Fright night, Hong Kong style
At one point I said, “You have no one to blame but yourself.”
I was staring at what looked like a typical club scene: blaring music, neon lights, high tables full of drinks, and mirrors everywhere. But what made the familiar so eerie was that the figures enjoying the mise en scène in this particular club were not moving. At all. Imagine a crowded room full of mannequins, where all the hair are obviously wigs and the eyes are clearly painted on. And while everything was clearly fake from head to toe, one thing was definitely real: the creeping dread of knowing that I’d have to walk through, and the suspicion that one of them was an actual person, waiting to scare the living hell out of me.
I asked myself again, why did I volunteer to walk in first?
You see, this manifestation of my greatest fears — big crowds, loud places and creeps lurking by — happens to be Club Blood, the newest haunted house to grace Hong Kong Ocean Park. It veers from the usual haunted house tradition by offering an entirely new experience. They teamed up with Taiwanese pop star Danson Tang to create a vampire-themed experience, in which Tang plays a vampire king of sorts who ensnares people into his club with shocking traps and bloodthirsty vamps. (Think True Blood vibes by way of super bae Alexander Skarsgård.)
Long story short, I got out of that labyrinthine club semi-alive. After minutes of darkness, sitting out in the sun put me in some sort of daze. I couldn’t even answer the Ocean Park staff when they asked us who had been screaming so loudly. (Official answer: ghosts. Actual answer: me.) As the last of our huge group emerged from Club Blood looking totally okay, I sought a bit of solace in the form of a calm roller coaster ride or a nap on the Ferris wheel. But three words shook me into a deeper state of fear: There. Was. More.
I mean, who was I kidding here? This is Ocean Park, after all, and they take Halloween very seriously. I was told that, last year, their scariest Halloween attraction involved guests being strapped to a hospital bed (!!!!) as they were wheeled through what seemed like the Seven Circles of Hell. This year, we were able to visit five themed haunted houses, including Club Blood, all part of Ocean Park’s extravagant Halloween Fest. From Oct. 2 to 31, from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., Ocean Park offers eight attractions with 10 experiences (some attractions change up their theme in the evenings) and 10 shows — the perfect smorgasbord for Halloween aficionados and good old-fashioned thrill seekers. As I would come to learn in the next few days of touring Ocean Park’s spooky attractions, these are not for the faint of heart.
Yeah, I know. The temptation to bust out your leftover birthday money is so, so, strong. So if you ever find yourself hovering over the “Book” button for a ticket to Hong Kong, here’s some reassuring news. There’s definitely a way to get your money’s worth if you’re seeking an immersive Halloween experience. Ocean Park is in the Aberdeen area, tucked away from the hustle and bustle of Kowloon and Central HK, and it’s admittedly quite a trip to go back and forth if you’re staying at a hotel close to the city center while you’re enjoying your Ocean Park days. Sure, you can still do that, but the best way to do it at the moment is by bus. The joke among locals in that area is that there’s definitely a subway line being built, someday soon. Maybe. Hopefully. (Like all wonderful bureaucracies, the local government’s promised date of completion is constantly getting pushed back.)
Hotel holiday
Thankfully for us, we got to stay at L’Hotel Island South, just a five-minute car ride to Ocean Park, or a 15-minute walk if you particularly hate yourself that day. There’s not much to do in the immediate vicinity of L’Hotel, but the hotel itself can fill up a decent itinerary: a gym, an outdoor pool, and a bed so nice that I almost didn’t wake up out of it on time. Best of all, the staff was nothing short of amazing — over our all-seafood welcome dinner, the hotel manager Jaime (who happens to be half-Filipino!) asked me if I could share with him my own adobo recipe, and graciously did not judge me when I reported back that I can barely boil water.
The wonderful people at L’Hotel also told us that they offer a pretty good package for those who come to visit with Ocean Park in mind. For two adults, their Ocean Park package includes one night in L’Hotel, inclusive of a complimentary buffet breakfast as well as two Ocean Park two-day daytime adult admission tickets. Not a bad deal for just a little over HK$1,000. Plus, their complimentary WiFi was so fast that I Netflixed my heart out as I soothed my tired feet from walking around Ocean Park for two days.
