HSGworld

United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland

2009-11-27T16:34:00.019+09:00

How does one follow 6 months traveling around Asia? Spend some time in the lovely UK and ROI.

Here I am in the County Carlow countryside near to County Wexford.

Southeast Ireland is full of rolling hills and fantastic coastline.

This is Huntington Castle in Clonegal where I attended a Samhain festival.

The grounds and the gardens around the castle were gorgeous and still quite green even in November.

I stayed in the lovely towns of Enniscorthy and Wexford.

Check out the videos of the coastline and the gorgeous beach Curracloe near Wexford.

Back to London after my 8 day romp and have been visiting all my old haunts as well doing a bit of museum viewing. I also had the good fortune to spend a bit of time in the lovely English countryside in Sussex.

Walking in the South Downs and seeing loads of pheasant, some deer, and tons of mushrooms.

My next journey was to the highlands of Scotland on the sleeper train from London. 12 hours to Fort William from London Euston. This is some of the most gorgeous scenery in the world, in my opinion. So much water everywhere.

This is my view from my little townhouse cottage in Isleornsay on the Isle of Skye. After taking the overnight train to Fort William, I took the local train to Mallaig, the end of the line. This is the train route used in the Harry Potter movies. Then I took the ferry over to the Isle of Skye.

What a trip. I saw a huge heard of red deer, thought they were elk, and more waterfalls than you could ever count.

A couple more days left in London and I'm off to Baltimore. This stage of my big adventure is coming to a close.

"To awaken quite alone in a strange town is one of the pleasantest sensations in the world.” –Freya Stark

How to spend your last week in Asia...

2009-11-09T18:33:00.007+09:00

Pictures tell the story...

Live as you will have wished to have lived when you are dying.
- Charles F. Gellert

I saw a leopard in Yala!!!

2009-11-09T17:17:00.014+09:00

As I sit watching the sun rise over the Irish Sea in Wexford, it is hard to believe I was in Sri Lanka a month ago. My plans to go to India were thwarted by the fact that one cannot get an Indian Visa in Singapore unless you live and work (i.e., valid work permit) in Singapore or are Singaporean. Such is life and I figured it was just meant to be. Go with the flow and be pleasantly surprised.

Sri Lanka offers free Visa on arrival for 30 days for many nationalities so off I went.

I spent the first 9 days at the Barberyn Beach Ayurvedic Resort in Weligama. This is the real thing, no lavender in site, it is all stinky and I was rubbed with, washed, drank, and swallowed all kinds of things.

I had planned to do the pancha karma but on the third day developed a high fever which resulted in the lovely ayurvedic doctors changing my whole treatment plan as well as having many new things to drink and swallow. The importance of food is quite fascinating and I was carefully monitored while I had the fever. Oddly, to me at least, you are not allowed to have anything "cooling" while fighting a fever.

In the ayurvedic way, the fever and its associated illness are encouraged to work their way out. Easier said than done in some ways. I NEVER get fevers but am quite accustomed to my occasional bouts of boiling hot flushes. On the second day I felt as if I burning from the inside out and then was told to drink hot water and I couldn't have any fruit except bananas as my favourite tropical fruit, papaya, is too cooling. The daily massages and herbal baths were lovely and the setting of the resort is quite spectacular overlooking the Indian Ocean.

I left on the 9th day feeling clean inside and out. Needless to say, my fever and illness resolved.

We also had very nice daily yoga and meditation sessions.

The food was mostly vegetarian and was delicious. When I was encouraged not to have the spicy condiment as it adds to my dominant pitta dosha, I ignored it and ate it anyway. This was my typical breakfast:

Oat porridge, sauteed shallots (big red ones as are typical in Asia), lentils, and Sri Lankan chili paste...YUM!!!

The Sri Lankans are quite adept at making vegetarian food delicious although fish figures heavily in most areas.

Like India, cows are sacred in Sri Lanka and wander all over at will. Some sources quote Sri Lanka as the original seat of Buddhism.

I never ceased to be amazed at the different types of Buddhism all over Asia. The heavy influence of Hindu gods and practises is evident in Sri Lanka. I even had the luck to see animist ritual which wandered down the street at 4 a.m. one night. See the video.

The most important event for me while in Sri Lanka is reflected in the title of this post and here he is:

What an experience. I made the right decision to go to the park VERY early and was the first gov't jeep entering that day. Seeing the leopard was the highlight even if he was just acting like a cat...lying around sleeping. At first I couldn't see him as the spots are such good camouflage. The sun shines through the trees and creates spots on the ground and this guy just looked to be part of it until I saw him flapping his tail and occasionally shaking his head.

Yala National Park is a huge park on the SE of the island of which 2/3 are pure reserve and not open to the public. I was quite lucky to see the leopard. It has always been a goal of mine to see a big cat in the wild and now I've seen one of the most elusive. The landscape is desert savanna and so different from the lush tropical south coastal areas.

Many tourists and locals died in Yala during the 2004 tsunami (Sri Lanka lost 40K+ people in all) but none of the big animals are known to have been lost. Apparently, the animals felt the vibration well before the first and more damaging second wave and had made their way to higher ground.

Going to the park early allowed me to see many other animals as well:

Sri Lanka grey langurs

Asian elephant, in this case a young female on her own

estuary crocodile

small spotted deer

rarely seen jackals

We also saw tons of birds, including some eagles, and a full family of wild boar with 11 piglets.

Sri Lanka is exceptional in its variety of fruit and spices. If it is a fruit or spice, it probably grows in Sri Lanka. The wood apples were in season and very interesting. Seeing sandalwood, cinnamon, and licorice trees was a special treat.

Most of the rest of my time was spent close to the sea in various guesthouses along the SE coast. Next time I will do a bit more exploring as this island is so diverse that I imagine it would take many visits to take in all it has to offer.

China AUG-SEP09

2009-09-21T10:26:00.025+09:00

Where to begin and where to end for this one? A tough question indeed. China is a country that both elates and saddens, stimulates and frustrates, and surges emotion of many kinds. In 23 days, I saw so much and yet so little. You cannot help but feel the palpable energy of change throughout the country and many places seem to be in a state of continuous round the clock construction.

Some of the videos are really fun so do check them out on http://www.youtube.com/user/HSGWorld. They are not edited as much as I would have liked but you'll get the idea of the places. There is a playlist for all the China videos.

The Giant Buddha of Leshan was one of my favourite sights and I walked down the super steep steps to his feet and back up the other side. He is in a beautiful park on the confluence of three rivers not far from the lovely mountain town of Emei.

Back to the beginning for a moment. Started out in Beijing where I celebrated my birthday by joining up with my tour group and going out for dinner where I was treated with an adorable birthday cake with a rat on it. I am a rat in Chinese zodiac.

I found Beijing very interesting but lacking in soul. The Forbidden City, the Temple of Heaven, and the Summer Palace were all impressive sights and yet diminished somehow by the immense crowds and constant din of talking...and amplified tour guides. The Peking Opera was a special treat and I was fortunate enough to catch it on a night when they were doing the "Monkey King", one of the more famous Peking Operas. The Simatai section of the Great Wall was perfect as it is a seldom visited part of the wall. It was very foggy day when we went which added to the mystique of the whole experience.

3 overnight trains and 3 nights on the Yangtze River were part of our group's travel modes during the trip. The first overnight train took us to Xi'an where we saw the Terracotta Warriors.

The 1st class trains are quite nice with 4 of us sharing a berth with bunk style beds, air con, and a nice window to watch the countryside.

Xi'an is a big college town as well as a big town in general. In fact, it never occurred to me but a town in China is frequently up to 3 million. The word city tends to be reserved for 3 million plus people. The town itself is quite attractive and the Grand Mosque is particularly lovely. This was one of the few religious sites we visited that was quiet. There were also lots of cats wandering around who seemed to enjoy the space as much as I did.

The Warriors are quite impressive and it is fascinating to see how these huge buildings have been built up around them to protect the sites. Lots of excavation is still going and, of course, they have never found the burial site of the First Emperor. All very interesting stuff.

Mt Emei and the Giant Buddha of Leshan were some of my favourite parts of the trip. We were able to see the top Mt Emei on a clear day which our tour guide said he had never seen even thought he had climbed Mt Emei many times. The spectacular blue skies were certainly a welcome sight. The altitude (3000m +) was quite noticeable while hiking.

This multi faced bodhisattva is a more recent addition to some of the very old temples and statues. I just loved the bright blue sky and all of the different roof angles.

The picture on the right is the original pagoda built by the monks in the 1st century. To be able to see it peaking in and out of the clouds was really gorgeous.

While walking back down we were treated to a sighting of the wooly monkeys, also known as Tibetan macaques.

