I'm just going to give a brief run down of various adventures and a quick run through of our days in Penang, mainly because it would take forever to go into great detail.
Arrived Friday at 9 am at our hotel. Check in wasn't possible until 9 am so we went and ate breakfast and took the free shuttle around Georgetown to see what the city was like. Afterwards, we went and chilled at the pool and ate some lunch at a place called Mr. Pots which had Malaysian food and western food, in addition to breakfast all day! The rest of the day was spent sleeping till dinner. Audrey and I were grateful to be taken to a Country Club in Penang outside of Georgetown by my dad's friend Vythi. We had such an amazing meal that filled us up! After dinner him and his daughter gave us a quick tour of the city at night. It was beautiful!
Saturday morning had to be downstairs at 8 am in order to catch our bus to the boat for snorkeling! We made it in time with 15 minutes of waiting :). Our boat ride ended up being about 2 hours long, but it was worth it! We arrived at Pulau Payar in the midst of a huge rain storm and it pretty much downpoured for 20 minutes straight. Afterwards we hopped right in the water. The fist were EVERYWHERE - as in I stepped into the water and had fish swimming up against my leg within seconds. It was sooo unlike any snorkeling I'd done before! I saw some of the most beautiful fish I'd ever seen! Eventually in the afternoon the sun came out and we tanned on the beach for a bit until we left and headed back to Penang. That night we went to a Tapas restaurant which served absolutely zero tapas. Weird.
Sunday morning we also, well the girls, woke up at 8 am for a hike up Penang Hill. Little did we know that this was going to be one of the most intense hikes.....ever! It was raining and humid, but after 2 and a half hours the 3 girls, a family friend Bee Leng and her son made it to the top of the 800 meter MOUNTAIN! It was beautiful and fun, the only thing was none of us had mentally prepared ourselves for an ACTUAL hike. At the top we tried a local Malaysian dessert that you can see in my pictures. After that, we tried on a "python" for pictures. (check them out!!!) We then went to a Buddhist temple, Kek Lok Si, in Penang...soooo beautiful.
Here are the pictures from this part of the trip:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2619133&id=6844049&l=265e08d3eb
Sunday night we ended up going to the night market near the beach on Penang. It was a lot of fun...just the usual shopping market. Monday night we were leaving, but we wanted to get in a day of sun. We went to a sister-hotel and soaked up the rays until about 4 pm. After that we left and headed to have dinner in Little India. We then hired rickshaws (see pics) to take us around Georgetown, Little China and Little India.
Last pics from Penang:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2619143&id=6844049&l=8bcfde4eeb
We arrived at our hotel 2 am Tuesday morning in Kuala Lumpur. We woke up expecting to a full day of fun! We headed to the Petronas Towers to get tickets to the sky bridge for later in the day - they are free, but run out by about 10 am. After we got our tickets for 6 o clock, we headed to the butterfly garden. I had SUCH a great time taking pictures at the park.
Here they are:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2619150&id=6844049&l=53deaf4566
After the butterfly garden, we headed to the bird aviary park thing. It was pretty neat. After that, it was about 1:00 in the afternoon and we were all pretty hungry. We decided to head over to Central Market of KL and grab some food. We ended up eating at this Reggae Bar, which if you've ever been to China Town in KL, you've heard of the bar or at least walked by. We had amazing pizza for lunch and then proceeded to go shopping in Central Market as well as a street market. We ended up running into some people from our school. *small world* After shopping and purchasing more fake purses, we headed to the towers to grab a drink at the mall before we went up to the sky deck. Finally it was our turn to go up and it was pretty neat! The Petronas Towers are the tallest twin connected towers in the world in case you didn't know. After that, we all went back to the hotel and met up with our friends for dinner at, none other than the Hard Rock Cafe. Afterwards we walked over to the Petronas Towers to get some pictures at night.
Here are the pics from KL:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2619158&id=6844049&l=e2f2d71c65
We left the next morning, after a visit to....wait for it.....KRISPY KREME! To sum up KL, it was basically my favorite city I've EVER been to. It could be slightly because it was a MAJOR taste of the Western world I miss so much, but I would NOT mind having to take business trips to the beautiful city!
Someone told me the pictures of me and my friends aren't working, well here is a new link as well as some additions:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2605314&id=6844049&l=8d320a6d85
Friday, May 1, 2009
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Cambodia Pictures
First make sure you read the post below this one about my first couple of days in Cambodia and view my first album of Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia.
So seeing as that I have a project due Sunday at midnight, an essay due Monday, a final Tuesday, and a short essay to start this week before Thursday, I don't know how much I'll be able to talk about Cambodia.
But in the mean time.. I thought I'd put my pictures up so you can see my trip!
Cambodia countryside:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610561&id=6844049&l=d3bc1a91f5
Island we visited outside of Phnom Penh:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610564&id=6844049&l=f183a61eba
Sunrise in Angkor Wat
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610568&id=6844049&l=b06f33ba15
Random Cambodia in Siem Reap
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610591&id=6844049&l=93f72b52b4
Angkor Wat and the sunset:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610594&id=6844049&l=a0921b6505
A combination of some random pictures from various places in Hong Kong and Thailand that friends have taken:
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=50221739&l=d570157765&id=6844049
Thursday night I'm off to Malaysia until Wednesday the 29th of April ...if I have time I'll update you a little more on Cambodia!
So seeing as that I have a project due Sunday at midnight, an essay due Monday, a final Tuesday, and a short essay to start this week before Thursday, I don't know how much I'll be able to talk about Cambodia.
But in the mean time.. I thought I'd put my pictures up so you can see my trip!
Cambodia countryside:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610561&id=6844049&l=d3bc1a91f5
Island we visited outside of Phnom Penh:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610564&id=6844049&l=f183a61eba
Sunrise in Angkor Wat
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610568&id=6844049&l=b06f33ba15
Random Cambodia in Siem Reap
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610591&id=6844049&l=93f72b52b4
Angkor Wat and the sunset:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610594&id=6844049&l=a0921b6505
A combination of some random pictures from various places in Hong Kong and Thailand that friends have taken:
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=50221739&l=d570157765&id=6844049
Thursday night I'm off to Malaysia until Wednesday the 29th of April ...if I have time I'll update you a little more on Cambodia!
Friday, April 17, 2009
Cambodia1
So..I know I have a lot of stuff to write about and pictures to post but it is going to take me a while.
Sooo basically I'll start off with the first couple of days in Cambodia until I get tired for writing.
Thursday at 7 am we all meet downstairs (Audrey a girl from IU, Leo from Switzerland, and James from the UK, the boys both go to school in the UK together). We start off on our long journey that makes our flights cheaper and we are off to Macau. From Macau we arrived in Bangkok (before any of that crazy stuff happened, don't worry!!!) Well we literally leave our plane, go through immigration, check our baggage, shove an ice cream cone from dairy queen in our mouth and board the planed. No time for breathing...whatsoever!
So we arrive in Phnom Penh, Cambodia and it is humid and hot and amazing! We get in a tuk-tuk $7 US ...anywhere to leave the airport...and we are off to our hostel the Top Banana.
First you should know Cambodia is an extremely poor country. Second they except US $ everywhere, its basically mixed in with their money. Third if you are ever in Phnom Penh and are looking for a fun hostel to stay at, Top Banana will spoil you!
