My search for pegs takes me to many places and provides countless stories. The one I am going to tell you now, started on Monday October 9th 2006, the day Korea set off an underground nuclear bomb.
At the time, we were staying with friends in Hong. DB (Dearly Beloved) and I woke up with just enough time to drink coffee and rush off in a taxi to the ferry terminal where we caught the high speed catamaran ferry (made in Western Australia). This took us to Lotus Hill, China, in one and a half hours. The shipping lanes were extremely busy and the pollution for the rest of the day was horrific -- like a low cloud.
We were led by our Chinese friend (CFJ) who grabbed a taxi and seemed to argue (in Mandarin) with the driver all the way to Su Liao Cheng or "plastic city" which was in the suburb of Pan Yu in the city of Guang Zhou. Try to imagine a rectangular area, say 300 yards wide and 100 yards deep. This area had hundreds and hundreds of shops with wide roads splitting them up. Every shop was selling plastic items and the roads were busy with motorbikes and delivery vehicles.
The first shop we entered had a huge display of single packets of pegs. Just one of each type and most of them I had never seen before! I was so excited I could hardly contain myself. Not being a Mandarin speaker, I just started to remove them from the display and left CFJ to ask about the prices. Total disbelief was followed by utter despair as CFJ explained that the miserable woman would not sell me any pegs unless I purchased a complete carton full. .... i.e. 144 packets of each. We tried offering her three times the price but no -- this shop was only for wholesalers. I was distraught. DB & CFJ had to drag me out of the shop protesting all the way.
With heavy hearts we moved on to the next shop -- another big display -- more negotiations but very little success -- though we did manage to get one precious packet as the sample was obviously obsolete. We moved on but it was the same story at each shop until at the fifth shop we managed to wear down the owner and he agreed to sell me any packets from his extensive display -- WOW. I filled my rucksack with the packets -- cost HK$162 about A$27.
We carried on trying shop after shop but with little or no success -- it was heartbreaking to see so many pegs that I didn't have but I couldn't buy them. The day was hot and dusty and I was feeling a mixture of exhaustion and disappointment mingled with exhilaration.
We decided to move on. This was difficult as we were in an industrial area where there were no taxis. We looked around desperately, wondering what to do next, when a local bus pulled up. Any port in a storm ... we all jumped on thinking that even if it didn't take us where we were heading at least it would take us to somewhere that had a taxi. Fortunately for us, it was heading in the direction of the Chime Long Safari Park and CFJ knew there was a hotel in the park where we could have lunch.
We were dropped at the entrance to the park, in a layby where there were three young motorcylists. Since the hotel was right in the middle of a safari park, a long and exhausting walk away, we were again looking around for a taxi. .......Ta da !!! CFJ to the rescue .... after much negotiation, CFJ declared that the motorcyclists had agreed to take us to the hotel. Whilst the riders went reasonably slowly (I had insisted before getting on), they also went the wrong way around roundabouts and the wrong way up dual carriageways -- we had no helmets and clung on for dear life. We half expected them to kidnap us if we didn't pay more because CFJ was arguing with them all the way. Visualise the sight of three wind blown guests arriving at this beautiful hotel on the back of motorbikes whilst still arguing over the price.
The superb buffet lunch laid out in the White Tiger Restaurant was about to be put away so we raced around filling our plates and then relaxing over a delicious selection of foods. I had king prawns, caviar, mussels, chicken, kangaroo and all sorts of beautiful sweets including durian turnovers.
After lunch we inspected the white tigers and pink flamingos in their glassed-in enclosures before catching a taxi (at last, a taxi!!) to the local bus station. Here we boarded a comfortable bus for the one and a half-hour drive to Shin Zhen. The pollution was terrible but the new skyscrapers everywhere were amazing. Out of the bus and straight into another taxi to take us to the Lo Hu commercial shopping centre where, after spending the morning trying to persuade people to sell us pegs, we spent the evening trying to avoid people selling us everything! "Missy you want DVD? Missy you want handbag? ". Yes, I know, I am a man and I look like a man, but it was still "Missy you want whatever". We all purchased various things before we became tired of the verbal haggling outside each shop. It was a short walk to the railway station where we boarded the fast train for Hong Kong. Then a tram trip to CFJ's apartment where I pulled out all my pegs and found I had collected 81 different ones. We were exhausted but I was a happy man.
What an eventful day and how many types of transport had we used?
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