Voyage through China

I've been thoroughly missing the Internet these last 10 days or so. I met up with the PLU "crew" + some other American students .
from various places that are traveling with us. We stayed at the Kowloon YMCA in HK for a couple of days exploring places that I had already seen but it was still a fun time I really appreciated seeing my friends and getting to have a taste of home. The highlight of my time with them in HK was the seafood dinner we had on Lamma Island and the day at Repulse Bay with my buddies.

From Hong Kong, we took a flight to Guilin. Guilin is famous for it's beautiful natural scenery. However, when we got in at night, the area looked really sketchy. It was the first time in my life that I saw obvious places of prostitution. It was funny at first but then just creepy. It is definitely a new thing to see those places. We could identify them by the purple lights illuminating from open businesses. I think we stayed at the nicest hotel in town, which was still sketchy. The next day in Guilin, we took a river ferry exploration down the Li River. This whole area is famous for it's jagged rock hills that jet up out of the ground. We also took a small tour of the rural area.
This was poor China. Quite different than Taipei or Hong Kong.

At night we took a train to Wushan. The train was very cramped. I had just a small bed that was the top of three bunks.
I just slept all night considering it was a 12 hr. train ride. At first it was very claustrophobic but I was tired from all the travel so it was fine.

We arrived in Wuhan early the next morning and spent some time exploring there. Wuhan is very polluted, very crowded, very Chinese. It was a good experience but out of my comfort zone. I loved it though. In Wuhan we traveled to famous place called the Yellow Crane Tower. It is one of the three most famous towers in China. From there we took a long bus ride to the Three Gorges Dam were we would board our 5 star cruise along the Yangtze River, China's biggest and the 3rd largest in the world.

This cruise ship was so insanely nice. Never did I expect to travel on a 5 star cruise for this trip. Apparently all the 4 star cruises were booked so we took the 5 star one. It would take us all the way to Chongqing(near Chengdu, look on a map). For the first night we remained docked and the next day we had a tour of the largest dam in the world, the Three Gorges Dam From here we would leave up the river.

The cruise was very very nice. I was really taken aback. Most of the other travelers were coming from the Olympics. .It was very surreal. Each day, we would stop at a different location and have a short excursion. One day we took a small boat up a tributary of the Yangtze. It felt like we could have been natives navigating the
river. Very cool. Another day we visited Fengdu, or the "Ghost town." It was mostly just idols and deities that were worshiped. Here was the supposed afterlife connection from physical to Heaven or Hell. So many evil statues, many depicting Hell torture scenes.

The cruise would end after 4 nights, 3 days. We finished in Chongqing. From there we went to the Buddhist cave carvings in Da Zhu.
It was just more history and statues. This place was a place that people would stop at before heading out on their journey along the Silk Road. This would be there prayer location to ask for protection for the long journey and also to thank the gods after they returned.

A 5 hr bus ride would deliver us to Chengdu. Then following our Sichuanese dinner(Spicy!) we would arrive at Sichuan University. We are staying the International dorms. I just met some Koreans and some Japanese wing mates. We communicated through Chinese. This event will really challenge me to get better. I'm really excited. I'm in the market for a used bicycle right now. It should be fun. I've been super busy so it will take some time to get back to everyone via Email. Know that I am doing my best and I will get around to every email. So if you send me something, I will reply. It just might take some time. I'll try to get some pictures up soon. Dzi-jian!

HK Friends

I've had a lot of fun traveling this summer, and HK is no exception. I've made a lot of friends through church. And I also made a lot of friends through playing basketball at the courts next the church I'm staying at. One friend I had some chance to spend time with off the courts. His name is Man.

He's a real cool guy that is from Hong Kong. His parents both grew up here working on fishing boats as a part of the "boat people." Now his mom works at Ocean Park, along with him, and his dad works with a boating company. He is 19, just like me. Although he is finished with high school, he is still not yet in college. The system is different here so he still has to do some more schooling. Although life isn't easy, he has a really easygoing personality. I really enjoy being around him. His family isn't heavily religious but he says that occasionally he will go to the temple with his parents.