So we are in our tuk-tuk riding to our hostel for about 25 minutes, riding through the city. What an experience! We hear music out of speakers larger than all 4 of us. We smell the best bbq we've smelt since being in Asia, we see kids running around, people selling fruit...basically everything looked amazing! We check in to our hostel and had booked 2 rooms, but changed to 1 because the rooms were bigger than expected (as were the beds), and for safety it was nice for all of us to be together. The room we had though, came with 2 rooms, 2 full size beds, a stair case, a bathroom, 2 fans ...all for $5 p/person/night. Not bad :) So after we put some shorts on we mozied on upstairs and ordered the best food ever. They had shakes (mango, strawberry, raspberry, coconut, dragon fruit, passion fruit, banana, chocolate, and more). Meals ranged anywhere from fried rice with veggies or meat, to (excellent ..or so I heard) curry, to the best pancakes/crepes for not being in France. The food at Top Banana was so good, perfectly priced, delicious, and kept us coming back for more. That night we just sorta of hung out and walked around our hostel to get an idea of where we were at.
The next morning we woke up and decided to go to the Grand Palace and some other touristy must sees. First we stopped at the Russian Market for an hour. We all wished we'd stayed longer, because little did we know that the Russian Market was actually where the knock-offs were as close to real as you could get. A lot of Abercrombie, Polo, Old Navy, H&M clothing is made in Cambodia and anything that isn't up to quality is often resold at the Russian Market. We all bought a couple things but it would have been nice to go back. Next we went to a landmark where a little girl sold us rice cakes that looked sort of like Styrofoam. Not bad...(you can see a picture of her in my album). After that we took a stroll along the river to lunch. Along our way we passed a dead rat and a HUGE truck carrying pigs to be slaughtered....some already dead, it was GROSS!!! We stopped at a restaurant and tried some more Cambodian food and headed to the Grand Palace. It wasn't very crowded so I was able to get some great pictures. All of the buildings were really beautiful and had very similar architecture to the Royal Palace in Bangkok.
Sorry but its super late/early so I'm going to get to bed, here are the pics of Phnom Penh:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610306&id=6844049&l=cfcffffde3
Enjoy!!
Sooo basically I'll start off with the first couple of days in Cambodia until I get tired for writing.
Thursday at 7 am we all meet downstairs (Audrey a girl from IU, Leo from Switzerland, and James from the UK, the boys both go to school in the UK together). We start off on our long journey that makes our flights cheaper and we are off to Macau. From Macau we arrived in Bangkok (before any of that crazy stuff happened, don't worry!!!) Well we literally leave our plane, go through immigration, check our baggage, shove an ice cream cone from dairy queen in our mouth and board the planed. No time for breathing...whatsoever!
So we arrive in Phnom Penh, Cambodia and it is humid and hot and amazing! We get in a tuk-tuk $7 US ...anywhere to leave the airport...and we are off to our hostel the Top Banana.
First you should know Cambodia is an extremely poor country. Second they except US $ everywhere, its basically mixed in with their money. Third if you are ever in Phnom Penh and are looking for a fun hostel to stay at, Top Banana will spoil you!
So we are in our tuk-tuk riding to our hostel for about 25 minutes, riding through the city. What an experience! We hear music out of speakers larger than all 4 of us. We smell the best bbq we've smelt since being in Asia, we see kids running around, people selling fruit...basically everything looked amazing! We check in to our hostel and had booked 2 rooms, but changed to 1 because the rooms were bigger than expected (as were the beds), and for safety it was nice for all of us to be together. The room we had though, came with 2 rooms, 2 full size beds, a stair case, a bathroom, 2 fans ...all for $5 p/person/night. Not bad :) So after we put some shorts on we mozied on upstairs and ordered the best food ever. They had shakes (mango, strawberry, raspberry, coconut, dragon fruit, passion fruit, banana, chocolate, and more). Meals ranged anywhere from fried rice with veggies or meat, to (excellent ..or so I heard) curry, to the best pancakes/crepes for not being in France. The food at Top Banana was so good, perfectly priced, delicious, and kept us coming back for more. That night we just sorta of hung out and walked around our hostel to get an idea of where we were at.
The next morning we woke up and decided to go to the Grand Palace and some other touristy must sees. First we stopped at the Russian Market for an hour. We all wished we'd stayed longer, because little did we know that the Russian Market was actually where the knock-offs were as close to real as you could get. A lot of Abercrombie, Polo, Old Navy, H&M clothing is made in Cambodia and anything that isn't up to quality is often resold at the Russian Market. We all bought a couple things but it would have been nice to go back. Next we went to a landmark where a little girl sold us rice cakes that looked sort of like Styrofoam. Not bad...(you can see a picture of her in my album). After that we took a stroll along the river to lunch. Along our way we passed a dead rat and a HUGE truck carrying pigs to be slaughtered....some already dead, it was GROSS!!! We stopped at a restaurant and tried some more Cambodian food and headed to the Grand Palace. It wasn't very crowded so I was able to get some great pictures. All of the buildings were really beautiful and had very similar architecture to the Royal Palace in Bangkok.
Sorry but its super late/early so I'm going to get to bed, here are the pics of Phnom Penh:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610306&id=6844049&l=cfcffffde3
Enjoy!!
Sunday, March 29, 2009
March is coming to an end...
Sooo I have done so much stuff since the last time I wrote so much has happened and I've learned a ton. I'll start from that Monday.
I had a midterm which was pretty difficult. I later found out all of the local students had access to a pretty exact copy of the solution, and because it was an open book test, all of the students brought the copy with them. Unfortunately they neglected to share any of this information with the exchange students so we'll see how our grades turn out (should find out tomorrow). Well after that stressful midterm, I went to transportation logistics where I received my midterm. Unpleased with the grade I received I spoke with the professor after class. Half the test was an essay test and I had answers straight from the book because I studied. Luckily he raised my grade to in the states what would be next letter grade. I knew that grades percentage marks worked differently out here, but I wasn't sure HOW differently. Well I was speaking to someone to find out a 75 is the lowest possible A (like an A-) ...just for comparison in case any of you have forgotten, in the states most professors count a 90 as the lowest possible A or an 89.6 if you are lucky. That changed everything, and from the looks of it, I'm doing pretty great in my classes :).
After those 2 classes my friend Dan took me to this place called New York Fries. Its a Toronto chain serving french fries with toppings. Ironic cause its not called Toronto Fries. Anyways, after a delicious greasy meal I got really sick and passed out in the MTR station. I guess I hadn't really been paying attention to what I had been drinking, or rather what I hadn't. Apparently I was really dehydrated and by Wednesday was fully recovered!! (after sleeping and drinking water in bed all of Tuesday). So Wednesday comes around and after a full recovery, I went to Happy Valley Horse Races. My friend Sean from IU had a cousin in town and had to show her the ONLY gambling in HK. I won ~$40 HK ...which is like $5 US pretty fun though!
Thursday came around and it was time to interview a contact for my Transportation Logistics class project. Thank you to my uncle for being a great networker!! I met with a business man at APL and learned a great deal of information about the company! Friday came along and I had dim sum with 3 other exchange students. Our school has this great restaurant with delicious dim sum! After lunch me and my friend Jasmine went exploring to find a post office. Wow, I could not have been more surprised. A tiny room that didn't sell envelopes (luckily they sold padded envelopes) as I needed to send Flat Stanley back to my nephew. After that we went exploring and found this great dessert place. They have a lot of Chinese desserts for cheap! While Friday was interesting...I was super looking forward to Saturday because was off to DISNEY! Yes Disney in HK. I wasn't sure I wanted to spend $50 US to go, but it was my friends 21st and that's what she wanted to do. AND I couldn't have been more happy I joined. While its a pretty small theme park in general, it was neat to see the different cultures and have a little fun of something that reminded us of back home.
