My exciting trip to the wonderful city of Buji, Shenzhen, China

On Thursday my flight was canceled, giving me an unexpected extra day in Hong Kong before my trip to the US.  The day before I had ID'ed a wholesaler for some automobile accessories I wanted to get for my dad as a gift but I didn't have a chance to go across the border to get them.  So my flight getting canceled ended up being not all that bad.

The problem was the place was not in the Shenzhen special economic zone,  it was outside in the neighboring Longgang district (龍崗區) in some place called 'Buji City' (布吉鎮). 

Here's a map I found on Buji.cn (a site who's whole existence centers around trying to explain where Buji is)

I tried to get the company to send a guy down with the stuff I wanted to get but they weren't willing. Doh.   So I headed up Thursday afternoon. First the bus to the train and within an hour and 15 minutes I was in China:

The first big challenge was how to get from the border crossing point to Buji...   Since the Shenzhen metro opened a few years back, I haven't ridden a bus over here... there's a bus depot right near the shopping center at the border though:

that hill is on the HK side of the border (there's a guard tower on the left side).

After a bit of searching, I thought I probably found the right bus:

Compared to the last time I've ridden a bus in Shenzhen, these ones aren't too bad -

has AC at least! And it was a real bargin, only 2RMB! (actually it was only 1.6RMB cause I used my SZ autopay card (I got a 100RMB card like 2 years ago and I haven't hardly used up half of it yet).

along the route it got pretty crowded at points, since I was riding this line pretty much end-to-end I got to see a lot of people come and go...

including this guy who was carrying propane bottles... on the bus.... a good idea if I ever heard one.  But this is China, you have to be prepared for stuff like this if you're going to last out here. :-P

Unfortunately the weather decided to crap out and we got stuck in a big traffic jam by the time we got to Buji.... traffic came to a stand still but eventually I got to somewhere that looked like a main street so I got off the bus.

The next problem - where the hell is this office I'm supposed to find?  The bus driver hadn't heard of the building name, so I had to grab a taxi and he was going to take me the rest of the way (which cost 10x more than the bus!)

Partly because the weather went from bad to worse. You can't tell from this pic, but the entire roadway is flooded w/ muddy water.  They're in the middle of building an ambitious extension of the Shenzhen metro line all the way out here.  it will make it a lot easier to get out here when its done,  but in the meanwhile its a mess.

Rain or no rain... the Pipes must be delivered!  Its ok, he has an umbrella.

Eventually I found the office.... and after some detailed negotiations, I got what I came for:

For those who are interested,  these are data cables for connecting your PC to your car's onboard computer.  In every modern car (since the mid-80s or so),  there are onboard electrical systems to control things like emissions control systems, engine monitors, security system, airbags, etc.   Nowadays when your car's check engine light comes on, they can just plug it into a diagnostic system and find out from the car's computer system what's wrong with the car.   You also need to plug into this system to reset the computer to turn off the fault warning, etc.  In most cases a dealer or repair shop will charge you a minimum of $50-100 just to diagnose the problem,  much less to actually fix it.    Depending on what kind of car you have, these cables will pay for themselves after their first use. :-P

Plus since this connects to your laptop, you can do all kinds of cool diagnostic things too.... I'm curious to play around with it and see how it works. I bought one BMW cable for my dad's car and one VW one for my car (which has been living in exile in my parent's driveway since 2004!) Anyway, mission accomplished. Now all I need to do is get back across the border.  Now all I needed was to find a bus that was heading back towards Lo Wu...  I walked a block or two in search of the right bus.

Famous what?

Famous Fown?

China's labor abundance makes things interesting some time.  You get interesting services you can't find overseas.  These guys are recyclers, according to the sign, they take appliances, computers, scrap metal, etc,  they just sit around all day on the corner waiting for someone to call them.  I wish they had this kind of service in Japan. :-P

Eventually I found a bus -

and enjoyed some more fun views of traffic jams and muddy construction sites

This bus was different than the one I came on.  Instead of everyone paying a flat fare upon entry, this one has different fares depending on how far you go.  How do they figure it out?

There's a lady walking around inside the bus who collects fares from each person based on where they say they're getting off.  She even has a scanner to charge your auto-pay card.  (in Beijing back in the day, they used to have something similar, but the lady sat in a little booth bythe door... in this case she had to hunt down the fares).

On my way out you'll recall there was a guy bringing a propane tank onto the bus.  This time there was something less dangerous, but defnitely very interesting:

for those who aren't familiar with the printing business... this is what those backdrops and signboards we use at our parties look like when they come from the print shop.  and yes, in China you can actually take that on the bus (if you can fit it in the door).

Before crossing back to HK side, I stopped at the shopping center to try and find a last few items:

Actually I really hate this place,  its basically 5 floors, each with about 100 small shops, all of which have one or more guys sitting on little stools outside saying 'hey sir, iPhone, USB, DVD movie!'

Wow,  is that even possible?  they must have really pissed someone off. :-P

This place was really funny...  I stopped there looking for a replacement battery for my digital camera (but they only had mobile phone batteries, as you can see on the left),  but then the girl asked me if I was interested in any of their OTHER products...  yes this particular shop specializes in low cost replacement mobile phone batteries and low cost pharmacuticals!

That is in fact a box of VIAGRA (or more likely, fake viagra). out of curiousity I asked the price, apparently the going price is about $16 for four pills,  but when I told her I wasn't interested, she ofered to lower the price. :-P

For the budget conscious ED sufferer, there's also 'Jin Wei Ge', a Chinese Viagra alternative.  I declined this purchase too!  Some things are too important to risk! :-P