Of course no trip to China would be complete without seeing the pandas, and see them we did at the Chengdu Research Centre where we saw 6 week old twin pandas, a four day old panda, and lots of playful adolescents. They are some of the most surreal animals I have ever seen, especially when they are just frolicking and playing. I had the pure luck to see the red pandas and their keeper right at feeding time when almost no one else was around. The baby pandas were the cutest baby animals I've ever seen. No pictures of any kind allowed but we were able to watch them playing with each other in their playpen. According to the centre, in the wild, there would never be twins as the mother would consume the weaker twin. I suppose that is one of the benefits of the captive breeding.

Chendu is also the captial of Sichuan province. I had the most delicious street food there including fantastic dumplings and spicy chicken and pork BBQd and served on a stick. YUM!!!

After Chengdu, it was off to Chongqing to board our Yangtze River cruise boat, the Victoria Queen.

Here she is at one of our stopping spots along the river.

I ended up catching a bug while on the Yangtze and was lucky we were on the boat as I was able to spend one whole day in bed which is always the most helpful thing to do for me. I coughed and sneezed for the most of the rest of the trip but getting that nice day of rest of really helped.

The dam...that goddamn dam....well ok, from an engineering standpoint it is unbelievable but the environmental impact has only begun and it not good. There are 3 or 4 locks to pass depending on where your ship is positioned and it takes 4-5 hours to make it all the way through.

Approaching the dam on a boat is quite a site and pictures certainly do little to display the gigantic size of it. There are currently 4 slips for ships to enter the locks and they are building one more for smaller boats which will be moved with something like an elevator.

The views along the way were very mountainous with the three gorges being the last bit before the dam. The Yangtze is very dirty and I am still struck by the comment of one of our UK guys in the group..."there are no birds and very little life that isn't human." Unfortunately, he was absolutely accurate and it does make one ponder the progression of such a state. After all, dinosaurs were of the bird family. Nuff said.

Our ship was lovely and comfortable with all rooms having a private balcony. I had a lovely massage, practised tai chi, and got LOTS of sleep.

Everyone who cruises the Yangtze must take the dam tour at the end so you hear all about how "wonderful" the dam is and how it will help people have electricity for many years to come. There is a scary array of high power wires coming out of the back of the dam...a bizarre site for sure.

Yangshuo and the Li River. We took a lovely bamboo raft up the river here and the following day took a long bike ride through loads of farms and villagers finally ending up in a cave and taking a mud bath. This was another highlight of the trip for me.

Check out the water buffalo swimming with her baby.

Along the Li River.

We spent three days in Yangshuo and it was lovely.

The lovely little canal town of Tongli about 2 hours from Shanghai was our last excursion before the group went on their separate ways.

I loved this town!

This sleepy little village doesn't make a peep after about 9 p.m. and lots of people are up and around at 5 a.m. My kind of place for sure.

Some of the canals were built 1000 years ago.

The market was quite a site with loads of gorgeous food on offer.

I spent the last three days in Shanghai on my own and had a

great time at the Shanghai Museum, Art Museum, Xuhui, and Xintiandi. I spent my last evening in Shanghai at the New Heights restaurant looking at the lovely skyline of Shanghai.

Pearl Tower in Shanghai and lovely lotus flower in a garden in Xi'an. The old and the new blending together...a bit like most of what I saw. It was an incredibly memorable trip.

I'm now in Singapore with my darling friends Carolyn and Cher Wee. I must say it was nice to arrive in Singapore and know my way around, feel really cool air con, and hear lots of English...even if it is Singlish.

"A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step." ___Lao Tzu

Kyushu

2009-08-21T09:54:00.008+09:00

I flew from Tokyo to Miyazaki in Kyushu prefecture which was an experience itself. The Haneda airport in Tokyo is the domestic airport and is packed with people. I think part of it was because a big holiday week was just ending and people were headed off to other parts of the country. I flew to Miyazaki and rented a car. It was a bit of whirlwind as I didn't reserve a car in advance and so had a difficult time, not to mention, out of Tokyo, hardly anything in English. It was still fun and I drove all over the eastern coastline.

There are miles and miles of protected beaches here where there is really no development at all. Little villages are inland from the beach and there are big forest preserves, like the one at left, in between the village and the beach. No doubt this comes in handy during a big storm or tsunami as well.

Check out the videos of Takanabe beach and fireflies. I now understand why so many Japanese paintings have fireflies in them. There are millions of them everywhere. They fly in huge groups like birds. I'm not sure you can really see it that well on the video but they are thick.

Takanabe beach and Dragonflies:

http://www.youtube.com/user/HSGWorld

Pretty sure this sign is warning you about the storms.

I just love the way the little house protected by the trees is smiling.

I really didn't plan too well for this part of the trip (this was before Yufuin) but enjoyed it just the same. The day I had the car turned out to be quite overcast and rainy so I found a bit of retail therapy in Miyazaki. My first UniGlo in Japan and they were having a big sale. I also stumbled upon a discount store with TONS of fun stuff to look at. I was completely absorbed with the "lost in translation" tshirts.

The whole t-shirt thing is pretty fascinating in Japan. Everyone wearing shirts that say things in English. Frequently they say things that make little or no sense.

Yesterday in Tokyo, in the Shibuya district, I saw the fancy fashionable t-shirt stores where the designs make more sense but they are not nearly as fun as the others.

I imagine I will see tons of this in China as well.

After all of my searching, here is the shirt I ended up with from the store in Miyazaki. Joann, as a native Missourian, can you explain this?: LOL!!!

Life is good...pass it on! And when you figure out where that store is that has the delicious shells and fish of the fresh sea from Missouri is, please let me know.

Numata and gorgeous Japanese countryside

2009-08-21T04:02:00.007+09:00

The view from the lovely home of Yoko's parents in Numata, Gunma prefecture, less than two hours from Tokyo by bullet train.

So all these years, I never "got" why of all the adorable Sanrio characters (Hello Kitty), they had a train. I've never liked that character...thinking that's not so cute. But now, in Japan, I get it. It's for the Shinkansen, the bullet trains which whisk travelers all over Japan. The Shinkansen is about as sexy (still not cute) as a train can get so probably well deserving of a Sanrio character. My first experience was to be whisked out of Tokyo to the gorgeous countryside north of the city. Tokyo station is a huge pulsing intersection of multiple subway lines, train lines, and the bullet trains. Somehow the more of these huge stations like this I see in the world, the easier they get to navigate. Rule no. 1, don't freak out and do your best to find your own way. These huge stations can be overwhelming but usually have good signage and at least some in English. English language info is relatively available in Tokyo but not once you are outside of the city.

The Shinkansen trains are fast, on time, and expensive. In fact, everything in Japan is expensive. Do check out the movie of the house. It was great staying in a real Japanese home with such lovely hosts. The food was amazing and I've eaten lots of different types of fish and tofu and bitter gourd prepared in many different ways. They have a huge garden and big bitter gourd vine right outside the dining area.

Here's Yoko walking back into the house after taking me on a tour of the area with Genko, her nephew. Yoko's father is an architect and the house is built on the property of what was once a silk farm and the residence of her grandparents.

That's Yoko laying out some of the dishes for my last delicious meal at the house. The seating area has a well for your legs so you are sitting on the floor but your legs are going down into the floor. It is a comfortable and natural way to sit.

The bounty of the garden which we enjoyed for lunch. Those baby tomatoes are some of the best I've ever eaten.

One of the best parts of our morning walk was seeing the real Hello Kitty. Not sure if you can tell from this photo but this cat is HUGE. I saw her resting under a car and thought it was a dog. I don't think she appreciated being woken up from her nap.

Other pics are posted here http://picasaweb.google.com/hellokittyinlondon/NumataAndYokoSHome02#

Video of the house...and the toilet: http://www.youtube.com/user/HSGWorld

I think you could do a whole blog just on the toilets of Japan. I have never seen such interesting variety and so many electronic controls that do all kinds of things. Suffice to say that the Japanese must have the cleanest bottoms in the world. I particularly enjoy the toilets where the lid pops up when you walk in the room. Now how does it know whether to raise the seat of not...mmmm...no doubt there is a toilet that does that as well here.

I was sad to leave Numata as I had a wonderful and peaceful time at this lovely home. I would spend the next 6 days traveling around the south island of Kyushu and a brief stop in Kyoto before returning to Tokyo where I am now back in the Shiodome getting caught up on my blog while looking out at the Tokyo skyline.

Oze National Park

2009-08-20T17:39:00.001+09:00

This is Genko and me hanging out in the Oze National Park in Gunma prefecture where I had the unique and fantastic opportunity to stay in a traditional Japanese home with my YTT friend Yoko. This is her darling nephew who happened to be staying with his grandparents while I was there.

