Moving On
February 28, 2007
KL, Kuala Lumpur.
Although we're both tired of Shanghai - the drafty winters, hard work, little relaxation other than watching DVDs of old TV series or massage at the local mega bathhouse/spa - we were relieved to come back from our Spring Festival/Chinese New Year excursion to see just how wonderful an atmosphere our apartment has. Spacious, light and underfurnished.
Our first vacation since this summer, we'd traded a week in a "timeshare" we bought this summer, for a week at a resort in Shenzhen. From there we hoped to cross the border into Hong Kong and Macao. Unfortunately, only a few days before our trip, we learned that the resort was an hour away from the border, which was at least 45 minutes subway ride into Hong Kong.
We booked a hotel for two nights in Hong Kong and went for the parade. we missed it! We stopped for a coffee, and when we came out, the police had blocked access to the stree we thought we'd be watching the parade from. We got caught up in an enormous crowd of people walking in a horde through the Harbour City Shopping Mall, emerged and doubled back underneath overpasses, through a wet market we thought to be under a highway. We welcomed the smell of bleach, washed down stalls - we never found bleach on the mainland.
The next day we took a half-day tour of the major sights. Ate Dim Sum. Aboout 6PM, we met up with a fellow tourist and taxi-ed to where the fireworks were to be viewed. It had been drizzling, and there'd been talk of cancelling the show. I decided not to wait outside for two hours, I didn't have the wardrobe for it, so Mr. X. and our acquaintance braved the cold on their own. I went back to the hotel and watched it on TV. I was sad to miss it, and Mr. X. said it was unsurpassed, that the sky was used as a canvas.
The next day we found a place in Kowloon for me to buy the Salwar suits I've wanted to buy, then were led by the proprietor's brother to a great little Indian restaurant in a small mall. We went a few stops on the subway to find a shoe store we were directed towards, but gave up and went on to Causeway Bay, to the "Times Square" mall. Very hard to see the distinctiveness of cities when they are unified by huge shopping complexes. We browsed an English language bookstore, Mr. X. bought a beautiful book on playing the guitar, a new adventure for him. We returned to Shenzhen that night and found our way to the resort by about 11PM.
Macao - We took a bus from our hotel into a resort nearer to Shenzhen, where we took a very long taxi ride to the port - It was in a section called Shekou, upscale, expat school, Walmarts, too. No ferry for several hours. Every hour was a boat to Zhuhai, so we went there, got a cheap hotel from a tourist assistance booth at the port, then walked the ten minutes to the border building and then waited for over two hours to cross into Macao.
Starved, we caught a cab and asked if he knew the name of a restaurant that a friend of Mr. X had recommended. It became a very, very long taxi ride, on the other side of Macao, as far as we could be from the main crossover from the mainland. We found ourselves without cash and without an ATM - the restaurant didn't take cards. We hopped a bus and went back into town. Hotel Lisboa was shamelessly overpriced, despite the fact we were starving. We went up and down staircases looking for a spot to eat. We saw dozens of young women who probably were hookers looking for business, right there on the lower level lobby. Next, we went to the new Wynn Casino and found the tables booked for hours. We had a drink and then got directions to a restaurant that turned out to be fantastic. Couldn't find a cab, headed in the direction of the Wynn, raining and damp. I suggested we get on a bus. We were on that bus until the end of the line, why I thought it would circle and repeat its route, I don't know. We saw Macao in the dark, from one of the oldest areas, boarded another bus and got off near the gate, crossed back into the PRC and went to sleep at the seedy old hotel, with its advertisements for women and in-room dispensary of condoms and various sex aids.
The next day we took the boat back to Shenzhen. It was raining hard when we got to our resort's partner hotel in Shenzhen city proper. We got online and found the Queen Day Spa where we spent the next eight hours. Back to our resort in a taxi for our last morning.
After a week of gloomy weather, the sun was out. We walked into town and bought some water, snacks, got cash from an ATM our bank reported as "China - Unknown City." Then, to the airport and back to Shanghai.
We spent our last day of vacation at Xiao Nan Guo spa, having "Tui Na" - Chinese acupressure massages.
Back at work. The Big Monday. No one in charge seems to know what we're doing. That's okay, but I'm very sore from renewed exercise routine. Everything hurts!
Shanghai can be grand on a vacation. However, we're isolated in the typical big city way, with the weird historical mix juxtaposed with Western frenzy and capital. In Dalian, I could never get comfortable anywhere inside the apartment - here, it seems hard to be comfortable anywhere outside.
I'm having a tele-interview on Friday morning for a job in Kuala Lumpur.
