The next few days in Hong Kong were mostly spent chilling at home in the mornings and going to the malls in the afternoon. Since I was unable to eat in restaurants, it was easier to limit my time out so I could save myself the hassle of having to return home each time for a meal. But after spending so many hours at the mall, both my wallet and my luggage space were significantly depleted, so I needed to find other things to do to fill my time. =P

Day 2 was when I needed to complete my second compulsory PCR test at a local community testing site. The night before I made sure to book my appointment and got in line prior to the opening at 10am. Apparently there was an outbreak of cases at a nearby apartment building, so there were more people waiting in line than anticipated. However the entire testing process was quite smooth so I was done in about 10 minutes. 

I ran a few errands during my time in HK, including mailing out parcels at the post office and [most importantly] getting my HKID renewed. I was already 4 years late, but at least it’s finally done! Originally I wasn’t sure if I was allowed to enter government buildings under my Amber code, so I booked a later appointment. By the time I realized I could have taken an earlier appointment, all the reservations were full lol. The MTR trains also malfunctioned the day I wanted to try for a walk-in appointment at the Tseung Kwan O office, so it just wasn’t meant to be. Luckily the actual renewal process was really smooth on the day of my appointment. However they do require 7 business days to complete, so I wasn’t able to pick it up in person. 

Backtracking again to my Day 2 PCR test – I never received the results lol. I had been diligently doing daily rapid tests and uploading my results, but there was no update regarding the test I had done at the community testing site. I ended up going back on Day 3 to redo the test and they told me I should have received an initial text message showing my registration, which I didn’t receive. Since I was using a foreign number it was possible some messages weren’t going through, so I ended up taking a photo of the specimen bottle and looking up my test results online later in the evening. I was also able to upload the test results onto my LeaveHomeSafe app, so I had everything in one place. Honestly I’m not sure why it was all necessary, because it was definitely a pain trying to figure out how everything worked. 

Thankfully everything came back negative and by the morning of Day 3 I finally got the Blue code. I definitely made up my time by eating out as much as I could!