In the last few weeks I have discovered “the Mid Levels”. Which is odd since I have been here a year. The Mid Levels are located – unsurprisingly – halfway up the steep hill that forms that backbone of Hong Kong Island. The area is a bit vaguely defined – everyone has their own slightly different version – but the area above (but South of) Hollywood Road – Soho – is a good starting point.
Here, many of the island’s nicest restaurants, bars and boutiques are concentrated in a quaint and tony little bubble, on steeply risingly streets. So why hadn’t I explored it earlier?
The Mid Levels is Hong Kong’s gweilo central, desperately in denial of its place in Asia. In many streets here you see more white faces than Asian, and the Irish pubs, Mexican restaurants and inauthentic sushi bars are filled with young transplanted professionals from Lille, Dublin or Toronto. The connection between this hovering enclave and the rest of the city is minimal. Its the most relentlessly Westernized place on the continent.
With the righteousness of a new arrival I had dismissed the area as a self-absorbed playground for those too scared or unimaginative to engage with the city at large; but now, a year later, my hardline stance has predictably softened. Its not as if I have been doing such a great job at integrating – or particularly want to – either. And in a city that is starved of pleasant places to just hang out, I have to admit the area had its (overpriced) charms. At least it is …nice.
Parts of Soho really do feel to me like a sunnier London – you could be on a (less gay) Old Compton Street.
My favourite spot so far is the Soho Junction, a rickety openair bar with dressed down locals and Nepalese owners, looking across a pretty local intersection and the green shacks of street market traders. Here you can sink a pint and eavesdrop on conversations about Perth real estate or meet Spanish backpackers, while enjoying a real tropical evening breeze. Just next door, stone stairs descend past a wondrous little reminder of the area’s roots – a mini-shrine in a corrugated iron shack, lit with fluoro lights and wreathed in smoke from a dozen spiral incense sticks.
At the base of this staircase I found a kitsch-beyond-words “African bar” with fake animal pelt banquettes and “giraffes blood” cocktails, and the “Joyce artists cafe” which I am yet to try.
But it seems like the area is more than worth a return visit.
