21 January 2008: Bye-Bye Shanghai!

Today we awoke early, and finished packing our things for Hong Kong. The plane was due to leave around 12.30 int the afternoon, but we had to be there just as early as an international flight. Even though Hong Kong is technically part of China, it's still regarded as an international journey. Hong Kong is managed by a special governing council, who try to keep Hong Kong the same as it was when the British left in 1997.
Chris and I caught a taxi to the Maglev station. The Maglev is a magnetic levitation train. It was designed for super-fast travel between Shanghai and the Pudong international airport. The train reaches speeds of about 470kmph.
I don't think the train has been terribly successful, because the city terminus is too far from the centre of the city. It would have been cheaper for Chris and I to catch the taxi the entire way to the airport instead of going on the train!
When we reached the airport, we checked through immigration, and waited by the gate. I was pretty excited to be going to a new place. Shanghai was fun, but I think I had seen enough.
When we arrived in Hong Kong, we took another train from the airport to the city center. Then we took a bus to the hotel. The bus also dropped passengers at other locations around Kowloon, so we got to see a little of the city before we even arrived at our hotel.
When we got to the hotel, we were unable to check-in because Ryan had booked the rooms using his credit card. We left our bags at the hotel, and roamed around the city for a few hours, until Brent and Ryan arrived from Japan.
My first impressions of the city was that it was big and glamorous. It was all the good parts of China (cheap clothes, cheap food) but without all the dirty parts of China. People also didn't hassle you on the streets as much as in China, and most people could speak English very well.
From our hotel, Chris and I walked down Nathan Rd, which is the main shopping strip in Kowloon. we wandered through shopping malls into the botanic gardens, which were quite spacious, given how compact everything else in Hong Kong is!
We strolled through some night markets, which sold everything. I was surprised to see some of the stalls selling adult toys! We stopped to buy some CK watches, and also some little trinkets as gifts.
When Brent and Ryan arrived, we checked into the hotel. Our rooms were very nice, although small. The entire hotel room that Chris and I had could have fit into our living room at home!
Brent and Ryan showed us part of the harbor which we had not seen during our wanderings earlier in the day. It was beautiful. (But there was smog haze everywhere!)
We stopped on the way home for some cocktails at the Hard Rock Cafe. I tried a long island ice tea, and discovered that the cafe also had root beer, so I tried some of that too.