Sunday, February 12, 2012

Hong Kong, Day 3

Got up.. had a much better experience on the public transport and headed in to find the bookstores. About half of them are out of business (we intend to go back online and fix these references on the websites where we found them).

We headed up to the offices of the Asia Literary Review. This was an outcome of a previous adventure in Korean literature (short story – they found me through my Korean literature blog and I had some fun conversations with them and LTI Korea in which it became clear that AR and KLTI might have a long and productive partnership in the future. But that’s for the other blog!).
The offices were on Wyndham Road, an old road with the Correspondent’s and artists’ clubs, as well as a variety of swanky restaurants. The Asia Literary Review, it turned out, had awesome 24th floor offices with a view of the hills to the South of the city. We met with Katherine, who I had already met in Seoul, and she gave us a series of quick answers to our questions, and as she had an appointment at 2 we agreed to meet for lunch the next day, and Yvonne and I went off (via a short stop at the bar) to find one last bookstore, and then off to check out museums.

We found the last bookstore out of business and then headed off across the harbor to the Science and History Museums. We got there and discovered that on Tuesdays the History Museum was closed.

No problem, we checked out the Science Museum and discovered that it was open til 9. A bit peckish, we wandered onto the plaza behind the museum and had sushi, deciding NOT to pick up a pack of the shark-fins that was available in a nearby store. Then it was a quick stop at a lovely open-to-the-plaza beer garden and into the Science Museum.

These are evil shark fins.... :-(


Which utterly rocked. It was perfect for children of all ages, with four stories of brilliant exhibits, nearly all of which were interactive. I made an utter ass of myself directing laser beams, having my pulse taken, testing my balance, and cranking a handle that then delivered electrical shocks to Yvonne’s hand. That last thing may have been my favorite museum thing ever, and I just wish I could have cranked the damned thing about 500% faster.^^ Even the sections that seemed utterly retarded and/or prosaic (a section on appliances / a section on energy conservation) had cool stuff to look at and do. Then there were the moving dioramas and the videos of cool things like robot colonoscopies. … uh, robots doing the colonoscopies, as I think that Mitt Romney is the only actual robot in the world with (who is?) an asshole.

ALWAYS get a picture of the dinosaur!

Your colon on Robots!


I think I need to get to the Smithsonian in the US so I have some kind of local comparison, because compared to the museums in Korea and Hong Kong, the ones in California just entirely blow chunks (now the “Blow Chunks” interactive exhibit was a bit alarming!^^)

We wandered back to the hotel and ate at the same restaurant we had the first night, but this time a bit more adventurously.

I watched National Geographic on the TV, while Yvonne trolled the bar for single men.

Later, she moved on to married men.

Then broad-shouldered women.^^

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

the Smithsonian in general doesn't operate that way -- many museums ranging from fine art through history through ... whatever. I hear the children's museum in Houston is more like that but I think Singapore would probably outdo most places!!
Glad you are no longer lost.
ysm

Anonymous said...

don't mean to denigrate the HK museum but I have been reading some about Singapore and since I have not seen either one, ok, HK is probably the most dynamic!