July 3, 2023
Day P5: Accounting for PTSD
With such a successful yet frantic Hong Kong / Macau trip, the accounting had to be done. There was one endless transaction after another, but thanks to keeping a budget and trying to keep track of the spending in real time as best as possible, it didn't go out of control.
Rewind to last night. The ferry was delayed and there was no WIFI on board. My wife ended up landing at the airport in Shanghai before the boat even reached the destination, supposedly an hour away. It was due to terrible weather and rough seas. The catamaran was swaying violently and you knew there was going to be trouble when the staff went around passing out barf bags at the beginning of the voyage.
Once arriving in Shenzhen, I was supposed to scan a health QR code but it couldn't work without reliable internet. Frustrations were getting to me by this point and I snapped out to the guard, "How am I supposed to do this without the internet?" Other passengers were equally pissed and eventually they produced a hotspot so we could all do this. Later we cleared immigration then walked for ages in the arrival hall. A guy asked if I was carrying a bike and he looked at me with a combination of amusement and disgust.
Thankfully due to my master plan, the ferry terminal was only a 2.5km bike ride from Sea World Shekou where I was staying in the same hotel.
I unpacked then repacked all my stuff and all the Thai baht now fit in the previous containers for HK and Macau coins, so the load was already starting to lighten. Exhausted, I hit the sack.
The next day I called the insurance company to see if my payment would finally come in so I could make one more trip to Hong Kong. They said it was still "under review" so the delay would keep on happening. Not good. Just frustrating. So I said to hell with this, I'm biking to Panyu.
But before that, one more fitness class.
It was an amazing workout, and then I lingered for over two hours eating food at the restaurant and talking to people.
Several of them were moving to Shanghai and they were very curious to know about the life there. As time went on, of course the topic of the lockdown came up. As I told one horror story after another to these people, it then occured to me: I still have PTSD from the lockdown over a year ago. Not only that, but I had been walloped by all sort of other past events in the year.
Talking to people was certainly helping a lot. The upcoming trip to Laos and Thailand would help even more.
Before setting off on the bike I lingered some more at Starbucks and did all the accounting. It turns out, thanks to the casino wins, everything fit within $5 of my budget. Astonishing, really. Now time was closing in on 3pm but there was no rush. I would bike until I was tired then take a taxi over the bridge.
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The riding started out fabulous as the sun came out after a downpour, but it was to be shortlived. Conditions were just brutal. It was nonstop city traffic and an endless concrete jungle mixed in with extremely hot and humid weather. It seemed like Shenzhen would just never end.
Unfortunately this area is one of the least pleasant to ride a bike. Things are just not designed for it. Shenzhen is a demonstration city and well, it's for cars. While bikes are shoved off to the sidelines to mix with pedestrians, what I have noticed lately are more and more e-scooters and they are taking over. They tend to ride in the middle of the road so I just follow suit. Otherwise you'll never get anywere. But it leads to a lot of honking as impatient drivers are in abundance.
There were some major positives though. Since it's an endless city, there were no shortage of interesting things to stop for.
The rain came back with a vengeance so I found a nice restaurant and had beef salad with spicy tofu. At that point I was going to call a cab and pack it in, but there was only 35km on the odometer and it was a rather pathetic distance. At least I should get 50km in to warm up for the bigger rides. Honestly the last time I had done a ride close to 100km or more was years ago. This trip needed to rectify that.
The city did eventually end and I wanted to push for the highlight, that was crossing into the next city of Dongguan. The transition was immediately apparent. Things felt grottier, less obsessed with rules, more relaxed, and more like the real China. The first thing I noticed was all the street food and cars randomly parked anywhere. In demonstration cities like Shenzhen and Shanghai, the amount of rules are insane and the street food was taken away many years ago. It just sucks.
Satisfied that I got enough distance in, I folded up the bike and got a taxi across the Humen Bridge. Bikes simply can't ride this bridge which is a key crossing into the southern part of Guangzhou, basically Panyu. Due to this remote location, it is a real tricky task to reach it even by car, and hardly any taxi drivers want to go there. I just got lucky that mine did. Once across the bridge, there was a series of small and dark roads that led to the main part of Nansha but I told the driver to just stop here and I would see if some nice random hotel had rooms. They did. Since the location was so remote, this swank hotel only cost $36 including breakfast.
Today's ride: 53 km (33 miles)
Total: 305 km (189 miles)
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