Tired Laura Hates Everything And Everyone

5/17- 5/19

Some people work and manage brilliantly without sleep.  I am not one of those people.  I turned into a crazy, judgmental, mean, bipolar, angry, emotional bitch.  It's really bad.  Those crazy people you see on reality t.v. that snap because they're sleep deprived and stressed have nothing on me.  Physically it feels the way I feel when I'm drunk- exhausted, but usually when I'm drunk, I'm quite happy, though a bit annoying and repetitive.  Usually when I'm drunk, I'm quite happy, though I can be a bit repetitive and annoying. 

Suffice to say, it's absolutely horrible, and for this reason, I will do almost anything (sleep in odd places, skip out on doing something really amazing, decide something isn't really that important when it is) to make sure I get enough sleep.  If I'm just a little sleep deprived, I'm still normally okay, but if I get less than about six hours, the craziness sets in.

You can imagine then, that after a 1:25 a.m. flight from Taipei to Manila, followed by a 5:40 a.m. flight to Hong Kong, I was not a pleasant person to be around.  I remained as silent as possible to avoid screaming at an innocent person for walking wrong, for example, and wasn't even especially cheered up by the man at Immigration asking me my name to confirm I was the same person as the girl in my passport since he said my face had gotten much thinner.  (Side note- my passport photo is horrendous and somehow managed to make me look much fatter and uglier than I was even at the time, when I was much heavier.  I don't know why it's so bad because even though I'm not particularly photogenic, most official photos I have are okay (licenses).  I blame it on the fact that the photo was switched to digital and somehow added weird shadows and redness, creating chins and rosacea that were never there.)

Whatever.  I found an ATM, thrilled that I could finally take money out on my schedule since BoA (the worst bank ever) partners with China Construction Bank so they don't charge a fee.  I bought a Coke Zero, found the right bus to take me to a hostel area, was told to go to another bus (same number, just across the road, I still don't know why) and finally got on the right one.  On the bus, I kept falling asleep but I wasn't too worried about missing my stop since it was about 45 minutes away.

I'd looked on Wikitravel's Hong Kong guide well ahead of time so I wouldn't have any hostel issues and it had suggested walking along Nathan Road, between Mong Kok and Tsim Sha Tsui (TST) and not booking ahead because there was always room and there were just tons of hostels in this area.  So I got off at Mong Kok and started walking South on Nathan Road, towards TST.  The area seemed about right for hostels; run down, near a large market, central, but oddly, I didn't see any backpackers or hostels.  I do need to mention here that it's entirely possible that there were several hostels I passed with signs only in Chinese, but I sure as hell didn't see any.  So I kept walking.  And walking.  And cursing Wikitravel.  And walking.

About 2.5 km later, not having seen any hostels (though later, walking along this same road, I saw one, and only one, I'd missed), I was ready to scream, give up and sleep on a park bench like a homeless person.  2.5 km isn't that far (about 1.5 miles) but it feels like it when you're carrying a backpack that's falling apart and made of crap materials so it feels MUCH heavier than it actually is.  It also feels farther than it is when you're exhausted and pissy and homicidal.

I found a little park, that was actually part of a huge park, and sat down.  Part of me wanted to go to sleep but part of me thought that was a terrible idea.  It was around 11 a.m. and my flight had arrived at around 7:45.  Hoping, without any expectations of success, I got out my computer and tried getting Wifi.  Amazingly, it came through with a strong, unsecured (meaning open), free, government signal!  This actually did help my mood a bit and I felt a little better.  Online, I found the name of a specific hostel that Google Maps told me was nearby and headed off.  Within a few blocks, several hostel began to pop up obviously and the area became much more expensive and commercial.  I passed the Tsim Sha Tsui subway station and it was true that in this area, there were tons of available hostels.  I'd only had to walk over 3 km to get there because Wikitravel blows.

The hostel I'd found online was located inside Chungking mansion, which is actually more like a prison.  I'd describe it in detail, but I'm doing my best to forget it.  I spent the rest of that day and the next two sleeping, walking/wandering around for long periods (seeing a convertible completely covered in crystals on a pedestal in a mall at one point), watching t.v. or movies on my laptop, writing and trying different kinds of ice cream (Dryer's Toasted Almond, which was delicious, and Haagan Daaz Orange Chocolate, which was deeply disappointing).

P.S. This is my last entry without pictures!  Thank god, even I was boring myself.