Having been to Hong Kong last year, I was keen to return for another trip, and this time, I was more prepared. I was expecting the polluted atmosphere, the crowdedness of the streets, the volume and speed with which people spoke.
On 23rd December, I travelled to Guangzhou, and visited the Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall. That night I had turtle for dinner again. Yum! After that, a few cousins and I went walking through some night-markets and enjoyed a ride on the new Guangzhou subway.
On the 24th December, I attended a wedding. Early in the morning, our family endured a bone jarring bus trip to my brother-cousin's new home, and he and his new bride poured tea for everybody. Lunch was a happy boisterous meal, after which my new sister-in-law had to attend an exam (yes, we found that strange, too). In the afternoon, my cousins and I went to the Museum of the Western Han Dynasty Mausoleum of the Nanyue King, Guangzhou. Here, we wandered through the excavated tomb of a king, and studied the artefacts from the tomb. In the evening was the wedding banquet, where a huge amount of food was served.
Back in Hong Kong, I spent a day at Ocean Park. There, I saw two beautiful pandas - Jia Jia and An An. I love pandas. We watched the fish feeding in the large deep-sea aquarium, walked through the goldfish house, and relaxed on the cable car ride over the lovely mountains on which the Park is built.
Electronic equipment being much more expensive in Australia than in Hong Kong, I took the opportunity to acquire a digital camera I'd been eyeing for over a year. Hopefully this means future updates of this website will be much better illustrated!