HONG KONG BABY!

Hong Kong Day 1
For over half of the voyage, I had no idea what I was going to do in Hong Kong or China. Most of my friends had already booked trips through SAS and I had missed the deadline by a day. My plans managed to materialize during the few weeks before arrival. I found out that my friend Geoff (pronounced Jeff) was planning an “indy” trip, which included going to the great wall. Seeing the great wall was my only goal for China. So, with very little information on the rest of the plans or who else was going, I booked my flight. I actually had very little knowledge of the daily plans until I was there and doing it. If there are one or two things that I have learned from traveling on SAS, it’s be flexible and just go with it. So that’s exactly what I did and the following entry is what became of the big question mark that I called China.
We arrived in the center of Hong Kong on a hazy (or smoggy?) cool morning. It was incredible. Surrounded on all sides by tall buildings and skyscrapers, we ate a quick breakfast out on the ship’s deck while taking in the immensity of the great concrete and steel jungle that awaited us. I was anxious to get off of the ship and explore. To my surprise, the gangway off of the ship led straight in to a huge shopping mall. I’m sure that it was planned. It was a nice treat after our usual dock sites of dirty, stinky, industrial areas.
Teddy, Mary Alice, Anna, Brandon, Finnly, and myself all set out to explore the city. As usual, I am in a daze as we wander around the city. I am always content just walking around and taking it all in. We stopped in to look at some shops but our first goal of the day was to find the Mountain Hardware store so that people could by jackets. Brandon had gotten an address from who knows where. We quickly figured out how to maneuver the subway system and made our way there. We saw a sign for the store from the street. We went up about 10 flights of stairs before we figured out that it was no longer there. There was a second address that was further away. We decided to try that one instead. After another subway ride, we finally found it. It was located inside this incredibly huge 16-story shopping mall. Hold me back and cut up my credit cards ASAP. Actually, I didn’t buy anything. Shocking, I know. Our next goal was to find a travel agency because people needed to buy their Japan Rail Passes. We found one and quickly became friends with them because we had to go back about 4 more times. While they were being processed, we went to a local pub and had a drink. We did a little more browsing and then headed back to the travel agency. I picked up a little $5 oil painting… I think it was a good first purchase. The rail passes we not ready yet so we went out to dinner after having worked up a bit of an appetite. After dinner I was stuffed so much that I even passed up getting my fav. ben and jerrys ice cream. I still dont know what I was thinking. We went and got the rail passes, except for Mary Alices because they had spelt her name wrong. More shopping blah blah blah. Later that night Teddy went back to meet up with people and the rest of us ate dinner. Mary Alice and I ate pizza while the other three went for sushi. The pizza was so so good, but it was pretty gosh darn expensive. We had a nice talk, enjoyed some wine and desert. It started to rain right before we left to meet back up. As soon as we had crossed the street though, we both could immediately tell that Finnly had had a little bit to drink because her southern accent was the strongest I had ever heard it. It was hilarious. She tried to deny it, but there was no point. It was too obvious. We all started to head back to the ship to watch a movie but I wasnt quite ready to do that. I had been doing that for the last several days on the ship and I am only in Hong Kong so often... so Mary Alice and I headed out to find a bar. After walking around for a while and stopping in and out of a few shops, we found ourselves in a Aussie bar with a bunch of middle aged men. We had only planned on having a beer but that soon turned in to a few beers because we got to chatting with a man from Texas and his Chinese business partner. (He and Mary Alice talked about the south) They offered to buy us a couple rounds and no way was I going to pass up a free Corona or two. After that we called it quits and headed back to the ship. Once again, a bunch of drunken SASers were making their way back as well. I dont think that I have ever been more embarrassed before in my life. It happens it every single country, and I would have thought that they would be over getting absolutly wasted in port by now, but I was wrong. O well. It was a great first day and I was ready for bed!

Hong Kong Day 2
Ummm... day 2. What did I do? That is an excellent question. It is amazing how quickly my memory fails me... Oh yes, Brandon and I hung out the entire day before meeting up with our independent group to Beijing. We woke up early and went to starbucks. yes starbucks. It was great. I was able to use the internet for almost two hours. I talked with both of my chriss and it absolutly made my week. I also bought a green tea frapp in memory of study days in Minnesota with Kelle! Good times, kinda. I pretty much had to force myself off of the internet in order to go explore Hong Kong some more. we had some fun going in to some fancy designer stores and we went back to the huge mall from the previous day. We decided to split up for a couple hours so that we could do our own thing. It was sooo nice. I think that it might have been the second time on the entire trip that I was alone (the other being South Africa). I dont mind going off on my own in port, and a lot of time I would like to. My friends freak out and dont let me though, which i guess is a good thing too. (and Im sure that my mom LOVES that lol). I just wandered around. I didnt buy anything yet again. Phew. That could have been a disaster. I think that I will break off more in Japan as well. We will see. I love interacting with the sales people the most. They are so much fun. After a while, we met back up and I ate some really awful Chinese fast food. ugh. and I thought that the fast food in the states was bad... Once again, it made me a bit sick later, as usual. Im not sure what we did after. I think that we made our way back to the ship, quick packed, and went to meet up with our group going to Beijing. There were 12 people going in all, which made me really nervous since it is next to impossible to travel with a large group. I also knew only three of the other people going. I knew Teddy, Geoff, and Brandon. After meeting up, we made our way to the hostel. It took a while because it was very well hidden, and well, none of us speak Chinese. It makes it a little difficult, but eventually we made it! Brandon, Teddy, Geoff, and I all shared a room so we just dropped our stuff down and headed back out to grab some dinner at a local sushi restaurant. Once again, I passed on the sushi and only order a lemonade. It turns out that lemonade in Chinese actually means Sprite. So, I ended up drinking the hot tea that they serve for free. lol. Eh, what are you going to do right? The ladies night market was next on the list. Night markets are a ton of fun... I love markets in general. The US is really missin out. After that, we quickly made our way to the tram up the mountain were we got a panoramic view of the entire city at night. It was absolutly stunning. I really hope my pictures turn out, although I know that they will never be able to capture it completely. Brandon and I then split off from the group and did our own thing. The only problem was that we did not have a key to our room. Eeks. Eventually we called it a night and headed back to the hostel with our fingers crossed that someone would be there. I was fully prepared to sleep outside on the concrete in my clothes. No one answered the buzzer when we got there. We went up to the office and luckily they were still open so the owner let us in to our room. We then had some pillow talk and Teddy showed up a little later. We had no clue were Geoff was but eventually he came in after we had all passed out. Today just made me wonder how the rest of the trip was going to go. Tomorrow we were off to Beijing on a 24 hour train ride. woohoo!