Here are some photos that I took during the first day of my recent holiday trip to Hong Kong.  This is a very famous and must see attraction there, where you take a tram up to the the Peak Tower at the top of Victoria Peak.  The aim is to view the cityscape of Hong Kong down below.  As I was there in the evening, I got to see the night view! 

The Peak Tram station at Victoria Peak, on Hong Kong Island.  It’s within walking distance from their Central MTR Station.

The Peak Tram at Victoria Peak, Hong Kong.  After a 10 minute interval, the tram arrived for the batch of visitors queuing before me.  I became the first in line for the next batch of passengers to be released onto the platform after this tram left!

The long queue of visitors to take the Peak Tram at Victoria Peak, Hong Kong.  I queued for more than half an hour on a Sunday evening, in the heat of summer!

The steep Peak Tram track at Victoria Peak, Hong Kong.  The very steep track slopes at around 45 degrees at some points, where the buildings next to the track seem to look like they are ’tilting’ at scary angles instead!

Hong Kong City view at night from the top of Victoria Peak.  A photo cannot truly capture the breathtaking night city view that I saw from the top of The Peak Tower.  You have to be there in person to experience the full granduer, though the feeling would had been much better if it wasn’t summer time.  It didn’t feel that much cooler than the foot of the mountain.

I’ve been to this venue some years ago during their winter season.  It was very cold but much more comfortable then.  So I suggest visiting Hong Kong during anytime except their summer time and typhoon season.  Summer time is great for sales though, if shopping is your main aim for your trip!

Be back again tomorrow to view the photos I took at Repulse Bay and Aberdeen, also on Hong Kong Island!

Yes, I’m back in Singapore as my plane touched down at Changi Airport around midnight today!  While it feels great to be stepping on home soil again, I also feel regretful that my short holiday trip was over so soon.  As I travelled light, handling my luggage and clearing the customs were easy for me. 

While in Hong Kong over the past 5 days, I visited the popular tourist attractions and some shopping areas.  Traveling by their MTR (equivalent to our MRT) was a breeze and very convenient.  On some days I travelled by pre-arranged tour coach to the attraction places like Lantau Island, Disneyland, Ocean Park, for the city tour, plus to and fro their air port.

The blog posts to expect in the coming days will be about:

1) Taking the Peak Tram and visiting the Peak Tower, plus seeing the breath taking night view of Hong Kong from the top of Victoria Peak.  Read more [>>]

2) The beautiful Repulse Bay (a long and curved sandy beach) and Aberdeen (formerly filled with boat people, now has a large collection of private yachts docked there) that is rich in history.  Read more [>>]

3) Taking the cable car up the mountains of Lantau Island to visit Ngong Ping Village (where the giant Buddha statue sitting on top of a hill resides).  Read more [>>]

4) The Hong Kong Avenue of Stars (Hong Kong’s equivalent of Hollywood’s Walk of Fame in the US).  Read more [>>]

5) My visit to Hong Kong Disneyland (the 3rd Disneyland I’ve visited so far, the others being the ones in California, and in Tokyo)!

6) My visit to Ocean Park, the most famous theme park in Hong Kong!

As my laptop is still awaiting its new screen replacement, I’m using an older and much slower back up laptop for now.  Hence uploading photos will be more tedious. 

Nevertheless after unpacking my stuff, I’ll find a way to upload my photos to blog about the places in Hong Kong that I visited.  Come back again to view my upcoming blog posts on the above places that I visited!

How to prepare your travel luggage for lugging toys home from overseas shopping - Most people use a small boxy trolley luggage to pack the things they need to wear and use when going on an overseas trip.  Many a times, we don’t really know what kind of toys we might buy during the trip, much less know the size of the toys and their packaging to cater a space for them in our luggage.

A suggestion is to pack in some foldable hand carry travel bags (those cylindrical shaped travel bags that some tour agencies tend to give out to their customers for free) in your travel trolley luggage.  If you have no problems hand carrying your toy purchases in their given shopping bags, then do it that way if you prefer. 

If not, some MOC and smaller MIB toys are better off packed in your boxy trolley luggage to protect them.  Use your clothes as padding to stop the toys from moving about in your trolley luggage.  Your excess clothes can be packed into the foldable travel bags that you brought along and then padlocked before checking them all in with the main luggage!

