China/Hong Kong: Foshan, China
The bus ride and hotel breakfast were uneventful, although we left probably the nicest hotel of the whole trip the first night. *sigh* Hotel rooms in Asia and Europe, for those who don't know, are much smaller than in the USA. In Asia at least (outside of Japan) they're dirt cheap, although the whole "4-star" or "5-star" thing is not a guarantee of the quality we expect it to be.
The first stop was at a park full of traditional doors, a mask show, and former home to someone famous. (curse my lack of Chinese language abilities!) They had some bizarre things there: a pony painted with zebra stripes was the most notable one. Exercises in bargaining also began, as well as the first faux pas-- someone who shall remain unnamed strung the seller on a little too far and didn't actually buy anything, after negotating something like a 65% discount. Oops.
Foshan itself is known for ceramics, so we visited the Dragon Kiln and museum, then wandered around a wet market for a bit. The wet market was almost like the ones in Malaysia, only this one didn't seem quite as big... Pretty cool.
The major sucky part of the trip happened that night-- outside of our hotel, my cousin's purse got cut and snatched. On the plus side, hotel staff and local police were very efficient... but it still sucked. And the insides of Chinese police stations? Just like the movies. This one was a little smaller than the movies suggest, but the vehicles were almost the same. Driven around in old school minivans and flatbed trucks. *grins*
