In the South - SZ

So I was in Shenzhen to visit a friend I met back in Sichuan, 2004. Back then, we had gone up to Emei Shan (Emei Mountain) together and hung out with monkeys for a day. Unfortunately, Shenzhen, one of the newest and fastest growing cities in China, had less to offer in that respect, though it offered quite a different experience.

I went up Shenzhen's tallest skyscraper, the Shun Hing Square (地王大厦):



From there, you can see Lo Wu, the border checkpoint with HK:



We also visited Dongmen (East Gate), a pedestrian shopping district that looked very similar to certain areas in many other cities in China, such as Nanjing East Rd in Shanghai, Wangfujing in China, etc. Note however, the reference to Taiwan's Ximending (West Gate):



I then took the subway over to the "Windows of the World" station. The one-time subway pass, like Guangzhou's, is in an interesting token shape as opposed to the cards you see most everywhere else:


Windows of the World has a miniature version of a bunch of well known landmarks from all over the world, and is supposedly built to scale. It is managed by OCT (Overseas Chinese Town), a group that maintains the whole tourist park around that area. Here is the front entrance:

While I didn't bother going in (time was short, and I've traveled to quite a few of those landmarks in person already), I did tour much of the rest of the park, which was quite suitable for walking, running, or biking:

There were also some interesting statues in the area and people posing/sleeping next to them:



And then I met Mr. Chiu.