Another early morning at 4:20 was pretty rough but we somehow got downstairs to check out of our hotel and caught a cab to the train station. We got there by 5:00 for our 5:30 train but about every 15 minutes our train kept getting delayed until it was 2.5 hours late. In the long wait we met a really nice girl named Queen who spoke perfect English. She even knew the slang we were using which caught us off guard. She was fun to talk to and made us feel a little less out of place until she told us that we were the first white people she had seen in Shaoguan in over a year, which is pretty impressive.
We literally did not see a white person for this entire leg of the trip so I can’t say that I am too surprised by that. Everyone seemed pretty shocked by us including this man who we realized had video taped us the entire time we were waiting for our train even when we were just sleeping on our bags. Another guy was taking notes too so they clearly found us intriguing and we definitely found them creepy.
After we confirmed that it was finally time to board, we got through the gate and to the platform and then saw a train on the tracks but didn’t know how to get on or even what car because we only had standing room tickets. We saw some people start running so we started freaking out and running too but we didn’t even know what we were running for or what to do. As panicked as I was, it was hard not to laugh that our train was 2.5 hours late and somehow we were about to miss it. Turns out that wasn’t even our train and we were just running around like idiots for no reason. We really we were just the Asians that we always make fun of at home for running everywhere and then decided to be less harsh because when you have no idea was is going on it can get pretty stressful. We were actually pretty relieved when we realized it wasn’t our train because it looked pretty packed but unfortunately when our train pulled up it looked even worse.
We picked a cabin and squeezed our way on the train and instantly were very scared for the next 5.5 hours ahead. We literally had to climb over people curled up in balls with next to zero room in any direction. Meanwhile, we are being absolutely stared down because clearly no Americans ever ride the train. We somehow made our way to a somewhat available spot and just stood until people eased with the staring and then threw our bags down and found a way to sit not completely miserably.
Realizing it was going to be a long 5.5 hours on a filthy floor that was literally everyone’s trash can for anything from apple cores to sun flower seeds and chicken bones, we broke out some playing cards and iPhone battleship to pass the time. The four of us rotated games to pass the first hour or so and Bryan even made a card house on the floor of the train, which was pretty impressive for how bumpy it was. I’m not going to lie, it was pretty miserable and it was pretty hard to make the time go by quickly with carts going down the aisles every 5 minutes forcing us to stand up, move all of our stuff, and press up against the seats to let them through.
There were also people selling things in the car and they would just walk up and down the aisles with megaphones and scream in Chinese about whatever they were selling which could be anything from face cream to toothbrushes. Like seriously, who wants to buy a toothbrush on a train?! Apparently everyone, because people were eating that shit up and buying tons of them!
Anyway, we made a stop in Guangzhou, which seems to be a big transportation hub and about half of our train got off, leaving us with seats for the rest of the ride. Bryan and I ended up sitting in a little pod with a kid and his dad who made for a pretty good time. Bryan tried to teach the kid to make a house of cards and then we played war and a few other cards games that were really fun.
We then noticed the kid had an Abraham Lincoln book, which obviously made me excited, and so I explained that he was from where I am from. He then took off his coat and was a wearing an Indy car sweatshirt, which also blew our minds. Adam told him that that is where he is from and then we were expecting something from West Lafayette for Bryan and Ohio for John but were sadly disappointed. We talked with the little boy the rest of the time with some interpretation help from another girl on the train and got some good practice in of our Chinese. At one point they randomly asked if we had been to Harbin, so I pulled out my pictures from the trip and they were amazed.
The little boy then had some fun playing with the camera and taking some goofy pictures. A lady then came around to sweep the floors of all of the trash and the boy's little sister was in the way so I got to snatch her up and hold her for a while which was definitely a highlight since I am obsessed with Chinese babies. After not much longer it was time to say goodbye and we started on our adventure to Macau.
The guys all changed into shorts since the train was about 100 degrees. It was also a really warm day and after a little help from the point book, we made it to the Shenzhen Ferry Station to catch a ferry to Macau. We had a little while until the next one left, so I also changed into shorts and then we all waited at the gate until it arrived. We got on smoothly and it was a really nice boat so after enjoying the view for a few minutes, we all took a little nap after an exhausting morning in transit. When we arrived we were all starving but wanted to make it to our hotel so we just stopped for a little snack that as John would say, “only put more gasoline on the fire.”
