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Here is a bit of the story of my last 2 weeks.
I had to run to China to bring my dad back after a medical emergency. Sunday night (April 27) plane tickets were booked. Monday run out to Vernon, BC to get my mom and brother together to go. Tuesday head out. We arrived in Hong Kong late last wednesday (local time), expecting to get visas on thursday and head into China. Turns out last thrusday was labour day in Hong Kong so the visa office was closed. On Friday we went to the Chinese visa office only to find that they no longer (as of 3 weeks ago) issue visas in 1 day. A trip to the Canadian consulate got us our visas that afternoon. Anyone that glanced at the news last week may know that the Olympic torch went through Hong Kong on friday. The route went along the block behind the Chinese visa office. Have you ever seen THOUSANDS UPON THOUSANDS of people lined along the edges of the street from the 7th floor of an office building? I have.
Late friday night we get into China by train, and then 40 minute taxi ride to the city where my dad is in the hospital. In the hospitals in China, the family of the patient is expected to bring in food for each meal, and pay the bill every day. Kinda hard when the family is in the dark about what is going on and over 10000 km away. Luckily my dad has made some incredibly nice friends in China that took care of meals until we could get there. We are here now and looking after things while my dad gets his strength back in order to travel.
Anyways, I wanted to share some of the quirks I have noticed about the cars and driving habits in Hong Kong and China.
In Hong Kong, all of the vehicles are newer (thanks to strict pollution laws), most are upscale (BMW, Lexus, Mercedes, etc.) and there is a large percentage of mini-vans. I personally like the styling of the mini-vans there, most are quite stylish compared to the bland boxes we see here. People follow the rules of the road fairly well, and the highways appear to be well laid out.
China is a stark contrast to Hong Kong. Most of the vehicles are older, but there are noticable amounts of newer ones, and I even saw a Plymouth Sundance running around (who exports one of those TO CHINA??). I don't know why they bothered to paint lines on the road, all lanes are used for driving in all directions at any given time, including the shoulder, medians and the sidewalk. Traffic lights are also useless because people go when they want. They are basically just used to determine when you are least likely to be hit from which direction as a pedestrian. Horns are in almost constant use, but mostly to let people know you are there (over-taking or turning right from the left lane), not in anger. They have these funny micro-vans here that have a wheel base shorter than your average sedan, and barely wide enough for 2 people across. I will post some pics up when I can get them off my camera.
The taxi fleet in the city we are in, Huadu, is completely composed of VW Mk2 or 3 Jettas and VW Santana 3000's, which appear to be a Mk3 Jetta body with some Mk4 parts (dash, lights, things like that), and all run on propane. You can get almost anywhere in this city for less than $20 RMB, which is about $3 CAN.
Thanks for reading, I am not a world traveller and would not have gone to China by choice, at the last minute, and definately not around the time of Olymic events. However, there are some very nice people here, and if you want a pile of T-shirts for a couple bucks, its the place to go (assuming you are not much larger than your average Chinese person, which I am).
I had to run to China to bring my dad back after a medical emergency. Sunday night (April 27) plane tickets were booked. Monday run out to Vernon, BC to get my mom and brother together to go. Tuesday head out. We arrived in Hong Kong late last wednesday (local time), expecting to get visas on thursday and head into China. Turns out last thrusday was labour day in Hong Kong so the visa office was closed. On Friday we went to the Chinese visa office only to find that they no longer (as of 3 weeks ago) issue visas in 1 day. A trip to the Canadian consulate got us our visas that afternoon. Anyone that glanced at the news last week may know that the Olympic torch went through Hong Kong on friday. The route went along the block behind the Chinese visa office. Have you ever seen THOUSANDS UPON THOUSANDS of people lined along the edges of the street from the 7th floor of an office building? I have.
Late friday night we get into China by train, and then 40 minute taxi ride to the city where my dad is in the hospital. In the hospitals in China, the family of the patient is expected to bring in food for each meal, and pay the bill every day. Kinda hard when the family is in the dark about what is going on and over 10000 km away. Luckily my dad has made some incredibly nice friends in China that took care of meals until we could get there. We are here now and looking after things while my dad gets his strength back in order to travel.
Anyways, I wanted to share some of the quirks I have noticed about the cars and driving habits in Hong Kong and China.
In Hong Kong, all of the vehicles are newer (thanks to strict pollution laws), most are upscale (BMW, Lexus, Mercedes, etc.) and there is a large percentage of mini-vans. I personally like the styling of the mini-vans there, most are quite stylish compared to the bland boxes we see here. People follow the rules of the road fairly well, and the highways appear to be well laid out.
China is a stark contrast to Hong Kong. Most of the vehicles are older, but there are noticable amounts of newer ones, and I even saw a Plymouth Sundance running around (who exports one of those TO CHINA??). I don't know why they bothered to paint lines on the road, all lanes are used for driving in all directions at any given time, including the shoulder, medians and the sidewalk. Traffic lights are also useless because people go when they want. They are basically just used to determine when you are least likely to be hit from which direction as a pedestrian. Horns are in almost constant use, but mostly to let people know you are there (over-taking or turning right from the left lane), not in anger. They have these funny micro-vans here that have a wheel base shorter than your average sedan, and barely wide enough for 2 people across. I will post some pics up when I can get them off my camera.
The taxi fleet in the city we are in, Huadu, is completely composed of VW Mk2 or 3 Jettas and VW Santana 3000's, which appear to be a Mk3 Jetta body with some Mk4 parts (dash, lights, things like that), and all run on propane. You can get almost anywhere in this city for less than $20 RMB, which is about $3 CAN.
Thanks for reading, I am not a world traveller and would not have gone to China by choice, at the last minute, and definately not around the time of Olymic events. However, there are some very nice people here, and if you want a pile of T-shirts for a couple bucks, its the place to go (assuming you are not much larger than your average Chinese person, which I am).
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