Chicken feet and the Symphony of Lights

I’m usually quite adventurous with food – and today was no exception when the team went out for lunch at a local dim sum restaurant – one of the specialities being chicken’s feet. (Tastes just like chicken!)

I ventured back over to Kowloon on Tuesday night to experience the Symphony of Lights. Now I have to say that this nightly event is frankly bizarre – but manages to attract hundreds of tourists! It was strangely reminiscent of Waltzing Waters in Newtonmore (which I know some of you have had the misfortune of visiting!). The show is 20 minutes of flashing lights and lasers set to music – the video will give you a flavour :-)



The view over to Hong Kong Island is, however, spectacular (don’t worry about the lop-sided skyscrapers in the photo – that’s more to do with the angle I was standing at and where I've had to join the photos rather than a sign of any strange seismic activity…).



Today’s HK trivia: the distance between Hong Kong Island and Kowloon on the mainland has shrunk from 2km to 1km as a result of all the land reclamations. Kowloon (or Kau Lung or 九龍) means “nine dragons” – but the story of how it got its name is quite sad (and comes with a PG rating). In 1279 the Mongols were advancing on the last of the Southern Song Dynasty emperors, Emperor Bing, who was only 7 years old. It was believed he would be safe if he sheltered in a place with nine dragons. When the young emperor arrived on the Kowloon peninsula he counted eight hills ("dragons") – but a servant pointed out that the emperor himself was a dragon – and so they had found their nine dragons. Alas, the protection of the nine dragons was not successful and when the last battle was lost to the Mongols an official took the young emperor and jumped from a cliff into the sea.