Let The Adventure Begin

I'm writing from Le Meridien Cyberport Hotel in Hong Kong. It is around 8:30am Hong Kong time, and so far the sky is blue, and there are puffy clouds floating across the sky. My room has an amazing view of the water and the luxury apartments and tropical foliage of the hills of the 'Peak' and I'm lying in bed, looking out the floor-to-ceiling windows at lone fishermen in little fishing row-boats out on the sea as shipping freighters sound their horns in the distance.

I'm on my first business trip to Hong Kong, Singapore, and Beijing, and I'm really glad I'm in Hong Kong first - it can ease me back into Asia ;) I took the train into central Hong Kong from the airport like a pro, since that's how I got into the city the last time I was here visiting Shuo. Then I took a taxi, with a driver who spoke enough English to understand where I wanted to go, who got me to the hotel in one piece.

I'm feeling quite cosmopolitan at the moment, since I'm meeting up with Shuo today and Andy later this week - just meeting up with my friends abroad ;) I'm not sure what we're going to do, since I've already done a lot of the touristy stuff the last time I was here on my way home from India. I'm sure Shuo has a few places up his sleeve that don't make it into Lonely Planet. I'm also curious about how I'll find the city now that I'm comparing it to the US rather than India - last time I was here I thought it was the most modern, convenient city in the world - let's see if that opinion still stands compared to San Francisco rather than Hyderabad.

I flew on Cathay Pacific non-stop, and the airport was an absolute graveyard when I arrived. Literally, I was the only one going through passport control - two flights had just arrived from SFO - one on Singapore Airlines (I ran into some of my buddies from the Hyderabad office who were heading back to India from SF on that flight), and the other on Cathay, and apparently I was the only person of the 600-700 people on those two flights who was actually staying in Hong Kong - weird!

I've been stressing out over the last few days since I wasn't able to reserve a seat on my 14 hour flight because I had to change my itinerary last minute (I was booked to go to Beijing first, but because of Chinese holidays, I wasn't able to get my visa in time because the consulate was closed). I knew with all the online check-in options available to everyone but me, I would be stuck with a 14 hours in a center seat, a fate so drab that I woke up in a cold sweat on Friday morning thinking about the impending 14 hour squeeze.

Indeed I was assigned a center seat, but when I got onto the plane, it turned out that a couple was sitting in my row with a window and an aisle seat, and when I reached my seat they asked me if I would be 'willing' to take the aisle seat so that they could sit together. Stifling a "HELL YEAH! Are you serious?" with an "Absolutely, I would be glad to," I took my aisle seat and tried to hide the overwhelming sense of relief and happiness at barely dodging my impending fate as the middle of a two stinky old man sandwich. Once again, I am reminded never to take any detail for granted- had I been assigned an aisle seat to begin with, I wouldn't have fully appreciated how lucky I was for my comfort on the aisle.

And on that note, I will now embark on my first adventure as an 'important businessperson' let loose on the streets of Hong Kong :)