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The White House

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(The White House Teahouse dons an exceptionally rare retro outlook which has a sleepy quality to it.  The old-styled Chinese characters goes perfectly with the window grille.  The small octagonal fitting hanging on the grille is a feng shui mirror for dispelling bad luck)

A true tourist's attraction in its own right and sparsely known even among locals, the White House Teahouse (pronounced as Pak Kun Bing Suck in Cantonese) heaves into sight at the corner of the sidewalk leading to the Kowloon City Pier nearby.  With a history of 50 years, it occupies the place of great-granddad in the family tree of the local chachangtangs (literally tea meal house, previously discussed here and here).

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(The teahouse occupies the whole premises around the corner on the ground floor of the outworn tenement building)

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The old teahouse is situated on the ground floor of a tenement building in Tokwanwan (literally Earth Melon Bay).   During the better days that it saw, numerous manufacturing workshops clustered around the neighbourhood and factories on some levels of the tenement building sitting atop.

The hanging fans, dusty windows, period floor tiles, rottening wooden benches suggest that the teahouse is way past its hayday.  But the history and unique atmosphere are so well retained inside that it has been a popular filming location.

A chance to dine in it will be an experience of a lifetime provided that the eater is not as mature in age.  Although it was not a dining tour at the time of taking the photos, there are some tips for the must-eats.  First thing first, the Si Mut milk tea which is the all-mighty tonic offered in actually all chachangtang.  Then, try the rice with deep-fried chicken leg in black pepper sauce.  Don't forget the omellette with ham slices.  You will wish to come back.

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Of corse, bring your camera.  This time I would recommend bringing along a DSLR in addition to a serious compact like the GX200 which cannot easily achieve a shallow depth of field.  For these old places, you would definitely need a shallow depth of field to highlight some special features in the teahouse. 

R0013108 (Medium)(This is the door to the teahouse, to the right of which breads are sold)

Oh, you have got to try the breads of special Hong Kong style which was introduced to readers here.  And look, the breads are sold in almost the old fashioned way except for the lids.  In the days of yesteryear, breads were sold right in those baking trays with not the lids on but big, black joyful flies hovering around.

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(There were just a few eaters in the teahouse at the time I took the pictures.  The eater seemed barely moving and the waiters walked as slowly as could be.  It was so quite in the restaurant that the atmosphere was sort of ghosty)

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