Zai jan to China

---

Just a quick one today peeps as we've only been in HK for 2 days and thats been long enough.
We caught our flight from Guilin (no upgrade to 1st class this time though) and arrived in Shenzen an hour later. What a chuffing palavor the border crossing is! We caught a cab to the boarder where we got our passports stamped for exit then realized that we need some HK dollors to pay for the bus.....opps! Now you would think that there would be cash points the HK side but oh no and there is no way of getting back through if it hadn't been for a friendly little man who swopped our Chinese Yuan for some HK dollor we would still of been stood there like a couple of prats now.
We then got onto a bus that took us about 1mile to another boarder crossing where we had to get off and get our passports stamped again with entry visas, back on the bus a few minutes later and we were on our way.....at last!!!!
When we arrived in Kowloon we immedialty knew we were in a more multi cultural city, there is an even mix of Indians, Africans, Europeans and Chinese here, somewhat different to mainland China.
We walked to our hostel which is in Chungking mansions....what a complete and utter sh*t hole!!!!!!!!!!!!
You walk into what looks like an indoor market with people selling anything and everything under the sun, the only thing all the stalls have in common is that everything is off the back of a lorry or as fake as it comes. Its not the most desirable places to say the least and at first we were both a bit ' oh my god lets get out of here' but accomodation in HK is a nightmare to find unless you have a large wallet and as we are poor little travellers, money is not a luxury we have ( although I did buy 2 pairs of shoes today, but they were only 10.00 each!!!)
We went up to the 3rd floor to where our so say hostel was and were taken to what we were told was a 'Delux' room on the 11th floor....delux my arse, its the worst, the stinkiest, smallest hell hole you've ever seen and to make it worse we had to change to a different room this morning which has a pipe in it which extracts fumes from a near by kitchen into it....its revolting!
Believe it or not this 'delux room' is costing is about 20.00 a night each and compared to paying 2-4 in Mainland China , we're both so glad to be leaving for Thailand tomorrow. Saying that we have both realised today that despite earlier comments about China we both really do like it. HK is compleatly different to the rest of the country and we're glad we've seen the real china. Once you scratch beneath the surface, the country and the majority of its people are really lovely and I'm sure we'll both come back.
As we are the Kowloon side of HK, last night we went down to the harbour to see HK Island skyline and boy is that a wow, for me I think one of the most impressive things I've seen since I've been here....Anna and Paul you have to see it when you come, its amazing, especially at night time. After that we wandered around a bit trying to find an internet cafe, which beleive it or not is very difficult but low and behold we found one on the ground floor of our mansion block (please don't get the impression that Mansion in anyway gives it some kind of appeal....its minging!)
Today we haven't really done much...got up about mid day and ventured across to HK Island via the Star Ferry which crosses the harbour. HK Island is alot more european and parts of it feel like you are in London. We went up to the peak which looks down over HK Island across to Kowloon and the view is amazing....of course we sat and had a beer, and this is where I bought my shoes....Vic did buy some too though!
As its our last night in China/HK we went out for a lovely chinese meal and now have come back to type this up before we go to bed and get up to leave for the airport tomorrow.
We're going to do a little rundown of best and worst things when we leave each country so this is what we think of our time in China..........

Best tours we went on - Terracotta Warriors, Pandas and Summer Palace.
Most disappointing - Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square.
Biggest Wow - Vic: Beijing Skyline from the summer palace, Sam: HK skyline and baby pandas!!
Lowest point - Train journey from Xi'ian to Chengdu and arriving at this god for saken place!
Funniest moments - trying to get onto the top bunks on the trains, going out with the people we met in Xi'ian, espeacially watching the guys trying to get away from gay chinese blokes dancing to 90's techno music.
Most random - Our night out with Donna and Kio to the black magin club and Vic eating chbicken feet.
Worst toilets - Forbidden city
Best toilet - Xi'ian black magic nightclub
Whats annoyed us the most - The starring, starring and more starring we get and Xfactor man on our train to Chengdu.
Panic stations - Arriving on HK with no HK dollors, booking train for 4 days later than we wanted to Xi'an
Things that take some getting used to - Bad teeth, men with very long thumb nails (apparently they are very useful, god knows what for though!) Foot prints on the toilet seats...they have to squat everywhere, even when they're given a western toilet, Spitting and the smell in Beijing and shanghai.
Best food - Culture house hostel
Worst food - Yoshinaya in Beijing
Most expensive meal - Today at the peak. 20pounds for 2 pints, 3 mini spring rolls and 3 small dumplings.
Cheapest meal - Guilin, 4 pounds for 2 pints and 6 dishes of food.

Just to let you all know that after our 2 days in the Millenium Hilton we are going to Ko tao for 4 days before meeting up with some frinds in Koh Phagnan for the full moon party, then our plans are to go back to Bangkok for a few days then off to cambodai before heading up to the north for a week of so then coming back down to the Islands.....will probably change though.

We'll update photos next time.

Love you all
Sam and Vic

---

Comments

[Wilcox GUS]

little fibby pants
Your are poor little travellers my ar**. Were the shoes more important than food you silly willies? xxx