Hong Kong Kid Tour

I don't know about you guys but when I think of Hong Kong, I think of urban, globalized, commercial sophistication. A lot of top businesses are concentrated around here, people in general dress pretty nice, the shopping is decent, and there is supposedly a nightlife worth checking out.

Well, I don't have any stories about that side of Hong Kong because I totally did not do that here. If I were to summarize my trip in HK, I went to preschool, visited Disneyland, and played in the best kid's funhouse/obstacle course I have ever seen in a country club. Between my two cousins, there are four kids ages 7, 4, 3, and 1. We went to Hong Kong's wonderful world of Disneyland yesterday which is much smaller than the ones in the U.S. but since I hadn't been to Disneyworld since I was 10, I didn't notice much of a difference. We went on Space Mountain, It's a Small World (as cute as it was, my Women's Studies eyes made me look at the displays in a different light), a Buzz Lightyear shooting game-ride, and Donald Duck's 4-D screening. We even got to see the daily Parade where the announcements and some of the songs were sung in Cantonese but still entertaining. Today I went to a country club my cousin Vivian belongs to, which has the sickest obstacle course for kids. Much like Playspace, except a hundred times better! There were so many ropes, ladders, and cushions to climb, tunnels to crawl through, firepoles to swing down, and rotating tables to jump over. The best part were a series of huge slides, one of them requiring a potato sack and had bumps along the way. Another one had a vertical drop before ending on a slide. I don't know how little kids just went down this slide without any hesitation but my cousin-in-law Will had to push me down because I was too scared at first. It's like a 5-10 foot free fall before you land on a slide... so scary but fun! We ended the day going to the Wan Chai Market for some shopping, had some good eats and bought a Halloween costume which are so much cheaper here and they sell them year round and some leggings.

I will be leaving Hong Kong to go back to Shanghai soon and even though it was a short trip, I enjoyed seeing my cousins again and their young but growing families. If anything, I got to see what I get to look forward to in the future perhaps. No nightlife stuff this time but going down the scariest slide of my life was definitely worth it :)

Sorry no pictures this time, my computer is not reading my camera at the moment. And I will try and break the great firewall of China when I get back but it is likely I may not get to update this again when I return to the States which will actually be in less than a few weeks, yikes!

Hello from Hong Kong

So as it turns out I can't access my blog in Shanghai, which means I will update during my short time in Hong Kong! I'm mainly here to see my two cousins, Vivian and Livia and their families since this is my third time in the city. There won't be much sightseeing on this trip, which is fine because the exhaustion of traveling through SE Asia has finally caught up to me and I've been tired all day today.

I've spent my first few days back in Shanghai with Jaimie, who just finished a month long internship in Singapore and has been living in Taiwan pretty much since she graduated from college. The weather has been pretty sad and gray so we have been taking sightseeing pretty easy so far. We've visited the Super Grand Mall to eat some xiao lon bao, Shanghainese soup dumplings and walked around The Bund on the Pudong side to see the French Concession on the opposite side of the Huanpu River. It's pretty foggy out so we couldn't get the greatest view of the skyline but I can only imagine what it could look like. Shanghai has been gearing up for the World Expo 2010 starting in May so they have been doing some heavy duty landscaping and cleaning of the city. Haibo, the adorable little blue Expo mascot can be spotted at pretty much every corner and block of Shanghai, and now people on the street are selling stuffed and keychain Haibos.

The architecture in Shanghai is modern and glorious. The buildings just keep getting taller and more extravagant, definitely a sign that this city is growing and developing at a crazy pace. Maybe that's why the people here are rude. Yes, I said it. I don't think the people in Shanghai are very nice at all. I realize its part of the city's culture and I am uncomfortable with it because I am obviously not used to it but I've only been in Shanghai for a total of 4-5 days so far and I'm already sick of people cutting in line, refusing to help with directions, and walking around like they have a huge stick up their you-know-what. The most frustrating part is feeling helpless about it because my Chinese is not advanced enough where I can express my disdain for the rudeness (or at least tell off a person who just cut in front of me). I suppose it's not my place to say anything but isn't it also a universal thing to treat one another with respect?

