"She's 86 and her feet are sore..."

This was the phrase of the week as Aunty B and her sister-in-law, Aunty Jackie, visited Hong Kong. But in all honesty, they have no problems keeping up with us young'ens and i can only hope to be as active and heatlhy when I'm an octonagarian.

Since their much anticipated arrival on Sept.26, we have done practically everything on the tourist trail: up the tram to Victoria Peak (see pic), betting at the Hong Kong Jockey Club horse races (and winning $1500 collectively - beginner's luck? see pic), shopping at Stanley Market, feasting on a gorgeous dinner at a famous Chinese Restaurant (see pic), sitting in the second row at the HK Cultural Centre where we heard the Philharmonic Orchestra accompany a famous Japanese Taiko drummer and organanist, wandering the streets of the WanChai wet market, and taking the newly-opened cable car to the famous biggest bronze Buddha in the world (see pic).

What's been most fantastic about their trip here is having the time to talk and get to know one another better. Last year Aunty B made the trek from her home in Perth, Australia, to our Xinjiang wedding and as most weddings go, there wasn't much time for lengthy conversations. This time round we have her for almost 2 weeks and it's been simply wonderful hearing stories about Matt's granny (Aunty B's sister) and grandpa, their courtship, marriage, etc. We learn so much from stories about our family history, images are conjured up in our minds about how it was then and how we've come to be today.

Aunty Jackie has just left to go back home in the UK. Aunty B's daughter, Anne, has arrived to continue the sight-seeing with her. Today we had a lovely girl's day out at Stanley Market where we bought as much as we could carry back: camera, mp3 player, electronic games, blouses, 3-piece suit, dresses, candles, fans, fruit bowl, wooden candle holder, postcards, hats and toy dragons. Oh, and let's not forget the heating pad we each purchased, for those aches and pains after a 6 hour shopping spree.

Yesterday was China's 57h Birthday and there was a huge fireworks display on the harbourfront. We gathered around the clocktower with thousands of other people and watched the 23 minute show, which was quite impressive to say the least.

As always, it's fun showing guests around, as we also get to appreciate more the city we live in. For the next several days, we have plans of attending a benefit concert for the Korean mentally/physically-handicapped orchestra, trying a dimsum lunch, climbing the Buddha and Victoria Peak again, checking out the lantern festival in Kowloon Park for Mid-Autumn Festival and of course doing more market-shopping!