We arrived

We arrived in Guangzhou at 11 PM last night, March 23. The 13 hour flight from Chicago to Tokyo is a bum buster. We watched four movies each and ate three meals. Then after a few hour layover, we flew 5 hours to Guangzhou. Fortunately the last flight was not completely booked. We go three seats each and had a a nice nap.
This morning we were met by a staff member of the Foreign Affairs Office of Guangzdong University of Technology. His name is David, he will be our main contact.
Our first stop was the Bank of China. After a thirty minute queue, it took us over an hour to setup two bank accounts. One for each of us, as they do not have joint accounts and there was no way to get two cash station cards for one account.
Next we got to see our apartment. It is on the fourth floor of a four story walk up building. The building is actually called the Foreign Expat Apartments. The apartment is quite large. Three bedrooms, one of which is setup as a den. It has a two burner stove, refrigerator-freezer, dish sanitizer, two room air conditions, washing machine, TV and a computer with Ethernet. We have a queen and full size bed, one small clothes closet and two balconies.
I was surprised to see that all windows and doors have metal bars.
David took us for lunch in a middle region Chinese restaurant. We had lotus soup, some duck dish for which he did not know the English name, a greens dish and a taro dish. All of it was good and our first leftovers are in our refrigerator.
Sunday we will move into the apartment and have dinner with the head of the Business School and the head of the Foreign Affairs Office. Then we will begin our work.
Right now we are in a deluxe hotel at the center of Guangzhou, the Garden Hotel. The hotel is very expensive by China standards but would cost at least twice as much in New York or Chicago. The lobby is exquisite with gigantic planters with birds of paradise plants and gold wall decorations which are three stories high. Outside our window are two waterfalls approximately 50 feet high. Across the street are many banks and restaurants. Beside the many local ones are McDonald's, KFC, Pizza Hut and Starbucks.
So long for now.
P.S. Figuring out how to write a new entry was pretty tricky. The tabs are written in Chinese.