To say this park is gorgeous would really be a gross understatement. OK, after a typhoon in Taiwan and an earthquake my first night in Japan, I was ready for something serene and beautiful. I was lucky enough to go with Yoko and her family on their planned hike which was a 16 km loop through Oze National Park. What a day it was without a cloud in the sky and absolutely gorgeous scenery throughout.

The part of the park we hiked is a huge wetland area with km after km of raised wooden walking paths as you can see below where Yoko is headed off the distance. There were tons of wildflowers in bloom and yet it was not the peak wildflower time. The rest stations throughout the park were huge houses with the opportunity to rent a space to roll out a futon and sleep for a night or longer. I was quite fascinated with the enormous range of hikers out on this day including very small children and many mature adults, some that were easily in their seventies.

Our hike was supplemented by delicious homemade rice balls thoughtfully prepared by Yoko's Mom. These wonderful rolls were stuffed with tuna, Japanese pickles, black sesame, and other interesting vegetables. Delicious.

This was view while walking through the wetlands. They are lotus ponds throughout the wetlands and the lotus flowers opened up in the afternoon. It was very special indeed.

This is one of the informative signs at one of the rest areaS. Apparently bears poop on toilets and this is good for the environment. LOL!!! The Japanese toilets are pretty special...I'd want to use them even if I was a bear.

A little more Taiwan

2009-08-20T17:07:00.000+09:00

Now that the shock and horror of the Morakot aftermath have started to die down a bit, I've had a bit more time to reflect on what a wonderful place Taiwan is and how much I enjoyed my time there.

It's amazing to me that I was in Kaoshiung county during the typhoon and that is where all the worst damage happened. I read in the paper today that two high level government ministers will likely resign over the slow response to the mudslide and something about a refusal to accept help from mainland China. UGH!

I realized what a lovely place I was in and how well the staff of the resort I was staying in did to keep things under control throughout the storm. We still had piles of fantastic food, were only without electricity and water for a couple hours and most amazing of all, the internet was only down for about 4 hours throughout. That was actually my saving grace as I would have gone a bit nuts without being online as you could see from the video, going outside at all was a bit of challenge.

The wonderful staff at the resort remained cheerful and helpful throughout. In fact, it seemed the people at the resort were pretty unscathed as well. Everyone seemed to be finding things to do (the game room was packed)

and no one was complaining. The sand bags were piled everywhere and many of the entrances and exits were blocked to the tremendous wind.

Oh yeah, the food...the breakfast....here ya go....

How about some nice kidneys for breakfast? Just where do you suppose these kidneys came from anyway? I am going to guess from a pig.

My favourite part of breakfast...the pau and dim sum...YUM!!! Some of the best I've ever had.

This was my favourite breakfast...some delicious watermelon, nice strong coffee, and three kinds of pau (or pow or boa or lots of other interpretations). The purple one (coloured by taro?) is filled with red bean paste, the white with BBQ'd pork, and the yellow one was plain. All delicious and fresh and steaming hot from the bamboo steamers.

Cheers to Taiwan and all the lovely people and food there.

“There's no disaster that can't become a blessing, and no blessing that can't become a disaster”___Richard Bach

I felt my first earthquake!!!

2009-08-11T11:33:00.000+09:00

Taiwan took quite a beating from Morakot. I'm sure the stories will keep coming for days to come. They are just finding out about a lot of people missing in huge mudslide in the mountains. I wish the best for all the good people of Taiwan. My personal adventure involved waiting it out until Sunday a.m. when I was checking out of the hotel in Kenting anyway. I could tell that the storm had abated a bit but was certainly not gone and the ocean was still rockin' and rollin'.

After checking in several times, I finally heard the 11 a.m. shuttle would leave for Kaoshiung on time. It would take an hour or more longer than usual due to the road conditions. So off I went for a bird's eye view of the destruction. Downed trees and whole fields of crops destroyed. I understand the bananas took it the hardest. Our journey was full of twists and turns and at times on dirt roads or were they roads washed out from the storms....not sure. We had to take a more inland route and at times the road was nearly impassable. I got to play nurse to a poor young girl barfing her guts out through a good part of the journey. I think she was very grateful for my wet wipes, tissues, and essential oil spray. She knew the English workds "thank you" but that was about it. As it turns out, the south of the island took it much harder than the north even though the center of the storm was in the north. The river about 2 hours into the journey was the most surreal. You can't really see the full effect in my video but it was like boiling oil. The river was black and raging and GIGANTIC. This same river a couple days earlier looked mostly like a big beach with huge dry areas everywhere. This is the same river where the hotel fell into the river which has been all over the BBC and CNN. I am not sure of the name of the river but I am sure I will never forget that sight of seeing it after Morakot. So maybe there is a blessing in the storm:

Check out the video...http://www.youtube.com/user/HSGWorld or it should be displaying on the right side of the blog.

So we made it to Kaoshiung and HSR station. I was very lucky in that the station was pretty calm, I had no idea no lucky but would find out the next day. Anyway, there were no trains running at all which made me quite glad that I didn't buy a ticket in advance. I did have the good sense to buy a ticket then even though there was no guarantee of the trains running in the morning. I had to be in Taipei to catch my flight to Toyko at 1450 on Monday. I bought my ticket for the 7:06 train and headed out to the taxi stand. I ended up, with lots of hand signals to help, at a very interesting little motel in town close to the station. I had my own garage and stairwell. Kind of a drive through motel of sorts. Exhausted from the rest of the day, I just crashed into the rock hard bed (typical in many Chinese hotels but surprisingly comfortable) and flipped on the TV. Goodness TV is so boring, how does anyone watch it regularly? Of course, then there are surprises everywhere in life like when channel surfing you come across porn movies. What? Plenty of free porn to go with your Love Cats lubricant and condom (only 1) provided in the room. There was even a choice of porn, very American low budget style and Chinese style where you never see the man's face. How about that? Finally, my favourite part of the room:

VeryNineJoy Cream...see the video on http://www.youtube.com/user/HSGWorld or it should be displaying on the right side of the blog.

6:3o a.m. Monday at the HSR station. I was too lazy to get my camera out but really should have, there must have been 3-4 thousand people trying to get moving. Once again, things were on my side as the one train that was going to run was the one I had bought a ticket for the night before. YIPPEE!!! 2 hours later I was in Taipei and headed to the airport to catch my flight to Tokyo.

Finally, the title of this post must be explained of course. Early this morning (Tuesday 11AUG) in Tokyo there was an earthquake. I am on the 33rd floor of the Shiodome media building and I felt it BIG time. It was bizarre. I thought I was dreaming but then again, I never dream about earthquakes because I have no idea what they feel like. I had been awake at 5:30 and decided to do a little waking sleep meditation practice which frequently means I sleep for another 30 minutes or so. The whole building was swaying and felt like it was moving in a circular way. I didn't hear any noise. I understand there is now a tsunami warning as well. Who knows what tomorrow will bring.

Opinion has caused more trouble on this little earth than plagues or earthquakes. ___Voltaire

Morakot is abating

2009-08-08T22:10:00.000+09:00

Looks like Morakot will be settling down by tomorrow morning (Sunday a.m.) This is how it looked at 5p.m. Sat 8AUG09. Not sure if you can tell but this is the infinity pool and the sun loungers around it. Looking a bit rough from the beating it's been taking for the last 2+ days.

I finally found a good spot to view detailed weather and radar stuff. This is a great site if you are into that kind of stuff. There are plenty of great sites for US weather but not much for Asia. This one is very good: Weather Underground http://www.wunderground.com/

Here are the specifics about Morakot:

http://www.wunderground.com/wundermap/?lat=24.8&lon=120.7&zoom=6&type=hyb&rad=0&wxsn=0&svr=0&cams=0&sat=0&riv=0&mm=0&hur=1&hur.wr=0&hur.cod=1&hur.fx=1&hur.obs=1&fire=0&ft=0&sl=0

My other pics from the US Navy site did not display on the blog so had to pull them off. Darn Navy boys...

Should be an interesting day tomorrow.

Morakot...or more wind and rain might be a better title

2009-08-08T16:46:00.000+09:00

So I am now coming up on the second full day of hanging out with the typhoon. I do feel quite lucky to be safe and to have such great accessibility. The internet was down for several hours this morning but zipping right along again now. I tried to get out to the beach (video to be posted soon) and I really couldn't do it. The wind is still so strong and rain is so hard that I barely made it to the edge of the railing. The Flip was getting wet so I didn't want to ruin it for a foggy video you can barely see anyway. I saw online that the center of the storm has passed Taipei and should be weakening. The way the wind sounds here, you would never know it.

