WHAT A DAY!

MARKETS:
Following breakky we caught a taxi to the Silk Markets. Much the same as the Pearl Markets, but slightly more upmarket. (Same, same but different.)
The shopping and bargaining continued....Kathy's bargaining skills were significantly better today! I love it! Laden with arms full of bags, we caught a taxi back to the hotel to collect all our China goodies and head off to the International Post Office.
What looked like a simple block away was actually a 30min taxi ride to a tiny little Post Office full of postal people loading boxes and sealing them. Thankfully, a Brazilian woman spoke English so was able to explain the chaos a little. It took a while, with lots of hand gestures and calculator punching, but we eventually managed to package all our purchases and send them home.
The next challenge was to find a taxi to take us back to the hotel. One refused the fare as he was going the other way, but 6 lanes of traffic meant getting to the other side of the road was going to be tricky!
We asked a young Chinese girl for advice on crossing the road but she suggested we use the subway rather than a taxi and walked us to the subway station, showed us how to get the ticket and gave directions on how to exit the subway! What an angel. She was our GM for today!
MASSAGE:
A head and shoulder massage was next, down in the bowels of the hotel. It wasn't quite the relaxing experience we had anticipated, but it was a Chinese massage in China by a Chinaman. It was a 30 min massage. As soon as the time was up, a voice from down the hall called out and our masseuse went 'slap, slap' "time's up" and walked out of the room!
DINNER:
We went straight up to dinner from our massage - bad hair look and all - and enjoyed another selection of Chinese dishes that were very tasty!

Now we're all packed and ready to head downstairs and check out in time for our 9pm transfer to the airport. The hotel (Novotel Xian Qiao) allowed us a late checkout which was very helpful.
Our flight leaves Beijing at 1.35am so we still have a few hours to amuse ourselves in the airport yet.
Until the next installment ....