Back from China

And so much to write about, but so little time left in Hong Kong, and there's a sunset over the harbour to be enjoyed - so forgive me for keeping it brief!

First, let's just salute the freedom of the internet!  Back in HK, we can actually access the web as it's meant to me.  Over in China, it was a nightmare - some things would work, some things wouldn't, and most of the time, it just left you waiting.  It was so annoying not being able to access the blog; even though I could get to the main Blogger site, I couldn't access my own blog!  And life without Wikipedia is always a darker place.

1. Taxi drivers!  Surely the worst in the world.  In an effort to control them, the government have made them install meters which play a recorded message to the passengers to reassure them that the taxi driver is legitimate.  Yeah, right.  The message goes something along these lines: "Hello tourist!  Please understanding, as foreigner, the driver is take advantages of you and journey may be taking longers as driver take longer route before droppings you far away from intending destinations".
1. The worst taxi journey in the world, ever.  Today's journey from the hotel to the mag-lev station was the worst car journey either of us have ever been on.  The taxi had two speeds - stopped, and 45 mph.  45 mph is too slow for the clear traffic over the harbour bridge, but far, far too fast for queuing traffic and, more specifically, on roundabouts.
2. Taxi to Jean Georges.  Ok, the restaurant wasn't far from the hotel and we might have been a bit lazy getting a taxi (although pushing off the "watch bag" men would have added half an hour to the walk).  But I don't think it excuses the driver going in completely the wrong direction to run the fare up a bit, before dropping us some distance from our destination because he saw another fare that he could pick up on the street.  Thankfully they saved the table for us (and the food was fabulous).
2. The mag-lev train.  A modern engineering miracle (apparently) which rockets along its route to the airport.  It's just a shame that its route to the airport starts quite a way outside Shanghai's city centre, necessitating a taxi ride to get to it (see above).  Also, I'm not sure how many of the signs for the mag-lev station actually had it spelt correctly: "magnetic leviation train", "mag iev train" and "meg lav" were variations that we saw.
3. The hair dyer in the room.  Some issues!  Was very poor, kept "fading out" and stopping for no reason before starting again, equally randomly.  Getting it fixed presented some challenges, not least trying to explain the meaning of the word "intermittently" to the receptionist.  Despite repeated complaints, the hotel staff never actually managed to fix it, but they did manage to come up the room (eventually) and show us that we were plugging it in to the wrong socket.  Worked much better after that, strangely enough.
4. Everything about the hotel.  Truly, the best hotel that either of us have ever stayed in (and typical of the quality of hotel found in China, but this really was top class).
1. Champagne reception at the hotel.  This Friday just happened to be the official opening of the hotel (although it's been occupied for around 6 months) and guests were invited to drinks in the new rooftop bar.  Just a little nicer than our own rooftop café, it even had its own Jacuzzi (something that the café doesn't have).
2. Laundry.  Put your clothes in a bag, they go away and come back rolled, folded, hanging and generally looking somehow even better than new.
3. Food.  Even at the end of a two-week trip, they make Chinese food seem appealing once again.  Some of the best food we've had on this trip was in the hotel restaurant.
4. Spa.  A huge, warm pool and perfect facilities.  Leave your towel for more than a second and they've thrown it away and replaced it with about 18 new, beautifully warm ones.  (I reckon that they'll back off this a bit once the hotel management works out how much this is costing them).
5. Beggars, and the "watch bag" men.  Just everywhere.  Someone always wants to sell you something.  Always.  At night, the beggars won't leave you alone and it really makes going out after dark much less attractive.  Mainly confined to the major tourist areas, it gives you an awful feeling in a number of different ways.
6. The "special" smell of the market streets.  No need for elaboration!
7. Dragon Fly massage.  Fearful as I was of taking Vicky for another foot massage after the complaints about last week's, this time everything was much more successful - we even managed to avoid finding something seedy (so no need to pass the address on to Ben, then).

Overall, Shanghai was, like the rest of China, a city of contrasts - some parts are just brilliant, very beautiful and impressive.  Some parts are impossibly poor, with poverty and poor conditions only a few yards away from something which is brand new.

Fortunately, the hotel staff in Shanghai understood Honglais, too.