I had hoped to be able to go into the village (Kenting) which is just about 0.5 km from here but I don't see how unless this rain lets up. As it is I am very fortunate as many of the hotel rooms are flooding or all wet and stinky. My room is on the second floor and in a rather protected area so it is fine. I do hope I can get out of here tomorrow. I have to go to Tokyo on Monday. Dang, wouldn't want the weather to interrupt my travel adventure.

It does seem a bit brighter today but the wind and rain are just unbelievable. It is about 38 hours now that this island has been getting relentlessly pounded.

I think Taiwan has been pretty lucky. I'm not sure the same will be true when this storm hits mainland China. I hope it weakens a lot after passing over Taiwan.

OK, this movie (if you care to call it such) is very choppy and will likely make you horribly nauseated. I was trying really hard to keep the flip from getting too wet or foggy. It wasn't easy since I could barely walk against the pounding rain and wind. I might try again with my little waterproof Olympus camera which has a short video ability. Stay tuned.

For the man sound in body and serene of mind there is no such thing as bad weather; every day has its beauty, and storms which whip the blood do but make it pulse more vigorously. ~George Gissing, "Winter," The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft, 1903

the latest on Morakot

2009-08-08T16:39:00.000+09:00

Here's another pic of the storm, you can see how it is starting to break up now that it has hit land...smacked dead center into the island of Taiwan.

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=39720&src=eorss-iotd

This one made picture of the week.

Typhoon Morakot in Taiwan

2009-08-07T13:02:00.000+09:00

Travel is the ultimate teacher...no doubt. I am currently sitting in my room on the coast in Kenting, Taiwan (on the southern most tip of the island of Taiwan) watching typhoon Morakot pound the island. Hopefully you can see the satellite image from the previous post. It came out a bit chopped up but if you click the picture you should see the whole image. Pretty amazing stuff. That monsoon storm on Phuket was NOTHING compared to this storm. This storm has been howling for almost 12 hours now. The sea is unbelievably rough. Check out my video on the usual spot.

Anyway, this is actually great to be on Taiwan during this storm as the internet is still working perfectly even out here on the tip of the island. How I do love things that work. Now if I just spoke some Mandarin.

Check out the other videos of Taipei too. I am really enjoying Taiwan. I took the bullet train from Taipei to ZongCheng which is near Kaohsiung (pictured at left), the largest city on the south end of Taiwan. I jumped on a bus from there and was in Kenting 2.5 hours later. There is a large national park covering most of the southwest coastline which is really gorgeous. Big mountains right down to the edge of the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait. At the moment, I am quite glad to be on this end of the island as it sounds as if the typhoon will hit the north and northeast parts of the island the hardest.

Have to add a bit about food in Taipei and here in Kenting. I had the distinct pleasure of having Taiwanese hot pot in Taipei (the Taiwanese version of Shabu-Shabu - famous Japanese dish) and it was quite an experience. There is a whole street of hot pot restaurants on one street and I picked my choice based on the fact that it had a cute sign with a mushroom on it. Mushroom sashami anyone? No one in the restaurant spoke English and the menu was all in Mandarin, so I just winged it and it worked. The mushroom sashimi was fab, slices of a porcini type of meaty mushroom and served with shredded cabbage, wasabi, and soy sauce...YUM!!! The dried mushrooms were a bit more confounding. I was also served some tea where nearly half the mug was flowers and other things. Back to the dried mushrooms....mmmmm....the lady in charge came over and saw me staring oddly at the dried mushrooms and pointed to her mouth which I assumed to mean they were to be eaten dried. She smiled when I picked up the first couple and popped them into my mouth. The first couple I tried were very nice with a hint of toasted garlic flavour and very crunchy. The other ones looked like fur and I had been curious about them as you see them in many of the bakeries wrapped about buns and bread. I cautiously picked up a small amount and put them in my mouth. Gag reflex...I swear they tasted like those "funny" mushrooms that I've heard (wink...wink) taste like cow poo. I didn't have my camera with me that evening which is really too bad as I have NEVER seen so many different types of mushrooms. The basic hot pot is a boiling vat of broth with easily 10 kinds of mushrooms and some pork balls in it. After a few minutes of boiling you get to add even more mushrooms and cabbage. The final stage is to dip some super thin beef in it for a few seconds until it is barely cooked. Then you make a party in your mouth with a bit of mushroom, cabbage, beef and broth in a bite. You also drink the broth on the side throughout the meal. It's delicious and very healthy.

Awesome cookies from a Taipei bakery which I bought because they were so cute but they were also delicious with a soft buttery sugar cookie base and buttercream frosting.

The buffet spread here at La Chateau in Kenting really needs pictures to go with it so I will get some pics in the a.m. and you will see what a Taiwanese breakfast looks like.

The storm is pounding harder and harder here so send some positive thoughts to all of the people who may be adversely affected by this storm. I understand it is expected to hit the coast of mainland China quite hard. The wind gusts are now up to 130 km/hour by some reports.

Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass, it's about learning to dance in the rain. ___Anonymous

Videos and pics

2009-08-03T10:30:00.000+09:00

This is really odd with those stupid golf videos of some dude linked to my blog. UGH!!! Anyway, if you go straight to you tube, you can see my channel with all the videos listed down the left side. I'm not too sure about the playlist thing, seems like another way to spend more time on the laptop and less getting out and about. Not even sure how I did that one for Malaysia.

Pics and videos here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/hellokittyinlondon/PhuketJuly2009#

youtube/hsgworld

Having an internet connection that works is FAB!!!!

Rewind, unwind, and move forward

2009-08-03T06:13:00.000+09:00

This was my room at the fab Indigo Pearl in Nai Yang, Phuket, Thailand. Yes, I had my own salt water dipping pool and a huge private patio. I spent 3 days here before joining up with my CELTA course at the British International School. This hotel is on the northern tip of Phuket which is two big national parks and a huge expanse of beach that goes for miles and miles. It is really lovely part of the island. I didn't expect to find anything so natural on Phuket.

Do check out the new videos posted to the right. That storm in Nai Harn on the southern tip of Phuket was really amazing. I listened to those videos again myself and decided I sound a bit...well...out of it or something. Anyway, it was 7 a.m. and I had just gotten up. I woke must faster than usual when I turned over only to see a gigantic spider in my bed. Thankfully, it was dead but who knows how that happened. Nevermind, I don't want to know. That was the weekend of July 12th and the storm lasted the whole weekend. The next two weekends were fabulous and I took full advantage by driving back to the southern tip of the island and the lovely Nai Harn beach.

A bit more about the CELTA course. We had 24 teacher trainees divided into two groups. It was actually two separate courses so we didn't get to know the other group nearly as well. At our award ceremony on the last

day, I found out that we had 3 PhDs among us, one of whom I had become quite close to, the lovely Mary Carey, a doctor of Eng Lit. Check out her blog at aboutamherst.blogspot.com. She is a journalist and teaches at U.Mass - Amherst. Here she is enjoying the lovely Nai Harn beach without the monsoon storm.

Mary and I became quite attached to this beach community on the southern tip of Phuket. It was just fab. Plenty of restaurants, shops, pharmacies (I am still endlessly fascinated with them), massage, and a wide range of hotels. We stayed in options from $12 to $100 and there are many more. I had the best massage of my life there for $15 for 2 hours and supplemented by a wonderful herbal steam bath which is traditional in Thailand. Our last weekend we had a 3 bedroom house in a lovely lush garden about 1 km from the beach.

Here is a view of Nai Harn from the viewing point above. It is such a nice little hideaway. I've realized there are some excellent benefits to excess tourism in certain places. Most of all I found I didn't have to see Patong at all and I didn't miss a thing. At the same time the island is full of diversity and is quite mature in what is available. I was able to rent a car (right hand drive, manual transmission) for a month without a hitch and return it to the airport on my way out. The Tesco, about 10 minutes drive from the school, was a huge asset for everything from club soda to magic markers to document covers. There is a huge variety of food including many great ethnic restaurants in every price range. We had an exceptional meal at Da Vinci, a lovely Italian eatery owned by a Brit who hasn't lived in the UK in 25 years. I actually lost track of all the places he lived but remember that he went to cooking school in France. The food was delicious!

The best thing about the school was a tie between the 50 meter pool and campus cats. Both FANTASTIC!!!

We had one kitty who became a bit of a permanent resident in Karon House, our dorm for the duration of the course. The room was adequate and I was thrilled to have my own bathroom. The freezing cold air conditioning blowing on my head every night was not as pleasant. I tried going without the air cond and that wouldn't work either. I think that is part of the deal at these intensive courses, it is a bit of everything thrown together. Could you make it through living with 24 strangers for a month in a boarding school style? Getting away on the weekends made it all worthwhile for me and I cannot understand how some of the folks did the course without ever leaving the school.

