Mong Kok Goldfish Market, Flower Market & Bird Garden: The One-Hour Walk

The Mong Kok Goldfish Market is a single stretch of Tung Choi Street where the shopfronts are walls of goldfish in plastic bags, and it is one of the strangest, most photogenic free things to see in Kowloon. It also sits a few minutes' walk from two other old Mong Kok institutions: the Flower Market on Flower Market Road and the Yuen Po Street Bird Garden. Put the three together in the right order and you get about an hour of the most local-feeling sightseeing in the city, all of it free, all of it off one MTR station.

Here is how to do the walk, what each stop is actually like, and when to go so you are not staring at shutters.

The short version

• Station: Prince Edward MTR. Exit B1 for the Flower Market and Bird Garden, Exit B2 for the Goldfish Market.
• Order: Bird Garden first, Flower Market second, Goldfish Market last.
• Time: about an hour, longer if you linger. Walking between all three takes under 15 minutes.
• Cost: free. The Bird Garden has free admission and the two market streets are just shops.
• Best start: around 9am, so you catch the birds while the morning crowd is still there and reach the goldfish shops as they open.

Why the order matters

The three stops wake up at different times. The Bird Garden opens at 7am and is at its best early, when older regulars bring their songbirds out. Most flower shops open around 9:30am. Most goldfish shops open around 10:30am. Do it backwards, starting at the Goldfish Market at 9am, and you will walk past rolled-down shutters.

So start at the far end. Come out of Prince Edward Exit B1, walk along Flower Market Road to the Bird Garden at the end of it, then come back through the flower shops as they open, and finish on Tung Choi Street once the fish are out.

Stop 1: Yuen Po Street Bird Garden

The Bird Garden is a small Chinese-style garden of about 3,000 square metres, with a traditional pai lou gateway at the entrance and moon gates dividing it into courtyards. Around 70 stalls sell pet birds, bird seed, porcelain water bowls and hand-made bamboo and wooden cages. Some stalls sell bags of live crickets, which is what the birds eat.

It exists because of redevelopment. Mong Kok's original "Bird Street" was Hong Lok Street, off Argyle Street, until it was demolished in the early 1990s; Langham Place now stands on the site. The government built the garden as a replacement, and it was finished in March 1997.

The reason to come early is the people, not the stalls. Regulars hang their cages in the trees, chat, and feed their birds crickets with chopsticks. The garden is open daily from 7am to 8pm, but most shops inside close around 5pm to 6pm, and the social scene is a morning thing. Ask before photographing someone's bird; most owners are happy to show off a good singer.

Be ready for mixed feelings. It is a fascinating piece of old Hong Kong, and it is also a lot of small birds in small cages. Twenty minutes is plenty for most visitors.

Stop 2: Flower Market Road

Walk back out the way you came and you are on Flower Market Road. Despite the name, it is not a market of packed stalls. It is a street of flower and plant shops whose buckets, orchids and potted plants spill onto the pavement, and it smells fantastic after the Bird Garden.

Most shops run from about 9:30am to 7:30pm, with the freshest stock early in the day. If you are in town just before a big festival, expect it to be properly crowded: in the run-up to Lunar New Year the street fills with peach blossom branches and kumquat trees. There is a small playground at one end of the street, which is useful if you are doing this walk with kids.

You are not going to take a bouquet back to the hotel, but this is the stop where a slow browse is the whole point. Give it 15 to 20 minutes.

Stop 3: The Goldfish Market on Tung Choi Street

From the flower shops it is a short walk to Tung Choi Street. The Goldfish Market is the northern section of the street around Bute Street, roughly 300 metres long with about 40 shops. If you are coming straight here from the MTR instead, take Prince Edward Exit B2, or Mong Kok East Exit C and the footbridge towards Bute Street.

The display is the attraction. Each fish is sealed in an oxygen-filled plastic bag with the price written on it, and the bags hang in rows on metal racks across the shopfronts, so the whole street looks like a wall of floating fish. Inside are bubble-eye goldfish, tropical species, tanks, fish food and the rest of the fishkeeping kit. More recently, pet shops have moved in too, selling reptiles, amphibians, puppies and kittens.

Goldfish carry real meaning here. In Chinese culture they stand for abundance and good fortune, and plenty of Hong Kong homes and shops keep a tank for luck. The street itself grew out of goldfish hawkers who worked near the old Yau Ma Tei train station from the 1950s, then moved into fixed shops in the mid-1970s when keeping aquarium fish at home took off.

Most shops open around 10:30am and close around 8pm, and a few stay open until 10pm. Many close for the first few days of Lunar New Year. Shopkeepers are used to tourists photographing the bags, but step out of the way when locals are actually buying.

Where to go next

Keep walking south on Tung Choi Street and the fish shops give way to the Ladies' Market, the clothes and souvenir stretch of the same street. That makes this walk an easy morning lead-in to a longer market day, and our guide to the best markets in Hong Kong covers the rest. If you want the evening version, Temple Street Night Market is a couple of MTR stops south in Yau Ma Tei and only really gets going after dark.

If the bagged-fish shopfronts have you hunting for more photo stops, our list of the most Instagrammable spots in Hong Kong picks up where this walk ends. And since the whole morning costs nothing, our round-up of free things to do in Hong Kong is the natural way to fill the rest of the day.

Quick answers

What time does the Mong Kok Goldfish Market open? Most shops open around 10:30am and close around 8pm, with a few open until 10pm. Many close for the first few days of Lunar New Year.

How do I get to the Goldfish Market? Take the MTR to Prince Edward and use Exit B2, then walk to Tung Choi Street. From Mong Kok East, take Exit C and the footbridge towards Bute Street.

Is the Bird Garden free? Yes. Yuen Po Street Bird Garden has free admission and is open daily from 7am to 8pm, though most shops inside close by 5pm or 6pm.

Can tourists buy a goldfish? You can, but there is not much point unless you live here. Treat the street as a free aquarium and leave the fish where they are.

Which is better, Ladies' Market or Temple Street? They do different jobs. The Ladies' Market is the daytime clothes-and-souvenir street just south of the Goldfish Market, so it fits naturally after this walk. Temple Street is a night market that comes alive after dark with food stalls and fortune tellers.