Hong Kong - Farewell China

Hello again!

Guess I am just gunna post a bunch at once (gotta take advantage of that free wifi ya know?!)

Answered comments in one of the other ones I am posting with this one.

Picture – this picture is of me atop Victoria’s Peak looking out over the entire city of Hong Kong on a decently clear night (rarity for China). It was our last evening in China and it was the perfect ending to a truly amazing country.

Well my time in China ended almost as abruptly as it began. Day 7 in China (6th day of our SAS adventure, February 22nd) consisted of an early wakeup call at our hotel 3:45 a.m. to be exact. That was an experience getting to see 100 people, most of which you haven’t known for longer than a week, fresh out of bed. Definitely saw some people’s true colors during the whole process of loading the bus, leaving the bus, going through customs, clearing immigration, and boarding the plane. I thought it was fine at the airport, definitely one of the easier customs at an airport, and there was no line to wait in. Some people however (the morning grouches) were not happy to do anything and just complained the whole time, personally I don’t see what there was to complain about; we were in China and had just had quite possibly the best 6 days anyone could ever hope to have in a foreign country. How could we be unhappy?!?!? It just didn’t make sense to me.

The plane ride to Hong Kong lasted 4.5 hours and the majority of our SAS group slept. I only managed to get an hour of shut eye and spent the remainder of the flight listening to music and reflecting on my journey. Sitting on the ship 3 days later I still can’t believe some of the things I got to experience! I truly had an adventure of a lifetime inside of an experience of a lifetime (Semester at Sea). How did I get to lucky? What did I do to deserve this? I kept making spiritual parallels with the worldly opportunity I had just been given and the spiritual opportunity I was given some 2000 years ago. God gave us the ultimate gift, He gave up his one and only son to die on the cross as payment for our sins, sins we have already committed and sins we have yet to commit. Again I ask…how did we get so lucky? What did we do to deserve this? The simply answer…nothing. We are completely undeserving.

Upon arriving at Hong Kong it was about a 1 hour bus ride to the ship where it took another hour for the ship security to screen all of our bags and allow us to board. By this time it was 1 p.m. and Jeremy, Kevin, and I decided to unpack, change out of the clothes we had been wearing for 3 days, and regroup around 3:30 to go out and see stuff. We were told that some must see places in and around Hong Kong were the markets in the temple district and Victoria’s Peak, so that is what we decided to do. We headed to the temple markets which have absolutely nothing to do with a temple, the street they are on is simple called Temple Street. There was a ladies market, a flower market, a goldfish market, a food market, and an everything market. We walked up and down the vendor lined street for about 3 hours taking in the sights and smells. I personally didn’t buy anything but a soda because we had already loaded up on souvenirs in Beijing and I didn’t want to spend any more money in China that I had to. Oh let me tell you about the Hong Kong subway. Ok so it was crazy crowded!! We were told in pre-port that this would be an issue in Hong Kong and you will never believe what they told us to do. They literally told us to shove people aside to get onto the subway train or you wouldn’t make it in. I had experienced some pretty packed subways in Russia before but this was different. It wasn’t so much that people couldn’t fit but that people would step into the subway and just kinda stop. Apparently the Chinese push each other too so it isn’t considered rude or inappropriate, simply something you have to do. Luckily it was just the 3 of us so we didn’t have to worry about leaving anyone and it wasn’t too big of an issue because the 3 of us were taller than most of the Chinese so we could muscle our way in pretty easy. Just another way of experiencing Chinese culture I guess lol.

After seeing the extent of the various markets we hopped back on the subway to return to the port area in search of dinner before hopping on the ferry to Victoria’s peak. The port terminal that our ship was docked at just happened to be the biggest 21st Century shopping mall in Hong Kong. They had all the major stores that you would expect to find in any mall in America (over 1,000 stores in all). Honestly I looked at a registry and except for regional stores back in Oklahoma there wasn’t one main store that I could name that wasn’t in this mall. Well we just so happened to an American burger joint. The three of us had all had our fair share of authentic Chinese food for the past 6 days so we were craving something different and we couldn’t have asked for anything better. They even had A&W Rootbeer…only my favorite Rootbeer!!! Ahhhhhh I can still taste that bacon, cheeseburger. SO worth it!

With full stomachs we headed to the end of the terminal/mall to the ferry dock and loaded up for our trip across the harbor. The boat ride took all of 6 minutes and we were on Hong Kong Island. Our ship was docked on Knowloon island, which is still Hong Kong, all the islands are just separated by the bays. From the Ferry Dock on Hong Kong Island we hopped on a bus which took us to the cable car station at the bottom of Victoria’s Peak which we rode straight up (literally almost a vertical incline) to the top. Everyone who knows about Hong Kong will tell you to go up Victoria’s Peak at night and they definitely know what they are talking about. It was INCREDIBLE!! You can see the ENTIRE city lit up! We could even see our ship sitting across the harbor gleaming in the night. Then you could walk around on top of the building overlook and look to the south and see ships coming into the harbor and ships sailing out to sea. It was awesome. The pictures I took don’t quite give the view the respect it deserves but I mean what can I say, I just can’t live up to the standards my Dad has imposed on me in the picture taking category, so I apologize if this picture isn't up to snuff pops. Haha oh well I have moved on. We chilled on top of the mountain for awhile just taking it all in before making our way back down the cable car, hopping back on the bus, taking the ferry across the bay, and walking through the mall to our ship. Jeremy decided to stay out later and went his own way at the bottom of the peak when Kevin and I hopped on the bus. By the time both of us returned to the ship is was nearly midnight and we were both about ready to drop like a sack of potatoes. 7 days in China, 6 of which were on a non-stop SAS trip including a 3:45 wake up that morning had finally taken its toll on the 2 of us. It was the best night of sleep I have had on Semester at Sea yet!!

My last day in China was honestly very uneventful. I slept until about 1030, I thought I had set an alarm but honestly I might have turned it off and rolled over because I was so tired I just don’t remember. There really wasn’t much left to do in the city of Hong Kong itself unless you wanted to shop or go outside of the city which I didn’t have a whole lot of time for before on-ship time. So I decided to take advantage of the free wifi in the mall/terminal our ship was docked at. This was the point where I uploaded my first two China blogs. After starting the China blogging process, I did some major research on some of the other ports I am visiting here in the next 2 months because I had access to the good travel sights and not just wikitravel. Before you knew it I had accomplished everything I needed to online and it was rapidly approaching time for me to be on the ship. I re-boarded the ship and said goodbye to China from the back decks of the ship, taking in the lights of Hong Kong harbor one last time.

As I have finished writing about my China travels I am currently in my next port…VIETNAM!! It was only a short 2 day sail and after 1 A day of classes and 1 B day of classes we woke up in Ho Chi Minh City!! Crazy huh?!? I stepped out of one world and into another in the blink of an eye it seems like. I still can’t believe all of this is happening so fast! Well I’m off to explore Vietnam, enjoy the three blogs I just uploaded, sorry again for not being as thorough with some things as some of you might like. If you have any questions about specific things that I might not have mentioned (sorry everything seems to kind of mesh together when I have written so much about China) just make a comment about it on the most recent blog post and I will try my best to address it in the next blog.

Love you and praying for you all!!!

T

“Lord I wanna feel with your heart……see the world through Your eyes.” – Casting Crowns