I had another wonderful night of sleep in my huge bed in Taipei and am starting to realize I'm done with the intense training stuff and now it is travel, travel, travel. Today I am going in search of a lovely yoga teacher I met in Kuala Lumpur who lives in Taipei. Turns out she teaches at a studio not too far from where I am staying. I'm anxious for her to give me some tips on what to do in Taiwan. Did you know there are big mountains on the island and it has the most natural hot springs in the world after Japan? Some people say it is the most underrated Asia destination. Finally, the internet speed is FANTASTIC and I can upload my pics and videos to keep in touch and keep my own record of my big adventure!

Happy Monday!!!

I survived!!!

2009-08-02T14:46:00.000+09:00

My oh my...I completed the CELTA course.... I really didn't know if I was going to make it. At the beginning of the third week, I really hit the wall. Anyway, it's all good. Here I am on the last morning of the course. I still had one

(full hour) teaching practice to go. As you can see by the look on my face, it didn't matter. I was SOOOOO ready to be done. I may have overdone it a bit by doing the intensive YTT for a month followed by CELTA for month.

BTW, I am enjoying some delicious chicken congee for breakfast here.

It was a very intense and challenging month. I don't think I have been that challenged on so many different levels in many, many years. It was exhausting. Last night as I lay in my huge king size bed with crisp white cotton sheets watching Sex in the City reruns and sipping a Taiwanese beer, I knew it all worth it and I am thrilled to have completed it. Towards the end of the course I realized I needed a break from the third world so jumped on a plane to Taipei, Taiwan where I am currently staying in a lovely boutique hotel in the heart of the fashionable Da An area of the city.

I have lots more to say about the last month but will save it for later.

These pictures pretty much say it all about Taipei so far:

Yes it is a Hello Kitty bakery and it is right down street from my hotel.

Cheers!

YTT and beyond

2009-07-01T11:09:00.000+09:00

Well, I've done it! Completed my 200 hour Yoga Teacher Training and can now apply for my RYT 200 certification. It was a great experience albeit a bit controlling at times. I learned a tremendous amount and do feel ready to teach yoga although it is good to know that it involves a lot to be a good yoga teacher.

Another post without pics as the wireless connection here in Siem Reap doesn't seem able to handle the bandwidth.

http://picasaweb.google.com/hellokittyinlondon/Angkor#

The location of our training was a huge complex (Tao Garden) and rather remote. My room was completely austere and plain though functional. Bare white walls, a wardrobe, a bed, and a desk. The gardens and grounds were exceptional and the daily birgsong and gecko chirping was pretty amazing. The personal space was not luxurious but the complex was quite nice. The room was, at first, quite a shock from the lovely Dreamcatchers B&B with the personal items and antiques all over the house. In the end, the simple room at TG worked fine for the purposes of my stay which clearly was not for luxury.

My hatha yoga poses are very strong and I've learned many new tips that I use in my personal practice and will use in teaching some day. The sections of the course on yoga philosophy and history, taught by a UC Berkley professor, were particularly engaging. Somehow through all these years of yoga, I had not learned much on the history of yoga as a life practice, not just hatha yoga or asanas.

We also had a guest teacher for anatomy. A craniosacral therapist from LA with a sideline in sexology. Only from LA...right? She was incredibly knowledgeable with quite a unique angle on the links of the esoteric and physical aspects of deep yoga practice.

Our main teachers were very knowledgeable and led great classes every day. We were assisted with work in asanas (poses), pranayama (breathing), meditation, and self practice. I am quite fortunate that I have had a very strong self practice for awhile now but the help I received in that area was quite valuable.

Being marooned at a remote setting, seeing the same people day after day for a month, and eating the same food is a unique part the setup that I found quite restrictive towards the end. Thank goodness I had the sense to get a private room. I honestly don't think I could have survived the entire month otherwise. The people were great, mind you, but I have been living alone for a long time now and I have no desire to share a small room with someone I have never met...for a month. I loved having my own room especially for the silence requirement from 10 p.m. to 10 a.m. which meant completing the morning practice and breakfast in silence.

The last day felt like a whole new kind of freedom. I decided to leave Chiang Mai and head to Siem Reap (Cambodia) where I am spending my last day today. I actually needed about 3 days of decompression from the YTT experience and Siem Reap and Angkor have been the perfect place for that.

Fast forward to the fab Viroth's Hotel in Siem Reap. Siem Reap has clearly been living the tourist mania for years now and it shows. Walking down the street yields constant calls of "tuk tuk madam?" and many other attempts to get you to buy something. Thankfully, the amazing sites of Angkor make it all worth while. I spent the entire day seeing the ruins on Monday and it is spectacular. Known as the largest religious ruins in the world and the only ones visible from space, the complex goes on and on. I had a tuk tuk driver to take me around and arrived at Angkor Wat (the main temple) just before sunrise. The clouds at the horizon obscured a spectacular sunrise show but the temples did not disappoint. Much of Angkor has not been excavated and/or preserved and much of that work is going on now. I found myself particularly fascinated with the relief stone carvings which represent many Hindu gods. The additions of the Buddha images came later as the temples were originally dedicated to Hindu gods (11th century), then Vishnu, and finally Buddha (13th century) which required the conversion of many Cambodians to Theravada Buddhism.

Yesterday I had an amazing 3 hour treatment with scrub, wrap, and massage to ease my aching legs from hours of temple hiking. The coffee and cocoa scrub was particularly good and my skin is soft and smooth. I think perhaps a job as a spa reviewer would be good. I've become quite a massage connoisseur over the past couple years. From overpriced London massages in lovely settings by eastern European child like women with no hand strength to unusually large Thai women in Malaysia hell bent on showing you how they can cause severe pain in a single move of their elbow and EVERYTHING in between. In my opinion, the best massages and treatments are those where the therapist is skilled at sensing and treating those areas of your body that need it. I could go on and on but will leave it at the Frangipani spa in Siem Reap is lovely and is right up there with some of my favourites.

I am going to try to see one more part of the Angkor temples today, a remote area known for its pink stone bas reliefs. I am back to Thailand tomorrow where I will have a couple days on the beach before I join up with my CELTA training on Sunday afternoon. I do expect this next month of in depth English language teacher training to be quite intense but fun and exciting as well.

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.__Mark Twain

Pics and Videos

2009-06-06T20:55:00.000+09:00

http://picasaweb.google.com/hellokittyinlondon

New folder with pics of Laos and do check out the videos now linked at the bottom of the blog dashboard.

Hope your Saturday ROCKS!!!

Love, El

Lost in Laos

2009-06-06T20:16:00.000+09:00

Another thing that I need to "let go" of is my typos or, god forbid, my grammatical mistakes in these posts. For some reason proofing my own stuff is quite hard and even harder on the computer. I used to print them out and for some reason that helped but that is not currently an option so I've decided to let it go. Of course I couldn't resist the chance to ensure that anyone that might read this would be aware that I know I make mistakes, I just don't always get them corrected before posting and never seem to have time to correct them after they are posted.

The week of 29May I had the exceptional and rare opportunity to experience one of those magical places on this earth. Luang Prabang, Laos reminds me of the feeling I've had in 2 other places, Zipolite, Mexico in 1983 and Olu Deniz, Turkey in 1989. Wonderful, out of the way places that are just starting to experience the good and bad of increased tourism. Thankfully Luang Prabang was designated as an Unesco World Heritage site back in 1995 and it is very remote so that will help. By the way, Laos is pronounced Lao as the "s" is silent. Yes, most English speaking people say it in incorrectly. The people are Lao and they speak Lao. It is a communist country but over 90% of the people are Buddhists.

It was actually a matter of having to renew my Thai visa as it would expire on 30MAY. I found that I could fly directly to Luang Prabang on Lao Airlines from Chian Mai. Sweetness! A lovely prop jet soared us over the mountains and down into the Luang Prabang. Visa on arrival, currently $35 USD to enter, a prompt and efficient process and I was off to my hotel. You can save $1 USD by having your own passport picture. I had originally considered Vientiane but it is much bigger than Luang Prabang.

I had decided to arrange a room in advance but this is definitely one of those places where, during off season at least, you will find many guest houses and I imagine the majority of them do not have any listing on the web. I guess the primary time to visit is Nov-Mar but the off season is perfect for me. Luang Prabang sits on the confluence of the Nam Than and Mekong rivers. The mighty Mekong and it is huge. I suppose it depends on your age but I immediately think of Apocalypse Now whenever I hear anything about the Mekong River. I adore large bodies of water anywhere in the world but big rivers have a character all of their own. I could watch the Nam Than from my hotel and was fascinated by some of the fishing practices using a large circular net and the fisherman gathering it up and folding in a very particular way and then throwing it out where it would land in the water in a perfect circle.

