Turning 20 in Asia's world city!

I'd been pretty excited about spending my birthday in Hong Kong since the day I booked my flights, and the day was finally approaching. On the Friday, I went to an island called Cheng Chau with Corane, which was about an hour ferry away. I'd heard wonderful things from everyone about Cheng Chau and it didn't disappoint. It was a nice chance from the hustle and bustle of Hong Kong, since nobody on the island owns cars and the place is filled with bikes. Since there was an upcoming dragon boat festival in Hong Kong, we even got to see the teams practicing from the pier. I managed to try some weird foods too! Firstly, mango mochi, which Cheng Chau is famous for, and then an egg that had been boiled in tea. Surprisingly not bad once you get past the brown moulding look.
We then headed back to meet some of the other delegates from my past trip to Hong Kong for dinner in Mong Kok. I was totally surprised by the amount who turned up and made time in their schedules just to see me, so I was able to see a further five people during my trip which was more than I ever expected. We ate some interesting foods, most of which I still don't even know what they were, and then everyone surprised me with a birthday cake. I was so appreciative of the fact that even though I hadn't seen most of them for almost 3 years, and that sometimes our postcards and messages are lacking, they still came together as a family for me to celebrate while I was away from home!

Saturday was quite a chilled day since Haruka was arriving from Japan! This was going to be the start of our little tour of Asia before I head to Kyoto in July, as we're travelling to Seoul and then to her home in Tokyo. Typical, after picking her up our bus from the airport broke down, so by the time we got to Causeway Bay we went straight to a Taiwanese cafe for dinner which was amazing! Later we met Jane for dessert which was so surreal seeing them both in Hong Kong since I only ever see them in England.
Sunday was finally my birthday, a day filled with dim sum to the max. We'd been invited for dim sum with Jane's family in Sheung Wan in the morning, and afterwards the three of us visited Lan Kwai Fong for the first time. We went for "afternoon tea" too, consisting of pineapple buns and milk tea. They're not really pineapple, the top just apparently looks like one. Good timing too since a thunderstorm was brewing, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't happy. After almost two weeks of constant humidity and heat, my birthday wishes had definitely been answered. We began to head to Kowloon, but the rain was so bad we ended up camping out at an MTR station for 20 minutes singing to keep ourselves occupied.
Haruka and I ended up killing time before dinner in a random shopping mall that was pretty amazing, before heading to Austin to find the Hello Kitty Chinese Cuisine restaurant, a place that specialises in dim sum. IT WAS PERFECT. Everything had so much detail and it was the perfect place for me being such a fan, with me also treating myself to a super cute plush toy only sold there. We then headed back and I wanted to show Haruka both central of an evening and the ding ding, but after getting drenched we decided to call it a night. It was a very different birthday than what I'm used to, but I wouldn't have changed it for the world!

For our last day, we went around a few of the sights in central before heading to Aberdeen, where Jane lives, to go to Jumbo Kingdom, the famous floating restaurant. It was nice to spend some more time with her since we hadn't really got a chance too! Then we headed to Mongkok for a final market experience, with me severely restraining myself from buying lots of shoes on sneaker street! However, I can't wait to be somewhere were the heat doesn't kill me every time I walk outside, and on that note, Seoul here I come...