Differentiate between impulse buying and passionate buying of fad toys - Fad toys do what they do, they are sold to people using a marketing strategy that based on hype at the point in time, especially for movie related toys. 

The hype usually reaches a high point where collectors get most crazy about the toys and there is frenzy to grab them.  But when the movie stops showing in the cinemas and after thehype dies down, the toys in the stores become peg and shelf warmers, while those already in our collections are reminders of our unexplainable short term craze over them back then. 

So in short, do think and consider very carefully before you part with your hard earned income, and follow the herd instinct with other people in the next fad toys frenzy!

Some toys deteriorate in tropical climate - I’ve had vintage My Little Pony and She-Ra toys from the 80’s whose plastic surfaces became oily or sticky with age and exposure to our hot and humid climate.  Most of the times they can be salvaged by using disposable wet wipes to rub onto the affected surfaces to remove the oily and sticky layers. 

If you are comfortable with washing your toys, you can also consider running them under tap water, then rub them thoroughly with soap before rinsing them.  Sometimes a few rounds of washing are required to remove all the oil and dirt.  

Toys with rooted hair can have added steps of having their hair shampooed, conditioned and then rinsed.  Leave them to dry off naturally or under a fan, instead of using a hair drying on them. 

Sometimes in the most unfortunate circumstances, the rooted hair becomes too brittle with age and exposure that they break off easily, especially when you wet the hair during washing.  At this stage, the toy is ruined.  By then, you either have to discard it, or send it to a customizer to re-root it with replacement hair.  That would mean extra costs!

Know the hidden costs of toy collecting - Do realise that in the midst of this hobby, you do inevitably somehow end up incurring more costs like: shipping costs to import them, plus getting special display cabinets, storage boxes, zipper bags of all sizes, cleaning and customizing materials, and even self-storage rental fees etc. to keep and maintain your toys.  Hence the costs of toy collecting do not just end at the point of purchasing the respective toys!

Keep proper toy inventory records of not only the cost of each toy purchase, but also where exactly you have stored them.  This makes retrieving and pricing them for resale more convenient, should you choose to clear them away one day.  In a way, it also facilitates an exit strategy for your toy hobby should you decide to call it quits one day!

I recall reading about a similar topic to this on Jcee’s blog some time ago.  I’ll be going off for my mid year short vacation to Hong Kong tomorrow and will be back 5 days later. 

While I’ve finished packing all the things I need to use for my trip, I’m still considering whether to bring a toy along for fun photography while on holiday.  I used to do this many years ago when I was much newer into toy collecting.  For my previous vacation to the US last year, I didn’t do it.

One thing about bringing toys out with me is that I worry they might get damaged, lose their parts, or worse, get completely lost by some unforeseen mishap, which I am not prepared to accept.  That’s why my toys are called collectibles that are supposed to stay at home and just look pretty for my enjoyment, LOL!

Oh well, I might as well forget this thought and just go on my long overdue holiday without any toys.  Maybe I’ll buy a new toy in Hong Kong and take photos of it there.  That would be a good alternative!

I’ll be taking my first overseas vacation of the year from 25-29 July 2010 and my destination shall be Hong Kong! 

I look forward to visiting their iconic tourist attractions like Disneyland, Ocean Park and Lantau Island; plus 1 and a half days of free and easy! 

I’ve scheduled some more short toy collecting tips to be posted daily on my blog while I’m away.  Now I need to go start packing for my upcoming mid-year trip!

The staff from OG confirmed that the latest 2010 Transformers toylines - Hunt for the Decepticons (HFTD) and War for Cybertron (WFC), will be eligible for 20% discount during the last 4 days of the Great Singapore Sale (GSS), ending on 25 July 2010!

Transformers HFTD Deluxe action figures - wave 1 - SGD 27.90 each

(Battle Blades Bumblebee, Ironhide, Jetblade & Sea Attack Ravage)

Transformers Generations Deluxe action figures - wave 1 - SGD 27.90 each

(War for Cybertron aka WFC: Autobot Drift, Bumblebee, Thrust & Optimus Prime)

If you have been holding out on the above toys till now and are satisfied with a 20% discount, you can head down to the store to get them from now till this Sunday.  Happy Transformers toys shopping!