I am the dumbass you think I am

There's a lot to report so let's get started.

First of all, on the 16th, some friends and I went to Causeway Bay for dinner and shopping. Well, first of all, Pei-chin, Wen-Li and I got lost trying to find an Esprit Outlet store. To make a long story short, we walked around Tsim Sha Tsui for at least 40 minutes looking for it, but when we found it, it was literally a 2 minute walk from the subway station we had exited from. Whoops.

In Causeway Bay, we went for dinner at a delicious Japanese restaurant. It was fun and we all got big girlie alcholic drinks. Good friends + alcohol = Good memories.

After the Japanese restaurant, we moseyed around the corner to a place known as the "Cat Cafe." It's famous in Hong Kong because literally, there are cats wandering around loose in the store. The kitchen part of the restaurant is of course segregated - there's a big glass door keeping the cats from escaping into it. There were probably around 12 cats in the restaurant. It was nifty. They could come and sit on the chairs with you or be on tables. Of course, as nifty as this place was, you couldn't help but wonder about the hygiene... Cats shedding everywhere, litter boxes located underneath tables, the definite smell of cat throughout the restaurant. All in all, it was fun though.

Pictures from my night in Causeway Bay can be found here!

Now for the more exciting news. Yesterday I went to China. Again. My Chinese History in the field class went on a field trip to Guangzhou, China. It was much better run this time (although we did get lost several times - I actually became familiar enough with the scenery to be able to pic out the same subway station each time we passed it). There were some other kinks, but they weren't really the Prof's fault.

Anyways, we visited 4 areas while in Guangzhou. (You can see all my pictures of the trip here.) Our first stop was the Nan Yue's King's Tomb. It was nifty, but a lot smaller than ancitipated (both in height and width). There were some rooms of the tomb that you couldn't even stand up straight in because the ceilings were so short. Outside of the tomb were a bunch of exhibitions showing the items they had excavated from the tomb. Now that was a cool museum. The artistry on the jade and metals was amazing. And unlike Beijing museums, this one was very well-kept.

Our second stop was the Museum of Guanzhou. This museum wasn't as nifty. Everything was written in Chinese so we had no idea as to what we were looking at. And it was a lot of pots. Pottery in my humble opinion, makes for a very boring exhibit. Oh well. I think the top floor was my favourite. They had a bunch of beautiful chinese silk screen prints, as well as carvings and other forms of art. The big thing about the museum was its actual structure. It's 5 floors high and historians can't figure out how they built such a tall structure... Or at lest that's what my prof said. I think he might be a bit confused there.

Cue stop #3. We went to the Guangxiao Buddhist Temple. By this time we were running behind schedule due to getting lost and whatnot, so we only had like 15 minutes to visit the temple. I wish we could have had more time at this temple because it was gorgeous. It was also a lot bigger than anticipated. Anyways, since I don't know what a lot of the things in there meant, you can simply check out my photos to get the gist of what I saw. It was also neat seeing real monks wandering around, doing their thang. I sometimes see monks in Hong Kong, but very rarely.

Our final stop, and by far my favourite was the Cheng Ancestral Hall. I could spend all day there trying to see all the details of the hall and not succeed. Every surface of the hall had a different carving or picture. It was gorgeous! But once again, we only had like 10 minutes to wander around because it was closing. So sad.

Now comes the fun part. My cousin Robyn is teaching English in Guangzhou right now, so we had made plans to meet after my field trip was done and go for dinner. So after the Cheng Ancestral Hall, I bid my class adieu and went down into the nearest Metro station to find a McDonald's, our meeting point. (FYI, Guangzhou's metro system is exactly the same as Hong Kong's. Cool.) I pulled out a book and began to read while waiting for her.

I look up, and there's Robyn! Yaaaaay! I haven't seen her in 2 years! It's so COOL that we finally saw each other again, but even cooler that it's happened in China. Anyways, she guided me over to Beijing Street, a big pedestrian area. It was very pretty. Same as Hong Kong though. We were accosted by like 10 men, all trying to sell us fake watches. Ha.

We had dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant with her boyfriend and one of their co-workers. I love Vietnamese. It was so tasty and fun. We chatted about random things and did the generic "fill me in on each other's family" lines. It was very relaxing. Afterwards we just wandered around Beijing Street again - I only had like 30 minutes till I had to start going to the train.

Robyn and Curtis escorted me back to the station (or were they trying to ensure I would leave China ASAP?). From there, I managed to go to the wrong area. I had gone through a security check and then approached a worker - I shoved my ticket into her hands and asked, "I go where?" in Chinese. LOL, with a lot of finger pointing I finally ended up at the right train part.

The train back to HK was fairly uncomfortable. The seats were padded, but their backs were at like a 90 degree angle, meaning you couldn't rest comfortably. Despite this, the excitement of the day wiped me out and I slept for most of the train ride.

Amusing anecdotes of the trip:

• While waiting at the station for all the students to gather, one of the French students realized he didn't have his passport. He did the EXACT same thing during our Macau trip. You'd think he manage to remember this time after the Macau fiasco. He ended up having to go back to his residence, get his passport, go to Shenzhen, buy a train ticket to Guangzhou, and then get a taxi to the tomb. Yeesh. (He was also usually the last one on the bus at each location... I've heard of being slow, but this is a new low. ;))


• On the way from the Guangzhou Museum to the Guangxiao Temple, I was gazing out the window. Suddenly I see a young girl running beside our bus. I take a closer look and lo and behold! It's Euna from our class! I guess we had left her behind at the Museum! Oh my gosh! LOL, I started yelling "Professor! There's a student outside the bus!" and we managed to stop and get her on. Ha ha.


• This is by far the BEST part of my trip. I figured that since I'd be taking a train back by myself to Hong Kong, I ought to bring a text book for a paper I'm writing along for the ride. I carted my book around all day, randomly pulling it out here and there and reading it. It wasn't until I was going through customs on the way back to HK that I realized my error. First of all, you aren't supposed to bring printed materials that may damage China's reputation in or out of the country (I saw a bin for newspapers which is why I remembered the potential problem of my book). Of course, when I was going through customs, I had pulled my book out beforehand because it was making my purse uncomfortably heavy... So here I am, walking through customs with a book in my hand. I started freaking out, but tried to maintain my nonchalant attitude while passing the guards. I must have succeeded because no one tackled me from behind. What makes this story even worse is that the book is about state violence. LOL. That's right, I was carting a book around that was criticizing state violence (of course, this book was critiquing violence in Serbia and Israel, but I'm sure they would care whatever country the book talked about). Luckily nobody asked me all day what book I was reading, nor did I try to show it to anyone. If you ever needed proof, there it is: I'm a dumbass.