There were 4 sections to the park and it actually started off the same size as Disneyland in LA. There is Tomorrowland including Space Mountain (my fave), Buzzlight year (for pics), and a Lilo and Stitch show (didn't see it though). There was a Fantasyland with Its a Small World (my absolute fave), the Golden Mickeys Show (kind of like an Oscars show for Disney characters, really cute!), the Dumbo ride, Cinderella's Carousel, and the Pooh Ride! We did all of the rides in Fantasyland, pretty neat! After that we headed to Adventureland and watched the Lion King Show, pretty well put together. We later found out that the reason the one in HK is more of a story versus song and dancing is because the HK children don't know the story. It was pretty cute! There was Tarzan's tree house which would have driven any parent crazy!! (but apparently Tarzn was bilingual and could read Chinese AND English...which who knew Tarzan could read in the first place!?) ha..and of course Adventureland included the ride through the Jungle River. They actually had 3 different lines one for Mandarin, Cantonese, and English. You could tell our tour guide didn't really love her job as her humor was very dry, and we were the only ones laughing (5 college students). The fireworks at the end were AMAZING!!! I'm EXTREMELY sorry I can't show you pictures because I accidentally deleted them on my flash drive before I put them on my computer. But I guess it is a mistake I'll make once to never make it again!
The next day I went to Lamma Island! I'm not really sure about the history of it, but it's definitely a fishing community. There were numerous seafood restaurants on both sides of the island. We entered on one side and hiked up the mountain to the other side. Extremely beautiful!! Here are the pics:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2599643&id=6844049&l=57cfdda589
I know its pretty hazey, but everything is more beautiful in person!
After that we stopped in Central and did a little shopping (prices at stores are amazing ...2 pairs of shorts for $20 US..that's unbeatable!) It was nice to get home and relax before the next week began!!
So this past Monday the 23rd nothing really exciting happened to my knowledge. Tuesday I took a field trip to the shipyard of HK. After sitting through 2 movies about their operations and listening to a speaker, we actually got a tour of the all of the terminals on the port. It was interesting because the company that operates the majority of the terminals in the Hong Kong port, operates several terminals throughout the world, except for the United States and Canada. We were curious as to why they chose not to operate in N.America. Well our teacher explained how he had talked about it in class (woops!) the reason being that US and Canada have high security restrictions. He went on to say that this was a problem. I was like I'm not really sure how this is a problem, and he said that it would be beneficial to the company and would increase business if they got access to terminals in the US. I sort of shrugged it off saying that personally being a citizen of the US I like my security. Sorry that our security restrictions are too high and we like to protect our people!!! (Sorry to any of you reading this disagreeing!!!)
Wednesday came around and my one class was awesome!! We got cheap stones (which are usually jade, but ours were free so can't complain!) to carve our Chinese names on! This way we can stamp them whenever we do artwork or write a paper. Our professor picked our names and because the Chinese language is composed mainly of sounds, they usually choose the sound that makes your name mean something graceful. Well I don't have the sheet with me, but will have it next week, but anyways the translation for my name is a slang word for beautiful - in other words hot, or sexy. cool..i guess?? lol Anyways my friend in that class has a new pair of glasses and I commented on how cute they were, she said she bought them for $200 HK (<$30 US). So I decided I had to get in on this deal and get some cheap plastic frames. So on Thursday we went adventuring and I picked out some cute purple frames (will show you a picture when I go to pick them up!)
*Back to Wednesday, I ended up going to the Peninsula Hotel for Afternoon Tea. It was amazing!! Hot tea (about 10 different choices) and a variety of foods. I'd say its definitely a must-do in HK. While it was semi-expensive, it was worth it and filled me up!
After adventuring around glasses shopping, a friend from IU who is studying in Shanghai for the semester was in HK. I went to meet up with her and her friends. Introduced them to LKF until they discovered ids were needed to get into the clubs. So at that point we went separate ways and they adventured into other parts of LKF (like club 7-11...aka a bunch of people buying extremely cheap beer and drinking on the streets!) I ended up meeting up with some of my friends from school at Club Cliq. Wednesdays and Thursdays in most clubs are free entry and open bar for ladies, although thist was the first time I'd actually been out clubbin in a good 4-5 weeks! It was fun going with a smaller group!
Friday morning woke up pretty early to go to the Jade Market, what a disappointment! It was no where cool as I was expecting. About 25 little booths all selling the same jade carvings. While things were pretty cheap there wasn't anything I was super interested in. After that I came back home and rested and did homework the rest of the day. I met up with a friend for dinner at a fancier Chinese restaurant. I also learned that there is a legit bookstore in the mall across from my school. I was beyond stoked and bought a book...yay!
So Saturday I was so excited because I was finally going to 10,000 Buddhas. But before we got there, we had lunch at a Turkish restaurant...in HK. It was delicious! It was hard to tell what language everyone spoke. The chef was definitely not Chinese, but possibly from the Middle East or Turkey. Our waiter was a Chinese local trying to make money, and barely spoke English. And the server was a woman...and we couldn't tell what language she spoke or where she was from! Anyways after getting filled up with delicious food, we headed off.
There are very few signs towards 10,000 Buddhas as it is a hidden tourist attraction. We finally got there and headed up. Its a pretty good hike up a mountain, but well worth it (minus the fact we got eaten by mosquitoes the entire way to the top!) Here are my pics from my amazing adventure:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2599641&id=6844049&l=b522647d93
Other than that yesterday I just relaxed and got dinner with a friend (pizza actually) ...delicious!
Today I did a lot of homework because before Easter break comes up I have a couple papers and projects due and have a busy week and a half before I'm off to Cambodia!
Here's a couple of plans in place for the next couple of weeks:
Wednesday (April Fools day and 3 peoples 21st bday) - Horse races and possibly LKF
Saturday - Ocean Park
Sunday - Hike up to Monkey Hill
next Thursday - Cambodia (first stop Macau then Bangkok then Phnom Penh...yes that was the cheapest way to go!)
Friday the 17th of April - return from Cambodia
Wednesday April 22 - last day of classes!!!
Possible travels after that:
Malaysia
then finals!!!
then possible hiking/camping on a BEAUTIFUL beach in HK
then MAY 16 PARENTS COME TO HK!!!! (I'm not sure if they know this yet, but that's the plan!!) haha
Hope all is well back in the states - anyone in Colorado reading this, I'm pretty freakin jealous that you got snow, and A SNOWDAY!!! I hope everyone is having/had an AMAZING spring break...and for all you Californians...hope you have an amazing spring break :).
I had a midterm which was pretty difficult. I later found out all of the local students had access to a pretty exact copy of the solution, and because it was an open book test, all of the students brought the copy with them. Unfortunately they neglected to share any of this information with the exchange students so we'll see how our grades turn out (should find out tomorrow). Well after that stressful midterm, I went to transportation logistics where I received my midterm. Unpleased with the grade I received I spoke with the professor after class. Half the test was an essay test and I had answers straight from the book because I studied. Luckily he raised my grade to in the states what would be next letter grade. I knew that grades percentage marks worked differently out here, but I wasn't sure HOW differently. Well I was speaking to someone to find out a 75 is the lowest possible A (like an A-) ...just for comparison in case any of you have forgotten, in the states most professors count a 90 as the lowest possible A or an 89.6 if you are lucky. That changed everything, and from the looks of it, I'm doing pretty great in my classes :).
