Hong Kong: Four Markets and a Wedding

The happy couple

Is this getting boring? I have visions in my head that I'm turning into one of those people who pulls out travel photos and doesn't let up on how AMAZING and INCREDIBLE and AWE-INSPIRING the trip was for at least an hour. I'm not trying to be that person, but I loved visiting Hong Kong, not least of all for the people I met there. Have I mentioned that the wedding was lovely? That the celebrations lasted from 11am to 9pm? That I almost couldn't move by the end of the day from all the delicious food? It was quite the international wedding, seeing as the bride is originally from India, the groom is American, and guests came from Hong Kong, the United States, Singapore, India, Indonesia, and the United Arab Emirates. There were other nationalities represented, too, because Hong Kong itself is such an international city. I had just as much fun getting to know new people as I did catching up with Wheaton classmates. In particular, I had excellent hosts, church friends of the bride's parents, who welcomed me and one of the bridesmaids with beautiful generosity.

Bridesmaid A and our lovely hostess D who never let us out of the apartment without a good breakfast and rebuffed my thanks with a simple "God is good, sweetheart."

Having no good transition to share my market pictures, I'll just say that my roommate M likes to go to church and grocery stores when visiting a new country. I think she's onto something. I visited Indian church on Saturday afternoon, where I was roped into playing piano, which probably wouldn't have happened if they had know how long it's been since I regularly played piano, and I visited four different markets (that's kind of like a grocery store, right?). I first visited the Pearl and Jade Market in the Yau Ma Tei area after a spectacular dim sum brunch. I don't have any pictures, but I do have some very affordable pearls and jade to show for my visit. After that I did some wandering through the neighborhood and stumbled on the Yau Ma Tei market.

This part smelled. And my sister, the nominal vegetarian who hates the sight of raw meat, wouldn't have liked it very much.

A passer-by kindly informed me that the stuff in front on the left is dried preserved duck. He didn't give me any help on the rest of it though.

I think there's some durian (beloved but smelly Indonesian fruit) in this picture. Can you find it?

After the wedding, I went to Stanley Beach which is just as famous for its cheap tourist market as for the shoreline. What can I say, I'm a cheap tourist. With art, trinkets, dishes, linens, clothing, and "your name in Chinese on (insert object here)," I got a great start on my Christmas shopping. But I didn't get any really good pictures there except for this one at the back of a trinket stall.

This little kid was cracking me up with the animated interaction between him and his GameBoy.

My last market was the Hong Kong night market, which is pretty interesting. The vendors' stalls fill the streets and shut down traffic from early evening to after midnight.

This stall was my second favorite.

My favorite night market stall belongs in tomorrow's post: strange (to me) sights.