Hong Kong 2025 Day 1: Arriving in Hong Kong & Sham Shui Po (香港.深水埗)
- Rick
- Aug 5
- 7 min read
Updated: 14 hours ago
5th August 2025, Tuesday | 🌧
We were going to Hong Kong. My sister was going there for Andy Lau’s "Proud of You" concert on 9th August — which coincided with Singapore's National Day. Normally, I would not plan a trip to regions around the South China Sea during the summer-typhoon season when the weather was either super-hot or rained heavily with occasional typhoons. Also, taking flights near public holidays would be more expensive. Anyway, I tagged along — it had been 17 years since I last visited Hong Kong & Macau in January 2008.
It was an early morning flight. We set off as early as 6am, in a light drizzle, and reached Changi International Airport Terminal 3 at 6:40am — exactly 2 hours before departure time. After registration at the self-service kiosk for SIA Flight SQ882 and dropping-off our check-in baggage, we entered the Transit Area right away. Immigration clearance was passport-less for Singaporeans at the automated gantries that used iris scanning for identification. We were through immigration in no time.
We came to Singapore Food Street (新加坡美食街), a food court on level 2, where many stalls served local delicacies. Despite flying to Hong Kong soon, I opted for Hong Kong-style char siew cheong fun (港式叉烧肠粉, S$4.80) from Chef Wei HK Cheong Fun (伟少港式肠粉) and a kopi-O kosong from the opposite coffee stall for breakfast — I had have Chef Wei's cheong fun dishes near my place several times.

Unlike Changi International Airport Terminal 4 that had a centralised security check immediately after immigration clearance and needing around 3 hours to be at the airport prior to departure, Terminal 1, 2 and 3's security checks were decentralised at the boarding gates, thus, needing to reach the terminals about 2 hours prior to departure. We cleared the security check and came to the waiting area at Gate B4 about 20 minutes before boarding commenced.
The 8:40am SIA Flight SQ882 to Hong Kong was delayed for about an hour due to heavy rainfall in Hong Kong — this was expected when flying to the city during the summer-typhoon season from mid-July to September / October. Fortunately, Hong Kong Observatory had forecasted no tropical cyclones for the next 5 days in Hong Kong. Typhoon Wipha, with Typhoon Signal T10 (strongest), had hit Hong Kong about 2 weeks back, thus, another strong typhoon was not expected so soon, but the city had been experiencing unusual heavy rainfalls for days.
At 9:40am, after sitting in the Airbus jet for an hour, the jet took off. Inflight meal was served at around 10:30am. I picked roasted chicken with dry-tossed noodle and my sister had omelette with sausages from the two options available. Accompanying the main dishes were fresh fruits, yogurt, a small bun with butter, a bottle of drinking water and we opted for coffee — no milk / creamer for me. We enjoyed the breakfast with inflight movies.

The air-conditioning in the jet was colder than expected and we had to use the blanket provided to cover our legs to maintain blood circulation. At 1:40pm, the jet landed, taxied to Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA) Terminal 1 and was further delayed, by 15 minutes, due to another jet having some issues at the designated arrival gate.
At Hong Kong immigration, our passports were not stamped but issued with paper slips stating our permitted period of stay in Hong Kong till 3rd November 2025 (90 days). At the bottom of each slip was a message: "May use self-service departure" — I guessed we were registered to use automated clearance on departure, just like in Singapore.
After collecting our baggage, we exited the restricted area to the Arrival Hall. We located the ticketing kiosk for Mass Transit Railway (MTR)'s Airport Express, but we were not taking the express train. At the Add Value Machine for Octopus cards (八达通), we topped up our cards with HK$200 cash each — each top-up would extend the validity period of the card for another 1,000 days. The machine accepted cash only.
We followed the signs to the Ground Transportation Centre of the airport. A Cityflyer Airport Service (城巴机场快线) A21, scheduled for 2:43pm towards Tsim Sha Shui and ending at Hung Hom Station, was waiting at its designated bus bay and we boarded it immediately. The fare was HK$34.60 per person when boarding at the airport. We paid by tapping our Octopus cards on the card reader — we did not noticed that payment could be done with credit cards too until after the trip.
Service A21's next stop was at the Hong Kong Port of the 55Km Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge (HZMB), which we would be re-entering Hong Kong on Day 3.

