Mind of Steps
After 6 airports, 6 hotels, 8 concerts, about 50 litres of bottled water, 1 entire spray can of insect repellent and more terrifying coach-miles than I care to remember, we're finally on our way back to Glasgow (currently blogging in Dubai, don't you know...). My blogs fizzled out in Zhongshan, sorry about that. The last few days of the tour have been manic, all self-inflicted (shopping! sights! snake-meat!...only kidding). Last night Douglas Templeton said that he thought Hong Kong was "like a China theme park". I agree and I loved it all the same.
So, since it's about 5am here I'll skip the details and get straight to my cheers and boos. In no particular order...
Cheers:
1) Decadent afternoon tea at the Peninsula Hotel in Hong Kong
2) Nicola's Sibelius
3) Food (see no. 5 below)
4) The ever-patient, ever-efficient, never-off duty management team
5) The great wall
6) Airports with free WIFI
7) Killie and Ian's Auld Lang Syne
8) Cocktails at the top of our hotel in Hong Kong
9) Tour hero, Allan Hannah
10) Fantastic halls
Boos:
1) Rushing in and out of Shanghai
2) Things that bite
3) Finally conceding and buying a pair of fake 'Crocs' for the monsoon weather
4) Hotels being changed at the last minute
5) Scales (not the musical kind) in almost every hotel bathroom
6) 'Dynasty' and 'Great Wall' wine
7) Jetlag
8) The utter shame of giving in to a McDonalds
9) Getting sunburn when it was raining
10) Squidslice – Air China's idea of a mid-flight snack
A couple of Quotes of the Day, over tea at the Peninsula Hotel...
Julia Carpenter - "who'd have thought happiness could be found in a de-crusted cucumber sandwich?"
Jo Sutherland - "we are lucky...this is a fantastic job, sometimes"
And one more...a notice at the hotel in Shenzhen (does it make anyone else think of ?):
David Chadwick
