Beach, Beeyotch.

Deep Water Bay, Hong Kong Island

The new speakers' beach debut.

"Cow Beach," Lower Cheung Sha, Lantau Island
Have I mentioned I've been going to the beach a lot? My weekly jaunts to the beach are still hold strong. Here's two Coronas and some tunes.

Also crossed off the checklist:
Shek O
Stanley
Tai Long Wan, Sai Kung

Still on the To-Do list:
Gold Coast
South Bay Beach
Big Wave Bay

I'm hoping the mild/warm weather will keep up until the end of the year. Mild is a nice way of putting it. It's still pretty f'ing hot.

Drinking Towers

I think I've been slow on the blogging because I don't have a camera. The 5 megapixel camera phone doesn't quite cut it, and I've just been relying on friends to cover for me. I don't feel the same without one :(


The Drinking Towers.
The first time I went was probably a couple of months ago. I was meeting some friends there and I was pretty cranky. I got to Causeway Bay a little late, found where I needed to be which included a long line. Of locals. This is kind of special because gweilo activites are usually different from locals activities, but I went with it. The line to use the lift was super long and I should have grabbed a beer at the 7-11 on the corner. I was in line forever.


Drinking towers are just what they sound like. Two tall, thin buildings, and each floor a different bar. Maybe about 25 floors of bar. I finally made my way to the 17th Floor, or wherever my pals were and the crankiness slipped away immediately.

Chum and Daven with the mics, and Daven's friend from home.


I was expecting some kind of crazy club, but it was very chillax and loungey. I appreciate any pub where you can sit. Each floor is pretty small but offers an assortment of games, refreshments, and KAREOKE.

I strayed from the singing, and stayed with the Jack.


The kids picked some pretty good songs though, including
What's Love Got to Do with it? and a slew of Ace of Base.


Powers and Me.
I also dig this place because it was amazingly friendly to the wallet. There were about 7 or 8 of us and after purchasing one bottle of Absolute, one bottle of Jack, and several rounds of free shots, our total was only $200 HKD each, which is unheard of. I'll put that into perspective for you. Last night I paid half that for one really really crappy lychee martini that I waited forever for.


Chum, Fred, and Wing.

Let's not talk about what happened after the Absolute and Jack. Cause I ended up at Beijing Club, and that's not ok.

PEACE.

Pirate/Viking Disco Dance Party Junk

It seems that I've had my fair share of junk this summer. This one was organized by the guys I went camping with, for Alex's bday. I love this picture. Can you spot the beer mid-flight?


The view as we leave HK Island.


They were serious when they named it a disco dance party. Alex even brought his 'fro.


Birthday boy with the jello shots.




Peter getting ready to jump from the upper deck.


A friend was gratious enough to let me borrow his waterproof camera for the day, so I got some coooool pics. Here's me and Powers.


Wing, Chum, Fred, and the turtle.


Me with our junk boat.


I've never ever hit the beer bong before. If you can't burp it's kinda hard to chug. Well, I didn't wanna be a weenie and not go for it, and when I did I found it so alarmingly easy that I kinda had to do another one.

So that, combined with the tequila-ritas and jello shots earlier made me completely unaware of the rest of the day.



After a lot of dancing which I don't really remember, I passed out at the front of the boat and woke up a tad sunburnt. But I woke up just in time for the sunset.

Private Kitchens: Sijie Sichuan

A few weeks ago I went to a private kitchen of a different sort.

Deep within the bowels of Wan Chai lies a nondescript apartment building, and on it's second floor you'll find Sijie Sichuan. It's a converted apartment that will feed 6 or so tables of people. Bring someone that can speak AND read cantonese. Many American born, Canadian born, Aussie, or Brit-Chinese might be able to speak cantonese but few of them can read it.

Since, as usual, I had no idea what was going on, I let the experts select the menu.


Sorry, I can't explain to you what any of this is. But it was good.








Everyone on that side of the table I had just met.


Even though this is a szechuan restaurant, most of the food was quite mild. I think they were holding off til the very end.


Don't worry-lah. This is not worms or anything creepy. It's just pork.




And here's where it starts to get HOT




And here it is folks. The final, face burning dish. The special kind of peppers are called mala peppers, and are so f'ing hot that your mouth and lips tingle.


Oh yeah, it was goooooood.


And I was not kidding about the peppers burning your face off.

The best part about the restaurant was the owner. A hilarious lady who would challenge all the guys to chug a glass of beer faster than her. And 95% of the time she would win. I hear that during the week she busts out some moonshine.

I admire Sijie. She lives a good life. Gets to cook good food for good peeps, and drink them all under the table 7 nights a week.

Private Kitchens: Magnolia

The private kitchen phenomenon is something I was not familiar with until recently. I've heard of private kitchens in NYC charging upwards of hundreds and hundreds of dollars. Here, you can find an indulgent meal at a very decent price.

You'll hear that Hongkers is a foodie town. I will beg to differ. People in HK love to eat, but that does not mean the food is always good. The cool thing is there are more restaurants here per capita than anywhere in the world, and it costs less to eat out than to cook. You can have a fantastic meal for pennies, or a crappy meal that will drain your wallet... it's all kind of a crap shoot. But an adventure nonetheless.

I think private kitchens are easy to come by here because it allows people to cook good food without going through all the red tape of opening up a restaurant.

My first private kitchen experience was a month or so ago at Magnolia Oh, sweet Jesus. My friend Willis, who happens to be from Los Feliz (!) organized a big dinner which needed to be rescheduled because a typhoon hit on our original date. But it was all worth the wait.

Magnolia happens to be in my neighborhood, and has gotten rave reviews. The chef is from New Orleans so it's real cajun/creole, which is otherwise non-existent here. Larger parties get their own room upstairs, and smaller parties will be seated together in a very family dining fashion. We started with some light appetizers and wine. Gotta love no corkage fees!


There was gumbo.


Salad


Crawfish pie. ::drool::


More crawfish pie.


Jambalaya.

Hmm, it's not a good idea to be lookin at these pics when you're on a diet.


Something wonderful. Not too sure exactly what this is.


Some okra/veggie/fabulousity


Mashed Sweet Potatoes. Oh. My. God.


For those of you who know my eating habits, I can get kinda weird when it comes to meat. If it's good, I'm all over it. If it's not so good, I get freaked out. And this... for someone who's not into ribs... was out of this world.


No proper southern dinner would be complete without it.

I didn't even want to think about dessert, but, since the menu is decided by the chef...





It was a fabulous, fabulous meal. I'll be there for Thanksgiving as well and I can't wait!!