Who you gonna call?
Boy, did we walk a lot. Ocean Park is so huge that it has its own modes of transportation within the park — a cable car system and a dedicated train line. (Manila, are you taking notes?) It took us at least 10 minutes to get to one haunted house to another. The first one we got to try was quite possibly one of my favorites. The Ghostbusters Academy is one of their more kid-friendly attractions, and where fake kids like me get another chance at an alternative career. One of the highlights is being given a proton gun and getting a chance to actually bust out ghosts in a firing range. (Proud to say that I reached the top 10 of the community leaderboard. Oh, yeah.) We later on visited the Haunted House, which give me a renewed appreciation of what Dr. Venkman and company started out all those years ago. Those cute ghosts ain’t so cute up close!!!
We moved on to something a little closer to home — Legendary Palace, which was built to look like a traditional Chinese manor. As we saw it during the daytime, we got to attend the non-horror version, where traditional spirits and ethereal beings gave us a tour of the castle. And in the spirit of Pokemon Go, Ocean Park created a Halloween Ghost Hunt, a free app that lets guests hunt down spirits found in the palace. All they need to do is aim their phone camera at specific locations. Later that night, the palace would turn into the Palace of Death, where darker creatures lurk by.
School’s out
We were warned that the last two haunted houses would be the scariest. School of Shadows takes inspiration from Hong Kong ghost folklore. The Ocean Park staff told us that in Hong Kong, a lot of ghost stories were set in schools, so setting this haunted house in an abandoned academy is the stuff of everyone’s nightmares there. I attempted to take a video of myself going through this house, but when I watched it again, all I saw was lots of shaky camera movements, a ton of darkness, and a string of curse words I dare not repeat here. The gags may have been simple — 100-percent shock value — but my heart palpitated just the same. I ran out of School of Shadows, vowing to home school my future children.
The last haunted house we visited tickled a different kind of fright. 16+ veered towards the bizarre side, which I thought was a brave move for a family-oriented amusement park. As its name suggests, it only admits people 16 and older because of the show’s content. When we walked in, we were asked to wear masks that made me wonder if I was about to get initiated into some kind of cult. We were led into a maze of velvet-lined rooms, where the horrors were shocking but not surprising. 50 Shades of Grey with a hint of Saw come to mind. In the thick of it, we were asked to exit the haunted house just to keep a few more surprises in store for the public, so that, for now, remains a mystery.
Fright and fun
To be fair, not everything in Ocean Park’s Halloween Fest is scary. The Sugary Spook Village is a chance to experience the city’s longest outdoor walkthrough in the form of a trick-or-treat trail — complete with candy, of course. Little kids can complete missions in exchange for some lollipop or chocolate from the Pumpkin-elf totems stationed throughout the walk, which I have to admit I enjoyed doing.
And while the Halloween Fest is certainly enjoyable, it was also nice to re-experience the parts of Ocean Park that I last got to enjoy as a nine-year-old. The dolphin show was, of course, very fun. And I got to see a red panda napping in the middle of the day (I want to be him when I grow up). But personally, my favorite part of the trip was our Dolphin Encounter right before we left for the airport. I am telling you, I can watch a string of wedding videos without a single tear in sight, but when the dolphins swam up to meet us, I was an emotional wreck. It was like Nat Geo come to life, and here I was, meeting these majestic creatures up close. Anything else that will happen in my life after this will feel like sleeping on wet garbage.
I came home with a renewed sense of purpose: to convince my best friends to fly back to Hong Kong and give us an October to remember. And I wasn’t just dying to give myself a good fright, but because of all the nice, fuzzy childhood feelings that being in an amusement park brought back. But if I indeed deigned to go back to those haunted houses for yet another self-induced heart attack, I’d gladly blame myself for it once again.
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Halloween Fest Premium Tickets start at HK$345 for children (aged 3-11) and HK$690 for adults, when purchased at the Ocean Park website. Premium Ticket holders are entitled to exclusive access to secret rooms at some haunted houses and unlimited priority access to all Halloween attractions, among many more perks. For more information, visit http://halloween.oceanpark.com.hk or call +852 3923 23 23.