After those 2 classes my friend Dan took me to this place called New York Fries. Its a Toronto chain serving french fries with toppings. Ironic cause its not called Toronto Fries. Anyways, after a delicious greasy meal I got really sick and passed out in the MTR station. I guess I hadn't really been paying attention to what I had been drinking, or rather what I hadn't. Apparently I was really dehydrated and by Wednesday was fully recovered!! (after sleeping and drinking water in bed all of Tuesday). So Wednesday comes around and after a full recovery, I went to Happy Valley Horse Races. My friend Sean from IU had a cousin in town and had to show her the ONLY gambling in HK. I won ~$40 HK ...which is like $5 US pretty fun though!
Thursday came around and it was time to interview a contact for my Transportation Logistics class project. Thank you to my uncle for being a great networker!! I met with a business man at APL and learned a great deal of information about the company! Friday came along and I had dim sum with 3 other exchange students. Our school has this great restaurant with delicious dim sum! After lunch me and my friend Jasmine went exploring to find a post office. Wow, I could not have been more surprised. A tiny room that didn't sell envelopes (luckily they sold padded envelopes) as I needed to send Flat Stanley back to my nephew. After that we went exploring and found this great dessert place. They have a lot of Chinese desserts for cheap! While Friday was interesting...I was super looking forward to Saturday because was off to DISNEY! Yes Disney in HK. I wasn't sure I wanted to spend $50 US to go, but it was my friends 21st and that's what she wanted to do. AND I couldn't have been more happy I joined. While its a pretty small theme park in general, it was neat to see the different cultures and have a little fun of something that reminded us of back home.
There were 4 sections to the park and it actually started off the same size as Disneyland in LA. There is Tomorrowland including Space Mountain (my fave), Buzzlight year (for pics), and a Lilo and Stitch show (didn't see it though). There was a Fantasyland with Its a Small World (my absolute fave), the Golden Mickeys Show (kind of like an Oscars show for Disney characters, really cute!), the Dumbo ride, Cinderella's Carousel, and the Pooh Ride! We did all of the rides in Fantasyland, pretty neat! After that we headed to Adventureland and watched the Lion King Show, pretty well put together. We later found out that the reason the one in HK is more of a story versus song and dancing is because the HK children don't know the story. It was pretty cute! There was Tarzan's tree house which would have driven any parent crazy!! (but apparently Tarzn was bilingual and could read Chinese AND English...which who knew Tarzan could read in the first place!?) ha..and of course Adventureland included the ride through the Jungle River. They actually had 3 different lines one for Mandarin, Cantonese, and English. You could tell our tour guide didn't really love her job as her humor was very dry, and we were the only ones laughing (5 college students). The fireworks at the end were AMAZING!!! I'm EXTREMELY sorry I can't show you pictures because I accidentally deleted them on my flash drive before I put them on my computer. But I guess it is a mistake I'll make once to never make it again!
The next day I went to Lamma Island! I'm not really sure about the history of it, but it's definitely a fishing community. There were numerous seafood restaurants on both sides of the island. We entered on one side and hiked up the mountain to the other side. Extremely beautiful!! Here are the pics:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2599643&id=6844049&l=57cfdda589
I know its pretty hazey, but everything is more beautiful in person!
After that we stopped in Central and did a little shopping (prices at stores are amazing ...2 pairs of shorts for $20 US..that's unbeatable!) It was nice to get home and relax before the next week began!!
So this past Monday the 23rd nothing really exciting happened to my knowledge. Tuesday I took a field trip to the shipyard of HK. After sitting through 2 movies about their operations and listening to a speaker, we actually got a tour of the all of the terminals on the port. It was interesting because the company that operates the majority of the terminals in the Hong Kong port, operates several terminals throughout the world, except for the United States and Canada. We were curious as to why they chose not to operate in N.America. Well our teacher explained how he had talked about it in class (woops!) the reason being that US and Canada have high security restrictions. He went on to say that this was a problem. I was like I'm not really sure how this is a problem, and he said that it would be beneficial to the company and would increase business if they got access to terminals in the US. I sort of shrugged it off saying that personally being a citizen of the US I like my security. Sorry that our security restrictions are too high and we like to protect our people!!! (Sorry to any of you reading this disagreeing!!!)
Wednesday came around and my one class was awesome!! We got cheap stones (which are usually jade, but ours were free so can't complain!) to carve our Chinese names on! This way we can stamp them whenever we do artwork or write a paper. Our professor picked our names and because the Chinese language is composed mainly of sounds, they usually choose the sound that makes your name mean something graceful. Well I don't have the sheet with me, but will have it next week, but anyways the translation for my name is a slang word for beautiful - in other words hot, or sexy. cool..i guess?? lol Anyways my friend in that class has a new pair of glasses and I commented on how cute they were, she said she bought them for $200 HK (<$30 US). So I decided I had to get in on this deal and get some cheap plastic frames. So on Thursday we went adventuring and I picked out some cute purple frames (will show you a picture when I go to pick them up!)
*Back to Wednesday, I ended up going to the Peninsula Hotel for Afternoon Tea. It was amazing!! Hot tea (about 10 different choices) and a variety of foods. I'd say its definitely a must-do in HK. While it was semi-expensive, it was worth it and filled me up!
After adventuring around glasses shopping, a friend from IU who is studying in Shanghai for the semester was in HK. I went to meet up with her and her friends. Introduced them to LKF until they discovered ids were needed to get into the clubs. So at that point we went separate ways and they adventured into other parts of LKF (like club 7-11...aka a bunch of people buying extremely cheap beer and drinking on the streets!) I ended up meeting up with some of my friends from school at Club Cliq. Wednesdays and Thursdays in most clubs are free entry and open bar for ladies, although thist was the first time I'd actually been out clubbin in a good 4-5 weeks! It was fun going with a smaller group!
Friday morning woke up pretty early to go to the Jade Market, what a disappointment! It was no where cool as I was expecting. About 25 little booths all selling the same jade carvings. While things were pretty cheap there wasn't anything I was super interested in. After that I came back home and rested and did homework the rest of the day. I met up with a friend for dinner at a fancier Chinese restaurant. I also learned that there is a legit bookstore in the mall across from my school. I was beyond stoked and bought a book...yay!
So Saturday I was so excited because I was finally going to 10,000 Buddhas. But before we got there, we had lunch at a Turkish restaurant...in HK. It was delicious! It was hard to tell what language everyone spoke. The chef was definitely not Chinese, but possibly from the Middle East or Turkey. Our waiter was a Chinese local trying to make money, and barely spoke English. And the server was a woman...and we couldn't tell what language she spoke or where she was from! Anyways after getting filled up with delicious food, we headed off.
There are very few signs towards 10,000 Buddhas as it is a hidden tourist attraction. We finally got there and headed up. Its a pretty good hike up a mountain, but well worth it (minus the fact we got eaten by mosquitoes the entire way to the top!) Here are my pics from my amazing adventure:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2599641&id=6844049&l=b522647d93
Other than that yesterday I just relaxed and got dinner with a friend (pizza actually) ...delicious!
