23 may

An update with some photos of today. It's 5 PM when I post this, so the day hasn't ended yet. About our trip. We started with a train trip from Leer to Bremen (Germany), then a flight with KLM Cityhopper from Bremen to Amsterdam, and then the flight from Amsterdam to Hong Kong. I didn't feel to well on that last trip, but Shen slept 8 out of 10 hours of it. My stomach is my weak point regarding to stress I think. I had all kinds of medication but nothing seemed to work. I was very worried for the health check that awaited us in Hong Kong and China. In Hong Kong everything went smooth. A very efficient airport. Health check (passed), passport control and customs, efficient. No waiting times. Then we went for the mainland coaches, we found them quickly. We booked one of them (150 HKD), Shen was free :-). It left 25 minutes later (again a temperature check of our foreheads), but I had to fill in new forms for the China border so that took up most of the time. The bus  trip to the border took about 1 hour. We went across the new bridge from Hong Kong to Shekou. The China border here is super efficient as well. We left the coach, and walked through everything. Health check, temperature control, passport control, luggage scan, so easy. At the end the bus was standing there again and we where driven to a car park where we where split (according to the colour of the stickers on our shirts). We had the red sticker for the Century Plaza hotel and where put in a minivan with a couple. That ride took another hour or so, and we where dropped off at the hotel. Check in, go up to our room (oh yeah, we where upgraded, that seems to be standard at this hotel, we have a Japanese style room now) and check if the internet worked :-) We then ordered fried rice and a shrimp cocktail Mimosa from the room service, which  came quickly. Shen loved the meal!
Shen went to bed at 8.30 and I went at 9.30. At 11 PM we both where awake again. At 1 AM we got up and played a bit. I wrote my diary for the first days, Shen played his Nintendo. At 3 AM we tried to sleep again,which worked. I woke at 10.50 AM and took a relaxing bath. My stomach wasn't set until then, so I had to try to relax a bit. I ate some crackers (so happy I took plenty of home food with me!) and drank some water. I woke Shen at noon (much too late,I know, but well...) and he ate some cereals which I also  brought with me. We then prepared for a walk outside to the shopping centre (Luohu Shopping Centre). It's only 10 minutes walk, but it rained heavily. Shen had his raincoat and I an umbrella. It's about 28-30 Celcius so the temperature is fine. We walked through the metro station at LoWu station and arrived at the shopping centre. We didn't buy anything, except water which is expensive at the hotel, and some popcorn and sweets for Shen. Then we walked back and ate something at the Laurel restaurant. I had different dumplings (Dim Sum) and Shen rice with seefruit (he wanted to have some shrimp). My stomach is feeling better now, after the food. The only problem is that we ate at a strange time, but well. Hopefully we can get some earlier sleep this evening, because tomorrow we have booked a guide from 9 AM. We have to be ready by then. I think you  can add the photos to the text, don't know how they appear, but I can only update the blog through email, which is fine. I tried to login on Blogger but it didn't work (even through a web proxy). Okay, this is it for today I think. Bye!