Later.
Although we're both tired of Shanghai - the drafty winters, hard work, little relaxation other than watching DVDs of old TV series or massage at the local mega bathhouse/spa - we were relieved to come back from our Spring Festival/Chinese New Year excursion to see just how wonderful an atmosphere our apartment has. Spacious, light and underfurnished.
Our first vacation since this summer, we'd traded a week in a "timeshare" we bought this summer, for a week at a resort in Shenzhen. From there we hoped to cross the border into Hong Kong and Macao. Unfortunately, only a few days before our trip, we learned that the resort was an hour away from the border, which was at least 45 minutes subway ride into Hong Kong.
We booked a hotel for two nights in Hong Kong and went for the parade. we missed it! We stopped for a coffee, and when we came out, the police had blocked access to the stree we thought we'd be watching the parade from. We got caught up in an enormous crowd of people walking in a horde through the Harbour City Shopping Mall, emerged and doubled back underneath overpasses, through a wet market we thought to be under a highway. We welcomed the smell of bleach, washed down stalls - we never found bleach on the mainland.
The next day we took a half-day tour of the major sights. Ate Dim Sum. Aboout 6PM, we met up with a fellow tourist and taxi-ed to where the fireworks were to be viewed. It had been drizzling, and there'd been talk of cancelling the show. I decided not to wait outside for two hours, I didn't have the wardrobe for it, so Mr. X. and our acquaintance braved the cold on their own. I went back to the hotel and watched it on TV. I was sad to miss it, and Mr. X. said it was unsurpassed, that the sky was used as a canvas.
The next day we found a place in Kowloon for me to buy the Salwar suits I've wanted to buy, then were led by the proprietor's brother to a great little Indian restaurant in a small mall. We went a few stops on the subway to find a shoe store we were directed towards, but gave up and went on to Causeway Bay, to the "Times Square" mall. Very hard to see the distinctiveness of cities when they are unified by huge shopping complexes. We browsed an English language bookstore, Mr. X. bought a beautiful book on playing the guitar, a new adventure for him. We returned to Shenzhen that night and found our way to the resort by about 11PM.
Macao - We took a bus from our hotel into a resort nearer to Shenzhen, where we took a very long taxi ride to the port - It was in a section called Shekou, upscale, expat school, Walmarts, too. No ferry for several hours. Every hour was a boat to Zhuhai, so we went there, got a cheap hotel from a tourist assistance booth at the port, then walked the ten minutes to the border building and then waited for over two hours to cross into Macao.
Starved, we caught a cab and asked if he knew the name of a restaurant that a friend of Mr. X had recommended. It became a very, very long taxi ride, on the other side of Macao, as far as we could be from the main crossover from the mainland. We found ourselves without cash and without an ATM - the restaurant didn't take cards. We hopped a bus and went back into town. Hotel Lisboa was shamelessly overpriced, despite the fact we were starving. We went up and down staircases looking for a spot to eat. We saw dozens of young women who probably were hookers looking for business, right there on the lower level lobby. Next, we went to the new Wynn Casino and found the tables booked for hours. We had a drink and then got directions to a restaurant that turned out to be fantastic. Couldn't find a cab, headed in the direction of the Wynn, raining and damp. I suggested we get on a bus. We were on that bus until the end of the line, why I thought it would circle and repeat its route, I don't know. We saw Macao in the dark, from one of the oldest areas, boarded another bus and got off near the gate, crossed back into the PRC and went to sleep at the seedy old hotel, with its advertisements for women and in-room dispensary of condoms and various sex aids.
The next day we took the boat back to Shenzhen. It was raining hard when we got to our resort's partner hotel in Shenzhen city proper. We got online and found the Queen Day Spa where we spent the next eight hours. Back to our resort in a taxi for our last morning.
After a week of gloomy weather, the sun was out. We walked into town and bought some water, snacks, got cash from an ATM our bank reported as "China - Unknown City." Then, to the airport and back to Shanghai.
We spent our last day of vacation at Xiao Nan Guo spa, having "Tui Na" - Chinese acupressure massages.
Back at work. The Big Monday. No one in charge seems to know what we're doing. That's okay, but I'm very sore from renewed exercise routine. Everything hurts!
Shanghai can be grand on a vacation. However, we're isolated in the typical big city way, with the weird historical mix juxtaposed with Western frenzy and capital. In Dalian, I could never get comfortable anywhere inside the apartment - here, it seems hard to be comfortable anywhere outside.
I'm having a tele-interview on Friday morning for a job in Kuala Lumpur.
Later.
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