My Amazing Race - Part 3

Yes, it's me again....

Didn't I warn you there was loads of news?

So, to continue....

Monday 10th:

Of course, this was our last morning in HK, and we were quickly running out of time to see all we wanted to see. Yes, we knew that 2 1/2 days in HK was not going to be enough time to see everything, but at least we could get a tongue-tip taste. Now we both definitely want to return to both HK and Macau sometime to do it full justice!

So, we decided to split up for the morning so we could each do what we individually wanted to. Gyo Lim went to the history museum etc while I went to OCEAN PARK! Now we all saw what the Chinese accomplished with the Beijing Olympics (opening/closing ceremonies, etc). I now have an appreciation for the way the Chinese do some things. When they put on a show, they really go all out. But, I'm getting ahead of myself.

Ocean Park is an amusement/zoo park. It's built on a hill/mountain, over 2 levels. The lower level houses the giant pandas, giant goldfish, exotic birds, red pandas, giant Chinese salamanders, Chinese alligators, otters and children's amusement park rides. To get to the upper level, one has to take a long cable car ride (about 15-20min) to the top of the mountain. The scenery along the way is stunning, of course, as one climbs higher and higher with an awesome aerial view of the bay and boats down below. At the top are the sharks, rays, dolphins, seals, reef animals (including various varieties of sea horses, Richard!) etc. How on earth they managed to get all these huge marine animals to the top of a mountain, I guess only the Chinese can answer. What a feat! And the further extension and constant construction continues.

I've seen dolphin shows in SA, but, yet again, the Chinese trump everything I've seen. They put on a fabulous show, telling a story with narration in Cantonese/Mandarin and English, about how it IS possible for man and animal to live together harmoniously. Human divers and dolphins performed exquisitely, dancing together, perfectly timed choreography in the water. They even included a little demonstration of how a dolphin can save a drowning human. (Trained dolphins, of course, but effective nonetheless.) Then a seal show where they get the seals to interact with random members of the audience. Adorable.

Thereafter, I just about had time for a quick browse through the coral reef section. Giant stingrays, prowling sharks, my kind of heaven!

I spent 3 1/2 hrs at Ocean Park but still didn't get to see everything. It's so interesting, that one needs to spend an entire day there. I definitely have to go back to HK, even if it's just to visit Ocean Park!

Then, it was immediately off to the airport again, and on to Bangkok!

So...Bangkok! I loved it! Absolutely loved it! What an amazing vibe! The first thing to strike you as you enter Thailand (and I remember Bradley telling me this...) is that you feel like you have arrived in the country of the Coloured people! Everyone looks like home! What an amazing feeling after living in Korea for almost 5 months now. I felt like I had come home! There were people from all around the world, of course, but mostly Indians and Africans, with a few Germans and English thrown in for good measure. So, Cape Town. The traffic is a BITCH! Hence, subway and skytrain are the way to get around. We had booked into a nice big upmarket hotel in central Bangkok where the traffic was the worst. Gyo Lim had prebooked a dinner/theatre show for our first night in Bangkok. But thanks to horrendous traffic, by the time we had checked into our hotel room, not even showered or changed, and managed to navigate our way via skytrain and subway, to the theatre, we had missed dinner but had arrived just in time for the show. And what a spectacular show it was! SIAM NIRAMIT tells the story of Thai history, (when the country was still called Siam). Stunning costumes and stage effects! Unlike anything I've ever seen accomplished on a stage. The musical, Showboat, at Artscape, only had a section of a boat constructed for the stage show. Siam Nirimvit had an entire boat, and not just one! They even constructed a river on stage, that flowed constantly, one of the actors could actually dive into it and swim. Other actors could row small boats on this river across the forestage. Audience members were invited to float flower garlands on this river. They had 2 live elephants on stage, as well as some goats and chickens! At one stage, the elephants came into the house, among the audience. AWESOME STUFF!

Meet-and-greet with actors...

... and elephants!

And after the show, there was a meet and greet session outside with some actors and elephants. Some patrons were paying the elephant handler to get the elephant to pick them up with its trunk.

Tuesday 11th:

Tuesday morning, we went on a private temple and city tour. Apparently there are 400+ Buddhist temples in the city of Bangkok alone. The Thai people take their religion VERY seriously. We went to about 3-4 temples, I think, I eventually lost track after seeing so many various statues of Buddha. But of course, the most impressive one has to be the reclining Buddha. What you see is real gold, everything that looks gold IS gold.

