Until yesterday, I’d never actually been to the Temple Street Night Market at night, only during the day, when it’s all closes down and basically not much happening. Finally I decided to head over and check it out to see if it was any good. The reviews aren’t great and rightly so. It’s probably one of the most uninspiring, disappointing and boring night markets I’ve been to anywhere in Asia.
As with a lot of things, if you’ve never been to Asia and haven’t seen any markets, it might be alright. But if you’ve done any amount of traveling throughout Asia and/or have been to any other night market in Hong Kong or China or Thailand or Taiwan or wherever, the Temple Street Night Market is going to be a huge let down. If not for the very mediocre street food we ate there, I could have walked down here once and gone home.
The Temple Street Night Market is full of crap, your usual fake bags, clothes, gadgets, watches, tech products and other junk, none of it special and none of it you can’t find anywhere else in Hong Kong during daylight hours. There’s absolutely no reason to come here, unless I guess you are staying near the area. It’s not particularly big, which doesn’t necessarily mean good, but what there is, well it’s pretty ordinary and I don’t think most people who have travelled even a little bit will rate this at all.
It’s located in TST, about a 10-15 minute walk from the main tourist area around Nathan Road. I didn’t even have great expectations for the Temple Street Night Market and going there I was still disappointed. It’s got no heart or soul, no atmosphere and the only positive I could take away was that there was nobody there. No to be fair, I went on a Sunday night around 6:30p.m, when it was just opening up, for the main reason to avoid any crowds, but even so, it just lacks any buzz or vibe.
There’s stalls down the middle of the street, behind them are the apartments and buildings and quite a few hookers looking for business. You don’t get hassled by the stall vendors, at least I didn’t, so that’s a plus, but other than that I’m really struggling to say anything good at all about the Temple Street Night Market. No locals go here other than the actual vendors and it lacks any kind of unique proposition.
At the Northern end, there’s a car park building which you can park in, or head up to take the very much overdone shot of “Shot Overlooking Temple Street Night Market”. Be warned though, the guards in the car park are a bit vigilant about photographers so don’t think you’ll get away with taking a Tripod in there. You could go up and take a few snapshots and get away with it, but you’re probably going to get a slap on the wrist if you’re in there taking loads of shots.
Below and around the carpark building are fortune tellers, some of which speak English (they will have signs). Not really my thing but I did it for shits and giggles. Of course, he lead off with a compliment to get you on his side, then basically said the same thing over and over. As with most fortune tellers, they get some things right and most things wrong. You choose what you want to believe and usually pick up on one thing they have said that will “scare or amaze” you, and tend to forget about how far off they were with others. Anyway, bit of fun and something different to talk about!
There’s quite a few restaurants in one area, all local, eat on the street type of thing. Most are foreign tastes, so don’t expect to get authentic Chinese good here. It’s alright, will fill a gap if you’re hungry but nothing more than that. There’s some sex shops, which I swear sell used dildo’s, or at least they looked used (not that I would know!), and well, like I said, If you’ve never been to Asia you might this okay, but I wouldn’t be rushing over here.
There are better markets here than the Temple Street Night Market. Sham Shui Po has a much better atmosphere and is infinitely more interesting, even during the day. Sure, it too sells a lot of shit, but there’s much more variety here and the people are way more interesting. Even Mongkok has a better market and just walking around that area is way more fun with much better food options and you can head to the shopping malls for some air con which you will need during summer.
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