I can only imagine it at this point, but it must feel good being able to sleep late. I'll know by tomorrow morning because this is probably the first time since I started working 2 months ago that I didn't have to wake up around 6am.

I'm in Chongqing tonight, the first time I've managed to stay overnight here. I'm living in a pretty sweet apartment hotel, 21st floor right in jiefangbei, the poshest of Chongqing's commercial districts. I'm only paying rmb$168 a night but there's a catch: I can only stay here for just one night, since all the rooms are booked solid for the national holiday. I'll look for a new hotel room tomorrow but I'm not optimistic I'll find anything for this week. Either they don't have any available rooms, or they're using the obscenely high posted rates. Worst case scenario, I return to changshou, not a big deal.

since this is essentially an apartment, it comes with a kitchen (stove, fridge, sink), small dining area, hdtv, Wi-Fi internet, and a washer in the bathroom. This would be a great place to live, I'm sure I wouldn't be able to afford it. The internet was one of the first things I tried, not only does it work, but it's also very fast.

I came to changshou with fengya via a bus leaving Yanjia. Everything was fine until we got to Chongqing; that's when the contain started. The driver let us off a few blocks away from the station as a kindness, otherwise we would had to sit through probably another 30 minutes south of traffic.

We got here with another fellow employee who was also going to jiefangbei. He guessed i was fresh out of college, i shocked him with my TrueAge™. I was about to guess he was maybe in his forties because of greying hair, but he told me he was just 29. He helped me find the apartment hotel which was very well hidden. afterwards I took him to chaotianmen dock. He said he was happy hanging out there for a few hours (he was waiting for a10pm train to honan), so I left him alone.

I returned to the apartment, collecting food as I went: rambutans (1.5+kg rmb$35), pork patties (rmb$4), scallion pancakes (rmb$4), smelly tofu (5 skewers rmb$10). I came back to take a shower and eat. I got in touch with fengya who was still stuck on the bus due to traffic leaving Chongqing.

I went out again around 8pm, to ride the cable car (rmb$10 roundtrip) across the Yangtze river. The view from the other side wasn't that great. Maybe it's better from across the Jialing river. Most people just bought the single trip ticket, take some photos from the other side without leaving the station.

The final stop was jiefangbei. It was a little weird being there. Chongqing was the last stronghold of the Kuomintang during the Chinese civil war. Once Chongqing fell, the KMT fled to Taiwan in october 1949 -including my grandparents. Here in China, on the eve of China Chinese independence day, it was weird seeing people celebrate an event that's actually a sad day in my family's history.

(I post photos once I can get back to my computer -I've got some good ones)