Up early today for the big trip to Shenzhen - a Special Economic Zone in China. We have to pay for a visa as we're entering the Communist mainland. Heard some interesting stories about this place - so it should be an experience.
To get to Shenzhen, we took a train trip which lasted about an hour. In order to enter China, you have to buy visa - which sets you back around $HK150. While filling out the various bits of paper work required to enter the PRC, there was a huge crash and commotion from a nearby set of stairs. As near as I can tell, someone had taken a tumble from the top of the stairs and ended up somewhere near the bottom. You know you'll hear those cartoon tumbles when someone will plummet a dozen stairs to the ground - that was what it sounded like.
After Dad attempted to lead us wandering off towards some unknown local train station in the Chinese heartland, I thought it might be a good idea to travel in the opposite direction towards the giant five story building everyone else was heading to. Lo and behold - that building was the actual destination.
We got there around 10am and immediately picked up two local guides who seemed to want to dissuade us from going inside and to instead head off towards the stores of some of their friends? How persistent? One of them followed us up five levels continuing to ask if we wanted purses or DVD's no matter how many times we'd say no. Good to see Casino Royale is already available to purchase at a price fluctuating form $HK4 to $HK7.
"Missy missy want wallet purse dvd ipod usb?" was then the constant cry that echoed everywhere you went. The blighters sure are persistent. And when it's every single person saying it, it does get annoying quickly. And as you might guess, it was haggling all the way - so much my favourite thing.
My first bit of haggling was to pick up two 4GB SD cards for the cameras. Originally offered for $HK380 each, I managed to bargain my way down to $HK300 for the pair - around about $A25 each. I was pretty chuffed with this - considering that these cards normally go for around $A120 each on eBay - let alone what you'd find in the likes of Hardly Normal. I was later to find however, that you could get them even cheaper. A subsequent card, I managed to pick up for $HK100. Even though I didn't do as brilliantly as I possibly could have - that price for those cards was still pretty good work.
That's the thing about haggling. Unless you do it every single day and have complete awareness of the actual local costs of an item, these people are always going to have it over on you in the end. It's all a case of deciding what's the best outcome for yourself - how much re you saving to buy. You won't ever beat them - they're the pros and your the rube. On that basis I think I did pretty pretty well with some of the stuff I ended up getting. Besides that - after haggling for four plus hours - I was bloody exhausted.
The two best tactics which I learned about in Phuket still held true here. The first is - if you've got the money you're willing to pay in your hand and show it to them - the seller is likely to budge. The second is - if they won't move - you just walk away. The number of times I did that, only to have the seller come charging after me was pretty much every single time - bar one. Of course - it's kind of hard to walk away when one of the girls is clamped to your arm. I was thinking I might have to gnaw it off to get away.
After wandering the five floors of this commercial centre, it was readily apparent that there was only about 10 different stores that were endlessly repeated in various configurations. If you wanted knock-off handbags or watches, memory cards, golf clubs(???) or every permutation of ipob (not ipod) knock-offs - you were in luck. A surprising lack of sports shoes, leather goods other than shoes or purses and for a nation were literally every single person has a mobile phone nailed to their head - phones for sale.
Overall - it was a learning experience. Perhaps with the hard-sell more of a sight of what Hong Kong proper was 20 odd years ago. Mao would be rolling in his grave if he was to see what was happening to his Communist dream. The moral of the day - you can always haggle cheaper.
Wandering though, it's obvious that the Chinese love their shiny uniforms. The more braid and buttons - the better.
Funny aside - looking at the duty free stores at the border crossing, and on the Chinese side seeing bottles of Penfolds and Wolf Blass wine for sale.
And have I mentioned how sick I was of filling out forms? Today I had to fill out the following:
A form to leave Hong Kong.
A form to apply for a Visa for China.
A form to enter China.
A form to leave China.
A form to enter Hong Kong
The forms never end!
An aside for those who've used the underground in London. Instead of the Oyster card, they have the Octopus - "Just insert your Octopus" was the amusing advert in one of the posters.
Once again dinner was excellent. The waitress we had, in between doing the usual screaming into some kind of mobile phone headset, insisted four times we order he Peking duck. I'm sure it was nice, but we had it last night so we wanted to try something else. We ordered soup for four, but it seemed to be enough for about 4000. In a room opposite us, there seemed to be yet another wedding going on - must be the season for them. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason for the arrival of guests - yet alone a dress code - suits to tracksuits seemed to be seemed to be the order of the day.
As well, dinner was another one of those speed deals. About 5-10 minutes after ordering, the first dish arrived. And within 5 minutes of that - the rest of the dishes had all arrived. Sure don't mess about.
Funny aside - the restaurant was selling a Jacobs Creek 2004 Merlot for $HK198 - about $A33 - it's a bottle which'll sell for around $A12-15 back home.
Finished the night with a cup of coffee in an excellent little coffee shop called Crema Coffee. The shop had it's own little roasting machine on displace - so the smell of fresh coffee was amazing.
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