 

I had originally said we needed to go to Central station or at least to Wan Chai. Of course, that was wrong. We could get into the metro system at any station.

So we were looking for any station. A man next to me must have heard us talking. 

Are you looking for an MTR station? Yes. There’s one at the next stop.

He changed his mind and said the stop after next is closer. So we took that and went to a station named for Tin Hau, the divinity of the sea people who has the temple on Temple Street in Kowloon. 

The section of Hong Kong Island where we got off is also named for her, and she has a temple somewhere not far from that metro station. 

Everything went well till we got to Admiralty, the transfer station for the line that would bring us home. It was rush hour. Three trains came in too full for us to get near them. 

We finally worked our way near the door and the next train—get this—was empty, sent to clear out the crowd. The system works very well here.

We went to Carpaccio for dinner. The manager and the waitress both said welcome back. I was surprised that they remembered us.

I had a craving for pizza and wine, and didn’t trust any other place around here. Carpaccio earned my confidence with its carbonara.

Joanna had an excellent lasagne, savory brown meat sauce between thin layers of pasta. I tried a bite. Very nice.

The pizza was fine, a Margherita made with sauce instead of plum tomatoes, basil (although there’s never enough to please me), and mozzarella. It wasn’t Naples, but was as good as any I’ve had in the States.

I had a glass of Chianti and finished Joanna’s Montepulciano d’Abbruzzo.

I managed to find a cheap Bordeaux, a mix of Merlot and Cabernet Franc, at a 7-Eleven. It probably wasn’t great, but it was a hell of a lot better than the blend of the night before. 

Good night, all.

Here’s wishing good travels and better wine.

Harry