Luang Prabang has one of the highest concentrations of temples and monks anywhere. Living at a monastery and practicing as a monk, even for a short time, is expected of all young Buddhist men. Some only participate for 2 weeks. On my second day, I climbed to the top of the temple at the center of town and had a lovely time chatting with a young Lao monk. He wanted to practice his English. At one point in our conversation he asked me how old I was and I told him to which he responded "wow, you're old"....he was all of 20 and had never been out of Lao but is hoping to continue his Buddhist studies in India someday.

There is still a very distinct wildness about this place. It is quite obvious that even though there are lots of little eateries and guest houses, especially along the Mekong, it is still quite innocent. The edges of the river are wild with overgrowth and all kinds of life. The boat drivers seem just as happy to go back to their games with their friends when you say "Baw, Khawp Jai" to their offers of "boat ride". The buzz of the jungle can be heard steps from the center of town. I took the opportunity to rest a moment at the end point of the town at the river confluence and saw TONS of butterflies, a beautiful orange snake and bright yellow lizard all while taking a few minutes rest just steps from the town road.

My title for this post is based on my activities the first day. I jumped on one of the free hotel bikes and took off towards town. The high and narrow bridge over the Nam Tham seemed quite mild on a bike. I covered the main streets of the town in a short time, although the searing heat and single speed bike made it a bit of a challenge. Although the seat was adjusted high enough for my legs, the crank arm is so short it makes taking a good strong pump through the pedals quite difficult. Overall, it felt great to be on a bike and was a fantastic way to get around this beautiful little town. So I set off in another direction hoping to see some more local colour. I weaved my way past little village after village each seemingly having some type of specialty going on. There was the mechanics village, the basket village, a weaving village, pottery village, and many others. Before I knew it I was on a busy road with trucks and fast moving traffic and I realized I had no idea where I was and that I was lost. Lost in Laos...sounds pretty cool. I knew I couldn't have gotten than far away so persevered and made it make in about an hour. I was soaked in sweat and exhausted and proceeded to stuff myself with beer and a delicious Lao lunch. YUM.

I went back to Chiang Mai on 29 and headed straight back to the Dreamcatchers B&B before joining up with my YTT on Sunday 31May.

Earth and sky, woods and fields, lakes and rivers, the mountain and the sea, are excellent schoolmasters, and teach some of us more than we can ever learn from books. __John Lubbock

Pics and videos updated too.

Finally...some pics uploaded

2009-06-05T08:33:00.000+09:00

http://picasaweb.google.com/hellokittyinlondon/BangkokAndChangMai#

Finally was able to post some pics with that go with the last 2 posts.

Lots more to come.

Peace!

Chiang Mai

2009-05-26T08:54:00.000+09:00

Still can't get any pics on the blog and at the moment I cannot even post pics on the picasa link. Eventually will get it all updated.

I have now been in Chiang Mai for almost a week. It is the second biggest city in Thailand. I completed lucked out on my choice of accommodation. I am staying quite a ways out of the city in an area called Seraphi. The lovely Dreamcatchers B&B. This is an exceptional place. I have thoroughly enjoyed my time here and will come back for a couple days before joining up with my YTT group at Tao Garden. This house is simply amazing and A is a great B&B host. She is French Canadian but has lived abroad for 20 years, most of them in India.

My time here has been most relaxing with a wonderful location for my morning practice by the infinity pool listening to the birds and chirping geckos. Little known to me prior to my arrival, Chiang Mai is VERY HOT!!! So much hotter than KL. A few folks in KL told me, ah, you'll love Chiang Mai, nice and cool there. They must have come in the winter. Chiang Mai has seasons and it is currently summer. It has only rained once since I've been here and the skies are mostly clear and sunny. In general, it is still quite humid, but slightly less so than KL.

I spent one evening wandering around the night market. I took a video and will post sometime when I get a connection that will allow uploading. This is the great thing about being here during the low season, 50% discount on rooms and the markets are not crowded. I was told that the night market is packed during high season and you can't even walk through all the people. It was great when I was out the other night, lots of room to move.

Chiang Mai is quite an eclectic city with lots of expats wandering around and what I understand to be a large retirement community from Europe. There is also an AMAZING number of mature white men with young Thai women, many toting babies or multiple children. Pretty interesting stuff. Another difference about Thailand since leaving Bangkok, most of the locals don't speak English. The Thai language has LOTS of tones and almost all phrases and sentences end with a masculine or feminine tone. The written language is quite unique looking and it helped me to realize that Bahasa was much easier as it is written in roman letters instead of symbols. I've been staring at the language for a week now and haven't learned a thing. It is quite pretty to look at but difficult to decipher anything it says.

A funny story in regards to language as I have had it pretty easy here thanks to the excellent assistance and guidance of my B&B host. I decided to go to the movies to get a nice break from the heat in the big mall near the airport. After the movie I decided to go to Tha Nam, a traditional Thai restaurant on the riverfront (Mae Ping river). Seemed like a simple idea and I even had a map. The taxis don't have meters and so prices have to be agreed in advance. Many of the taxis are small pickup trucks with 2 bench seats in the back. Great if you have a big group and are headed out of the city for some sightseeing but not so good if you are on your own and really want the air con. I finally found a taxi and happily showed him my map, which was in English. I kept pointing to the location of the restaurant and he just stared at it. He kept turning the map around and around and finally pointed to one of the temples on the map. I smiled and said "yes, temple" and proceeded to point to the location of the restaurant. Finally I said "Tha Nam" and he got a big smile on his face and responded with lots of tones and the words...Tha Nam...dinner. I was thrilled and he knew exactly where it was located. I realized the map doesn't do any good if you don't read or understand English words. What an interesting concept and a good lesson to learn. Trying to say the words even if you are not sure about the pronunciation could be all that's needed. Getting back to the B&B later was not so easy.

I am disappointed I didn't have my camera as this restaurant was very special. A huge old teak house right on the Mae Ping river. They had a group of local young men playing traditional Thai music. It was really beautiful! It was a foursome playing the La Sor, Saw Duang, Seung, and Ta Phon, or I think that is what there were. Traditional Thai stringed instruments and one drum almost like a bongo drum. What a lovely way to enjoy my delicious prawns, green curry, and sticky rice. The prawn starter was almost like a ceviche and quite spicy with lots of lime juice and fried shallots. The green curry was some of the best I've had with three kinds of aubergine in it and not too thick with coconut milk. YUM!!!

Yesterday I rode a bike to Wiang Kum Kam, some ruins near Chiang Mai with buildings going back to 2527 B.C. It is was a nice ride and the ruins are quite impressive. Most of the site has not been dug up yet as it covers quite an area and much of it floods in the spring time.

I figured out how to solve my Thai visa situation, by leaving the country and coming back via air travel I will get an automatic 30 days visa which will last me through my YTT.

Later today I am off to Luang Prabang, Laos. The ancient capital of Laos and on the mighty Mekong River.

Intuition is really a sudden immersion of the soul into the universal current of life, where the histories of all people are connected, and we are able to know everything, because it's all written there.__excerpt from The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

Bangkok

2009-05-26T08:52:00.001+09:00

I cannot seem to link any pics to the blog at the moment which is a bit of disappointment as I quite like the little pics in with the writing. Alas, I don't want to get too far behind...so...

Thailand...no more morning call to prayer from the mahjid but now I here the morning gong from the Buddhist temples. The sun rises much earlier here which I am loving...always have been been and always will be a morning person.

My three days in Bangkok flew by although I did manage to get around and see quite a bit. Bangkok feels hotter than KL which I imagine is due to all the people, cars, buses, tuk-tuks, and everything else. Bangkok is currently estimated to be about 9 million people with up to 15 mil in greater Bangkok. KL is only about 1.8 million (with 8 mil in Klang valley) so not surprising that it feels so different. I stayed in the Sukumvit area which is a bit of everything including apartment buildings, office buildings, huge markets, and luckily for me, lots of public transport including the sky train and MRT.

It definitely feels more third world than Malaysia...more dirt, more stinky smells, more slums, etc. No one drinks the water unless they have to where in KL the tap water was fine.

I decided to make my way to the Chao Phraya river on my first day after spending a lovely relaxing morning with a great breakfast including a large helping of delicious seaweed salad. Breakfast here is a bit different with a Japanese influence and no nasi lemak in sight.

