我到香港啦！

I've reached Hong Kong (香港). It is a strange place where the buildings are enormous, people would prefer to speak to you in English, the food is delicious and Indian people speak fluent Cantonese.

I came here via Shenzhen (深圳), which was incredibly convenient. I took a train from Guangzhou (广州) to Shenzhen and then followed the signs pointing towards Hong Kong. I had to fill out a questionnaire when I reached Customs about the Swine Flu, and there was a looped recording advising the public to seek a doctor if they are feeling flu-like symptoms. It was all a bit intimidating.

I found a cheap hotel which is run by a very sweet old man. I will stay here tonight, pick up my visa tomorrow (it's already processing) and be on my way back to Guangzhou tomorrow.

广州 Guangzhou

Martyr's Park (烈士陵园)

delicious

sexy santa chicken

Gar (a band from Beijing)

Kelvin and Demon

Erin and Jero

an old song from Henan, China  河南的一个老歌

lately

veggies


2 days after the H&M grand opening...


Ross and I biked all day long


and we took pictures near Tian'anmen



We went to a tiny village on the outskirt of Beijing. Ross posted about it.


Emily and Ralph just woke up.


and Emily's neighbor drew eye charts and wrote an essay about her uncle on the wall with chalk.

guangzhou

erin!

(chai1) It means "destroy". This building will soon be destroyed.

night street food.

a bar we went to called ping-pong. The sign says 'ping'

This sign says 'pong'.

Chinese people like Clinton and flowers

KTV

I went to KTV (karaoke) with my friend Sheen last night. Karaoke in China is a bit different to the karaoke I know. The one we went to yesterday is called Party World. We paid about 50RMB, which included a private room with a long couch for 4 hours, and access to their buffet, which was quite tasty. I thank Sheen for kidnapping me and taking me to Party World.


picking songs


Sheen's favorite song (Ariel is teaching her Spanish)



Singing is so great and this audio system somehow makes my voice more bearable and less like a boy who's hit puberty, which makes me feel more confident and content as a singer. Thank you, Party World!



Hotel California, an international standard

Qingdao

I went to Qingdao (青岛) to visit my cousin's business associate and friend, Michael. He and his family are very warm and made me feel like I was at home when I was with them.

Qingdao is a quaint place, and less of a gritty city than Beijing. At the end of the 19 century and the beginning of the 20th, for a little over 10 years, Germany had control of Qingdao. They did wonderful things to the city, like building a sewage system, constructing lots of beautiful colonial buildings and bringing beer to China. But it seems that the Germans didn't stay in Qingdao long enough for their culture to make a really big impact on China. Last summer when I went to Vietnam, I felt that French culture was much more a part of daily life for the Vietnamese (coffee, baguettes, even bits of language) than German culture is for the people in Qingdao. I would have liked to see just a tad of German culture in Qingdao and was a bit disappointed when I didn't find any. That said, the buildings are beautiful and I was extremely happy to see the ocean!


kites flying in a park by the ocean



a new way of making dumplings, which grandma taught me to do



there were many, many couples taking wedding photos by the water



extremely cute, fresh faced boys just arriving in Qingdao, ready to join the navy

A singing man 地铁车上的歌手

What I heard on the subway today.

你知道这首歌的话，请告诉我 谢谢