Other than that, Jaimie and I have been able to practice our Chinese. We've known each other for a really long time (about 19 years!) but I don't think we have ever heard the other speak Chinese before. The first night we decided to go out the other night to the Jiang Temple train stop to grab dinner and check out the nightlife. It was a bit difficult to find a bar for some reason but we went into a club called Fame which had really good American hip hop music but no one spoke English there. Instead we sipped on Long Island Iced Teas and sort of talked to a friendly bartender who tried to teach us this dice game, which I still don't understand the rules to this day.

So no concrete plans in Hong Kong, except to spend time with my cousins and their little kids. It's supposed to rain for the duration of my stay so I'm not sure how much we will be able to do but I did leave some room in my luggage which means, I should go shopping at some point!

Snorkeling in Ko Maa

I can't believe this leg of my trip is almost over! We left Ko Pha Ngan this evening and back in Bangkok. I was sad to leave our little beach paradise but if I believe in fate, then all signs pointed to leaving the island....

The day after the Songkran celebration, I cut my heel on a sharp rock (same foot as the first cut from the water fight) probably because I was trying to stay off my original cut and put more weight on my heel as I walked on the beach. Still following me? With two cuts on the same foot, it was hard to walk in the sand because bits of sand would get stuck. Yesterday we took a songthaew up north to Ko Maa, an small island connected to Ko Pha Ngan by a strip of sandy beach known for its nice beaches and snorkeling. What should've been a 5 minute walk to Ko Maa from where we were dropped off turned into a 20 minute walk because I couldn't walk properly. It was well worth it though, my first snorkeling experience was.... eventful. We definitely saw a lot of colorful fish swimming and sea slugs, sea urchins, and possibly a sea cucumber hiding in some amazing geometric shaped coral. I felt like I was in the fish tank of some fancy Chinese restaurant and we didn't even have to swim out that far. We turned around to return to shore and I noticed the sea floor was getting really shallow so I put my hand down on a rock to stand up and ended up slicing my index finger and the side of my left hand. I didn't expect the rock to be sharp so I'm guessing I cut it on coral? My finger was bleeding quite a bit so our snorkeling adventure had to come to an end. Fortunately I brought a small bag of medical supplies so I was able to clean out my cuts and cover it with a band-aid but that meant no more trips to the ocean for me.....

Nevertheless we were sad to leave Harmony Beach Resort and its remote beach, yummy food, and awesome staff. We took a boat to Ko Samui from Haad Rin and had some time to kill so I got a really great Thai massage while Haj continued to read The Kite Runner (I basically shoved the book on to him when he arrived) next door. Fast forward a couple of hours and now we are back in Bangkok, where we are far from the protests and had a delicious dinner on the street. There are several street food vendors on our block and we came across a noodle cart with a friendly older man who was more comfortable speaking Mandarin to me since his English was shaky. He gave us egg noodles in soup with wontons, slices of bbq pork, fried pork belly, crab meat, bok choy and scallions. This dinner is worth mentioning because it was SO delicious, even though the portions were very small. I love wontons and this was one of the best ones I had ever had, it had a peppery flavor that was just right and texture was tender (weird but I think the stuffing of a lot of wontons can be too gummy sometimes). And Dad, it looked like the meat was prepared ahead of time and they just cooked the noodles and cut the meat up and added it to the soup. I wish we had more time to eat more street food! Oh yeah, then I walked across the street to get some mango and sticky rice. What a perfect last dinner in Bangkok...

Tomorrow's our last day in Thailand and we are still trying to figure out what to do so I'm not sure if I will be able to update this blog after today for a while. I would like to keep up this blog in Shanghai but I'm not sure if the internet in China will allow access to Blogger. We will have to see but if I can't update from Shanghai, I will definitely write some new posts in Hong Kong, where I will be from 4/21-4/24. Jaimie will be in Shanghai when I return so we will be hanging out for a few days, who knows what kind of trouble we will get ourselves into!

Happy Songkran!

