I finally made a trip to China. Since there is no Chinese embassy in Taiwan I had to use a travel agency to get my Visa. It cost about twice as much as it would have cost if there was an embassy. Unfortunately, that was my only option once I arrived in Taiwan and the Chinese embassy in the US wouldn't give me a Visa until I purchased plane tickets for China first and I didn't have my trip planned before I left for Taiwan.
I flew from Taipei to Hong Kong and then took a ferry to Shenzhen. From Shenzhen I took a 12 hour overnight bus ride to Yangshuo. This was no ordinary bus. It was a sleeper bus with beds instead of seats. When I first got on the bus I thought it would make for a comfortable ride because only about half of the beds were taken. My friend and I moved to the back where five beds were spread out and we took two each. This lasted about an hour as the bus stopped every few minutes to pick up more people. By the end of the hour not only was every bed taken but people were sleeping in the aisles and stacked on top of each other. The back section with five beds now had 8 people sharing the same space. My friend had some random woman using him as a pillow and her friend's kid kept kicking me in the ribs. I ended up in the shortest bed, which was only about 5 feet long so there was no stretching out on this ride. Needles to say, I didn't get much sleep on this bus ride.
After 12 hours on the bus we arrived in Yangshuo. We went to the hostel where we were staying, got some food and headed out for a boat tour of the area. It's was pretty awesome. There are lots of limestone rock formations that are really cool to look at. Later that night we went to check out a show on the water a called Impression Liu Sanjie. It was a really cool performance put together by Zhang Yimou, the same person who developed the performance for the Beijing Olympic's opening ceremony. I really enjoyed the performance but others told me that this show isn't Zhang Yimou's best work.
The next day I headed to Guilin, which was an hour bus ride from Yangshuo. In Guilin I had the chance to check out some caves and some of the old parts of the city. More limestone formations can be seen in Guilin as well. It's definitely a place worth visiting.
After a few days in Guilin I took a flight to Chengdu. While I was there the Fortune 500 Forum was going on and coincidentally the president of my University and the Dean of my Business School were attending the forum at the same time. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to meet with either one of them. Chengdu was cool. The food was really good, the markets full of interesting things to buy and it was cool to finally hear what the local dialect, Sichuan hui, sounds like. Chengdu is a very developed city and I had a great time visiting the historical sites and checking out the Panda Reserve. All of these destinations are place I would definitely like to visit again when I have more time.
I flew from Taipei to Hong Kong and then took a ferry to Shenzhen. From Shenzhen I took a 12 hour overnight bus ride to Yangshuo. This was no ordinary bus. It was a sleeper bus with beds instead of seats. When I first got on the bus I thought it would make for a comfortable ride because only about half of the beds were taken. My friend and I moved to the back where five beds were spread out and we took two each. This lasted about an hour as the bus stopped every few minutes to pick up more people. By the end of the hour not only was every bed taken but people were sleeping in the aisles and stacked on top of each other. The back section with five beds now had 8 people sharing the same space. My friend had some random woman using him as a pillow and her friend's kid kept kicking me in the ribs. I ended up in the shortest bed, which was only about 5 feet long so there was no stretching out on this ride. Needles to say, I didn't get much sleep on this bus ride.
After 12 hours on the bus we arrived in Yangshuo. We went to the hostel where we were staying, got some food and headed out for a boat tour of the area. It's was pretty awesome. There are lots of limestone rock formations that are really cool to look at. Later that night we went to check out a show on the water a called Impression Liu Sanjie. It was a really cool performance put together by Zhang Yimou, the same person who developed the performance for the Beijing Olympic's opening ceremony. I really enjoyed the performance but others told me that this show isn't Zhang Yimou's best work.
The next day I headed to Guilin, which was an hour bus ride from Yangshuo. In Guilin I had the chance to check out some caves and some of the old parts of the city. More limestone formations can be seen in Guilin as well. It's definitely a place worth visiting.
After a few days in Guilin I took a flight to Chengdu. While I was there the Fortune 500 Forum was going on and coincidentally the president of my University and the Dean of my Business School were attending the forum at the same time. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to meet with either one of them. Chengdu was cool. The food was really good, the markets full of interesting things to buy and it was cool to finally hear what the local dialect, Sichuan hui, sounds like. Chengdu is a very developed city and I had a great time visiting the historical sites and checking out the Panda Reserve. All of these destinations are place I would definitely like to visit again when I have more time.
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