The Reclining Buddha

Buddha's feet inlaid with mother-of-pearl

Next, was a canal tour via longtail boat. How absolutely exciting! We were taken through many small water canals through residential areas on the outskirts of the city. This is where we could see how traditional Thai people live. Homes (poor and rich) built on the water's edge. Kids learning to swim, using coconuts as floaters, kimodo dragons sunning themselves at the water's edge, mango, banana and coconut trees growing in people's backyards, fruit dangling over the water...... At one point, was a bread shop. The set-up is amazing.... You stop your boat, and using a pulley system, pay the shopkeeper by placing your money in a bucket which he hauls in and returns a bucket to you that is filled with loaves of soft bread. (Actually, we didn't pay, I assume it was the driver or the tour guide who handled that but I never saw money exchange hands, or buckets, that is!). The special thing about this place is that if you feed the bread to the catfish, it's supposed to bring you luck. The sign above the hut says LUCKY FISH! Well, it was the first time in my life that I got baptised by fish! As we threw bits of bread in the water, hundreds of giant catfish appeared. We were instructed to hold a chunk of bread in the water for the fish (the boat was so low that we could easily put our hands in the water). Of course, the greedy fish swarmed for our fingers, amidst much thrashing of tails. So, that is how I got baptised by lucky fish...churning water in the face, a number of times. They were right up against the boat, so it was easy for me to stroke them...no scales, big toothless mouths, smooth sleek skin. Amazing experience! Amazing Thailand!

Sight-seeing via long-tail boat

Water baptism by catfish!

Next, was a stop at a jewellery factory, where I bought a nice-sized Thai ruby set in white-gold ring. (Apparently, Thailand's famous for rubies and sapphires, but they import the gold from SA! So, they were very happy to meet a South African! And, of course, I had to buy an original Thai ruby as a nice souvenir for myself.)

Later that evening, we went on a dinner cruise down the Chao Praya River. Stunning, stunning, stunning! Buildings and bridges and temples were all lit up. We met 2 middle-aged Chinese-Malaysian guys, 3 nice guys from Myanmar who live and work in Singapore (one of them is MD of an architectural company, ooh la la...); also met a friendly guy from Iran. What an enjoyable evening...buffet dinner, good company, lots of male attention, live jazz music, excellent live entertainment, lots of dancing, fantastic international atmosphere, Hebrew music, Iranian music, Western music, those Iranians know how to dance! WOW! It felt great! Lekker party boat!

Finally back to hotel and sleep!

Wednesday....to be continued....

Hope you enjoy the details!

Luv,

Andrea

My Amazing Race - Part 2

Hi!

To continue....

Sunday 9th:

First thing Sunday morning, we took a ferry from Kowloon to Macau. And this is where the customs and immigration marathon began! Immigration at HK stamps passport "Departed Hong Kong August 9th". Arrive in Macau an hour later (and can you believe it, even hotter than HK!). Macau immigration stamps passport "Arrived Macau August 9th".

Boiling hot!

What do I see?

Do you think anyone would mind terribly if I dove into the fountain?

Ok, I'll behave.

Now, Macau is known as the Las Vegas of the East. Oh my word! What an amazing place! Not only is it as hot as the desert, but all around, all you see are towering casino buildings, each one vying to be grander than the next. Quite an experience! And because the majority of Macau's income is generated from gambling tourists, they send glam shuttle buses to the ferry port to shuttle visitors to their casinos/hotels for free! So we hopped a bus for free and were treated to an eye-catching sightseeing ride along the coast. Eventually we were deposited at some or other hotel casino, with ridiculous gold decor and giant chandeliers. The weird thing, though, is that just outside the casino, was a residential area that is obviously on the poorer side of things. From there, we took a cab to the famous Central Square, from where it is easy to do walking tours to all the touristy places. I've never seen a posher McDonalds.

The ruins of St Paul's Church

A little piece of Europe in Asia

Now Macau has strong Portuguese heritage, thanks to Portuguese colonialism. It makes for a unique and interesting place in the East. Mainly Chinese inhabitants, European architecture, English and Portuguese street names, Portuguese food galore. Quite unlike the rest of the Orient. We did the usual sightseeing stuff; I bought an antique Chinese lacquered jewellery box (which also doubles as a pillow - you know the ancient Chinese wooden pillows we sometimes see in Chinese movies?). Macau is also renowned for all its antique stores. Wow! It's like walking through a museum! I browsed through a few antique stores, and absolutely beautiful furniture. One day, when I'm rich, I'll go furniture shopping in Macau and have it shipped to my villa in Tuscany!

Yummy to-die-for-hot-from-the-oven Portuguese egg custard tartlets!

Another thing Macau is renowned for is Portuguese egg custard tarts. Heaven on the tongue! I wanted to go to Macau just for this...seriously! The closest you gonna find in SA, is at Vida e Cafe. But of course, in Macau, it was hot from the oven, melt in the mouth, creamy, yummy....need I say more? They also do a style of jerkey (I'm not calling it biltong cos its more like jerkey, i.e. flat sheets of meat). Still delicious though. I bought some peppered beef, which I didn't get a chance to eat, as it stayed in my suitcase for the next week or so, and ended up in the bin at customs in Korea! Because I was honest enough to declare it. Oh well! At least I tasted it in Macau. And it was good!

