China through my eyes: Hong Kong: day 1

Shenzhen is a big, rich city right outside of Hong Kong and it is where you get off the train before crossing the border. Kristin and I decided to just spend the first night at a hostel in Shenzhen and then head to HK the next morning. To get to Shenzhen, I took a fast train from Yueyang (the big city near Huarong) to Shenzhen- it took only about 4 hours and covered a vast distance. The trip itself was one of the most stressful experiences I've had in my short life so far. A little recap:

So, my train from Yueyang was to leave at 5 30pm on Sept. 30- the first day of our vacation for national day, so I knew the roads would be busy. Usually it takes about 1 1/2 hours to get to Yueyang from Huarong, so I figured I would leave a little cushion time and around 2:30 I had my friend call a cab for me. The driver was stuck in traffic and wouldn't be able to pick me up for another half hour and then informed my friend that it would take 2+ hours to drive to Yueyang because there was a big accident on the main road and traffic was terrible... My friend discussed the problem with me, convinced I would miss my train and mentioned I cancel my trip. HAH! I had already paid for my train tickets and my hostel rooms and I'd been looking forward to this- I wasn't about to just give up! I told my friend I'd take the risk, so she called the driver again and he said he'd be there as fast as he could. Around 3:15 he finally showed up, I jumped in the car and we sped off. Luckily there were 2 students from my school in the backseat with me who spoke English and were eager to be my friends- Victoria and Cherry. Everyone in the car knew of my situation. The air was tense and the girls kept reassuring me I would make the train. The driver, obviously feeling even more pressured because I am a foreigner, was taking extreme measures to get me to the train station. Every time cars slowed down, the driver would swerve into opposing traffic, playing chicken with cars driving at breakneck speed towards us in an attempt to pass the traffic. When we hit a standstill, our driver would pull a U-ey (creating traffic for cars driving in the opposite direction but hey, nobody seemed to bothered), and we would backtrack for a few minutes before turning off another country road. At one point, after turning around from a particularly bad traffic jam, we turned off onto the one lane road that follows Dongting lake (the lake that Yueyang lies on). The lake road isn't meant for real traffic... after a few minutes along this bumpy road, it turned into a dirt road- did I mention it was raining that day?- so it turned into a mud road, with giant potholes and with constant stopping and speeding up due to the traffic from other cars with the same idea; Cherry was puking into a plastic bag next to me and Victoria was covering her eyes. The driver was dripping sweat. After what seemed like hours, we finally turned off the lake road onto a paved road and crossed Dongting bridge. It was about 5pm when we finally entered Yueyang and as soon as we were in the city, the traffic was at a stand still. We still had quite a ways to the train station and our driver was cursing and trying to weave between cars in our SUV. Cherry and Victoria looked up other trains I could catch in case I missed my train (thank goodness I had these girls with me) while I was messaging Kristin with updates on whether I would actually see her soon or not. Meanwhile, the driver had decided it was useless trying to drive on the road and started driving on the sidewalk, pressing his hand on the horn so pedestrians would jump out of his way. Once we'd made it to the road the train station was on, the girls told me to run as soon as the car stopped, and I prepared myself. At 5:25 the driver stopped the car, I thanked everyone as much as I could and ran. I cut everyone in line through security (nobody minded) and sprinted to the entrance of my gate, showed my ticket and jumped on the train probably around 5:29. I made it.

The train ride itself was pretty uneventful- took some pictures with a few kids and teenagers brave enough to talk to me, then around 9 30 we arrived in Shenzhen. Because I am me, I decided to just walk to the hostel rather than take a taxi- why do the easy way when you can make it hard on yourself, right? Of course I got completely lost for about an hour before finally finding someone who could actually show me the way- a young guy walked me all the way to the hostel (not before getting a picture together) and finally, FINALLY around 11 I set my things down in the dorm room. Luckily, Kristin and I had the room to ourselves. It had been a long day.

The next morning we headed into Hong Kong. It was crazy packed, SO MANY PEOPLE. We had to wait in long lines at the border, and it took us about 3 hours before finally arriving at our hostel.

Once we set our stuff off at the hostel, it was time to explore the city. It was early afternoon and we had much to see...

Of course we were starving so while walking through Jardine's Bazaar near Causeway Bay and our hostel, we found a little restaurant that was making sticky rice buns and was full of people. We decided to eat here- best decision we made all trip. I had fresh hot soybean milk and a sticky rice roll. SO GOOD. The rice rolls are filled with some sort of meat floss, or shrimp floss, or something who cares it tastes delicious.

Wet market

The forever blooming Bauhinia

All over the city were these women hanging out on the streets... We never really figured out what they were doing, but they would be all prepared for sitting on the streets all day.

Awesome window displays everywhere

We also used the bathroom in every fancy shopping center we happened to walk into. This was the winner... coolest bathroom I've ever had the honor of peeing in (in Pacific Place- I highly recommend it).