However, at the said address, there is no indication of a restaurant, just an ordinary house entrance with a staircase and some Chinese characters written on top. On the other hand, this is the only place where the restaurant could possibly be.
Finally, I follow some people on the staircase and I end up in a jam-packed hall on the second floor. It is populated by lots of locals and waiters in white jackets, who wave at the new arrivals and direct them to the scarce free places. The hall is lit by ugly white neon lights at the ceiling. Tables and chairs are extremely simple. Neither staff nor guests seem to speak a single word of English.
This is a picture that I found on the internet, and Tripadvisor says it is the Lin Heung Kui teahouse. (@Hong Kongers: this is not the Lin Heung tea house in the Central district; I am unaware of a connection between both places.)
With the smell of nutritious, if not outright fat food, the loud noise and the minimalistic, almost rude service, it feels like a Cologne beer hall. Another parallel is that everything works according to conventions that outsiders don't know. I am squeezed into an almost-full table, get a small cup with a table spoon and chopsticks, another cup for tea, and a piece of paper with a large grid of numbers. Somebody passes by with a huge brass kettle and pours tea into my cup. Like at home, it is refilled without asking, and it is even for free. For the rest, I have to give a sign to the elderly ladies who move around the carts with food. You just tell them to pass a basket, and they stamp the corresponding number on your paper. Simple principle, but since the baskets have a lid and I have no ideas what is in them, I avidly watch what my table companions are having. Following their choices and random pointing at boxes and baskets turns out to be a healthy mix. The food is good and proper. In the end, I have devoured a couple of savoury buns and dumplings for a very reasonable price.
After this, I head to Lingnan University where I will be giving a talk and conducting an experiment after the weekend. People there are very helpful, and on the way back, I stop in Kowloon (=the Northern side of the Hong Kong harbour) for the famous Temple Street Market, a paradise for cheap shopping and bargaining addicts.
There are also some food stalls, but they either look like tourist traps (like the one on the picture) or have a level of hygiene where you would not be surprised if, by pure accident, you would be served fried mice and sauted rats.
I follow my intuition and go for a small restaurant with Sichuan cuisine which seems to strike a good balance between being popular and being tidy. Since I am still quite full, I opt for a small meal: a "sour and chilly" (=spicy) Chongqing noodle soup. It looks like on the picture below, just with a bit more pretty decoration.
(This is not my actual soup. I strongly object to foodporn.)
The combination of spicy and sour aromas speaks to my palate. A welcome contrast to the Cantonese cuisine, which is more on the sweet and salty side. However, the noodles resist the German Spaghetti Eating Scheme: to roll them with the fork on a spoon. I end up spilling noodles all over the table and make a fool of myself. To make things worse, nobody brings me a napkin to conceal the disaster. First, I blame the equipment: I like chopsticks for rice-based dishes, but here, they seem utterly inadequate. A fork, a fork, my kingdom for a fork. Then, it dawns on me that the noodles are more slippery than normal noodles. They are probably not meant to be eaten that way. Although I get more pragmatic and use the chopsticks to get the noodles directly to my mouth, I am still struggling.
It takes me ages to finish my dish. The next day, I learn that these noodles have the poetic name "Slippery Noodles". I would not have guessed. Also, you are allowed to lift the bowl from the table. Good to know.
Again, the service is indifferent at best. Those who do not speak Cantonese (N=1) figure below the staff's radar. Plausibly they are equally impolite to the locals, just more subtly so. The only moment when I get a warm glow from the waitress's eye is when I quickly vacate my table after paying because at this moment, a group of four is entering the otherwise packed restaurant. Yes, it is important to be thankful for the important things in life.
I walk to the harbour and take the ferry back to Hong Kong Island, the center of the city. Everybody is in a good mood and enjoys the view at the two waterfronts. Suddenly, a dark, compact cannon boat with the flag of the People's Republic crosses our way, and for a moment, a touch of menace and uncanniness is in the air. The political situation in Hong Kong is known to be delicate. Then, people resume their conversations. We arrive soon and I disembark. Time to sleep, finally. It has been a long day.
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