I recently got home from a business trip flying from Boston to Hong Kong and then across the bay to Zhiuhai Mainland China for a trade show and then back to the Hong Kong airport for the flight to Tokyo, Japan and finally home after 10 days.
Getting in and out of Hong Kong was smooth. The protests that had impacted the Hong Kong airport are no longer at the airport. I sympathize with the Hong Kong protesters but was glad that my travel wasn't disrupted.
The van ride from the Hong Kong airport to Zhuhai goes across a new bridge and below ground tunnel. The bridge and tunnel are so long that just that part of the ride takes about 30 minutes. Without a doubt it's the longest bridge/tunnel I have ever been on.
China is described by the US state department as a level 2 risk. Level 1 is the lowest. Chinese Immigration can give people a hard time but I didn't have any problems.
I checked into my hotel. A very new Sheraton hotel next to the channel between Zhuhai and Macau. Here is a photo inside the lobby of the hotel. Not shown in the photo is a large banner celebrating the 70th Anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. They are all over the place. I expect the display is mandatory.
It's a very impressive hotel I'd have to say. Here is a photo that I took close the the elevators on my floor looking at the hollow center of the hotel and the floors above and below. I'd have to expect that building such a curved structure must have cost a lot. I don't know how much my room cost. I was an invited speaker at the trade show and so the Chinese event organizer paid for my three night stay.
The Exposition Center is about a 5 minute walk from the hotel. Along the way there is a view of this sky scraper and adjacent building. A curved skyscraper looks impressive.
The building to the left I guess is part of the expo center. Very curvy on the outside but it appears that the inside floors are level. Strange in any case.
These fire escape masks were in a closet inside my room. It was a nice room. The bathroom had a separate room for the toilet and a separate room with ironing board facilities.
Here is a photo from the hotel looking across at the skyline of Macau. Tons of Chinese flags were all over the place. I don't know if the over abundance of flags is normal or there was a serious increase of flags for the 70th Anniversary. I think it's interesting that what appear to be barges are designed like the old Chinese junks. Lots larger and motorized. But still the same style.
The opening ceremony for the trade show had a dancing show. I don't know if it's a Chinese thing to have such an elaborate opening ceremony. The dancing lasted about 10 minutes. Because I was an invidted speaker, giving a market overview, I had a VIP seat in the first few rows.
At the close of the opening ceremony these special people dumped what looked like gold colored powder onto a white banner that I guess had sticky sections in the form off Chinese lettering. The lettering was revealed as the powder stuck to it. I've not yet attempted to google translate the words.
This is a wider view of the area outside of the expo center where the ceremony took place. The expo floor is on the left.
Here is a photo at night. That interesting twisted skyscraper changes color at night. Here it is in blue. My hotel is to the left and it's currently changing from white to red, or red to white.
I'll post a second series of photos and the colors of the building will have changed. The colors morph from one to another about every 10-15 seconds.