Trip to Shenzhen

Ryan was stuck in China for 2 weeks waiting for his new work visa and was unable to come home last weekend as he had no passport. We decided to meet in the middle and spend a day in Shenzhen, a city in China right across the border from Hong Kong. Located here is our favorite mall to get knock-off purses, shoes and our beloved Ray-Bans, but this trip we decided to not visit there. 

We started off by touring an amusement park called Window of the World. Here, the most famed tourist attractions throughout the world have been replicated into miniature recreations. You can go from all the monuments in Washington D.C. to temples in India within a 5 minute walk. Ryan had visited a few years ago, but many of the attractions had changed since then. We spent a few hours touring around and enjoying the sites. There were many school age children pointing at us and yelling 'Hello'. One boy even ran up and took a photo of us with his phone as we exited the park. Once again, this is something I am becoming oddly used to.

Outside of Window to the World

Enjoying the sculpture garden

The older version of New York City, with big Jesus from Brazil in the background

Me with Mt. Rushmore (I have the same photo at the real one)

Ferocious koi being fed

1/3 the size of the real Eiffel Tower

We then traveled over to an oil painting village I had read about online to look for some paintings for our apartment. We weren't sure at first if we were going to find it, but luckily a food delivery boy driving by us wanted to practice some English and started a conversation (of course!) His English was actually very good and he said he learns it mostly from watching movies. He directed us to the village and I'm so happy we found it! There were streets upon streets of small shops filled with beautiful paintings at affordable prices. Many of the shop owners had done the paintings themselves and some were even painting while we shopped. We found 3 paintings for our apartment and I just got them back from being mounted and they finish off our apartment very well. 

Painting of downtown Hong Kong

Cherry blossoms

Now that the paintings are up our apartment is pretty much finished, pictures to come soon!