The heavy rainfall that Hong Kong was experiencing before our arrival had subsided to a light drizzle, though it picked up intensity at some point as we cruised along the highway from HKIA to the busy city. 45 minutes later, we alighted at the bus-stop, named Man Ming Lane (文明里), along Nathan Road in Yau Ma Tei (油麻地). Luckily, the rain had stopped or we would be alighting, with big luggage, from the bus into the rain as the bus-stop was not sheltered. We walked 200 metres to The Cityview, the hotel where we had made reservations.
The Cityview (城景国际) was an eco-friendly hotel without one-time-use toothbrush and toothpaste, and also no bottled water in the room but there were water dispensers in the lobby. We shared a Twin Bed Room on the 15th floor that was of reasonable size, not too crammed. The bathroom was a little small but did not pose much issues for us. After a quick change of clothings, we hit the streets — we were behind lunchtime by many hours.

From Yau Ma Tei, we took MTR subway to Sham Shui Po (深水埗) Station. It was already 4:30pm by the time we came to a Man Kee Cart Noodle (文记车仔面) along Fuk Wing Street (福荣街). A notice on its door said that it was closed for the day and directed us to another outlet couple of units away. We walked into the second outlet, seemed quite new, seated and ordered via their online menu.
I chose beef brisket (牛腩), fish skin dumplings (鱼皮饺), pickled mustard (榨菜), yellow noodle, spicy curry sauce and beef broth for my cart noodle and my sister had pig blood cubes (猪红), braised chicken wings (鸡翅尖), prawn tofu roll (鲜虾腐皮卷), vegetable, flat noodle, special sauce and beef broth as well. The total cost came up to HK$133, including a bottled roselle drink for me.

After exiting from Man Kee Cart Noodle, and walking further down the row of shops, we realised there were actually 4 outlets of Man Kee Cart Noodle along the same row. The original outlet, with a different signboard from the others, was 3 units from the one we visited.
We went in search for Kwong Yu Yee Old Wine Shop (广如意老酒庄) and found it at the intersection between Pei Ho Street (北河街) and Yee Kuk Street (医局街) at around 6pm. I entered the wine shop and asked if they still brewed yuk bing siu (玉冰烧), a traditional Hong Kong-specialty rice wine that was macerated with pork belly fats. They did and I took out an empty glass bottle (I brought if from Singapore) for the owner to fill. The small bottle could hold about 250ml of the rice wine (HK$23). Not a good drinker, I intended to sample the wine in the hotel room later.

We had planned to dine at Oi Man Sang (爱文生), a famous restaurant for wok-fired cookings, but the super-late lunch made us too full to eat more heavy food. We decided to check out the restaurant but to try its food some other day. We located the restaurant and noted that it occupied 4 consecutive shop units in a row along Shek Kip Mei Street (石硤尾街).
After exploring few streets in Sham Shui Po, we were back along Fuk Wing Street, which was also known as "Sham Shui Po Toy Street" (深水埗玩具街). Shops selling toys and stationery for kids lined both sides of the street. My sister shopped around for toys and stationery for her little boy while I window-shopped.

7:20pm, we were still not hungry enough to have dinner, but we could manage with some light food, so we popped into Kung Wo Beancurd Factory (公和豆品厂) nearby. The "factory" had two outlets facing one another along Pei Ho Street (北河街). They made various tofu products for sales as well as serving them as dishes in the shop.
We walked into the original outlet to try their warm Tofu Pudding (豆腐花, HK$14) without sugar and Tofu Ice-Cream with Ginger Syrup (姜糖豆腐雪糕, HK$15). They were nice and Kung Wo was a great spot for breakfast too — we were back on Day 5 for more.

8pm, we took MTR from Sham Shui Po to Mong Kok (旺角). With many shopping plazas, shops and restaurants in the area, there were also many people on the streets — it was really "people mountain, people sea" (人山人海). We also briefly strolled through Ladies Market (女人街) with lesser crowds. All sorts of goods were sold here, not just goods for ladies. However, most goods had no price tags and bargaining was essential — I disliked such practices and unwilling to shop here.

Before ending the walk around Mong Kok, we came to Wei Wei Snacks (威威小食), which sold fried foodstuffs on skewers, including stinky tofu, squids, curry fishballs, etc, and takeaway dishes. The smell of its stinky tofu had reached us some distance away.
We had fried stinky tofu (HK$15), which were cut into 4 pieces — I recalled that I had tried the same store before in 2008 and the stinky tofu then was not cut. Cutting the tofu before frying made it easier to eat and increased the area of crispy skins, which I liked but my sister preferred chunkier soft tofu with lesser fried skin — well, taste was subjective. We munched on the hot, stinky tofu while walking the last 200 metres to The Cityview.

Later in the room, I tried the yuk bing siu (玉冰烧) that I bought earlier. I intended to sip about 40ml of the rice wine a night and finish the bottle by the 6th day before returning to Singapore.
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