So i got to China last tuesday. Interesting. I finally got into a totally different culture. I took the ferry from Hong Kong to Shekou. (i'd link this to Wikipedia but that is blocked here. Aaaargh.) Ferry takes one hour, just driving along the coastline. Looking at those green hills.
At Shekou ferry port a driver was waiting. Not with my name, but with the company name. Didn't speak a word English but was very friendly. Brought me to the hotel they had booked for me. They also didn't speak English at the reception, but managed to find someone who does. Quite allright. The guy who helped me carrying my luggage up to the room also turned on the TV for me - i didn't ask, he wouldn't have understood. Chinese channels. And then he left. I just wanted to turn down the volume a little. So i got the remote. Lots of buttons. All with a Chinese character next to it, no symbols. There were only two with "up and down" options. So i assumed that one of those would be volume and for channels+-. 50% chance to get the right one. Of course i tried the channel one first. Which changed the channel of the TV. But the TV programme was coming from a satellite box. Good luck finding the button for changing back to the video input channel. Only ~35 buttons to try...
I took another night walk before i went to bed. Next to the hotel there was a public sport ground. Football, basketball, public fitness grounds etc. And: a skating ring. Old-school skating. Like you know from old American TV series. Cute.
It took them two days to get me a place in the staff house - great. Remember, back in Saudi it took eight months(!). I now live on the sixteenth floor. Next to sea world. No dolphins or anything like you might expect, they just put a real boat up on the ground and built loads of restaurants and bars in and around it. It's the top expat spot in town. So i guess it's a little more expensive. But still cheap for Middle-European standards. Flat is quite nice, living room, balcony and all. Three person flat, got an Australian flatmate who transferred here with me from Saudi. The third one might be an Indian arriving next week. We can have some nice parties at that place. And we will :-)
The flat was furnished, including the kitchen. Four plates, four soup bowls. And four Chinese soup spoons. And chop sticks. I like eating with chop sticks, but we agreed on buying some metal cutlery. So we went to WallMart to get some stuff. My first time at Walmart. Didn't get to one when i was in the states in 2004, neither during one of my many visits to Germany. Not that they're particularly special - except for some Walmart exclusive Star Wars toys, of course...
We got there with a bus for about 15 to 20 Eurocent, but having bought a couple of things we wanted to take a cab back. Of course the communication problems persisted. Try telling a Chinese cab driver you want to go to Seaworld where the McDonald's is. I was told that everyone knows that. No way they will understand you. I should have said Hai Shang Shi Jie. Obviously seaworld... which just reminds you, always, really always, have a piece of paper with you that has the name of the desired location written on it in Chinese. Always.
That time we took the bus. 20 cent instead of 1.5 Euros for a cab.
Btw, that seems to be our magical bus line. There are many buses going from our station, but that one line goes everywhere we need to go: The base, our place, the Walmart, Shenzen,...
Pics will follow with the next blog entry.
Cheers
CGA
No comments:
Post a Comment