HONG KONG! PART ONE

HELLO!!!

Well what more can I say? I AM IN HONG KONG!

We left the Complex at 1030 this morning to drive into Xining so we can get the airport bus however the driver drove us to the wrong place so by the time we reached the bus, it had gone and the next one wasn't until midday! Our flight was at 1320 so midday was cutting it rather close so we all piled into a taxi, yep all 5 of us with our luggage! To say the car was struggling with the weight of us all would be an understatement, luckily the airport was only half an hours drive away. We got to the airport with plenty of time to spare. After chilling out with our books, (both Mike and Cecilia have kindles so I felt the odd one out with my book, I'm reading 'Wicked') we boarded the plane for the first leg of our trip, an hour flight to Xi'an. Again the turbulence was bad and there was no movie to entertain us and the meal of a bread roll and peanuts failed to impress but for an hour we coped. I did the crossword in the English newspaper we were provided. This newspaper was written in China so naturally each article was very pro-China.

We landed in Xi'an for our 1 hour stop over. There was nothing in the airport and we were HUNGRY. Before we knew it we were back on the plane on the way to Shenzhen! And there was food! I stupidly asked for seafood for my dish (never ask for seafood on a plane...) but managed to eat it without being ill (so far...). The flight was 3 and a half hours.

We landed in Shenzhen, changed our money to Hong Kong Dollars and headed onto the Shenzhen metro. We were on the metro for a long time... About an hour but it felt so much longer! We eventually made it to the Shenzhen/Hong Kong boarder. We passed through relatively unscathed, except for filling out forms. I guess now our TTC visas are definitely invalid! It was quite novel seeing signs to Hong Kong in a metro station though.

We then had to spend a good hour on the Hong Kong metro! YAY for metro journeys... One observation though is that people in the South of China and Hong Kong have better English and better manners than those Chinese we are used to in Xining. Oh and its humid, thank goodness the trains had air con!

We eventually made it to our metro stop (Hung Hom) and we began our walk to the hostel, I got us there without too much hassle and we got checked into our rooms. I am sharing a room with Mike and Cecilia. The rooms are nice, we have a fridge, TV, ensuite, lockable draw, a LOUD air conditioning unit and shower.

Seeing as all we had had for food that day was on the plane, we were all starving so we headed for the nearest McDonalds. I really don't want to eat fast food all the time here but we were so tired and so hungry it was a safe bet.

Hong Kong looks amazing, lots of neon lights. It looks like China in the movies.

Tomorrow we are off to the visa company to begin the process of getting our new visas. Wish us luck!!