I just got back from a trip to Hong Kong and wanted to do
a quick recap of some of the highlights.
Now, I normally don’t like to share personal stuff on my blog, but since
this trip ended up being a bit more entertainment industry related than
expected, I figured writing about it would be a great way to capture the
memories.
It has actually been 10 years since I last visited
HK. In addition to doing the standard
visiting relatives and friends stuff that I normally do, I also ended up doing
some ‘touristy’ stuff too (even though I’m not a tourist). The 2 main ‘tourist attractions’ I went to
while in HK were Avenue of the Stars at the Star Ferry Pier waterfront in Tsim
Sha Tsui (better known as the more hip-sounding ‘TST’ nowadays…lol) and Madame
Tussaud’s Wax Museum at the Peak located on HK island (haha…I’m sure none of
you reading this are surprised given how much of an HK entertainment fanatic I
am). I actually make it a point to
visit both places every time I go back to HK and this time around, I’m glad I
did, as things have changed quite a bit from 10 years ago.
First, the Avenue of the Stars. One reason why this is a ‘must-visit’ place
for me each time is, of course, to go see my idol Jacky Cheung’s star and
handprint (even though I’ve seen it many times already…lol). Fortunately, there wasn’t much ‘wear and tear’
on the star and it still looks as good as it did 10 years ago – only thing is,
it’s further than I remember it to be in terms of location, as I had to walk
all the way around to almost the end of the pathway before I was able to find
it. No worries though, since I was
planning on checking out each star anyway, so I didn’t mind the walk (plus I
needed the exercise…haha). The beginning
part of the pathway consisted of the stars of film artists and
directors/producers from the 1950s/60s/70s (i.e.: Cho Tat Wah, Li Li Wah, Wu Fung, Chor Yuen,
Josephine Hsiao, Lin Dai, Bao Fong, etc.) – in addition to the famous names,
there were a few obscure ones in there too – regardless though, all were names
that I recognized and definitely deserved to be there given their contributions
to the HK film industry. In addition to
the stars that have been there for decades, there were also a few newly added
ones near the end of the walkway, such as Nicholas Tse, Louis Koo, Carina Lau,
Kara Hui, Kenneth Tsang, Simon Yam, etc. (I know none of those were there 10
years ago). In terms of statues, the
newest addition of course, is the Anita Mui commemorative statue that was added
to the walkway a couple years back – I had read about the unveiling of the
statue in the news, but wanted to check it out for myself. It’s a nice statue with the words ‘Hong Kong’s
daughter’ engraved at the base, though features-wise, it didn’t look like Anita
at all – nonetheless, it’s a nice gesture that I’m sure all of us who loved
Anita appreciate.
The popular Bruce Lee statue was still there as well,
though good luck trying to get close to it, as there are crowds of people
around that statue all the time (I gave up trying to take pictures of the
statue – I even had to fight to take pictures of Eric Tsang’s star, which was
located right by the statue, so there were constantly people blocking it). The second most popular ‘attraction’ there
was Jackie Chan’s star and handprint (I could tell by the amount of ‘wear and
tear’ on his star as well as the hordes of non-Cantonese speaking people
clamoring to put their hands in the handprint and take pictures). Of course, I’m not surprised at what I saw, since
Avenue of the Stars is a major tourist attraction after all and is mostly frequented
by tourists outside of HK who may be most familiar with international stars
such as Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan. It’s
rare for a non-local Hong Konger like me to visit and actually be interested in
seeing the stars of other celebrities aside from these 2 (as a sidenote – it was
kind of funny, but I think I was one of the few people there who actually
recognized all of the celebrities’ names).
The other tourist attraction I went to was the wax
museum. I went on a weekday hoping to
beat the crowds, but then I remembered that this was another place where very
few locals go anyway, so it actually didn’t make a difference the time of day, there
were still tons of tourists there (while I was there, I noticed groups of
tourists coming in by the busload…it was amusing but annoying at the same
time). I must say that the wax museum
changed a lot since I was last there 10 years ago – they renovated it a bit and
added a few new areas that weren’t there before as well as many new wax statues
that weren’t there previously. I vividly
remember on my last visit, I had ‘complained’ to my mom how ridiculous it was
that HK’s wax museum had so few HK celebrities in it (at that time – I’m
talking 10 years ago here -- there were only a few wax figures of local
celebrities – all the rest were Hollywood stars, political figures, the Royal
family, and sports personalities). Well,
someone must have heard my complaint (lol) because this time around, there were
a lot more local celebrities in the museum as well as ones from Taiwan (i.e.
