Why? Because in China, we do not have
access to Blogger (or to Facebook) through the hotel provided broadband. We heard later that Twitter is also censored here...
We
have access to Sydney Morning Herald and to Guangzhou weather forecast and a
few other websites, but…
Hence, today's events are written down in MS Word on the day and... anyway, here they are...
Other days to follow...
Today we packed up, checked out from B P International and
took the MTR from Austin to Hong Hum railway station.
Since we were leaving a SAR (Special Administrative Region)
of China to go to the mainland, it was like going from one country to another.
Passport control, xray scanners, filling in the immigration papers etc. The
train trip was uneventful; lots of high rise buildings were passing by. You
knew when you got into China as there were two uniformed and serious looking
young gentlemen standing next to the train tracks as the train momentarily
slowed down.
Arriving in Guangzhou, there was the usual spruiker trying
to drum up taxi and hotel business as soon as you left the train, but further
on, the main hotels had all their own reception desks with complimentary
shuttle bus service to their respective hotels. Nice ride through town, wide
boulevards, lots of parks and green patches and nowhere near as frantic as we
thought it would be from various publications. Guangzhou seemed a lot less
frantic than Hong Kong so far.When we arrive at the hotel, one of the first information boards was a company advertising bus trips to Macao. How convenient is that. The buses depart from the front of our hotel.
The room is quite big and had a view over Pearl River eastwards. Very nice.
We got settled and then went out for a wander around the
area. Across the street, there is a nice park area and just to the right is
Pearl River. We got ourselves a pastry from a Chinese bakery and supplemented
with a coffee from… McDonalds (which seemed very popular by the way).
Other observations; the park gym with equipment for exercise
is very popular here too, the mainland Chinese still clear their throats and
spit a lot, old men sit in crowds everywhere and play a variety of games, not
just Mah Jong, some people were living in kind of houseboats on water run-offs
under a freeway, walking is not always easy as right of a sudden the footpath
goes to the right only with a barrier between you and where you want to be.
We found an interesting alleyway which we had to explore and
ended up outside a crèche of sort where parents but more often grandparents
were waiting for the clock to turn 4.30pm so they could go in and pick up their
grandchildren.
Back to the hotel for a rest before dinner at HongXing
Seafood restaurant – looks fabulous with EVERYTHING you could ever eat from the
sea or river – including snakes, turtles and crocodiles. Many are kept alive in
tanks (not the crocs thank god!) but little sharks were alive.
At 7pm we returned to the restaurant to a prime table
reserved for us on the balcony. We knew the fish and prawns we ordered would be
fresh, after Di wandered the seafood ”market” to decide.
For us, a whole fried catfish (last one as it’s very popular
here) and some prawns in chilli salt and lots of garlic. Delicious – especially washed down with our
favourite beer – Harbin.
After dinner we promenaded with the locals along the river
and over one of the bridges. Lovely
views and really “almost French” – quite romantic and the locals seem to think
so too based on the number of cute couples by the river,
Back to our hotel around 10.15pm for a good night’s sleep. Another big day tomorrow.
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