With the help of the Tourist Information Center at the ferry station, we took a bus to a stop near our hotel. We did a little wandering before actually finding the hotel, but after not too long were up in our nice rooms. After feeling pretty disgusting from the train, we all took showers, had a few drinks, and then were ready to hit the town. On our way to the casinos we stopped by St. Paul’s to see the well-preserved church and took some pictures before making our way down this fun pedestrian street.
After still not having a real meal all day we were on the lookout for food and found one of my favorite foods to date, the Portuguese egg tarts. They were absolutely delicious and basically tasted like an individual quiche but with a sweeter taste and just the perfect flavor. We also found a bunch of stands with what seemed to be beef jerky, and managed to get a few free samples that were also amazing. Once again, this was only making us hungrier, so we decided to try and find a real restaurant to sit down and eat at.
We found a place that seemed to have decent prices and jumped on it. The food wasn’t bad, but definitely not what we were expecting. I ordered a sausage egg and cheese sandwich, which turned out to be 2 pieces of white bread with the crust cut off, with a few pieces of egg and a hot dog cut in half. Bryan also got a weird sandwich, Adam a pork sandwich, and John what seemed to be a pretty legitimate noodle bowl. After yet another unsatisfying meal of really small portions, we decided we didn’t have any more time to waste on food and to make our way to the casinos.
The first casino that caught our eye was the Lisboa, so we walked in to check it out. The outside was much more extravagant than the inside that wasn’t even big and didn’t seem like they had much to offer. We walked around for a little bit and then decided to take our talents elsewhere. We tried to go in another casino and found out that you actually have to be 21 to get in, which was pretty unfortunate for Adam and I. Apparently that is the case everywhere, but no one else really seemed to care so we continued on.
The last casino we went to was the Wynn, which was definitely more along the lines of what we were expecting. None of us have been to Vegas, but this was the big casino feel that we would expect to get there. Right when we walked in, there was a huge show at the entrance where this giant chandelier came down out of nowhere and a trees spun around which actually was pretty mesmerizing. We then headed inside and were blown away by how big the casino was with so many different sections.
We decided to observe for a little while and I tried to explain Roulette to the guys until we were confident enough to go get some chips. So since we were in Macau, naturally we all exchanged our money to Macau dollars, but for whatever reason the casino would only take Hong Kong money, which seemed pretty ridiculous to us. John was the only one with Hong Kong money, so he put down 100 and got only one chip in return. This is when we decided that maybe this wasn’t the place for us and decided to stick to the slots. We played a couple different ones and after the excitement wore off, decided we should probably just leave before we blow more than a couple bucks. After that we basically just wandered around to check out the city and eventually made it back to our hotel. By then we were all exhausted and called it a night instantly only leaving enough time to agree on the fact that we would sleep in.
We literally did not see a white person for this entire leg of the trip so I can’t say that I am too surprised by that. Everyone seemed pretty shocked by us including this man who we realized had video taped us the entire time we were waiting for our train even when we were just sleeping on our bags. Another guy was taking notes too so they clearly found us intriguing and we definitely found them creepy.
After we confirmed that it was finally time to board, we got through the gate and to the platform and then saw a train on the tracks but didn’t know how to get on or even what car because we only had standing room tickets. We saw some people start running so we started freaking out and running too but we didn’t even know what we were running for or what to do. As panicked as I was, it was hard not to laugh that our train was 2.5 hours late and somehow we were about to miss it. Turns out that wasn’t even our train and we were just running around like idiots for no reason. We really we were just the Asians that we always make fun of at home for running everywhere and then decided to be less harsh because when you have no idea was is going on it can get pretty stressful. We were actually pretty relieved when we realized it wasn’t our train because it looked pretty packed but unfortunately when our train pulled up it looked even worse.
We picked a cabin and squeezed our way on the train and instantly were very scared for the next 5.5 hours ahead. We literally had to climb over people curled up in balls with next to zero room in any direction. Meanwhile, we are being absolutely stared down because clearly no Americans ever ride the train. We somehow made our way to a somewhat available spot and just stood until people eased with the staring and then threw our bags down and found a way to sit not completely miserably.
