Air Asia is cheap, but it comes at a price. Or so we discovered yesterday. See, the airline will not let you check through, so if you are flying from, oh, I don't know, maybe Denpasar on Bali (Indonesia) to Macau (SAR of China) via Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), you cannot simply pick up boarding passes in Denpasar, hang out in international transit areas, or forget about your bags. Instead, you must book flights with enough time between them that if your first flight is delayed, you will still make the second (because if the first Air Asia flight is delayed and that causes you to miss the second one, that is your problem, and Air Asia will do nothing for you). Then, once you arrive in Kuala Lumpur - at the Air Asia low cost terminal, which is *all* Air Asia - you have to immigrate to Malaysia, claim your bags, check into your next flight, check your bags again, emigrate from Malaysia, and clear security. And the line-up at emigration can take about 45 minutes, which is not really that surprising considering 1. Air Asia makes more money if you miss the flight and 2. only Air Asia passengers are using this emigration line. Also, Air Asia not only does not feed you, but does not allow you to take your own food on board. And given the liquid ban, the only way you're going to get any water is to buy it at a store in the Air Asia terminal (and then surrender it before getting onto the next flight. Sigh.)
It was one of those days that included flight delays, lots of waiting, and mostly crap food. The best part (by which I mean the worst part) was when I figured out that the airport express link to the ferry from Macau airport stops at 19:30, and our flight got in at 19:50 and thus we actually had to get stamped in to Macau. Since this was a trip with Rick, we got on a local bus with our packs (I think there is one woman in Macau who really hates me) and then got confused by the ferry terminal. The ferries to Kowloon were no longer running. Jetfoil to Hong Kong goes all night, but the earliest available sailing was after midnight. That is, until Rick asked about "super class", and we could get on a boat leaving in 10 minutes - so off we raced to emigration, and onto our assigned seats on the boat.
Super class on Jetfoil is interesting. You get a meal, even. The meal consists of sugar, sugar paste, sugary cream things, sugary fruit drink, and sugary food colour products. I slept for most of the hour to Hong Kong. And then we spent five minutes figuring out how to get to the MTR, I was a total dummy about how to use my single fare ticket and had to be rescued by some nice Chinese woman, and we changed subways and before 11 p.m., we hit Chungking Mansions, dropped our stuff and raced up to the Khyber Pass Mess Club for some curry and then I fell asleep to the glow of the mac across the room (which in Chungking Mansions is about 1 meter away).
I love the grand names for things that... aren't. Chungking is to Mansion like favela is to Taj Mahal, and the Khyber Pass is a private club because I doubt that they'd pass a restaurant health inspection. The curry was good.
Right now, I'm perched on my bed, waiting for 2 p.m. to pick up our laundry before going out exploring some more. I ventured out this morning, for a walk and some errands. I feel accomplished: I found laundry, went to a pharmacy for some ointment for some nasty foot thing I picked up in Bali, got money out of the ATM, procured my very own octopus card to avoid having to figure out the single ride tickets from now on, ate breakfast at an unremarkable Chinese diner, found some coffee, and replaced my Hong Kong plug adapter for the computer (I have one. It is on a field trip to somewhere called "bar camp". Guess what Rick is doing today?) And while I'm listing my accomplishments, today I have also brushed my teeth, combed my hair, made my bed and uhhhhh... yeah. Hong Kong is overwhelming, ok? (And I'm not that fond of shopping. It's a weekend. That's what people *do*.)