Today we headed over to Causeway Bay to do some fun shopping, but also so that Danny can order new lenses for his glasses from his favourite optical store.

We left the hotel for that area knowing full well that a huge protest would be starting out in that area, over the killing of the bus hostages in the Philippines.  Danny assured me that Hong Kong police are famous for dealing with very large crowds effectively, and everything we’d heard about the protest said it would be peaceful, so we went.

The area was VERY crowded.  Between it being the weekend, and the protest, there were many more people in the area than would be normal, and many of them were wearing black shirts.  In fact, I realized I was wearing black too, but that was just a coincidence! 

We had some fun shopping in Sogo, but really didn’t buy much.  The kids had fun doing some kind of promotional game for Ribena, their favourite drink.  It was odd, and the game made no sense, but they were given a free bottle of Ribena for participating so they were both happy.

Danny ordered his new lenses, while the kids and I watched and had fun.  Just before finding the optical store, I ventured into a jeweler and found a ring I liked.  I’ve been wanting to buy myself a jade ring this trip, but just haven’t seen what I wanted.  Today, I found it.  A beautiful ring! Burmese jade, set in gold.  The one they have that I like is set in white gold, but they are going to make me one in yellow gold, the same, with that stone.  I get to pick it up in a few days.  As a gift, the store gave the two kids little silver necklaces.  The kids were happy, and I left convinced that I must have paid too much for my ring!

The protest began while we were still in the area, and for the first part it was well organized, huge, and really peaceful.  They marched the streets, as you can see in the photos, carrying banners asking for a more appropriate investigation into the incident, and extending condolences to the affected families.  It was really something to watch.  In fact there was a huge police presence, including the special forces, and many high ranking officers (the white shirts).  There were no incidents that we saw (or heard of later) in spite of over 750,000 people marching, so it was wonderful!!

We had committed to going to Pok Hei’s house for dinner tonight, since two of his daughters are heading back to Toronto tomorrow for school.  Wow, did they ever have a lot of food and a lot of guests!  There were over 20 people there for dinner, with homemade dumplings, followed by beautiful crabs and shrimps!  What a spread!  The kids also had pizza, since auntie offered to order it for all the kids and teens. 

They played Wii with the teenagers, and we found out that Stephanie can bowl like nobody we know!!!  Kid did nothing but throw strikes and spares!!  Emily was frustrated by Stephanie being so good at it, but actually was a pretty good loser. 

At one point, both kids were eating from a bag of chips on the table, and it wasn’t until I looked that I realized they were “HOT and spicy” chips.  Yes, both kids ate handfuls of these darn chips, and then only complained that they were thirsty!  My kids have very weird food tastes!