Realizing it was going to be a long 5.5 hours on a filthy floor that was literally everyone’s trash can for anything from apple cores to sun flower seeds and chicken bones, we broke out some playing cards and iPhone battleship to pass the time. The four of us rotated games to pass the first hour or so and Bryan even made a card house on the floor of the train, which was pretty impressive for how bumpy it was. I’m not going to lie, it was pretty miserable and it was pretty hard to make the time go by quickly with carts going down the aisles every 5 minutes forcing us to stand up, move all of our stuff, and press up against the seats to let them through.
Anyway, we made a stop in Guangzhou, which seems to be a big transportation hub and about half of our train got off, leaving us with seats for the rest of the ride. Bryan and I ended up sitting in a little pod with a kid and his dad who made for a pretty good time. Bryan tried to teach the kid to make a house of cards and then we played war and a few other cards games that were really fun.
The little boy then had some fun playing with the camera and taking some goofy pictures. A lady then came around to sweep the floors of all of the trash and the boy's little sister was in the way so I got to snatch her up and hold her for a while which was definitely a highlight since I am obsessed with Chinese babies. After not much longer it was time to say goodbye and we started on our adventure to Macau.
The guys all changed into shorts since the train was about 100 degrees. It was also a really warm day and after a little help from the point book, we made it to the Shenzhen Ferry Station to catch a ferry to Macau. We had a little while until the next one left, so I also changed into shorts and then we all waited at the gate until it arrived. We got on smoothly and it was a really nice boat so after enjoying the view for a few minutes, we all took a little nap after an exhausting morning in transit. When we arrived we were all starving but wanted to make it to our hotel so we just stopped for a little snack that as John would say, “only put more gasoline on the fire.”
With the help of the Tourist Information Center at the ferry station, we took a bus to a stop near our hotel. We did a little wandering before actually finding the hotel, but after not too long were up in our nice rooms. After feeling pretty disgusting from the train, we all took showers, had a few drinks, and then were ready to hit the town. On our way to the casinos we stopped by St. Paul’s to see the well-preserved church and took some pictures before making our way down this fun pedestrian street.
 |
| St. Paul's |
 |
| View of slums from our room |
After still not having a real meal all day we were on the lookout for food and found one of my favorite foods to date, the Portuguese egg tarts. They were absolutely delicious and basically tasted like an individual quiche but with a sweeter taste and just the perfect flavor. We also found a bunch of stands with what seemed to be beef jerky, and managed to get a few free samples that were also amazing. Once again, this was only making us hungrier, so we decided to try and find a real restaurant to sit down and eat at.
 |
| Portuguese egg tarts |
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| Fresh jerky |
The first casino that caught our eye was the Lisboa, so we walked in to check it out. The outside was much more extravagant than the inside that wasn’t even big and didn’t seem like they had much to offer. We walked around for a little bit and then decided to take our talents elsewhere. We tried to go in another casino and found out that you actually have to be 21 to get in, which was pretty unfortunate for Adam and I. Apparently that is the case everywhere, but no one else really seemed to care so we continued on.
The last casino we went to was the Wynn, which was definitely more along the lines of what we were expecting. None of us have been to Vegas, but this was the big casino feel that we would expect to get there. Right when we walked in, there was a huge show at the entrance where this giant chandelier came down out of nowhere and a trees spun around which actually was pretty mesmerizing. We then headed inside and were blown away by how big the casino was with so many different sections.
We decided to observe for a little while and I tried to explain Roulette to the guys until we were confident enough to go get some chips. So since we were in Macau, naturally we all exchanged our money to Macau dollars, but for whatever reason the casino would only take Hong Kong money, which seemed pretty ridiculous to us. John was the only one with Hong Kong money, so he put down 100 and got only one chip in return. This is when we decided that maybe this wasn’t the place for us and decided to stick to the slots. We played a couple different ones and after the excitement wore off, decided we should probably just leave before we blow more than a couple bucks. After that we basically just wandered around to check out the city and eventually made it back to our hotel. By then we were all exhausted and called it a night instantly only leaving enough time to agree on the fact that we would sleep in.
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