Gyo Lim wanted to go shopping at the Ralph Lauren Polo factory shop in Macau, so off we went, and she got some really good bargains for Korean money. Then I needed to buy some tissues (cos of all the constant face mopping, I was fast running out of face mops), so I popped into what looked like a pharmacy. Only it turned out to be like a big Clicks, called Watson's, which was packed with customers, so it took a while to just buy tissues. And then at the tills, don't I see Lindt and Cadbury's etc etc and go crazy! So finally, after an extra kilo or two of chocolate and chewing gum, we headed to a Portuguese restaurant for lunch. Then back to the Polo shop, cos Gyo Lim had worked out just how much of a good bargain she got, and wanted to get some more. By then, it was time for us to start heading back to HK, so we walked to the nearest casino, naively thinking (rather...hoping) we could return to the ferry port via free casino bus again. LOL! Naturally, we were stopped by casino security, and asked for our casino tickets, which, by the way, you can only get at one of the gaming tables, hence, you HAVE to sped money at the casino. Of course! DUH! So, we politely, and as unobtrusively as possible, walked through the gambling section till we found the exit, and took a cab to the port! And yet again, at the duty free shop at the port, I saw more varieties of chocolate, bought some more, plus Magnum ice creams. I was educating Gyo Lim in the ways of the West, you see, not being greedy at all! ;)

Immigration stamps passport "departed Macau August 9th". Nice bouncy, bumpy ferry ride back to Kowloon across the South China Sea. (It feels so James Bond to say the South China Sea! I just had to do it!). One hour later, HK immigration stamps passport "Arrived Hong Kong August 9th". (My apologies to those who don't find this funny, but I get a kick out of it!)

We then took another ferry across Victoria Harbour to Hong Kong Island, then a topless sightseeing bus to the tram station to take a tram uphill to the top of Hong Kong Island where we had another breathtaking view of Hong Kong at night, and of course, we saw the light show again, this time from a different angle. And we could look across to Kowloon.

See how much Hong Kong resembles Cape Town?

On board the Topless Bus touring the streets of Hong Kong.

Breathtaking night-view of Hong Kong, from the top of Hong Kong Island.

After an exhausting but thoroughly enjoyable day in the intense heat, we headed back to Kowloon by ferry, then subway to our area, and finally, aircon, in our tiny room!

Monday 10th....to be continued!

Luv,

Andrea

My Amazing Race - Part 1

Hello everybody!

I'm back in Korea, after a whirlwind vacation! There's so much to tell, that I'm going to have to do this in instalments.

Oh! Before I forget...I am under quarantine for 7 days. Yay! So I only get to go back to work next Tuesday instead of tomorrow (Thursday)! Thanks to Korea's strict health regulations regarding Human Swine Flu, because I travelled to Thailand, where they have a high number of SI cases, I have to stay at home for 7 days (house arrest, yes) but at least I get to recover from my hectic travel schedule! Win-win situation! :)

Right! Here goes.....

I hit the air running.

I finished off my fifth English camp, which was a week-long, late-night camp...thoroughly exhausting, but what amazing kids! I couldn't believe it, but I actually cried when we bade our farewells. All the teachers stayed in a love motel! So cool..... for those of you who are not familiar with the love motel concept, allow me to explain briefly. In the East, i.e. Japan, Korea (I'm sure China must also have this), due to lack of space, and tight family units, where young people stay with their parents and grandparents, things can get a bit crowded. So when young couples, as well as married couples, need some special alone-time, they go to a love motel. The entrance is covered with fabric/tarp which hangs down 3/4 way to ensure privacy from curious eyes. Rest assured, of all the love motels I've stayed in here, none have been sleazy. They are tastefully decorated, bigger and cheaper than traditional hotels. Patterned wallpaper on the walls, (yes, sometimes, of nude ladies) but I've never stayed in one of those rooms. LOL! Sometimes rooms are decorated according to a particular theme, seasonal, colour, etc. Mood lighting, large screen tv's, sometimes internet in the room, minibar, toiletries, etc, etc. Apparently, love motels are the way to go, especially for single ladies travelling alone, as the rooms are well equipped, private, safe and of course, cheaper and bigger than hotel rooms.

Automated room selection

Anyway, on Friday, 7th, I just had time to get home, dump one suitcase, finish packing another, shower and change, and then Gyo Lim and her mom were waiting to collect me. Off to Gumi we went, to Gyo Lim's aunt's home. The family took us out for dinner, and then we went to bed for a few short hours. Again, these Korean people.... the mother gave up her bed for me to sleep on (the only raised bed in the house, as most Koreans sleep on the floor) and everyone else slept on the floor.