Today I did a lot of homework because before Easter break comes up I have a couple papers and projects due and have a busy week and a half before I'm off to Cambodia!
Here's a couple of plans in place for the next couple of weeks:
Wednesday (April Fools day and 3 peoples 21st bday) - Horse races and possibly LKF
Saturday - Ocean Park
Sunday - Hike up to Monkey Hill
next Thursday - Cambodia (first stop Macau then Bangkok then Phnom Penh...yes that was the cheapest way to go!)
Friday the 17th of April - return from Cambodia
Wednesday April 22 - last day of classes!!!
Possible travels after that:
Malaysia
then finals!!!
then possible hiking/camping on a BEAUTIFUL beach in HK
then MAY 16 PARENTS COME TO HK!!!! (I'm not sure if they know this yet, but that's the plan!!) haha
Hope all is well back in the states - anyone in Colorado reading this, I'm pretty freakin jealous that you got snow, and A SNOWDAY!!! I hope everyone is having/had an AMAZING spring break...and for all you Californians...hope you have an amazing spring break :).
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Macau and such
So I know I haven't written in a long time...but that's because I haven't really done that much. Here is a little bit about what I've done and learned and then I will tell you about Macau.
I'm in 3 group projects. One with a guy from Purdue (rival) and 3 girls from HK. Our project is all about the Red Bull testing team. Yes the girls who serve samples of Red Bull to the public. Don't ask how that became our topic, please. lol. Anyways we basically have to analyze the work behavior environments of this company and organization.
My second group is with the same guy from Purdue, a guy from Arkansas, and 4 guys from HK. This topic we are doing on APL due to a reference from an uncle (thanks :). ) This project is really just learning about the company and how it operates.
Lastly my criminology group consists of a guy from Long Beach, and 2 girls from HK, and 2 other people who I have yet to meet. Our requirement is to visit a court hearing and write a 2000 word reflection essay. Well Thursday we ended up visiting the court. First of all, it took an hour to get there. Secondly, it was in Cantonese. Thirdly, the first 50 minutes of the hearing it was just the judge speaking. Needless to say there was no translator and the other exchange student and I left and said we would write a lot of the paper (after they helped translate).
Okay so this weekend I was supposed to be in Shanghai, but due to a change in a midterm, it would have been extremely inconvenient, so instead me and a friend Jennifer, from Syracuse, went to Macau. We left at around 1 pm on Friday and journeyed to the ferry, which was surprisingly empty. We landed in Macau and stepped off the boat into a rain storm that looked like it was never going to end. Luckily, by the time we got situated in our hotel around 330, it was clear, but cold. When we checked in our hotel upgraded us to a "Premier Executive Suite." Nothing special, but nice none the less.
We started our journey off at the Grand Prix Museum and Wine Museum. Personally I thought it was one of those attractions that you pass on interstates. When you are a kid you might think its cool, but when you are grown up you know better than to stop and pay for something like that. Oh well, we got to try some wine and learn some pretty neat stuff for less than $3 US. After that because of the weather, we decided to get dressed and head over to the Venetian. We picked up our tickets to see Cirque du Soleil - Zaia. We had an hour to kill so we walked around the shops and the casino. We were super stoked to see the show though and wanted to save our gambling experience for after the show. The show was amazing, tons of actors, actresses, dancers, singers, and tons of props including a 4000 pound globe. We were in LL and there were only 3 rows of seats behind us, but of the ~4000 people in the room, our seat wasn't bad at all. I would definitely recommend seeing the show - however, not if you've been to Vegas. (On the way out everyone was saying how the one in Vegas is better).
After the show we gambled the slot machines a little bit at the Venetian. I definitely left with extra money - pretty exciting!! Next stop was MGM. The hotel was back on the main island of Macau and was extremely beautiful on the inside. We walked around the casino and stopped at the slots where I proceeded to loose my winnings :(. After that we wanted to get some dessert and headed back to our hotel cause nothing was really open. Our hotel had a lounge with the most amazing desserts (chocolate mousse cake). Very delicious. While relaxing, we planned out Saturday's route for walking around and hoped for good weather. We headed up to the room and watched The Pursuit of Happyness. Yes our hotel had about 10 English channels (including HBO, ESPN, and FOX news), 7 Cantonese channels, and about 5 Portuguese channels.
Saturday we woke up and got ready for the day. We checked out of our hotel and walked outside to warm weather and sunshine. YAY! We asked the hotel for breakfast type places and he said to start walking. Eventually we found a cafe that had decent food (I didn't get much because I was looking forward to those Portuguese egg tarts). After eating we started walking around to see the temples and other ruins and shopping in Macau. We got lost, but a guy from Portugal led us to the ruins through a shopping area which was extremely convenient. Now that we knew our way around we took pictures, tried egg tarts, and did a little shopping.
We finally made our way to the casinos which was the end of our journey before bungee jumping. Don't freak, I didn't do it, but only because of the price (~$200-$300 depending on the added options like pictures, dvds) I just thought that I'd rather spend money on another trip than 15 seconds of my life. My friend Jenn wanted to jump though, so I sat at the bottom and waited and watched. It looked pretty neat, but nothing special, minus the fact it is the tallest in the world!
Here are the pics from Macau:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2589670&id=6844049&l=d9227a555e
After her jump, we headed back to HK. It was a neat relaxing trip away from HK. Can't wait for my next ones:
Cambodia
Shanghai
Malaysia
and then China with the fam. Hope all is well back home. I'm pretty sure it is, but don't rub it in because I miss it dearly!! Especially because everyone is going on SPRING BREAK!! So have fun and be safe!
- People in HK have no sense of a personal bubble. Crowding is not an issue and they don't mind getting in your face about it.
- If you are a westerner and you go into a store you get followed around. If we are getting stereotyped for being rich, isn't it true that we wouldn't need to steal something, but rather we could purchase it? So to put a positive twist on the situation, I suggested that maybe they think we will need help or have a question. However it happens in ANY store you go into.
- They have hair cut prices ranged anywhere from $10 US to $50 US and they do a GREAT job!
- Professors love to rag on America. If it is something negative, you can guarantee that America will be part of the example.
- If you want more than one packet of ketchup at McDonalds you must ask for it (sometimes twice).
- Movie theaters are extremely different. You purchase a ticket for an actual seat (ex. E4). Culture wise, people laugh.....at everything. They have sweet popcorn and salty. Sweet popcorn is caramel corn. Salty popcorn has zero toppings. No butter, no salt, no flavor shakers. However, I can go to a movie for about $6 US. So pretty cheap.
- Some parts of HK smell really bad.
- There are *BODY SHOPS* on every corner (for those of you who don't know, I'm talking about the lotion, spray, flowery type store usually in US malls).
- There is always ice cream and fruit available.
I'm in 3 group projects. One with a guy from Purdue (rival) and 3 girls from HK. Our project is all about the Red Bull testing team. Yes the girls who serve samples of Red Bull to the public. Don't ask how that became our topic, please. lol. Anyways we basically have to analyze the work behavior environments of this company and organization.
My second group is with the same guy from Purdue, a guy from Arkansas, and 4 guys from HK. This topic we are doing on APL due to a reference from an uncle (thanks :). ) This project is really just learning about the company and how it operates.
