Chungking Mansions

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Chungking Mansions

Area: Tsim Sha Tsui (Nathan Road)

Overview: This bad boy deserves a special mention, as I stayed in the Chungking Mansions guest rooms for about a week. Hong Kong’s Chungking Mansions is undoubtedly the most lively, vibrant, often smelly and dirty, exciting and busiest places on earth. I’ll tell you off the bat: the Chungking Mansions is for the adventurous and not for the faint of heart. It’s utterly exciting and frustrating simultaneously. Your room may be up 10 stories and you have to wait for the dingy, tiny elevators for what seems like 20 – 30 minutes because guests and mainly, the vendors, are constantly using the elevators, unloading and taking large, multiple suitcases and filling up the elevators.

This being said, you must at least check out the Chungking Mansions. It’s one of the greatest treasures in Hong Kong. The ground floor swarms with (often) narrow aisles between a swarm of vendors, stalls, pieces of overflowing luggage, restaurants and food stalls. The crowd? East Indians and West Africans mainly. There were some Chinese but my main impression was that of Pakistan and African folks. What do these guys sell? Watches, luggage, chopsticks, knickknacks and more.

Guest Rooms
If getting an elevator is a challenge, the very “cheap” rooms will be as well. They are smelly and the beds and some of the greasiest and smelliest things. But, that’s where the adventures lies, right? 🙂
See below for wheelchair accessibility of the Chungking Mansions.

The Chungking Mansions is enormous and is a highrise of 17 floors. It seems to take up a third of Nathan Road in Tsim Sha Tsui (but it doesn’t). It was in front of the Chungking Mansions that someone actually put money on my lap because he thought I was pan-handling! That’s what you get for hanging out in dodgy places!

Location: 36-44 Nathan Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon, Hong Kong
Site: www.chungking-mansions.hk

Rates: $10 – $30

Accessibility: The ground floor is wheelchair accessible. The very cheap guest room – room itself – is wheelchair accessible. The beds are high and the showers, toilet and sink are a single, small unit. There is also a step up to the small bathroom. You have to crawl up and sit on the toilet and take a shower.
Front Door: Multiple entrances
Ramp/Step: Multiple entrances but the main one is from Nathan Road. The alleyway to the north also has a ramp up to the ground floor.
Elevator, Lift: Yes, small and crowded
Rooms, Bathrooms: See Accessibility above. There are larger, more expensive options that are probably better suited. Check out the website and email the Chungking Mansions for more info.
Bathtubs with Handles: No
Roll-in Showers: No

Features: All sorts on the ground floor