Bangkok seemed just like I imagined it would, big and chaotic with a bit of dark feel to it. I managed to find my way on the MRT to a section of town near the river and I had the ridiculous idea I would find my way to the river front and walk along some lovely path on the river. Uh...not so much. I ended wandering around in Chinatown for about 2 hours while I figured out that nearly every inch of river and canal front in Bangkok is used for anything and everything. Everything from little wooden shacks nearly hanging in the river to elaborate riverfront condos with huge decks overlooking this majestic river. Tons and tons of private docks into the river moving around all kinds of goods. I finally managed to get out of Chinatown and get to a public ferry at the riverfront. I took the ferry up to area near the Temple of the Dawn. After all my wandering, I realized I was too late to go to Wat Pho (the reclining Buddha) and decided to try to find a little hotel/restaurant I had read about called "the Deck" that is known for its fantastic view of the Temple of the Dawn. It took awhile but I finally found it and was very happy to have my first sip of cold beer (big bottle for less than $2) and look out at this impressive Temple. The temples here are HUGE and this is one of the biggest. The river in the foreground is quite a site with its piles of seaweed everywhere and ferries and longboats zooming past. My pics will not do the temple justice as it is so massive. I did end up chatting with a lovely young Brit with his Thai wife and baby and he was taking pics with an awesome camera so have to follow up on that one as I have his email address.

Watched the sunset and then had a delicious meal of papaya salad and Pad Thai, my favourite combo of Thai food. This was a very unique and interesting presentation of phad thai with an omelette sort of wrapped around the noodles. It was delicious.

As there are no trains around the temple, I decided to take the tuk tuk back to the hotel. What an interesting way to see the city. The tuk tuks are all motorcycles now where they used to be bicycles. The poor little driver had to stop and ask directions 3 times to get me back to the hotel. I don't think tuk tuks are meant to go all the way across the city. It was all very entertaining. Some of the fancy Mercedes and BMWs whizzing past seemed to be as amused as I was at the farang in the big city.

The next day I was off bright and early to Wat Pho hoping to beat the heat and the crowds and luckily it worked. You can't really believe the size of the Reclining Buddha, it is gigantic! The feet are really spectacular as they are inlaid with mother of pearl. The temple grounds go on and on and eventually intersects with the Grand Palace.

Once the heat really started descending on the temple, I headed back on the ferry and to the skytrain to another part of town where lots of the fancy hotels are and where lots of expats live. I think I already mentioned this but I am still struck how many Caucasians I see in Thailand, that was simply not the case in Kuala Lumpur...or really anywhere in Malaysia.

I ended having a 2 hour Thai massage and foot massage in the area. I really like the Thai massage but it is not particularly relaxing but sure stretches things out nicely. I had some delicious green curry at a little outdoor cafe and headed back to my hotel early. Green curry, papaya salad, and Pad Thai...all my Thai favourites and now I've eaten them in Bangkok. I am flying to Chiang Mai as another 10 hours on a train did not sound that great when I could fly in an hour.

Cheers!

Da Train...the very long train

2009-05-18T14:50:00.000+09:00

I made it to Bangkok. Nearly 30+ hours on two trains and it was fascinating and well worth the longer journey.

I wasn't even sure I could do it properly as I have 3 suitcases. I am so glad I kept my nice small rolling bag for all of my electronic equipment as I do have lots of it. I also have the biggest rolling backpack made that I picked up in KC back in January. I am able to wear the backpack and pull the other two. I should have had a picture as I look pretty ridiculous when lugging it all around. Thankfully the wonderful concierge at the KL Hilton helped me get to the KL Sentral station with all of it so that part was easy. Getting on to the train, down the escalator and up the steps of the train was a bit more difficult.

I had a wonderful sleeper berth from KL to Butterworth. Butterworth is on the west coast of Malaysia directly across from the island of Penang. I had a blog entry about Penang in the KL blog. I spent the weekend there in Nov 08. I had quite a long layover in Butterworth but with all my junk didn't have the energy to go to Penang. As luck would have it, I met a lovely gentlemen at the KL Sentral station who lives in Butterworth. I ended up running into him after I got off the train and we sat at a hawker stall having coffee at 4:30 a.m. while he got in touch with his wife to come and pick him up. Mr Ho and his wife graciously offered to take me for breakfast in Butterworth at a Chinese hawker center that specializes in dim sum. OMG!!! Delicious beyond words. Amazing homemade noodles with prawns and pork swimming in mild Malaysian soy sauce and sambal. YUM!!! Killer pau stuffed with BBQ pork, steamed rice paper stuffed with all kinds of greens and garlic, fried radish paste, steamed mushrooms wrapped in rice paper, egg tarts, and many other yummy things. Some of them do not have a English name. I just asked Mr Ho and his wife to allow me to skip the ones made with offal (parts...so to speak) which they found quite amusing as they said the pig liver is particularly delicious. I was absolutely stuffed and very thankful for the wonderful new friends I made in Butterworth.

I boarded my next train at 2 p.m. for the 20+ hour ride to Bangkok. Luckily, the second class only train was not too bad at all. I was very smart to reserve both the upper and lower bunk so that I didn't have to have anyone crawling on top of me. It also gave me some space to keep all my bags close at hand so I didn't have to worry about them. Traveling in the Golden Triangle and crossing borders makes you want to keep a close eye on your luggage...a tip from my American buddy in KL...and he should know.

The train ride was really great and went by quite quickly. The train seems to stop every 10 minutes until the Malaysian border and was filled with Malays who use the train for school and work. It was interesting to see that ALL the Malay women (wearing tudongs) got off before the Thai border. The southern Thai region is having some issues with violence against Muslims. I wasn't able to get a visa in advance as I went to the Thai embassy in KL and they would not process the visa the same day...as it said they would on their website. Ugh...I knew my horoscope was a bit of an omen when it said "you will do lots of running around today for administrative reasons but will get nothing done." That is exactly what happened. So now I have a Thai visa that is only good for 2 weeks. Have to figure that out later.

The landscape changed immediately when entering Thailand. Fascinating...no more oil palm plantations, no more mahjids (mosques), and LOTS more padi fields (rice). As we approached various villages, I could also see the huge and ornate Buddhist temples. Lots of people getting on and off the train and we seemed to stop in each and every village again. I had my first Thai beer on the train. YEAH!!!! Another thing to love about Thailand....cheap beer. I fell asleep really early and amazingly slept until the sun was just rising. I could tell we were getting closer to Bangkok as there were lots more towns and less padi fields. The architecture of the villages in Thailand is quite different from Malaysia. As we got close to Bangkok, I got a close up view of the slums and they go on for a very long time. I know they say the slums in Mumbai are the worst, but these were pretty heavy duty. I was reminded a bit of my first visit to Mexico City where we saw the slums when traveling into the city. The rubbish everywhere is pretty scary and seeing people living right next to it. We had a huge delay just over an hour from the station as something was wrong with the train. I was lucky in that they finally got us going again and we did not have to change trains. I did not want to have to mess with the luggage again.

Finally in Bangkok where I was smart enough to reserve a room in advance. A bit of negotiation with the taxi drivers and I was off to my hotel. I think I am more or less in the financial district of Bangkok. Last night I wandered around and had some delicious wok fried noodles with pork, veggies, and basil...and yes, of course, I had 2 big beers for less than $5. I have to say, I haven't thought about this much in the past year, but it is really nice to feel like you kind of fit in to the masses and are not in such a minority as I was in KL. It is rather comforting to feel like it is OK to walk around in tank tops and shorts. I never minded covering up more in Malaysia and felt it was important to do so to be culturally appropriate, but it is nice not to stand out so much.

OK, this blogging stuff is time consuming and I need to go out and do some site seeing in the city.

Cheers!!!

The Ultimate Malaysia Adventure

2009-05-18T08:37:00.000+09:00

What a fabulous trip!!! OK, we could have used two more days and it would have been great if the air con in the car didn't quit on the second day, but the sights we saw were just spectacular.

We started out in KL and spent most of one day in the Lake Gardens, including the Islamic museum, the bird, butterfly, hibiscus, and orchid gardens. We also went to the Saturday night market in my old hood, Little India. Of course, we ate all along the way and never went hungry for a moment. In fact, I'm not sure we ever got hungry...the food in Malaysia is quite amazing. I will miss that.

On Monday we got the car and headed off to Ipoh. I had my Garmin Nuvi GPS and it was really helpful although do NOT rely on it in KL as it doesn't understand the crazy traffic patterns in the city. Of course, no one really understands the crazy traffic patterns in the city. The drive to Ipoh was nice including passing through some of the most amazing limestone rock formations ever. It looked like something out of an ancient Chinese painting (thx to J for the analogy). We made it to Ipoh without a hitch and had a simple room above the old train station with a huge veranda looking out into the town. I was did have a touch of the flu when J & R arrived but found that those bubbly vitamins pretty much kicked it over the next few days. Feeling a bit under the weather, R got to have her first experience driving around Ipoh town. We ended up at a Steamboat restaurant, where we ate, you guessed it, steamboat. If you are not familiar, it is a bubbling vat of broth, usually two types, we had chicken and vegetable broth. Then you order a whole bunch of stuff to drop into it. It's fab! We had the best noodles EVER, which is something Ipoh is known for...awesome noodles.