Jay Chou, Ethan Ruan, etc) and also Mainland China (pianist Lang Lang, Huang
Xiao Ming, etc.). Oh and for fans of
Korean entertainment out there, they actually added an entire section dedicated
to Korean celebrities and singers (I think it’s called the K-wave section or
something like that).
I like how the museum is a lot more organized now than it
was in the past. There are new placards next
to each wax figure introducing each celebrity (in Chinese and English), more ‘special
features’ on some of the figures (i.e. Andy Lau’s beating heart, Miriam Yeung’s
laugh, Sandra Ng in her “Sparkle Club” setting with a couch where you can sit
and pretend to be interviewed by her, etc.), and also the wax figures are
separated into featured areas that actually make sense (i.e. most of the
singers are in their own section, the local HK film and television stars are in
their own sections, etc.). Another new
section added was a ‘making of’ section where they actually walk you through
step by step how they create each of the wax figures, from the initial
selection and measurement process to the final result – Donnie Yen’s wax figure
(another new one that was added the past few years) was used as an example and
there are actually video clips of him talking about the process on various
monitors. Another thing I noticed is that they gave the museum
more of a “something for everyone” feel in that they added a Superhero section
(with statues of Marvel comic book figures such as Spiderman, Incredible Hulk,
Ironman, Wolverine, etc.) as well as a ‘Kids’ section with Hello Kitty,
Doreamon, Mak Dou Dou pig, etc. Another
new section that I believe is only temporary is an area dedicated to the
Journey to the West movie from 2013 (the one with Donnie Yen as the Monkey King
and Aaron Kwok as the Bull Demon) – not sure why they decided to feature this
movie in particular, maybe because of the costumes? The figures themselves didn’t look like the
artists much but the elaborate costumes were very definitely very similar to
the real thing!
Overall, my visit to the museum was quite worthwhile (despite
the crowds of rude tourists I encountered – but then again, most of the people
in HK were rude…not sure if they’ve become jaded or dissatisfied with life or
what….this is the first time in my many visits to HK where I was actually
treated so rudely by my own people…I miss how nice people were 10 years ago…..). Anyway, rude people aside, I definitely
recommend that anyone who gets the chance to visit HK go see the wax museum and
Avenue of the Stars at least once, especially those who are very ‘into’ all
aspects of the HK entertainment industry.
Of course, if you get the chance to meet a celebrity in person, that’s a
different story, but for those of us who are usually not that lucky, well, I’m
happy with just looking at wax figures and handprints (and thereby taking that
nostalgic trip down memory lane for a brief instant).
Speaking of celebrity sightings….I was lucky enough to ‘bump
into’ a celebrity on this trip without even trying. (As a sidenote….for those of you who are
serious about ‘chasing’ celebrities, the best place to go is definitely Hong
Kong International Airport in Chek Lap Kok.)
Actually, on my visit to HK 10 years ago, I had actually bumped into a
few celebrities at the airport too, but they were lesser known artists, plus it
was just a glance from far away, so probably not much worth mentioning. This time around though, I bumped into not 1,
but 3 artists in close proximity while at the airport – I saw Calvin Choi, Remus Choi, and Edmond So
from the famous HK singing group Grasshopper!
Here’s how it went down: my mom
and I were standing in line in the departure area waiting to go through
security….since the line was long and we had nothing else to do, I started
glancing around and suddenly, about 20 people in front of us, I spotted a
familiar-looking guy with long hair putting his stuff on the conveyor belt for
x-ray – I looked closer and sure enough, I was right – it was Calvin Choi from
Grasshopper. A few people behind him was
Edmond So, still standing in line, playing with his Ipad (I assume it was an
ipad – could’ve been a tablet too).
There were a few people with them, whom I’m assuming were their
assistants. They went through security
and went into the gate area, all relatively low-key (not sure if anyone else
recognized them…didn’t sound like it though).
I pointed it out to my mom and we were both wondering where Remus was,
as we were assuming that they were going out of town to perform, so all 3 of
them should’ve been there. We didn’t see
him though so we thought perhaps he went in already…then, when the security
people opened up another line, we got into that line and as I was putting my
stuff on the conveyor belt, I noticed another familiar face in line right
behind me – yup, Remus Choi (looks like he might have gotten there a little
late?). I didn’t say anything or linger
around after my stuff went through, as he was probably in a rush to catch his
flight just like everyone else there, so didn’t want to bother him.
So there you have it….a few highlights from my trip to HK. I had fun overall and definitely looking to
go back again in the near future. I included
a few pictures below, mainly from Avenue of the Stars, since those pictures
turned out better. Enjoy!
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| Entrance to Avenue of the Stars |
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| Anita Mui commemorative statue |
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| Jacky's star at Avenue of the Stars :-) |
