[Mekatulia]

LT and EZ air dropped into BH late at nite, almost one of the last flight, the only one from SZ. There are several flights from GZO to BH also, and cheaper too. But due to accessibility since we are way in DS, SZ airport is the nearer and more logical option.

After we hopped onto the Taxi where the driver knew we must be from out-of-town, LT tried to strike up a conversation to pick his brains on the "happenings" in BH. That is when I knew that BH was a hot bed for MLM activities.

As we drove from airport into town, a sudden wiff of fishy smell hit my nostrils, and as I look around the pitch dark sidewalks along the highway, cannot find any tell tale red neon lights, so I guess that must be the real fishy smell anyway... hahaha

The driver commented that there's basically nothing much in BH, the industries or activities supporting the local economy are either tourism or sea products.

After we reach our hotel, though on the outside looks rugged, I suppose we should be relatively safe since LT mentioned that the hotel was opened by the military police 武警。

Feeling a bit hungry, we decided to head out to get some food and since it was quite late, we asked the recept where would be a good place to have supper, and we were directed to the nite market 夜市 along 长青路。

There were plenty of small shops dotted along the street, all providing BBQ and simple 炒粉、炒面 kinda stuff. LT and EZ decided to take a stroll down the whole street to see what was on offer before making a final stop at one. LT was debating whether to visit the shop opened by his younger "brother" from Dongbei, 东北胡子， but because that shop was on the opposite side of the street, we were a bit hungry and lazy, therefore we just pop into 1 along our way. Hygiene standards is somewhat not correlated to the tastiness of the food, or perhaps we must be hungry. I find the food pretty alright on a cold winter nite in BH.

After satisfying our stomach, we headed back, it was almost 2am. We saw some shadows in the park near to our hotel. While we were checking in at the hotel, and when we asked where to have some supper, 1 guy, supposedly a regular stayer at the hotel warned us not to walk in the park at nite and beware of pickpockets/muggers especially those from 新疆. But from the shadows, we saw some guys and some gals, somehow, instincts tell me that something is going on in the park, and I instigated LT to walk thru the park, which I later regretted.

Barely 1 minute into this eerie park, a Witch jumped out and tried to cast an evil spell on us by saying "带我去。。。“ we tried not to listen too clearly to the spell otherwise we'll be in deep shit, we walk along and the second one who jumped out was Medusa who tried to give us "the look" in hope to turn us into stone, or perhaps more accurately her intention was to turn some parts of a man's body into stone, but she definitely has reversed polarity, instead of turning into stone, I think my balls shrinked!! Before she could speak, I quickened my pace to get away from this Anti-Medusa.

This is when I told LT, we must be in a "Monster Park" where all the monsters come out to play at nite. I concluded that we should get out of here and head back, besides my stomach was starting to feel uneasy with the supper tossing and turning.

The next day, after a good nite's rest recovering from the fright, we head out to the beach. We walked through the streets of the city, and usually that's where we get a better sight of the city.

We saw people picking see-hum and all sorts of other shells. We head towards the beach area when it started to drizzle. Furama opened quite a huge complex here, somewhat like a holiday resort just next to Shangrila, but seems like they couldn't sustain. Shangrila has the tallest building along the beach front, but somehow, I felt that their light skyblue colour wasn't quite in-synch with their global image. We decided to reward ourselves with a cuppa real Americano or kopi-o kosong after a long walk. Besides, we wanted to test if all coffee served in Guangxi comes with pre-added sugar. At least Shang's doesn't.

While sipping our coffee, we planned for the rest of the afternoon's activities. After resting our feet a bit, we decided to head back to walk through the old part of town （老街） which is now turned into a tourist attraction, trying to mimick the Lijiang （丽江） concept. It seems like we have been 2 months too late. There was a World Bikini Model competition in Sep-Oct. They build a whole cat walk platform along the 老街, where they held the competition. The bikini clad gals pictures were posted on the pillars all along the 老街. At the end of our walk, which is the beginning of the 老街, there's a huge x'mas tree, and this phenomenon has been driving LT nuts, somebody has gotta educate the Chinese that when x'mas is over, take down the x'mas tree and decor.

We decided to head back to the hotel for a short rest and thereafter plan for some nite activities. For the purpose and good spirit of exploration, we decided to check out the local KTV scene. The locals here start their partying after dinner, not as kiasu as in CP. So despite being there at 8pm, we were considered early. LT and I just pick 2 gals and we began our cultural exchange. As I didn't plan to have any activities that night, so I didn't make an offer. But our gals were quite sporty, especially mine loves to sing and dance.

There's a good number of SN and KTVs in this town, definitely no lack of nite activities.