After lunch we found this nice little park by the water. There was a fountain in the centre and all around the fountain were footprints that had the names of capital cities around the world and the distance they were from that point. It was very cool. We quickly started to run around the footprints looking for the capitals of Canada and the USA and other cities that we had visited.
Before leaving the office back in Guangzhou, a co-worker of mine had recommended a cheap place to stay if we ended up having to spend the night. Hong Kong is not known for their reasonable prices. In fact, Hong Kong can be very expensive to visit. Little did I know that I would be in need of a cheap place to stay.
After getting Amariah his favourite lunch, a McDonald's Happy meal, and Patrick and I having some Hong Kong noodles, we set out to find this cheap place and what an adventure that ended up being.
We found the place without trouble. In fact, we had been there before without realizing it, not to stay the night but to exchange money. I actually didn't even know that there were places here to spend the night. It was a 16 floor building, with the first floor being entirely dedicated to money exchange. There are counter, after counter, after counter, all trying to persuade the people to exchange with them. According to every booth, "they have the best price." Each booth also has people standing around the outside of the building advertising for the different exchange booth, trying to get people in off the street to go to a certain booth.
The cultures represented here was unbelievable. It almost felt like Vancouver. Lots of East Indians, Africans and Caucasian backpackers all crowding inside this building either to exchange money or looking for a cheap place to spend the night.
We found the elevator and stood in line to go up. There was a sign beside the elevator advertising for each hostel/guest house that was on each floor. The whole thing looked dirty and questionable, but again, I kept reminding myself that G was above all things, and never once in our spirit did we feel unrest, but rather peace.
We first went to what we thought looked to be the nicest one, and maybe it was, but it was more money than we were willing to spend so we decided to go up a floor and see what that one was like. We went back to the elevator only to discover that you can't go up from the different floors, only down. There was no up button. So, we went for the stairs. Walking up the stairs made me feel like I was in the inner city some where deep in the ghetto. The walls were covered with graffiti , it was dirty, profanity was every where and some really skinny woman, who looked like a drug addict, was slowly wondering the stairs looking as though she wasn't really present.
Smiling as we walked by her, we headed for the door of the next floor. We weren't impressed with the next floor, so went kept going up. We had one place show us a room that seemed reasonable and clean, but we thought that we would keep looking and then make our decision when we saw more places.
When we came to a floor that had big steel bars on the doors and locked with chains, we decided that we had seen enough and that we would go back to the place we had seen. The halls were narrow, the room was the size of a storage closet and the toilet was in the shower. It was the smallest room I had ever paid to stay in. Something about it seemed almost fun.
After getting the keys we decided to walk the streets for fun and go find somewhere totally not Chinese to eat dinner at. This was a family get away and we were going to enjoy it.
The streets were crowded with foreigners shopping and enjoying the sites. Double Decker buses drove by frequently. Huge flashing billboards, the largest I have ever seen, were advertising Big American brand names such as Adidas. And the biggest treat was during our whole time in the Hong Kong public we didn't hear one person hacking up phlegm and spitting, we didn't see any one peeing on the street or pick their nose, no body pushed and shoved (it was actually the opposite, people helped others), people smiled when you smiled at them and people lined up and took turns for whatever. It was such a breathe of fresh air.
We decided to go to TGI Fridays for dinner. It was just like back home and we enjoyed every minute of it.
After eating and exploring the street we called it an early night, heading back to our little closet hoping to catch up on some sleep. We had so much fun as a family playing together and making Amariah laugh, which made us laugh. It was a much-needed family time. The beds were actually soft, unlike China, and we had the best sleep we had since arriving in China. Who knew that would happen in a questionable cheap guesthouse with three locks on the door.
The next morning we woke up, took our time getting ready and then tried to rush to McDonald's to make the breakfast menu, which we missed. So we went and picked up our visas and purchased our train tickets. We were surprised to learn that we had 2 hours to kill before the next train. No big deal though, we found a place to get lunch, and chased the birds that were flying around the station.
Our Hong Kong adventure was coming to a close. The trip home was smooth. No bumps, no bruises, no name misunderstandings. We arrived home that evening having completely enjoyed our time away as a family and were praising G for the blessing of a mini vacation, for His provision, hand of protection and visas.
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