The Return

So I'm back in China now. Today's Valentine's Day and I arrived in Hong Kong Feb. 2nd, almost 2 weeks ago. I first flew from Atlanta to Newark, NJ, then to Hong Kong from there. I had about a two hour layover which I spent eating lunch and just people watching. When we were landing in Newark, I did get my first glimpse of New York city, which just made me want to go there even more. I was able to see the Empire State building as well as the Statue of Liberty.

Anyways, during the flight to Hong Kong, the fasten seat belt sign didn't come on once. We had a perfect flight. Each seat came with a tv screen on the headrest in front and I was able to choose from over 200 movies and many, many tv shows. Needless to say, I was entertained the whole time. I shared a row of three seats with a Canadian on his way to Taiwan so we had plenty of room to sleep.

I landed in Hong Kong and got through customs with no trouble. I arranged a private car to take me from the airport to Shenzhen that night because Vivi was unable to obtain permission to go to Hong Kong before I arrived. The private car is definitely the way to go. When you take the bus, you have to get off the bus (with all of your bags) to leave Hong Kong, get back on the same bus to go over a bridge, then get off the bus (with all of your bags) to enter China. Once you're in China, you have to get on a new bus, one that people will help you find because they've placed a sticker somewhere on your person. If you lose this sticker, you're stuck and have to pay again to get on a bus, it's not fun, especially when you don't speak Chinese.

With a private car, you just go to a separate border and you don't even have to get out of the car. The driver just handed the guard my passport, he scanned it, took a look a me and let us on our way. We did have to do it one more time for the mainland border but same procedure, very easy. I arrived in Shenzhen in no time and met Vivi at the hotel.

It was an easy and great trip to China, unlike the first one.