Yesterday we engaged in the biggest water fight I had ever been in my life because of Songkran, the Thai New Year. Throwing water on the streets is the biggest and most obvious form of celebration of Songkran, and Ko Pha Ngan was no different. A bunch of us staying at the same resort piled into a songthaew to make our way to Thong Sala, the Southwest region of the island where the biggest water fight took place. The 4 km drive already had us soaked from people on the street spraying us with water guns, hoses, and dumping by the bucketfuls. Since it's pretty warm out, the water was quite refreshing, except for the occasional chilly water that gets thrown on you. Once we reached Thong Sala, we bought some water guns at a convenience store and joined the crowds. There were large buckets of water in front of most stores so you could refill and you just hit anyone from locals to fellow tourists, everyone was pretty much involved. I felt like I was living a childhood dream I never achieved, except this was ten times bigger and better than any water fight that I could ever imagine. Some of the locals had buckets of flour or colored baby powder that they would wipe on your face, another Songkran tradition.

Why throw water? Like I've mentioned before, April is one of Thailand's hottest months and while the water relieves us foreigners of this heat, water throwing originated from a way to pay respect to your loved ones, particularly your elders. People would cleanse Buddha images at home or at monasteries with water as a "renewal bathing ritual" then use this water to cleanse each other for the start of a new year. Somehow this evolved to young people throwing water at each other in the middle of streets and at passing vehicles but you know, whatever gets everyone involved right?

Unfortunately none of us took our cameras to Thong Sala because they would not have survived this soak fest. Towards the end of the festival, I cut the bottom of my foot on either a piece of glass or sharp rock. It's pretty shallow, like a paper cut but I couldn't really walk after that. For the New Year, there was a Black Moon party, located about 2 km away from where we were staying and I was worried about my foot but we couldn't miss a beach party while we were at Ko Pha Ngan! There was techno music blasting, black light artwork scattered, and fire dancers entertaining us by the water. I was bummed I couldn't be more active last night but at least we got to people-watch and check out the party scene.

My foot feels a lot better now, we'll see if I can stick it in the water today! Those of us back at home, we should really think about organizing an epic water fight this summer....

Island in the Sun

We are now at our last stop of the Thailand leg of this trip, Ko Pha Ngan, the backpacker's getaway island off Ko Samui in the Gulf of Thailand. It was sorta rough getting here, our speedboat from Ko Samui to Pha Ngan was delayed by almost an hour, then 13 of us were crammed in a songthaew to get to our hotels. We were a bit grumpy by the end of the night but looking out the window the next day to see that we are about 20 feet away from the beach totally made up for it. We are located between Haad Rin and Thong Sala, a remote stretch of beach and bungalows and for some reason, no one was at the beach today so Haj and I literally had an entire beach to ourselves! Maybe because it was way too hot out today? Every time the sun poked out from the clouds, I felt like I was in an oven. We spent most of the time in the crystal clear water, which was actually pretty warm. I'll admit, this is not the nicest beach I've ever been to (that would have to go to Miami Beach or Cabo San Lucas in my opinion) but the absence of other tourists and peacefulness makes this experience a winner.

Not sure if the rest of you have been doing this, but we've been following the protests in Bangkok all day. There is definitely some concern for returning to Bangkok since violence has taken place at this point and it looks like neither side is backing down. With the most recent news of the Democrat Party failing to report substantial funding for its election, I wonder what the PM will do but I hope no one else gets hurt in this protest.

No Timetables

This is the fourth day in a row that I've updated this blog, you're welcome!

No major tours planned for today. We met up with Stacey and Brittany to visit Wat Umong, a temple built in the form of tunnels underneath a large chedi (another term for stupa commonly used in Chiang Mai) around 1380 inspired by a monk who loved the forest. The Wat lies within a park of other forms of community gathering. We almost walked into some ceremony held for monks wearing white robes but there were living quarters for monks and a library on the compound.

In the middle of the heat, Haj convinced me to see Wat Chedi Luang, another one of Chiang Mai's most well known temples. There was a dazzling temple housing a large gilded Buddha but the real sight was the large pink brick chedi perched on a set of steep stairs. Half of the roof has been destroyed by an earthquake in 1545 and while it is not exactly known when the chedi was built, it has been estimated that construction began sometime in the 14th century. This chedi also used to house an Emerald Buddha, but since the earthquake this Buddha has been moved to Luang Prabang.

