You take Picture

After four days of touring Hong Kong we decided to cross the border into mainland China and take an overnight sleeper train from Shenzhen to Guilin. We wanted to travel by hard-sleeper; however, we found out the hard way that purchasing tickets a few hours before a train departs isn't always the best. The only seats available for the train were in the soft sleeper class, which were twice the price but were quite nice.

Whenever we reach a new city we always try to find a map and explore the local area to get our bearings. What we weren't expecting was to be invited to join a game of bad mitten. So, after a few hours of sleep and glasses fogging over, we tested our bad mitten skills. As one could guess, this didn't go too well; however, we all had a great experience and were invited back anytime (we assume that's what they said as we parted ways). We grabbed some yummy dumplings for breakfast and watched groups of people doing their morning exercises, from Tai Chi to line dancing. (We managed to stay out of those)

As we walked around the rivers and lakes taking in the scenery and lovely pagodas we were suddenly ambushed by Chinese in the trees. As strange as it sounds, we seemed to be an added tourist attraction around the lake as several people took our pictures, some discreetly and others not so much. A group of kids ran up to us asking "you take picture", so the "laowai's" (foreigner) obliged, and we even threw up the peace sign which seems to be the Asian photo trademark. We were going to get a picture with our camera, but they disappeared into the trees giggling as quickly as they appeared. We have discovered the Chinese people to be surprisingly nice and extremely, but sincerely, inquisitive of foreigners as you are shamelessly stared at where ever you go.

Halloween unfortunately isn't as widespread in Guilin as it is in the States and other big cities; however, there were a few Halloween decorations and costumes. We didn't dress up as we were too lazy to go shopping for any costumes unlike other Westerns around town. A highlight for many locals was to admire the ridiculously dressed foreigners as they hung out downtown. So we had a couple beers and watched too.

Without any real plan yet for China we broke down and joined one of the flag-led tours through the hostel to Longsheng with some friends we met the night before. The Ping An rice terraces are a highlight of the Guangxi province and although they had been recently harvested, the vista was still quite extraordinary. Though said to be touristier than other terrace locations, you could still catch a glimpse of weathered farmers tending their crops that have been built into and along the mountain side of the Dragon's Backbone. Our tour took us to the village of the long hair where we took-in an "authentic" long hair show. Although touristy, it was neat seeing the actual villagers that only cut their hair once in their lives when they get married. We ended up breaking away from the tour and began to wish we had more time to hike up and down the soil stair cases as it came time to make a mad dash to the bus.

“The Great Firewall of China”

Falling behind the censored boundaries of China, it's become a little more difficult to keep up with the outside world. The Chinese government filters the internet, blocking content it deems inappropriate, however, it seems to focus mostly on preventing negative political comments. Unfortunately for us, this also includes Blogger, Facebook, Youtube and many other websites that in some way involve China, so we apologize to those we have not responded to, but we do still get your email and comments! We have a temporary work around for posting blogs to blogger, so there may be some formatting issues. Please let us know if the pictures do not load on the blog.

Hong Kong Photo Album

Click here to view our Hong Kong Photo Album

Hong Kong

Hong Kong was a total sensory overload of flashing neon lights and a population just brimming over 7 million people who walk as bad as they drive; though being the fourth densest "country" in the world probably doesn't make it very easy. Despite being overcrowded things run very smoothly thanks to inventions like the Octopus card (a universal debit card) and the 800m Central-mid-level Escalators, the world's largest covered outdoor escalator. The people are also surprisingly friendly and polite. After transferring from Macau we bumbled around Kowloon trying to find our hotel, apparently with lost faces, when a man asks us if we needed any help. Skeptical, we accepted his offer and were astonished when he actually walked us to the hotel we were looking for, no baksheesh required!

On Kowloon and Hong Kong Island there are many markets that make up whole streets selling almost any and everything such as birds, fish, flowers, jade, ginger, chandeliers….the list is endless. After a couple hours of taking in some interesting sights we headed to the Peak for sunset; although we never actually got to watch the sunset since it completely disappeared behind a wall of pollution. However, the glow from the skyscrapers at night more than made up for it.

In the morning we explored the culture filled island of Lantau. Hopping on a bus to the quiet fishing village of Tai O, we spent the rest of the morning trying to identify dried seafood that was being sold in stalls along the narrow streets. No longer trying to understand why or how people eat these things we decided to see a creature that has no problem with it. Tai O has developed its own little tourist attraction by boating groups out past the breakwater to admire the rare pink dolphins that trail behind the trawling nets of the fishing vessels. Back on shore we make our way to Ngong Ping, home of the Tian Tan Buddha, or just Big Buddha. This 110 ft tall Buddha pleasantly sits on his lotus throne looking out over Po Lin monastery and the mountain side, which was a view that you too can share after climbing up the 268 steps. Leaving the company of Big Buddha we took the cable car down soaking in all the sights of the island.

Once the sun went down and the city lights came on, we strolled down to the Avenue of the Stars for the world's largest permanent sound and light show. The Symphony of Lights involves over 40 participating buildings that flicker on and off with happy Asian techno music. After the show, hoards of people "line up" to have their picture taken with Bruce Lee's statue and Jackie Chan's hand prints.

You like snakes? Check out these pythons!

So we’re back to Bangkok for just a day before we catch our flight to Macau. For our amusement, we went to the Red Cross Snake Farm (Good Combo) and watched the snake show in the morning! Everything from King Cobras to Kraits slithered across the floor as young girls squealed and squirmed in their seats.

However, the main event was later that night at the Calypso Cabaret where the performers are “Kathoey” or as we know them, the famous Lady Boys of Thailand. We found our seats in the front row and just knew we were in for trouble. The show was intriguing and hilarious and most of the “girls” were stunningly beautiful, while others were definitely dudes. Thailand performs the most sexual reassignment surgeries in the world so it should be no surprise too how close they can get to the real thing. Jason was the favorite of the night to be picked on, as he was the only Western male in the front row. He was a good sport and went above and beyond the original dare of just dancing with a lady boy and was smothered and kissed on the cheek.