We caught an express bus to Incheon Airport (3-4 hours away) at 04:20. While we were standing in the queue, waiting to check-in, we were offered seats on an earlier flight (Cathay Pacific). But what they didn't tell us was how much we had to run to make that earlier flight that they decided to offer us! And hence, we hit the air running..... Our very own little Amazing Race! Cape Town INTERNATIONAL Airport really spoils one with it's small size!

Landing in Hong Kong was amazing. What a stunning landing view! The airstrip extends into the ocean. Everything is spotless and in place. One minute, you're flying over sea traffic, the next you are taxi-ing down a runway with ocean on either side. Beautiful!

Hong Kong airport

The drive from the airport to Kowloon Island, where we were to stay, was magnificent. Mountain and sea. Beautiful combination of old and new. The new parts are big money, glam buildings, while the old parts look like something out of an old Jackie Chan movie set in Chinatown. Quite similar to some areas on the Cape Flats, actually, people's laundry hanging outside their apartment windows, buildings that haven't seen a fresh coat of paint in maybe a decade or two.

Hong Kong just reminded me so much of Cape Town. After Korea's neon signs, and wonky road planning system, Hong Kong, Macau and Thailand were like visiting a bit of home. Small things, like driving on the left side of the road, road signs, traffic lights, building and town layout, products like KitKat, Cadbury's, Lindt, Cote d'or, Lay's, etc etc, (all the important things, you know!) things that are not easily found (if at all) in Korea. British colonialism has certainly left its mark here. The positive thing about it, though, is that it made me feel more at home in more familiar surroundings. And almost everyone I spoke to, could understand and speak English! Not like in Korea! Just goes to show, one up for the Brits instead of the Americans, whom Korea strives after.

But oh boy! Hong Kong is BOILING HOT! I developed a bad sun-heat rash on my arms in Hong Kong. Temperature is mid-30s at midnight! We stayed at a Korean guesthouse, which was ridiculously tiny. We stayed in a room with a double bunk, with only enough space for our suitcases on the floor. Mini-en-suite bathroom. I couldn't stop myself (you know, me and my blunt tongue!) but when I saw the size of the room, I immediately commented on how small it was. The manager said, "This is Hong Kong style." Well, okay, I suppose, since it is composed of a few islands with millions of people on it. Fortunately, we would hardly be spending any time in that tiny room! (By the way, "Hong Kong style" my proverbial ass! I saw nice big apartments in HK while sightseeing!)

Okay, I'll try to be brief now....

Saturday 8th: We went to a popular Chinese restaurant for lunch, where I tried dim sum for the first time. Had a delicious steamed cake. Then shopping and mall sightseeing... Lah di dah! All the big brand names and fashion houses with humungous stores! I bought facial products and perfume. We then made our way to the Avenue of the Stars which extends along one side of the Victoria Harbour (like in Hollywood, only here Chinese actors are being honoured, i.e. Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, etc). We watched the light show on Hong Kong Island from Kowloon. Every night on Hong Kong Island at 8pm, the buildings lining the harbour display a lighting and lazer show set to music. No wonder HK is so hot! The amount of heat and energy generated in that small space must have totally destroyed the ozone layer over HK by now. Stunning atmosphere, ships and boats constantly moving up and down the harbour. If I could describe HK in a nutshell.... Cape Town on a far grander scale. People from all around the world. Hong Kong people are so used to this international atmosphere, that they don't stop and stare at you like they do in Korea. They are friendly and just go about their business. Then dinner, and sightseeing, street market shopping, all while the sweat dripped away continuously. Finally back to aircon in our tiny room!

At the promenade on Kowloon Island, looking across to Hong Kong Island.

Statue of Bruce Lee

Sunday 9th: to be continued......

Ciao for now!

Andrea

Whirlwind Holiday

Hi everyone

This is just a quickie to say sorry for the quiet period. I have been on a whirlwind vacation, it's been crazy, sometimes I haven't even had time to eat, its been so hectic. After this holiday, i'll need another to recover!

Arrived in Hong Kong on Saturday, Macau on Sunday, back to Hong Kong on Sunday, Bangkok on Monday and leaving for Krabi today. Right now, I'm waiting for tour bus to pick us up at hotel for our final tour in Bangkok. And then we're off to airport again. Most of our holiday thus far has been spent in airports, and sea ports, especially customs lines, it seems! LOL! My passport looks as if I've seen the world already, with all the Immigration and Departure stamps I've managed to collect in just 48hrs!

Just wanted to let you guys know that all ok thus far. We have been safe, but there has been a typhoon/tsunami warning issued for the region we're headed for today. But this time, things should be different to the big tsunami last time, thanks to early warning systems and evacuation plans. I'm sure I'll have more time to stay in touch once we arrive in Krabi as that is meant to be R&R time!

Anyway, I should be back home in Korea next week. I'll send you details then...

Love,

Andrea