~Entering the Unknown~

I woke up at 4-5am to do a final check of my luggage before proceeding for my breakfast buffet at 6:45am. After showering, I drank tea in cooled water (hot water and instant coffee was not replenished on the last day of cruise). Mum and I passed the rest of the morning by watching some boring programme. During the night, the cruise had already stopped at the port of Chongqing.

After a quick look of the port, we went for breakfast at 6:45am. The waiter kept forgetting my order for minced meat noodles. Nevertheless, the noodle was quite chewy and minced meat tasteful. By 7:30am, mum and I got our luggage out to be sent down the cruise. After struggling with our luggage at 8am, our same Chongqing guide took us to visit the nearby Chao Tian Men Square. I stayed in the coach to update my physical diary.

After that, the coach sent us to an ongoing constructing sports complex space and Yangtze river museum for toilet relief. There was a number of locals doing morning dance there. The toilet usage was charged 30 jiao.

After that, we were drove to visit Eling Park to see memorials for Russians who died in China during WWII, old photos of Chinese leaders and an old building. I could see the hazy city from the top.

Outside Eling Park, many of us went shopping in the nearby shops. Dad bought fruits and I noticed an Internet Bar.

The guide drove us to a silk shop where I sneaked out to see the street.

We had lunch in New York building in the middle of the busiest district of Chongqing. After lunch, we had free time between 1:30pm to 3pm. There were a number of statues on the street, bringing an interesting scene for passingbys who went shopping there. I was surprised to see so much cooked animal organs and preserved vegetables in supermarket. My only regret was that I did not take photo of its food court. It was almost the same as that in Singapore, except the utensils used were not as uniform, its surroundings not as better furnished and the type of food sold differed. After walking around, we even went to McDonald for a rest while waiting for the time to be up. The strawberry sundae did not taste as nice as that I've tasted back home for the strawberry sauce is too 'jelly'.

We went to Holiday Inn to pack our stuff at 4pm. There was a delay in room cleaning and we could only return to our rooms at 4:20pm. Mum and I were allocated room 918 while dad and bro room 908. I called up room service to send my jeans, mum & dad’s coat and bro’s jackets and jeans for washing before assembling at level 1 at 5:30pm for Chongqing steamboat.

There was limited food (beef, mushrooms, squids, bird eggs, vegetables unless you don’t mind pork brain) to go with the steamboat and I disliked the slippery taste in the spicy part of the soup. We continued with our instant cup noodles bought outside Eling Park earlier that day while I watched the later part of ‘Blade: Trinity’ on HBO which I couldn’t watch on cruise due to television reception problem.

I had an early sleep around 9:30pm with weird dreams of going to Taiwan and being pursued by demons. I kept having the strange feeling of the floor rocking, probably due to after effect from my cruise trip.