Rockstar does Hong Kong Wetland Park In Tin Shui Wai, “City of Sadness”

Tin Shui Wai, as seen from inside the HK Wetland Park... I love how the buildings seem to rise up out of all the park shrubbery...

Finally here are more pics from our periodic HK Wetlands Park outings…

We thought this looked like your average HDB in say, Tampines or Eunos in Singapore (where I rented my first room for SGD 300 a decade ago) so what with Wetland Park nearby, we happily recommended it to friends on a budget looking to stay for a few months, fresh out of college. Which was when we discovered Tin Shui Wai‘s nickname is City of Misery/ Sadness because of some high-profile cases of domestic violence and suicides in the past.

We’d been frequenting the Hong Kong Wetland Park for some time and even toyed with having Rockstar’s birthday party in the park cafeteria (Okok we will cater some non-“HK fastfood fare” to supplement).

"Fastfood," HK style!

There’s a big bunch of indoor educational activities as well as a playground (that unfortunately has a min height requirement of 100cm 🙁 Rockstar’s not there yet)

Check out this wall at the entrance to the park, made from recycled oyster shells... Loves!

Thru the entrance, to the great indoors and outdoors

 You can seriously spend a long, busy, educational (translation: guilt-free, affirming) day with your child here.

Whether it's letting your rockstar stomp about outdoors on the slightly moving boardwalk...

Which leads adventurously into the wilderness (umm, sort of)

In low tide and the right season you get lotsa mud skippers and crabs up close, from this walkway… Rockstar’s run around in the park (though not the actual boardwalk, obviously) with the local kids here before – there”s always local kids here, a far more common sight than obviously expat kids (though you do see some, very occasionally)…

The funniest thing is Rockstar speaks no Cantonese, and the kids speak zero  English, yet somehow they can understand each other perfectly…

Various kiddie craft stations in the gift shop

Like so... This is Rockstar making"keychain" bottles of decorative sand for grandparents...

(Btw Rockstar’s wearing real Ralph Lauren bot on sale, because I noticed the dad had a cheapo pasar malam t-shirt bought months earlier that looks just like it!)

And a scented candle with lotsa sparkles in it for the dad to put in the toilet, of all things...

(The molten blue wax is kept in a thermos box in hot water – and those are the hands of one of the local college kids manning the station and helping all the little kids get their crafts done)

Why go outside on a rainy day? Meet some of the umpteen critters they now have tanks indoors as well!

Now you know boy crabs from girl crabs!

The way to more entertainment!

See?

An unfair fight... (You can move that claw but seriously, HOW tall do they think this crab is??)

So, boys and girls, is the above a boy crab or a girl crab? (Who the hell cares)

This Is Not A Plastic Croc...

Every time we’re here someone nearby thinks these guys are fake… If you stare at them long enough you’ll see their claws start to move… Or else their eyes start to follow you… And they have strangely clean teeth… For a croc… (WHY do I think anyone cares?)

Auditorium surrounded by exhibits and umpteen touch screen games

OK – try these games on for size! (There are just loads more than the few we played with… Ditto interactive exhibits…

Rockstar is feeding these virtual bats and selecting a good urban home for them

This one's a Chinese Sinseh Game where you pick the right herbs to cure various ailments

So we suck...

So sue us…

Rockstar does a mean Whatever This Thing Is though...

Rockstar going up and down in the section full of conservation messages

( The photo above doesn’t do this place justice, there are umpteen interactive displays for kids to read and press tantalizing buttons and touch screen displays, including How Much Water Does It Take To Make a Hamburger Or Pair Of Jeans?)

And so lastly, a public service message: Frogs have feelings too 🙂