Lastly my criminology group consists of a guy from Long Beach, and 2 girls from HK, and 2 other people who I have yet to meet. Our requirement is to visit a court hearing and write a 2000 word reflection essay. Well Thursday we ended up visiting the court. First of all, it took an hour to get there. Secondly, it was in Cantonese. Thirdly, the first 50 minutes of the hearing it was just the judge speaking. Needless to say there was no translator and the other exchange student and I left and said we would write a lot of the paper (after they helped translate).
- Our groups our huge. In America we would never have group work with a team this huge.
- The language barrier has been an issue in all groups.
Okay so this weekend I was supposed to be in Shanghai, but due to a change in a midterm, it would have been extremely inconvenient, so instead me and a friend Jennifer, from Syracuse, went to Macau. We left at around 1 pm on Friday and journeyed to the ferry, which was surprisingly empty. We landed in Macau and stepped off the boat into a rain storm that looked like it was never going to end. Luckily, by the time we got situated in our hotel around 330, it was clear, but cold. When we checked in our hotel upgraded us to a "Premier Executive Suite." Nothing special, but nice none the less.
We started our journey off at the Grand Prix Museum and Wine Museum. Personally I thought it was one of those attractions that you pass on interstates. When you are a kid you might think its cool, but when you are grown up you know better than to stop and pay for something like that. Oh well, we got to try some wine and learn some pretty neat stuff for less than $3 US. After that because of the weather, we decided to get dressed and head over to the Venetian. We picked up our tickets to see Cirque du Soleil - Zaia. We had an hour to kill so we walked around the shops and the casino. We were super stoked to see the show though and wanted to save our gambling experience for after the show. The show was amazing, tons of actors, actresses, dancers, singers, and tons of props including a 4000 pound globe. We were in LL and there were only 3 rows of seats behind us, but of the ~4000 people in the room, our seat wasn't bad at all. I would definitely recommend seeing the show - however, not if you've been to Vegas. (On the way out everyone was saying how the one in Vegas is better).
After the show we gambled the slot machines a little bit at the Venetian. I definitely left with extra money - pretty exciting!! Next stop was MGM. The hotel was back on the main island of Macau and was extremely beautiful on the inside. We walked around the casino and stopped at the slots where I proceeded to loose my winnings :(. After that we wanted to get some dessert and headed back to our hotel cause nothing was really open. Our hotel had a lounge with the most amazing desserts (chocolate mousse cake). Very delicious. While relaxing, we planned out Saturday's route for walking around and hoped for good weather. We headed up to the room and watched The Pursuit of Happyness. Yes our hotel had about 10 English channels (including HBO, ESPN, and FOX news), 7 Cantonese channels, and about 5 Portuguese channels.
Saturday we woke up and got ready for the day. We checked out of our hotel and walked outside to warm weather and sunshine. YAY! We asked the hotel for breakfast type places and he said to start walking. Eventually we found a cafe that had decent food (I didn't get much because I was looking forward to those Portuguese egg tarts). After eating we started walking around to see the temples and other ruins and shopping in Macau. We got lost, but a guy from Portugal led us to the ruins through a shopping area which was extremely convenient. Now that we knew our way around we took pictures, tried egg tarts, and did a little shopping.
We finally made our way to the casinos which was the end of our journey before bungee jumping. Don't freak, I didn't do it, but only because of the price (~$200-$300 depending on the added options like pictures, dvds) I just thought that I'd rather spend money on another trip than 15 seconds of my life. My friend Jenn wanted to jump though, so I sat at the bottom and waited and watched. It looked pretty neat, but nothing special, minus the fact it is the tallest in the world!
Here are the pics from Macau:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2589670&id=6844049&l=d9227a555e
After her jump, we headed back to HK. It was a neat relaxing trip away from HK. Can't wait for my next ones:
Cambodia
Shanghai
Malaysia
and then China with the fam. Hope all is well back home. I'm pretty sure it is, but don't rub it in because I miss it dearly!! Especially because everyone is going on SPRING BREAK!! So have fun and be safe!
Saturday, February 7, 2009
More than a Month
It has been over a month since I left the states and I've had so many wonderful experiences since being away.
In the past 3 weeks I've done so many different activities and have been super busy and trying to relax, I haven't had much time to write. So here goes probably the longest post you'll see/read from me all semester.
So the couple of days before Thailand, everyone had been craving Mexican food. In central (the ex-pat part of Hong Kong), one can find just about any store or type of food. There are of course a couple of taco places, american places, burger joints, salad places, and much more. The only problem with central is it takes about 25 minutes to get there. Its not an issue, it just means the food better be well worth it. Anyways we found a place called el Taco Loco. I ordered steak fajitas and they were pretty tasty.
After eating there, we thought we'd take a journey over to a Chinese New Years Fair. It was pretty neat to see "live infomercials" and all the cutesy type gifts that would be popular for this new year of the ox. I also got to try a delicacy while at the fair. Octopus...quite different than what I was expecting. I was thinking more of a squid/calamari type taste, but not quite as rubbery. Anyways that was enough excitement for me before my trip to Thailand.
Thursday was finally leaving for Thailand day! We stuffed our cheap knock-off "Oakley backpacks??" with shirts, shorts, a pair of shoes, and swim suits and off to Macau we headed. The ferry there was quite quick as was the taxi to the airport. A group of about 25-30 people had all decided to wait to eat dinner (it was about 8 pm) until the airport. Bad idea, almost everything was closed and there was barely food anywhere. Luckily we got the last chicken nuggets at a Chinese food restaurant before closing. We arrived in Bangkok luggage and all, to a humid, loud environment. There were 8 of us who booked rooms together and off we went in the scariest taxi ride of my life to our hotel ...the Ramada. After arriving, we encountered our first learning experience of bargaining with the taxi drivers. What an obnoxious business. Eventually we checked in and passed out.
We woke up Friday to our free breakfast buffet. We had Chinese donuts, eggs, potatoes, fried rice, fresh fruit, quite an assortment of pastries, cereal, omlettes (with everything minus cheese), bacon, waffles, toast, etc. All in all it was a pretty exquisite meal to start the day. The rest of the day was spent walking around, shopping, riding in tuk-tuks, and booking our train/bus/flight (whichever we chose) to whatever island we decided to go to. Eventually we chose Phuket by bus & minibus. That night we went to a night market, the biggest one in Bangkok.
Saturday we woke up and decided to see the Grand Palace and Golden Buddha before our bus ride to Phuket. It was pretty neat to see both of them. Here are the pictures from that day...
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2568740&l=6b4f2&id=6844049
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2568752&l=050fc&id=6844049
Saturday 7 pm - Sunday at 11 am - Charter bus to mini bus to hostel. It was probably the 3rd most frustrating experience of our trip, but needless to say once we saw the ocean there were nothing but smiles on our faces. The rest of that day was spent on the beach soaking up the rays in Phuket. We ran into other people from our school and had dinner with them at a local restaurant.
Monday our friends who were staying at the same hostel as us joined us (except not til 6 pm. Their bus experience was quite worse than ours ...as it was 22 hours long). But before meeting them for dinner and a night of fun, we spent the day on the beach again. That night we went to dinner and strolled down the street of bars. We came into our first contact with a ladyboy, which was pretty crazy. In case you didn't know, Thailand is known for having lots of transgendered people, as well as all of the surgeries (just watch the Real World: Brooklyn). Well after that 1 minute of being followed by a lady boy, a couple of us went home, while the others went to an Aussie bar, but weren't really welcomed there. After all, we are Americans lol.
