The first thing we noticed was the really bad smelling street food on the corner of our apartment building. The second thing we noticed was the insane amount of people! We're on floor 9 of our apartment building but unfortunately no windows, so no good views! We left our luggage, but we were too early for check in so we had a couple of hours to kill before we could come back. We went to the Wong Tai Sin Temple first. It's a famous Taoist temple in Kowloon. As it turns out, mom went there during Chinese New Year on her mission! The temple itself was really pretty and despite being structurally similar to temples we've been to in Seoul, it was really different! There were statues of the Chinese Zodiac characters and they also had a really pretty "Good Wishes" garden. We couldn't see the inside of the temple itself because we couldn't get close enough, plus there was so much incense being burned by people worshiping outside the temple that the air was a little smokey!
The "Good Wishes" garden was really pretty! It had really pretty garden bridges over a little pond filled with fish. It had some statues and fountains in the water that gave it a very Asian feel to it. It was really peaceful and relaxing to just sit there. The rain started coming down pretty hard so we waited it out in the garden area and ended up falling asleep at one of the tables. It was probably one of the best naps I've ever had!
When we woke up the rain had stopped and we headed to the Nan Lian Gardens and Chi Lin Nunnery. The gardens were really pretty and the Nunnery was really cool. I wasn't supposed to take pictures inside the Nunnery but I snuck a few! We walked around for a little while but we were still pretty tired from only sleeping for a couple of hours last night. We decided to head home, but not before stopping at a 7 Eleven and getting our first Wai Ta Li! Corbin and Spencer weren't super impressed but I loved it! I'll be getting plenty more while we're here!
We took our second nap of the day back in our room and rested for a couple of hours before getting up and going to the Tsim Sha Tsui Promenade to watch the "Symphony of Lights" which is a laser light show that they do over the harbor every night at 8:00PM. It was pretty cool, but nothing overly spectacular! Of course, maybe that's because it was raining again and we were pretty cold and drenched!
We only walked for a little while because of the rain and then we walked back up to Mong Kok looking for a yummy dinner place on our way. We decided to try a bun place that we found. It looked really yummy, but didn't taste super good. Our first attempt at authentic Chinese food was a bust. Hahaha.
Our first day in Hong Kong was a success! Tonight the plan is to get some good sleep so that we can get an early start tomorrow before the rain hits! I can't believe we're here!