Tuesday a.m. and off to the Rainforest in the northern part of the state of Perak. This is untouched rainforest country up here and is probably the oldest rainforest on earth at 130 million years old. Thankfully, the Sultan of Perak is known to be quite a naturalist and although we saw quite a bit of logging in the national forest, the state of Perak Royal Belum Rainforest does not allow anything to be disturbed. I pray that it stays that way as this is some of the most beautiful and wild country in the world. They say if the Malaysian rhino still exists, it is in this park. There is also lots of Malaysian tigers but they are rarely seen. The jungle is unbelievably dense. It was quite a drive from Ipoh but the North-South freeway in Malaysia is an excellent road. We did make the choice of trying to find some ruins on the coast and got a bit off track doing that. Unfortunately, we never found the ruins although we did see some signs, we ended up driving around in circles and felt like we needed to get on the road to our hotel in the rainforest before it got dark.

The hotel is on Palau Banding (palau is island in Bahasa) in the middle of the Temenggor Lake. The lake was man made in the 1960's by a dam located at one of the rivers. They created the dam to chase away communists...or so we were told. The lake is HUGE and incredibly gorgeous surrounded by pristine rainforest. This is an extremely remote area of Malaysia (and the world). We were fascinated that we didn't see monkeys at the resort and our guide to see the rafflesia told us it is because all the animals in this forest are still afraid of humans. They hide from us which is why it is difficult to see wild animals in the park. We spent two nights in the rainforest resort and all agreed we could have spent a few more days, so peaceful and the sound of the forest at night is beautiful. The best part of all...hold on to your seat...WE SAW A WILD ELEPHANT!!! Not in a zoo, not in a reserve, not trained and domesticated, but a real wild elephant. We had given up on seeing one as we drove around the night before trying to see them and didn't. So this was on our way to Kelantan (another state) from Perak. I think I almost scared R to death as we were just driving along and I saw it and screamed and slammed on the brakes. Yes, of course, that is EXACTLY what you are not supposed to do. Anyway, in the interest of breaking all the rules, we then stopped, turned around and drove right up to him. He was hanging out munching on the grass at the side of the road. We all noticed when he looked right at us and we decided that was our clue to move on and leave him in peace. I still keep repeating it...I saw a wild elephant in Malaysia. I will NEVER forget that moment as long as I live.

We continued along the way to Terangganu where we hung out for 2 nights before taking the ferry to the amazing island of Redang in the South China Sea. This has to be some of the most amazing water in the world. So clear and a lovely moderate temperature, you could hang out in the water all day. Yes, I took this picture from my room...it is not a postcard. We did a great snorkel trip with 4 stops and saw tons of fish. I had my first experience with my underwater camera. I got some decent shots but had a hard time getting down far enough in the water.

Redang is all designated as a marine park, they take you snorkeling where the water is quite deep so you don't damage the coral. This made getting good shots of the fish quite difficult. I think my favourite is those amazing parrot fish with the aquamarine colours. The colours are so inspiring. I sitting here now wearing my Save the Oceans Hello Kitty t-shirt and I sure hope we continue to try and do that. The coral reefs and all the life in them is very special.

Headed out of Redang and drove all the way to Fraser's Hill. This is where we REALLY needed another day but we did it. The last 2 hours of getting to Fraser's Hill was almost all switchbacks climbing a huge mountain. It was really our only experience driving late at night so interesting to be in the mountainous jungle in the dark. There were some pretty amazing sounds coming out of the jungle. We finally arrived at the Ye Olde Smokehouse Inn and spent a lovely night in the coolness of the mountain air. This place is an old English tudor house built 85 years ago by some of the Brits when they were in KL as they needed a place to get away from the heat. Fraser's Hill is only about 100km from KL. We woke to the birdsong of thousands of birds all around. It was a lovely clear day and I think we were all glad for the nice long sleep and fresh cool air. A yummy full English breakfast and we were off again to our final stop in Melaka. A bit of a delay on the travel as we were stopped on the road while they pulled a truck out of the jungle. Very interesting indeed.

I wanted to stuff one more place into our journey and Melaka seemed like the perfect place. I've been there twice before and really enjoyed it. I thought J & R would enjoy it too. We had a lovely room at the Heeren House, right on the edge of the river. It is owned by Jan and Bernard (she's a Brit and he's a Baaba) and in the Jonker Walk section of town which is the most interesting, in my opinion. We the best Tandoori we had ever eaten anywhere, thanks to the recommendation of the owner of the hotel. That is one of the really great things about Malaysia, the mix of Chinese, Indian, and Malay food. We walked all over the Jonker area, drank some beer, and ate piles of delicious Indian food. We were going to have some Nyonya food before we left but we all felt sick in the a.m. from stuffing ourselves at the Indian Tandoori place.

I was very sad to see my playmates go back to the US. We had a great time and did some amazing stuff and ate like pigs. Oink oink!!! J & R were very kind to put up with me and my idiosyncrasies. Of course, that goes both ways and we are a great travel group.

I have created a YouTube account, the name is HSGWorld. Did I mention the awesome flip video my friends brought me from the US? It has Hello Kitty on it...too cool! Will have some videos out there soon.

Here are some pics from the trip:

http://picasaweb.google.com/hellokittyinlondon/UltimateMalaysianHoliday?feat=directlink

I am that I am. Off to Bangkok next.

Cheers!

Chapter 1 - Post 1

2009-05-02T10:07:00.000+09:00

Nothing like a new page on the book of life.

I know some of you have a few questions for me so let's see if this helps:

I resigned effective 14MAY09 but am on vacation till then so 30APR09 was really my last day.

I am checking out of the rat race and joining the human race.

I am homeless, once again, it is really quite amusing not to have a response for..."permanent address".

No partner, no kids, no car, no mortgage, no job, no debt. I AM FREE!!!

Brief itinerary for the next 6-7 months is as follows:

My dear friends from Reno, NV arrive in Kuala Lumpur today (2MAY09) and we will be spending 12 days traveling together around peninsular Malaysia including sites of KL, Ipoh, Belum Rainforest, Terangganu, the east coast island of Redang, Frasier's Hill, and Melaka (Malacca). It should be a fantastic and busy trip. We will be driving and taking a ferry to the island.

Happy Wesak Day (or Vesak) on 9May09 - the birth, enlightenment, and passing of the Buddha.

Somewhere around 15MAY09 I will travel by train from KL to Chang Mai, Thailand and may stop for a few days in a couple spots along the way. Beginning on 31MAY09, I will be living at the Tao Garden Health Resort in Chang Mai where I will attend a yoga teacher training certification course with a host of amazing teachers. It is a residential program and includes meditation, pranayama, physiology, and teaching approaches in addition to learning more about the yoga asanas. The primary teacher of the course is American and lived in Thailand for 9 years and follows an Anusara teaching style, my favourite style of yoga. I will be at the YTT until the end of June and will leave with a IYT certification.

Beginning in early July, I will be living at the British International School on the Thai island of Phuket attending the Cambridge English Language Teaching Accreditation course. This accreditation will allow me to teach English to non-native English speakers most anywhere in the world. Acceptance into this course was quite a process and included a very challenging grammar test as well as an interview process. If I pass, I will have the CELTA certification from the University of Cambridge in the UK.

When I leave Phuket, I will travel up through other SE Asia spots to hopefully include Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam. I need to be in Beijing, China on 22AUG09 when I will join up with an Exodus tour to include Beijing, the Great Wall, Xi'an (terracotta warriors), Chengdu (pandas), Leshan, Chongqing, Guilin, Yangshuo, and Shanghai. This tour will include 2 full days on the Yangtze River. I will spend a few extra days in Shanghai at the end.

From the end of my China tour, I plan to work my way back down through the island archipelagos (Philippines, Indonesia) and finally end up in India in the beginning of October. I plan to start out in Chennai (Madras) and will end in the north (probably on a short tour) to see some of the sites before heading off to London at the beginning of November. I will take some time to visit my old stomping grounds and dear friends in London (and around the UK). May the USD stay strong against the GBP.

Somewhere between the US holiday of Thanksgiving and Christmas, I will make my way to Baltimore Maryland to invade my Dad's space and spend the holidays with my family scattered around the east coast of the USA.

I do not have plans beyond that but know the next part of my path will be revealed in due time.

The rain has stopped, the clouds have drifted away, and the weather is clear again.

If your heart is pure, then all things in your world are pure...

Then the moon and flowers will guide you along the Way. __Ryokan

I will be keeping this post updated with stories, pictures, and hopefully some video.

I may even open a twitter account...

Om Shanti