This is all in chinese....I hope I remember what the symbols mean

Hi
I am in an internet cafe in Macau and some other blogger has been using this computer so the page is being presented to me in chinese. I hope I can remember where all the appropriate hot spots are on the page so I can actually publish the post when I finish typing it. I think this may be shades of things to come in the next six weeks as we enter our Chinese (and final) leg.

My typing is actually improving from this blog, I think. I now sound more like the other typists in the internet cafes who type like the dickens (or Ann Mikula). I know I am a bit of a pollyanna when it comes to travelling, but now I love Macau. It is very European in its architecture. As we were walking through the alleyways yesterday, it reminded me of when I lived in Basel, Switzerland and I thought I could be there if it was a bit cleaner and full of Swiss instead of Macau people. It is still western in it's varied restaurants. We decided to stay tonight as well because it is still Golden Week in China and we wanted to be sure of being able to find a place to stay when we arrive.

When we got to Macau, the taxi driver could not understand where we wanted to go. We had several phone calls to a mysterious friend who spoke some english and had to consult several maps before we got to our pre-booked accomodation. It is like being back in India where you can't even resort to writing it down because we can't write chinese. I didn't expect it as soon as Macau. I thought we had one more shot before we had to worry so much about communicating. We have to be careful from now on.

Jen and Shunji came home on Wednesday and we went out for a dim sum lunch with them before we caught the ferry to Macau. They have ferries between Hong Kong and Macau every 15-30 minutes all day. They are really fast and the trip takes an hour. Apparently people come here from Hong Kong for the casinos. Since two of our party are not even teenagers yet, we are giving those a miss.

It was really nice to spend time with Jen and Shunji (especially, I think, for Jen and I). She is so easy to talk to, just like Aunty Pam and the rest of the Fergusons. We will be going back for a few days before we head home. Hopefully we will also be able to see her when she comes over in the summer with the kids if we can make it down there. Heather especially really enjoyed playing with her kids (as predicted before we went). We left some stuff there so we could lug less around China. I am not sure where we put it all because somehow our packs are still full and we left so much there.....

It has been raining both days we have been in Macau. As they said in Cairns, that's what you get for coming in the rainy season. We didn't really have much choice. It doesn't really matter because it is so warm that even if you get wet, you don't get cold.