This mermaid had to take a break from chasing waves, so this time, the journey was spent chasing knowledge and wifi in Hong Kong.
It was my first trip outside the Philippines, and quite frankly, I didn’t know what to expect. This trip wasn’t purely for leisure because primarily, we were attending a tech conference, one of the largest gatherings in Asia. The whole experience at the Rise Conference is another story which I’ll discuss soon.
We were there to learn. Oh, and also have a little side trip vacation afterward. After all, there always should be a little leisure time even on business trips. I went with my colleagues Karla, Jerelyn, and Claudine who were all well-seasoned travelers who have been to other countries in Southeast Asia. Claudine, on the other hand, had been halfway around the world in Australia and New Zealand.
I was pretty much the newbie and was literally just trailing behind them as we passed through immigration and all the other necessary hurdles one had to pass through before reaching an international destination.
Our group stayed a total of eight days. The first half which was five days were spent in Wan Chai since the conference was held in the Hong Kong Convention Center and for the remaining three days we moved to Tsim Sha Tsui.
Now I had a few things set out on my list of what to do in Hong Kong, and I did my best to achieve them all even though the weather was against me and the almost lack of finances towards the end of my tip (I’ll explain in another story).
Accessibility from Point to Point
The first thing that impressed me so much was Hong Kong’s transportation system. It there was such a thing as scheduled and on-time, that was it.
I’ve stayed in Manila and Cebu for quite some time, and I know the horrors traffic bring to commuters on a daily basis. From our arrival at the Hong Kong International Airport, I realized the airport was so huge that you needed to ride a train to get to the other boarding gates. That was efficient and convenient.
Once cleared, there was a range of buses outside the airport whose routes were so conveniently displayed. All you needed to do was figure out their bus system and directions, as well as island train system which is called the mass transit railway or MTR for short.
I did a little research and found out through Wikipedia that the MTR system is under the government’s rail-led transport policy. And this next statement blew me away. “It is a common mode of public transport in Hong Kong, with over five million trips made in an average weekday. It consistently achieves a 99.9% on-time rate on its train journeys.”
Seriously. 99.9% on-time?? That felt like commuter heaven right there. I needed to check facts because I really felt that if used the MTR to get me to a meeting somewhere, there would only be two circumstances that I would be late. One would be that I was irresponsible and left home late already or nature interfered through an earthquake or whatsoever natural disaster.
If everything were normal, you could never be late if you rode the MTR. Also, the buses were as efficient too! There were designated bus stops appropriately marked with the routes that these buses would pass through. The buses were labeled, and each stop was timed.
Plus in all these, they made it even more convenient by having the Octopus card where you could preload it, so you didn’t have to worry about scrambling for bus or train money each journey.
I never experienced traffic in traveling in Hong Kong. I also tried riding their old school-looking taxis, and I never experienced congestion the way I did back home. It was a foreign concept for me to live in a highly urbanized city without traffic at all.
The transport system was so efficient that I loved commuting. It was so magical for me. I know this is me geeking out at human-made marvels such as this and my well-traveled friends, Claudine and Jerelyn mentioned that Singapore has a much more impressive one. I can’t wait to experience that.
The marvel of their transport system never seemed to waver even as we were back in the Philippines. I love my country, but I know that this wasn’t the Philippines that used to be. I remember a conversation that Claudine, Jerelyn and I had one night after watching Ant-Man in Cebu that the glory days of the Philippines was during the early years of President Marcos. We were one of the leaders in Southeast Asia.
Our more developed neighboring countries now once used to look up to us and spent time in the Philippines to learn about what we were doing. We used to be at the head of the pack, and now, we’re trailing behind. I’m not sure how long it’s going to take and what is it going to make for us to have at least comparable to the efficiency of Hong Kong’s transport system.
Overall, it was a great experience. It quite humbled me to realize that we are such patient people to endure traffic hours on a daily basis.
Stay tuned next week for more Hong Kong adventures and discoveries!
