The plane landed late at night, with city lights gleaming below. Our Uber driver dropped us off at our hotel in Mong Kok, north of Kowloon, and we went straight to sleep. When we woke up, we could see Hong Kong in the distance, so we rushed our morning routines to head out as soon as possible. We started by taking the metro to Central, which has great views of the city skyline and which is easy to navigate. The next couple of days, we strolled around the city, up and down hills, along dark alleys and bright overpasses, in search of the essence of this legendary place.