Lost In Hong Kong

On my way through the KCR station at Tsim Sha Tsui East, a bewildered-looking woman waved at me with an air of desperation.

"Lost tourist," I thought as I approached.

In that I was both right and wrong. The lady and her two companions, station maps in hand, were trying to make heads or tails of the layout in their search for the exit which would lead them to the Chungking Mansions.

Alarm bells went off in my head. When I asked why, I got the whole story with both barrels.

The trio had flown in from Johannesburg that morning and taken the KCR to the border at Lo Wu station.

They'd wanted to go to Guangzhou to meet with friends that evening, but no one had bothered to mention they'd need a visa to enter mainland China. An Indian fellow at Lo Wu had scribbled down the name of some travel agent in the Chungking Mansions on a Post-It note.

That's all they were told; they took the train back to Tsim Sha Tsui.

Imagine: three exhausted, frustrated South African ladies dragging suitcases through a city they've never visited and with no idea of what needs to be done.

I took pity on them. It was late in the day, but I checked with the station's ticket office to see whether they could get a same-day visa at Lo Wu. The station attendants weren't certain; my next move was to find the nearest China Travel Service office.

On the way out of the station, we were set upon by a Chinese man who gave the ladies the formal title of Sisters. I asked him where we could find China Travel and he said he could provide the visa service instead.

Suspicious, I stayed with the women to ensure they weren't about to be ripped off.

We followed him to Mirador Mansions, just down the street from Chungking Mansions, up to a dodgy-looking hallway on the 10th floor, stopping outside a doorway next a sign on the wall which read: Kowloon Hotel. I recalled reading about it as being popular with the backpacking crowd, which eased my concern somewhat.

The ladies were informed that getting a same-day visa was impossible as the office was about to close, but the passports could be ready by 2pm the next day. That meant they'd need to apply on the spot and select a place to crash for the night.

How convenient: one-stop shopping at the Kowloon Hotel.

At HK$100 per person for a night, the rate was reasonable. I had a look at the accommodations, little more than a dorm room with beds, but to my surprise it was clean and didn't look as though it held any nasty surprises.

The woman booking the rooms and handling the application (her accent confirmed she was a mainlander) also kept calling the ladies Sisters, which irked me; and she spoke too fast, which confused the women, but I could see she was an old pro. She promised to push through the visas as fast as she could.

The women looked to me to confirm they weren't being scammed. By then I knew everything was legitimate, so I explained the process in clear terms to set them at ease. Next, I advised them when to leave Guangzhou to be on time to catch their return flight.

They tried to give me some cash, but I refused it. "It's my pleasure," I said. They were floored.

Because they required photos for the application without delay, our sole choice was a photo booth in the MTR station. They only had paper currency, so I swapped it for coins at a couple of shops.

Fortune was on our side when we reached the booth: the maintenance technician had just arrived. He helped the three collect their photos in just a few minutes.

I gave them a quick lesson in thwarting pickpockets and avoiding con artists, then double-checked to make sure they knew the route back to the hotel, as I needed to meet my wife at a nearby shop.

The grateful women reached out one-by-one and gave me a hug, which was unexpected ... and better than money.

If one hour of my time saved them two days of stress, then it was more than worth spending.

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