First things first, let me point out that the Pacific Coffee Company's 'Mocha Brownie Chillino' actually has a chocolate brownie blended into it - I just watched it being done. This, apart from being fantastic and the way the world should works gives me just the excuse Ive been looking for to start boycotting Starbucks which along with McDonalds is offending me by being everywhere I look, in every town in the world, about one every 3 buildings, its uneccessary and the coffees crap and I vote no.

So I have been in Hong Kong 3 days, two of which have involved shopping and the other day I was ill... Its just SO cheap!! This morning I bought a pair of o'neil board shorts for 4 quid. Theres the obvious issue that my rucksack cannot fit anything else and weighs a ton but I really dont see how I can NOT buy stuff when its such a bargain. Its not even easy to avoid shopping streets as every streets a shopping street here. And its so nice that signs are written in english and that Im not being stared at in the street (as much).

My current passion is riding the tram along the top of hong kong island. It too is a bargain at 2 dollar flat fare which I make about 10p, they are double decker so youre all high up and the people on them are all locals who are either smily or indifferent. And theres NO SPITTING - hurrah! After a months soundtrack in China of spitting it is so fantastic not to hear it here cos its GROSS!! The whole fun of the tram is that its very tempting to stick your head out the window to gaze up at the zillion storey buildings but then your head is likely to get sliced off by another passing tram. Ditto with the arms if you were to hang those out. Its extremely engaging. Im catching the tram at every possible opportunity and sitting at either the back or the front to get the whole driving experience. It feels like the Edinburgh bus, minus the obsencely rude drivers, mum would really like it.

Yesterday I met my friend Dave from the China tour and we visited The Peak. We took the bus up there and it was nuts as mountain cloud reduced the visibility to zero so the driver of this regular public transport bus was driving us through thick white mist and we were surrounded by I guess you could call it rainforest, it was a very surreal experience and probably not one youd get in that many other places! Once at the top however said cloud, even though it clerared a bit, made it a pretty average viewpoint, not a patch on sugarloaf in rio which is probably still the best yet. We decided to walk back down to enjoy more of the rainforest but got caught in what Id call a monsoon in that it rained a lot immediately with no chance of finding shelter in time. We were drenched. I think Hong Kongs great but Im not sure if torrential monsoon downpours and threats of typhoons (6 biggies a year apparently but mostly in September) is preferble to Londons wet and miserable. Anyway Ive bought an umbrella to match my rip off gucci bag which just like my 'real jade' earrings (nudge nudge, wink wink) is falling to bits - the common factor here - bought in China. Ill get round to doing a China blog at some point. At this stage probably the less said the better ;) But god bless Hong Kong! And if you havnt already go see the new Indiana Jones, I thought it was brilliant :)