Shenzhen

You sometimes forget that in order to be the biggest country in the world, China has to have more big cities than just Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong. Shenzhen was a fishing village less than 20 years ago. The Communist Party decided to turn it into a "Special Economic Zone" and it quickly become a city with about 10 million residents. Basically that means it is a huge, dirty commercial city with a lot of shopping.

The Hong Kong subway takes you all the way up to the Chinese border. You hop off the train, clear customs and immediatly realize what you have been told is true; even though Hong Kong is over 95% ethnic Chinese, it has definitely been watered down with western culture. Mainland China has a distinct feel (and smell). You feel farther from the U.S. the moment you leave Hong Kong and enter the mainland.

It rained while we were there, so the Saturday afternoon trip basically consisted of walking around crazy markets and shopping for a few hours. I picked up a few cheap knock-off items. Because almost no one speaks english, bargaining involves taking turns punching numbers into a calculator until the vendor agrees. Sticking to a price and walking out seems to be the best way to get stuff cheap. They will chase you down and concede.

Excited for my trip to Malaysia and Singapore on Thursday.

Delicious spicy tentacles (octopus or squid?) from a street vendor:
People going shopping. Sadly didn't get any photos from inside the packed indoor markets: