Traveling to foreign countries is always like stepping through the looking glass for me: some things are similar in strange ways, while other things are completely different in stranger ways. When you land in Hong Kong after a 14 hour flight from San Francisco, the sun’s in the wrong place in the sky, the cars are on the other side of the street, the subway system actually works, even the air feels different, moister and scented with the perfume of far-off places (when we were younger, my sisters and I would refer to it simply as "the Hong Kong smell").
But if my dozen trips to Hong Kong during my life have not actually made me a resident, it has afforded me the pleasure of memories. I breathe in the air and I remember how, in my parents’ apartment, you have a water heater switch for each bathroom to turn on the hot water; how all public announcements are made in both Chinese and English (and, these days, in Cantonese, Mandarin, and English); how I can tell my parents in the morning that I want to eat lobster that night and we’ll find a place because if there’s one thing Hong Kong isn’t lacking, it’s restaurants, especially seafood restaurants; how I can see Hong Kong harbor from my apartment window – one of my favorite sights in the world.
This trip was a wonderful re-visiting of old memories and creation of new ones. Of course, any visit to Hong Kong can’t help but have a heavy concentration on food (unless you’re such a shopaholic you can’t tear yourself away from the stores to eat – shame on you!), and this time I took especial care to document my culinary journeys. In my next few entries I’ll try to cover the wide range of my gastronomic and non-gastronomic experiences – of course dessert will be included!
You can also visit my photo albums on Flickr:
Anita Chu, also known as pastrygirl, is a baker, writer, and photographer with a passion for pastry. She trained at Tante Marie's Cooking School and is the author of Field Guide to Cookies, Field Guide to Candy, and Lollipop Love. Anita lives in San Francisco with her husband, baby girl, and rescue cockapoo Snickerdoodle. 
what a wonderful journey and such great photos! look forward to your upcoming posts.
Wow, you just came from my part of the world (Asia) and later this week, I’ll be going over to your part of the world! 🙂 Hope you had a good time!
Anita,
oh so true about “HK smell”… now the scent of Singapore comes into my memory…
Love all the food photos you took during your trip. Those baked goods are so fancy and beautiful, but don’t know why, I just fixate to that chiu chow dumplings and steamed egg; they’re insanely delicious!
Look forward to your next entry!
Nice post. I feel I have got a little glimpse of Honk Hong, which I so far have only flown through on my way to New Zealand!!
I look forward to reading more about it!
Kat & Satoshi,
It’s good to be back! So much to catch up on, especially with reading blogs, but I can’t wait to share my stories!
Lori,
Are you perhaps coming to the Bay Area? Be warned – it’s cold!
Gattina,
That steamed egg was very good – you can see it was already gotten into before I could take a picture!
Bea,
Hopefully one day you’ll get a chance to visit – I think you’ll find lots of food to photograph – and eat!