The other day, he took me around town a little bit. We first went and had some famous fish soup dish. It was delicious and different then anything I had had before. Then we went the Hong Kong Museum of History. I loved it there so much. We spent almost four hours there looking at all the great pictures and reading all the great information about Hong Kong through the many years. It was the best museum I have ever gone to. Not only was it informative, but lso quite fun. It had many interesting things that kept us entertained. Each section of the museum was designed differently according to what was happening at that time. aFor the Opium Wars, it was designed like a British street from colonial times and also there were many pieces of furniture and such. Another part from before then that was mostly Chinese had big Chinese statues that used to be paraded around in the streets. It was just fun to see all the different things. They really did a great job in this museum.
Later, we went to a couple of street markets. We went to the Ladies' Street and also to a goldfish street where fish and aquariums were everywhere.
It was funny to see but I really had no interest... haha. We took the bus home in order to meet up with more of Man's friends to play some basketball. It was all fun!

I'm really going to miss those guys. When I come back to Hong Kong someday, I'm going to give them a call to hang out. And they all have an open invitation to come stay with me in America!

It can all be said in pictures...

A famous floating restaurant in Aberdeen, HK.


One of the many double-decker buses. One of my favorite things about HK is riding in the front row on the upper deck.


A panda I saw in the theme park, Ocean Park.


The bunch of crazies that I taught English to.


Aw... The beautiful Stanley Market.


Amazing night shot of Central across Victoria Harbor.


Apparently China is hosting the Olympic games...


Similar to our stars in Hollywood, this is in Tsim Sha Tsui. HK is the Hollywood of China. Here I'm with Jackie Chan's handprints.

BBQ and the Beach

On Friday, at night time the church and I went to the Hong Kong Police College where we had a BBQ. The church knows one of the professors/captains so they let us use there BBQ area and grassy football field. It was a lot of fun playing football with everyone and cooking meat over the open flames. It took a long time to cook the meat but it just added to the social aspect of it. I was told that this was a very HK type BBQ. We each had our own metal sticks to use to hold our meat of bread or spring rolls over the fire.

Playing football, I got so sweaty. It was a really good workout for me. Football is not my best sport but I had a good time and did a great job anyway. Afterwards, we took the bus back home.

On Saturday, I got to sleep in for a little bit and then later met up with about 30 of the youth from the church. We went to very nice beach and played games. I wanted to go in the water but ended up not going because we were playing games the whole time. Some guys who just chillin on the beach were tossing disc so I joined in with them. But I showed them my disc and they thought it was much better so we used my disc to toss. They asked where I got it and I told them America. It can be hard to find a good frisbee.

It was fun being the nice beach. It looked like something out of movie or magazine. The weather was so hot but luckily the clouds came out for little bit to protect my white skin from being chard. Most of the games we played involved water guns and water balloons. The hotels and apartments nearby looked really high class. I'm sure it is an expensive place. And out in the water I could see a couple of really nice yachts.

Now tonight we have a youth group and then later I'm going to meet up with some guys to play basketball. The days go by so fast here. Always busy...

Hong Kong

I'm here in Hong Kong. The city is the biggest I have ever been in. The food is great but the city is so crowded. It very busy and alive all the time. It always has an interesting fusion of East meets West. The cars drive on the left like in Europe and the buses are all two stories. It has been a fun treat to ride on them.

I have gotten to see some of the sights like the IFC building that is shown in Batman: The Dark Knight. I went up to the observatory level and saw the amazing view. I also got to travel on this large escalator system running through the city that I was told is very famous. I also got to travel up to The Peak - a very famous look-out area that gives a great view of the city.

I have also been teaching English to children from the church. They are just beginnners so it has been a challenge. Everyone who is caring for me has been very nice. I had dinner last night at a family's house. The food was very good and we all had a lot of fun playing games. Chris(15 yrs.old) taught me how to play Chinese Chess. I learned quickly and even beat him 2 games to 1! It was all in fun. We were also watching the Olympics. They, of course, were cheering for China.

I took a ferry across the water back home. It was definitely different. There is a lot of water in HK. It beautiful. Then when I got home, I saw a basketball court nearby so I got my shoes on and went to go play. It was a lot of fun. I think HK is hotter than TPE. It is more humid at least. Well, I having a great time. I meet up with my classmates next week. Looking forward to traveling to China even though I miss my Debbie.

Preparations

I leave for Hong Kong a week from tomorrow. I will be staying with a church there and the pastor is going to give me free housing. For compensation, I'll be teaching English to the 6-12 year olds. I am taking a "Let's Talk in English" magazine and some other English materials with me. Although I am excited about going to Hong Kong for 10 days, I will miss Taiwan a lot. I really love Taiwan. But fortunetly I won't have to say good-bye, but rather see you later. I will for sure be back to this country I love someday.