With nothing left on the itinerary, I decided to get my first Thai massage. I attempted to get one at the Chiang Mai Disabled Center but they happened to be closed today, I wasn't really sure of the reason but I was really disappointed as I had waited all day for the massage center to open (hours were 5pm-9pm). I just walked in another massage parlor and hoped for the best. I tried not to laugh when the masseuse pressed on my leg (I was really ticklish there) and I think Haj tried not to laugh when I was engaged in some wrestle-like position. I really enjoyed my massage overall, I feel like I got a good stretch out of it in addition to rubbing out some knots in my shoulders. I can't wait to get another one, but it'll probably have to wait until we reach Ko Pha Ngan.

Almost forgot to mention a dish that I really enjoyed today. Khao Soi is a bowl of egg noodles in a coconut Thai curry sauce, meat, pickled vegetables and onions, topped with a layer of deep fried egg noodles, a popular dish in northern Thailand. I can eat noodles every day if I had to, especially noodles in soup and I definitely tried something new and delicious today. If you are wondering why I talk about food all the time on this blog, it's mostly because my dad always wants to know what I'm eating over here. Except for the period I was sick in Vietnam, eating has been of the best parts about this trip, I wonder if I can call myself a travel foodie at this point...

As we returned to our guesthouse, we were sprayed by water by fellow backpackers, who had no idea that we were only trying to get into the guesthouse. Correction: water was sprayed AND dumped on us by the bucketfuls. It's still warm out and the New Year over here is coming up hence the water fights. I usually have a good sense of humor about this but the water was dirty and I was wearing a white dress. Thanks guys.

Elephant Walk

Today we went on an "Elephant Safari" tour at the Mae Taeng Elephant Nature Park, another must-see event outside of Chiang Mai. This day long program started out with a welcoming Elephant Show where dozens of Asian Elephants bathed in a nearby river and marched on the stage together. They performed various tricks for us such as carrying their handlers by their trunks or legs (we even saw a few handlers standing on their tusks!), kicking a soccer ball or putting a golf ball, and finishing off with a few elephant artists painting for us. The nearest elephant to us painted an elephant, go figure. It was pretty impressive though, the elephants seemed pretty pleased with themselves.

After a rickety ox cart ride up a hill, we loaded on to an elephant for our hour long elephant ride. The elephant that Haj and I rode on was one of the bigger elephants with large ears, very uncharacteristic of an Asian elephant. I had heard about this in the past but didn't realize how bumpy elephant rides really were! We had to get used to the constant shifting and held on for dear life when the elephant walked downhill, I almost slid out under the bar. We went on quite a walk though, through a river and up hills. Thank you Elephant.

After lunch we went on a bamboo raft ride down the river. They gave us rice hats which now I can see why everyone in Vietnam wears one, they really give you shade. April is supposed to be the hottest month of the year in this area so the water level is very low, which resulted in the raft running over rocks on the bottom of the river and getting stuck. Our raft rower let each of us row the raft for a while, I'm sure he was entertained by that. We got to see more elephants crossing the river or in their pens as we made our way down. Our tour also took us to an Orchid Farm, which was nice but nothing too special then finally took us back to our hotels.

Haj and I tried to meet up with some friends for dinner but couldn't find the place. Instead we noticed a very cheap Pad Thai stall crowded with locals and went in there, after giving up on our original destination. The cooks didn't speak any English and I'm not even sure if the water they gave us was clean but the Pad Thai was soooo good. I've also been enjoying the banana roti they make on the street carts. I've always enjoyed roti since my trip to Singapore and Malaysia but eating it as a dessert gives it a whole new dimension. We've had the banana roti with honey and with chocolate, both very decadent but the honey is the best. Since my sickness in Hanoi I had been a little hesitant to grab food from street vendors (and Ali can tell you how I look at their food so longingly during our entire trip) but at this point, I think I can tolerate a lot more than before and Thailand has a good reputation for keeping their cooking facilities clean.

