The whole adventure started in May, when Hongkong Shanghai Bank Credit cards issued a statement that, with five charge slips of at least P10,000 each, Cathay Pacific will give free ticket for one round trip to Hongkong. I decided to bring the two accountants (Nancy and Ana), Nelly (laundry woman), Fely (cook) and Lety, my adopted sister who is now 70 years old, and who has never been in an airplane, tickets to Hongkong with this Promo. From Day One when I told them of my decision, their whole hearts and minds were geared toward this goal: The Great Hongkong Adventure!!!
A. Getting Ready
1. Getting a Passport. That was the first hurdle. It took one month to get an appointment with the Department of Foreign Affairs, and another month for the DFA to release the passport. We were running out of time. There were all the requirements: birth certificate, marriage certificate, government IDs. The biggest problem was Lety, who only had a “Unknown” for her father and mother written in her marriage certificate. She didn’t have a birth certificate. But she staked out at the NSO (National Statistics Office) and the DFA (Foreign Affairs), until they told her how to get a passport. The NSO said that all she needed to do was to have Government IDs that stated her married name. She had to choose who will be her father, so she chose Coyang Dulcing Franco and Dang Floring as her parents. Coyang Dulcing is almost her age, but she has always called him “Tatang”, and Dang Floring was an old maid, never married, never been kissed, and too old for her to have borne Letty.
2. By August, all the passports were in. The next step was to get money to spend in Hongkong. Everyone in the office borrowed from the Social Security System, except for Lety, who expected Mel and me to give her some money.
3. Makeover. Each one of them went through a make over. Lety used my expensive blouse that I brought to Japan, and my Louis Vitton bag, Mom’s fake diamond-encrusted watch, my pearl earrings and my pearl ring for a total makeover. Fely had her hair curled, and everyone including me, had a manicure and pedicure.
B. AT THE AIRPORT
Thank God that I was with the girls at the airport, because the immigration people were not convinced that they were not planning to escape in Hongkong. So all of them joined my line, and I told the Immigration Officer that, yes, this was an Office Party, and we were going home together.
C. IN HONGKONG
Hongkong, Here We Come!
Ralph bought us matching hats so we could look like a Tour Group. You could tell that we had metarmophosed from ordinary people to tourists!
At the Hotel
1. Simple Instructions
We reached the Hotel by midnight, so I felt very tired. We were met by Jeanggay, Ralph’s former secretary, who was now based in Hongkong. I told her to run after Fely and Nelly to teach them how to get into their room and to slide their Entry Card into the slot so they will have power in their room.
Jeanggay did not think it was necessary to tell them how to operate the elevator. The next day, when I was going up to have my breakfast, when the door opened, Fely and Nely were inside the elevator.
“Why are you in the elevator?” I asked them. They were on the 14th floor and the dining room was on the 19th floor. I was on the fifth, which meant that they had gone down instead of going out on the 19th floor.
“We were the first to go in, and others came in the elevator. So they squished us inside the elevator. Before we could go out, the elevator had closed. The next thing we knew, the elevator had gone down, and you had opened the door.”
2. Security Fears. Nely was afraid of the security of her room. She said she was used to have THREE barrel bolts in her room. She was afraid someone might go in their room. She groped in the dark, even lifting the Room Entry Card. So their room was in total darkness. “Hay! mali!” (wrong move). So she put the Room Entry Card back in its place.
3. Cook Fely’s dream — to sample Cantonese food. Since this was the request of Cook Fely, I brought them to the most recommended restaurant by “Guide to the Lonely Planet”– Maxim’s. It looked like they didn’t enjoy the food, because they were served chopsticks. Or were they worried that this restaurant was too expensive, and they really didn’t want me to spend so much.
One of the group’s biggest concern was that they didn’t know how to use chopsticks. Here is Lety struggling with her chopsticks at The Maxim’s. You gotta hand it to Lety. She never let a small detail like not knowing how to use a chopsticks bother her. She just poked one stick into the food, and let the other stick assist bringing the food into her mouth. I was glad they were able to go into Maxim’s because that was their first and last meal outside the Hotel. Thank God, the Hotel gave a free breakfast, otherwise, they would have subsisted on the noodles they brought with them so they could save on spending for food.
SIGHTSEEING
Jeanggay was a good sport. She brought us all over Hongkong. We rode the tram, we rode the double-decker bus, the MTR (metro subway), the ferry.
Posing at the Avenue of the Stars
Hongkong at Night
The Sampan Boat looked too ritzy to be a Sampan Boat
We went all over the place. We posed at the Avenue of the Stars. We went to Hongkong Central to check out the bargains of the “alley-alley” where small shops like the ones back home sold cheap stuff. We went to the City Hall area where we saw all the thousands of Filipino maids on their day off (Sunday), playing their card games and eating their home-cooked Pinoy food, while sitting under the trees, on used carton boxes. We also watched the “Symphony of the Lights”, where all buildings by the Bay switch on their lights, and the lights open and close according to the music being played. We also went to the quiet side of Hongkong, up midway to Victoria Peak, to see some greenery amidst the skyscrapers. I was pretty happy to see so much of Hongkong in such a very little time.
HONGKONG DISNEYLAND
Finally, we were there– in Disneyland! That was the culmination of their dream. Nelly, our laundry woman, confessed that, her one dream, should she win the Lottery, was to go to Hongkong Disneyland. The only guy in our party, Art, who was the husband of Ana, said that, this trip was so special to him because, he never dreamt that he would be able to step into the shores of another country.
Disneyland, at last!
In the Disneyland Park, I was able to watch two shows, “The Great Mickeys” and the “Lion King.” I was thinking while watching the shows, that all the money I had spent on this trip was worth it, just by the two shows alone. I was able to take two rides. At the Astro Blaster, I knew this was for a child who wanted to shoot at space targets. At the Space Mountain ride, I was glad to have survived the sharp turns and roller coaster ride.
During lunch, I decided to sample more dimsum at the Disney Maxim’s Restaurant.
Animal dimsum
Bunny dimsum
Mouse dimsum
By this time, my companions had disappeared, doing their own thing. So I happily enjoyed myself. I had been to the Anaheim Disneyland, in my past life. It was in 1974 when I was in the USA Disneyland. What I missed most was the weather!!! For some strange reason, I couldn’t connect Disneyland to sweltering heat! It was just like going to a local Resort with Disney characters. I also missed the night parade where the Disney characters were all lighted up — their hair, their clothes– in tiny lights.
END OF THE HONGKONG ADVENTURE
Before we left, the girls made sure that they bring a bit of Hongkong back with them. They wanted to make sure that their families also shared in this once-in-a-lifetime experience by bringing home the veritable “pasalubongs”. I am sure that, every time they look at those stuffed toys that they brought home, they will remember what it was to feel like a tourist, once in your lifetime!
Bringing Home a Bit of Hongkong
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