The next day we did a tour near Phuket which included riding elephants, a hike to a waterfall, a view of the Gibbons project, and a ride in a cart pulled by an ox. Clearly it is obvious to tell what part was the most fun. Our elephant care taker was hilarious. He let my friend Audrey from IU sit on the head. He barely knew any English but "Oh my god" and "bye bye." He was this cute little Thai man probably about 5'1 and weighed 100 pounds, but by far was so entertaining and had quite a sense of humor. After the elephant ride they lead us to the "ox ride," which I'm surely you can guess was so thrilling, no one took pictures. Anyways some videos of the Gibbons Project are below. It was pretty neat to see these "monkeys" in action. Our tour guide you could tell had 2 part time jobs as he led tours during the day, but was a lady by night. He barely knew English and didn't tell us much about the project, but it was neat anyways.
The last couple of days in Phuket were spent shopping for dresses (5<$25 U.S. dollars), swimming, aloe massages, and eating. On Wednesday night it was time to return to Bangkok. We packed our now completely stuffed backpacks with our new purchases and headed towards the "12 hour bus-ride." Which actually was only 12.5 hours, not a bad estimate this time. So Thursday morning at 7 a.m. we finally negotiated our taxi ride to our final hotel. Not only did we overpay by 10 extra U.S. dollars but our hotel wanted extra money for early check in. At that point we broke down and started crying. While early check in wasn't free, we definitely got a discount and good service from there on out. We sent Peter (a kid from IU, and me and Jasmine's accompanier) off to the airport (he was leaving early), while we took a well-needed nap.
We woke up around lunch time and headed to the best shopping area in Bangkok. After spending more money and getting pedicures, we met up with my friend who graduated from Indiana University in 2008 and lives in Thailand. She took us to this amazing local cheap Thai restaurant and then to a fancy mall close by. The mall had all kinds of local desserts and samples at every station. Of course we had to try. Our favorite was this green-goo that was spilled on to toast. Clearly if we had eaten that everyday we would have gained about 20 pounds on our trip. Good thing we didn't find out about it until our last day there :). That night we spent at the night market to get our foot massages and any last gifts needed.
Overall Thailand was amazing. The best parts about it were the cheap prices and the food. The food was by far the best food I had ever tried in a different country. I had fresh fruit in Phuket daily. I had pad thai daily and either green curry or fried rice for my other meal. We had 50 cent dipped cones for snacks to keep cool from the sun. I ate a waffle filled with bananas for less than a dollar. I tried a bit of a cinnamon/sugar crepe. We actually ate pizza (yes I know...). I tried a Singapore Sling and a Mai Thai drink. Overall it was a pretty great experience. If you are ever in Phuket and are on a budget, stay at Divers Den. It was a nice hostel across from a mall and a market and a grocery store. The best thing about Phuket was that everything was within walking distance.
Coming back to Hong Kong was nice, minus the significant change in weather (and lack of delicious food). We went from wearing swim suits on the beach to wearing winter coats to dinner. It was interesting to hear the others' experiences in Thailand. I heard no complaints except about the bus transportation.
On the Saturday I returned I had the chance to go up to The Peak. It was pretty cool, but I discovered my camera is not the best at taking night pictures. Here are some pictures from my trip up there.
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=49106792&l=dbd5e&id=6844049
Anyways, this week was back to school through boring lectures. Wednesday afternoon was my first time meeting with my ELMS group. English Language Mentoring Scheme is an optional program in which people who excel in English help first year students improve their English. Throughout the semester, I get to meet with a group of 5 students and choose different activities to partake in. I get an allowance of $1000 H.K. dollars (about $150 U.S.) and front the money for activities and get refunded at the end (that is the only bad part).
My group has 2 girls and 3 boys, only 1 girl from mainland China, the rest from Hong Kong. We will meet for an hour each week doing various things like: bbqing, watching a movie (in English), playing board games, ice skating, and possibly badminton or table tennis. At my meeting, one of the boys decided to bring a friend, so I actually had 6 people. The first 30 minutes of my group meeting involved pulling teeth to get a single word out of these locals. I spoke about everything I could imagine, trying to get a conversation. I mentioned everything that I could relating to me: San Fransisco, Colorado, snowboarding, the mountains, Indiana, shopping, business, Ghana, Israel, Mexico, Thailand....still it was just me talking. Two of the boys had class, so they actually left a little early. Once it was down to 4 people, words started coming out. It was question after question, but at least they were curious and talking! Then one more boy had to leave for class, and it was down to BJ, Linda, and Dorothy. They asked so many questions we stayed for an extra 10 minutes. It was a neat experience and I look forward to teaching them more, and learning more about each and everyone of them. This coming Wednesday we'll be playing board games...I'll tell ya more about that next week :).
On Friday, some people from my Chinese Civilization class took our tour at the Hong Kong Heritage Museum. It cost us about 70 cents (US) to see a museum that had about 6 exhibits. We spent about an hour and a half before we got hungry/too tired. Our assignment is to write a 1200 word essay about one exhibit. This particular museum wouldn't let us take pictures, but at least most of the exhibits had brochures to help us jog our memory. After that we went to grab lunch. I had a fried pork chop, mmmm delicious!
Today is Saturday and I've just been catching up on school work because tomorrow we will be heading to Pontoi Island all day.
Everything is pretty great out here, but I miss everyone at home quite a bit!!! Sooo jealous IU had a snow day!! Misss yaaa!!
In the past 3 weeks I've done so many different activities and have been super busy and trying to relax, I haven't had much time to write. So here goes probably the longest post you'll see/read from me all semester.
So the couple of days before Thailand, everyone had been craving Mexican food. In central (the ex-pat part of Hong Kong), one can find just about any store or type of food. There are of course a couple of taco places, american places, burger joints, salad places, and much more. The only problem with central is it takes about 25 minutes to get there. Its not an issue, it just means the food better be well worth it. Anyways we found a place called el Taco Loco. I ordered steak fajitas and they were pretty tasty.
After eating there, we thought we'd take a journey over to a Chinese New Years Fair. It was pretty neat to see "live infomercials" and all the cutesy type gifts that would be popular for this new year of the ox. I also got to try a delicacy while at the fair. Octopus...quite different than what I was expecting. I was thinking more of a squid/calamari type taste, but not quite as rubbery. Anyways that was enough excitement for me before my trip to Thailand.
Thursday was finally leaving for Thailand day! We stuffed our cheap knock-off "Oakley backpacks??" with shirts, shorts, a pair of shoes, and swim suits and off to Macau we headed. The ferry there was quite quick as was the taxi to the airport. A group of about 25-30 people had all decided to wait to eat dinner (it was about 8 pm) until the airport. Bad idea, almost everything was closed and there was barely food anywhere. Luckily we got the last chicken nuggets at a Chinese food restaurant before closing. We arrived in Bangkok luggage and all, to a humid, loud environment. There were 8 of us who booked rooms together and off we went in the scariest taxi ride of my life to our hotel ...the Ramada. After arriving, we encountered our first learning experience of bargaining with the taxi drivers. What an obnoxious business. Eventually we checked in and passed out.