I am about to finish my third book on this trip, Handle With Care by Jodi Picoult. Anticipating that, I picked up The Lovely Bones which recently came out in theaters at a used book store and I can't wait to read it since I really wanted to see the movie. A small reason why I enjoy traveling is because I can catch up on reading and so far I've read My Sister's Keeper by Picoult, The Kite Runner & A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini, and now finishing up Handle with Care. I'm totally getting into Jodi Picoult's novels, so Lifetime but I love reading about bioethical drama and families. Anyone have any other book recommendations? I bet I can get a lot of reading done on the beach later this trip.....

Zippy Lining

Today we went on a zip-lining tour through Jungle Flights (whose advertisements are just as common around here as Flight of the Gibbon). A van took us about an hour outside Chiang Mai, although I'm not sure which direction it is because I was asleep on the way over there... and on the way back. This "tour" consisted of zip lining through 22 platforms in a forest, repelling down up to 40 m from a tree, and walking across 2 rickety sky bridges way above the ground. It was quite exhilarating to zip down a rope in a harness and our tour guides were hilarious and kept things interesting. They would entertain us by hanging upside down on their zip lines or shake the rope to scare us while we were on the ropes. It's pretty funny that this is part of the Chiang Mai experience even though we were not in Chiang Mai to do this. The scariest moment for me was dropping down 40 meters above the ground, I begged the tour guides to drop me slowly in Chinese since they had discovered that I was Chinese and kept speaking to me in Chinese. They definitely let go of the rope a few times to let me free fall for a couple of seconds but I managed to keep my eyes open to experience everything. A large insect also decided to fly in my eye earlier during the day, and my blinking effectively killed it but then I had a bug in my eye. That was entertaining.

We finished off the day with a nice lunch but then we were driven to some random hot springs right outside the forest. I'm not sure why they thought it would be appealing for us tourists to see hot springs in 100 degree weather, especially if the springs itself were too hot for us to touch the water. We walked around the fence surrounding the hot springs the size of a large table, cringed at the stench of sulfur, and walked to a coffee stand to get some shade. The driver realized we were not really enjoying this so we went back to the van and went back to Chiang Mai.

Later that night, we returned to the Night Bazaar where I snagged yet another dress and some souvenirs while Haj continued his quest to find the perfect t-shirts (we have already found some really funny ones). We bumped into Brittany and Stacey at the Night Bazaar and walked to Brasserie Restaurant east of the Ping River, where we had some beer and listened to some decent live music. Probably a good idea to get to bed since we have an elephant tour to wake up to tomorrow morning!

Slowing Down in Chiang Mai

We made it to Chiang Mai in one piece from the train thankfully, which was quite an upgrade from the train from Hanoi to Hue. A second class sleeper train will give you two levels of bunks (as opposed to three in Vietnam) with clean sheets and curtains. You are also out in the open rather than being crammed in a cabin with 5 other people. I think the worst part of the train ride was having two little cockroaches skittering inches from my face, but it was decent overall.

14 hours later we arrived in Chiang Mai. There were an endless number of things to do and see in Bangkok but I was ready to leave the capital. I can see why everyone who has visited Thailand loves Chiang Mai, it is big enough where there are plenty of activities to keep tourists busy and entertained but doesn't have the crazy traffic and city rush of Bangkok. The next few days will be pretty busy so we decided to take it easy today. We ate lunch at The Funky Dog Cafe, where the owner looks like he belongs in the age of Hippies and was telling us how art is his medicine and that his children are his teachers (and that computers are bad), it was pretty entertaining. The way that the city of Chiang Mai is structured is that the old quarter is set within a two km square moat, with more commercialized and tourist spots sitting outside the moat. It is an easy walk over the bridge to leave the old quarter and there are many opportunities to leave the city for trekking, zip-lining, elephant riding, bungee jumping, etc etc etc. We walked down Ratchdamnoen Road, passed by a several temples and reached the end of the road for Wat Phra Singh, Chiang Mai's must-see temple. I was surprised that we didn't have to pay an entrance fee to get in but even more confused by the elder monk meditating among a dozen shrines and didn't move a muscle. Haj and I debated whether he was real, I guess being deep in meditation can make you do extraordinary things?

