TAI LONG WAN CAMPING, HONG KONG
2018-01-08, 22:27, JASON
There's Hong Kong Island, the center of commercial business and finance. Across the Victoria Harbor, there's Kowloon, the more localized, Chinese-style of Hong Kong with mom and pop shops scattered under overhanging neon signs; gentrification pushing them out to the New Territories up north. To the east, there's Sai Kung, a small pier with tour ferries leaving to outlying islands, and a small community of fishermen who scatter nets into the ocean for the daily catch. They display their earnings in small tubs on their small boat, touting eager tourists willing to shell-out for the catch of the day. Sai Kung is where our journey starts.
Panu is Thai, and Joey a Hong Konger. We stroll around the pier, onlooking various seafood restaurants. In Hong Kong fashion, people go to Sai Kung to be seen. Being in the east, tucked away from the fervor of HK island and the grunge of Mongkok, it has become somewhat a haven for the rich to display their wealth. People walk their dogs by either leash or stroller. The dogs are dressed nicer than I am, chintzy shoes and all. What's more, these bitches even dine better than me -- some having a seat at the table for lunch. The apparent display of wealth is neither inconspicuous nor humble; it's flagrant. I find it amusing, though that's probably because I'm slightly jealous.
We pick up some beers and get some Thai food, and catch the bus to a trail which leads us to the campsite. The further in we go, the less it starts looking like Hong Kong. There was some hint of this in Sai Kung, with the architecture being low-rise and having some sort of seaside Floridan charm. But, in the mountains, it's more evident. The skyscrapers disappear on the horizon and the noise of honking cars disappears. The air is fresher, renewed by the seabreeze. The trees get greener and the rocks on the cliff sharper. It's more natural out here. When we finally arrive at the trail head, it were as if we were in a different country.
The trail to the campsite is paved, and easy to hike to the first beach. After the first beach, there's a stopover to a waterfall which is accessible by a one-way route over some boulders. Since it is a Sunday, and the following day a public holiday, this one-way path is crowded. We hear tourists, Filipino maids -- a familiar sound in my time in Singapore -- and local Hong Kongers at the site. We take a dip in the pools that have been carved by the waterfall, then continue towards the campsite.
The second portion curves up the mountain and is more strenuous. Several times along the hike, the trail winds so that you can get a view of the Hong Kong coastline. I'm reminded of Taiwan. When I see coast and peer out to the ocean, it seems endless. The cliff meets the ocean at a steep and jagged slope. I feel on top of the world. It's nostalgic: this is the coastline I remember, growing up and taking day trips with friends to Santa Cruz. But there's something different. I'm with a Thai guy and a local girl. It's a little warmer than I remember the coast being. So, it's familiar yet foreign. Still, I take a brief moment to cherish the Coast before the descent to the second beach -- our campsite.
I see our destination within reach. From atop, the beach is speckled with small dots of black, red, and blue, the first being people, and the latter two being the tent roofs. Most are Chinese tour groups with tents pitched for the night. We go to the only place with a restaurant to rent a tent for ourselves, and pitch our own. It'd been a while since I've done this -- since my camping days in California. Familiar, yet foreign. We successfully pitch it and then get cracking to the beers we lugged in. The night is spent eating at the only restaurant on the beach whose substandard food is not regulated by a presence of competition. But, with the company and the hodgepodge of tourists, it feels warm still.
It's 20:00 and people start cashing in for the night. Being obnoxious, and drunk on a few beers, we crank up our music and start dancing to something like Green Day, and we draw in the attention of the campers next to us. The darkness on the beach obscures their faces, but you can tell through their distinct accents that they are from China. I go over and meet them since they seemed interested in my messed up dancing, and find that they hail from places such as Inner Mongolia, Beijing, Hunan, etc. I ask them how they all met, and they said through a local hiking interest group and, from there, introduction of friends of friends; of course, the odd dating story comes up too (he knew her, and introduced her to him, who I knew!). I like the Chinese. In my experiences with them, they have been very down-to-earth, and have ambitions as desires as so many of us do. Meeting so many here in Hong Kong has the odd effect of making me understand and mellow down my preconceptions about them.
The lady next to us tells us to be quiet. She has to be up early tomorrow. My Thai friend is drunk and says under a harsh whisper, "what the fuck?" but, I get it, we are being a bit loud. To be more quiet, we decide to be equally as loud, but move our party closer to the shore. We meet an Indian guy there who has really broken English. He's clearly drunk as well and in our odd state of drunkenness manage to bond over nothing. We then head back to the tent to get some shut-eye. Hiking and drinking can be exhausting.
I get up at 05:00, woken up by the seabreeze tapping gently on our tarp tent, which has managed to stay up overnight. There are about 5 other people up who have set up their cameras to catch the sunrise. It's tranquil, I can only the sound of a small wave and light breeze. I look out into the horizon and watch the sunrise, while the other campers slowly make their way out of their tents and prepare for their Instagram shots. I look out into the ocean, into the ripples on the surface, and into the island off in the distance. The sun slowly rises. It's a new day. I haven't seen nature like this in years, and I'm lucky to have found it among new friends, in a new place. Familiar, yet foreign.
