There's no way to describe the sheer bedlam we encountered as we drove up to the ship dock. I knew something was up when Vicky suggested that I keep my camera away, so I was a bit concerned when as soon as I grabbed my suitcase out of the car, several men with thick sticks rushed up to me and started fighting over my luggage. I kept my hand on it until Vicky explained that they were porters "gangan". We rushed into a crowed and incredibly noisy terminal and I found myself wisked into the process, always straining to find my luggage.
We were then led into a small room with a bunch of holding straps, so I just grabbed one before the room shook and I found the room being lowered. At the bottom, we were quickly ushered through a maze of terminals with drums beating, Chinese dragons dancing and finally (after a fight over who would pay the porter) stepped up into the lobby of our ship. Incredibly, this entire process maybe lasted 10 minutes… 10 minutes of complete sensory overload.
Once we unpacked, I insisted that we go up to the top deck so I could get a couple of pictures as evening approached in Chongqing. While up there, I gave Tiger a lesson in flash photography and how we had to balance the flash against the ambient light. Once that was done, he took a photo of Vicky and me and we offered portraits to Xiaoling (who I found out goes by Celine) and her family.
This morning we awoke to an intense rumbling as the ship got underway (too many people arrived late and given the noise of getting started, I'm glad they didn't do it at 2:00 AM). Looking out from our balcony, we were enveloped in a thick brown haze, but I could still tell we were passing through some incredible scenery.
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