I felt like I couldn't do much today because it was so hot. I never know what the actual temperature outside is (I don't make an effort to find out because I don't want to know) and I don't know what it's been relative to the other cities we've visited but I think my tolerance for heat is plummeting because walking has been more and more miserable as the days go by. I've been really good about staying hydrated and my fitness level was decent before this trip (always could be better I know I know) so I don't know if I am just getting mentally worn out from traveling or if the temperature really has been climbing in April.

Fortunately we were able to make it back out in the evening for the Night Bazaar, where scores of street stalls line up on thanons Chang Klan and Loi Khro selling everything from jewelry to obscene t-shirts and Hmong embroidered handbags. We were able to pick up some goods and made a mental note to take advantage of the Thai massages offered on the streets at a later date. Tomorrow we arranged for a jungle zip-lining tour which I think will be fun but I'm hoping for some shade under the trees!

Computer Challenged

Hello! As you can see, I've managed to upload some pictures on this blog but as you can also see, I am having issues formatting them so I have just limited each post to one small picture. I don't know why I'm having such a hard time with it, it's not easy to pick just one picture to summarize one destination!

Haji just got into Bangkok last night so I am excited to explore Thailand with him. I took him over to the Grand Palace (he went in while I read a book in a cafe) and we also saw the largest and heaviest solid Golden Buddha at Wat Traimit. We ended our day with a visit to Jim Thompson's House, Thailand's most loyal American expatriate who mysteriously disappeared in Malaysia in 1967. He left behind an authentic Thai architectural charm of a house with gorgeous works of Thai, Chinese, and Burmese art displayed in each room. I loved the silk paintings the most, as he was interested in the Thai cottage silk tradition. We will be leaving for Chiang Mai tomorrow on a sleeper train so if it's anything like the train ride from Hanoi to Hue... well then this should be interesting.

I also wanted to elaborate why I enjoyed the Muay Thai Fighting so much. I felt like I was actually getting a glimpse of something very important in Thai culture and it definitely helped that I love watching sports in general. Even as what appears to be a brutal sport, there was something artistic about the kicking and blocking movements and I loved the live Thai music that accompanied the fights. I also found the rituals the fighters performed before their match to be really interesting. The whole atmosphere in the Lumphini Stadium was a hit overall.

The Jude Law Effect

Sawat dii ka, we made it to Bangkok two nights ago! I have about 12 minutes left on the internet before it dies on me so I'll make this quick (sorry for the brief posts!)

Back track to Siem Reap, we toured the Angkor temples for the second day, checking out less well known but equally as neat temples Preah Khan, Neak Pean, East Mebon, Pre Rup, Banteay Kdei, and ending with a failed sunset viewing at Phnom Bakheng (sky was cloudy so we couldn't really see anything, much like the sunrise at Angkor Wat). The best story from this day was when we checked out East Mebon, I bumped into an old friend from high school, Jack! It was pretty surreal since it's been somewhere around 4-5 years since we had seen each other and running into each other at an obscure Angkor temple (out of dozens of temples scattered around the area) is pretty crazy. Other than that, my favorite temple that day would have to be Preah Khan, which actually served as a temporary residence for King Jayavarman VII while Angkor Thom was being repaired after a Siamese attack in the 12th Century. For a temporary home, this place was not too shabby. There were all these chambers with wonderful carvings on the outside and I'm not sure what they were used for, perhaps for some kind of sacred ritual? There were also trees growing out of the walls and it was a relatively shady temple so that was nice. We ended our time in Siem Reap well and ready to take on Thailand....

Ali's mother has arrived in Thailand, which I know Ali has been really excited about. We have split off a bit, they are in the Lumphini area while I am staying on Kao San Road. I met up with Jack, his friend Jesse, and two of their friends Stacey and Brittany to tour the Grand Palace yesterday, which was very glitzy and well decorated. That night we attended Muay Thai Fighting matches which I really enjoyed.