We woke up Friday to our free breakfast buffet. We had Chinese donuts, eggs, potatoes, fried rice, fresh fruit, quite an assortment of pastries, cereal, omlettes (with everything minus cheese), bacon, waffles, toast, etc. All in all it was a pretty exquisite meal to start the day. The rest of the day was spent walking around, shopping, riding in tuk-tuks, and booking our train/bus/flight (whichever we chose) to whatever island we decided to go to. Eventually we chose Phuket by bus & minibus. That night we went to a night market, the biggest one in Bangkok.
Saturday we woke up and decided to see the Grand Palace and Golden Buddha before our bus ride to Phuket. It was pretty neat to see both of them. Here are the pictures from that day...
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2568740&l=6b4f2&id=6844049
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2568752&l=050fc&id=6844049
Saturday 7 pm - Sunday at 11 am - Charter bus to mini bus to hostel. It was probably the 3rd most frustrating experience of our trip, but needless to say once we saw the ocean there were nothing but smiles on our faces. The rest of that day was spent on the beach soaking up the rays in Phuket. We ran into other people from our school and had dinner with them at a local restaurant.
Monday our friends who were staying at the same hostel as us joined us (except not til 6 pm. Their bus experience was quite worse than ours ...as it was 22 hours long). But before meeting them for dinner and a night of fun, we spent the day on the beach again. That night we went to dinner and strolled down the street of bars. We came into our first contact with a ladyboy, which was pretty crazy. In case you didn't know, Thailand is known for having lots of transgendered people, as well as all of the surgeries (just watch the Real World: Brooklyn). Well after that 1 minute of being followed by a lady boy, a couple of us went home, while the others went to an Aussie bar, but weren't really welcomed there. After all, we are Americans lol.
The next day we did a tour near Phuket which included riding elephants, a hike to a waterfall, a view of the Gibbons project, and a ride in a cart pulled by an ox. Clearly it is obvious to tell what part was the most fun. Our elephant care taker was hilarious. He let my friend Audrey from IU sit on the head. He barely knew any English but "Oh my god" and "bye bye." He was this cute little Thai man probably about 5'1 and weighed 100 pounds, but by far was so entertaining and had quite a sense of humor. After the elephant ride they lead us to the "ox ride," which I'm surely you can guess was so thrilling, no one took pictures. Anyways some videos of the Gibbons Project are below. It was pretty neat to see these "monkeys" in action. Our tour guide you could tell had 2 part time jobs as he led tours during the day, but was a lady by night. He barely knew English and didn't tell us much about the project, but it was neat anyways.
The last couple of days in Phuket were spent shopping for dresses (5<$25 U.S. dollars), swimming, aloe massages, and eating. On Wednesday night it was time to return to Bangkok. We packed our now completely stuffed backpacks with our new purchases and headed towards the "12 hour bus-ride." Which actually was only 12.5 hours, not a bad estimate this time. So Thursday morning at 7 a.m. we finally negotiated our taxi ride to our final hotel. Not only did we overpay by 10 extra U.S. dollars but our hotel wanted extra money for early check in. At that point we broke down and started crying. While early check in wasn't free, we definitely got a discount and good service from there on out. We sent Peter (a kid from IU, and me and Jasmine's accompanier) off to the airport (he was leaving early), while we took a well-needed nap.
We woke up around lunch time and headed to the best shopping area in Bangkok. After spending more money and getting pedicures, we met up with my friend who graduated from Indiana University in 2008 and lives in Thailand. She took us to this amazing local cheap Thai restaurant and then to a fancy mall close by. The mall had all kinds of local desserts and samples at every station. Of course we had to try. Our favorite was this green-goo that was spilled on to toast. Clearly if we had eaten that everyday we would have gained about 20 pounds on our trip. Good thing we didn't find out about it until our last day there :). That night we spent at the night market to get our foot massages and any last gifts needed.
Overall Thailand was amazing. The best parts about it were the cheap prices and the food. The food was by far the best food I had ever tried in a different country. I had fresh fruit in Phuket daily. I had pad thai daily and either green curry or fried rice for my other meal. We had 50 cent dipped cones for snacks to keep cool from the sun. I ate a waffle filled with bananas for less than a dollar. I tried a bit of a cinnamon/sugar crepe. We actually ate pizza (yes I know...). I tried a Singapore Sling and a Mai Thai drink. Overall it was a pretty great experience. If you are ever in Phuket and are on a budget, stay at Divers Den. It was a nice hostel across from a mall and a market and a grocery store. The best thing about Phuket was that everything was within walking distance.
Coming back to Hong Kong was nice, minus the significant change in weather (and lack of delicious food). We went from wearing swim suits on the beach to wearing winter coats to dinner. It was interesting to hear the others' experiences in Thailand. I heard no complaints except about the bus transportation.
On the Saturday I returned I had the chance to go up to The Peak. It was pretty cool, but I discovered my camera is not the best at taking night pictures. Here are some pictures from my trip up there.
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=49106792&l=dbd5e&id=6844049
Anyways, this week was back to school through boring lectures. Wednesday afternoon was my first time meeting with my ELMS group. English Language Mentoring Scheme is an optional program in which people who excel in English help first year students improve their English. Throughout the semester, I get to meet with a group of 5 students and choose different activities to partake in. I get an allowance of $1000 H.K. dollars (about $150 U.S.) and front the money for activities and get refunded at the end (that is the only bad part).
My group has 2 girls and 3 boys, only 1 girl from mainland China, the rest from Hong Kong. We will meet for an hour each week doing various things like: bbqing, watching a movie (in English), playing board games, ice skating, and possibly badminton or table tennis. At my meeting, one of the boys decided to bring a friend, so I actually had 6 people. The first 30 minutes of my group meeting involved pulling teeth to get a single word out of these locals. I spoke about everything I could imagine, trying to get a conversation. I mentioned everything that I could relating to me: San Fransisco, Colorado, snowboarding, the mountains, Indiana, shopping, business, Ghana, Israel, Mexico, Thailand....still it was just me talking. Two of the boys had class, so they actually left a little early. Once it was down to 4 people, words started coming out. It was question after question, but at least they were curious and talking! Then one more boy had to leave for class, and it was down to BJ, Linda, and Dorothy. They asked so many questions we stayed for an extra 10 minutes. It was a neat experience and I look forward to teaching them more, and learning more about each and everyone of them. This coming Wednesday we'll be playing board games...I'll tell ya more about that next week :).
On Friday, some people from my Chinese Civilization class took our tour at the Hong Kong Heritage Museum. It cost us about 70 cents (US) to see a museum that had about 6 exhibits. We spent about an hour and a half before we got hungry/too tired. Our assignment is to write a 1200 word essay about one exhibit. This particular museum wouldn't let us take pictures, but at least most of the exhibits had brochures to help us jog our memory. After that we went to grab lunch. I had a fried pork chop, mmmm delicious!
Today is Saturday and I've just been catching up on school work because tomorrow we will be heading to Pontoi Island all day.
Everything is pretty great out here, but I miss everyone at home quite a bit!!! Sooo jealous IU had a snow day!! Misss yaaa!!
Monday, January 19, 2009
Monday, monday....
Saturday...Cultural tour of Hong Kong, what could be cooler right??? WRONG...what a waste of money. It was a tour set up for the exchange student at CityU, but turned out to be BORING!! We had the option to choose cultural tour of Hong Kong or urban tour - the obvious choice is culture. If I want to see buildings and explore tall skyscrapers, I can do that on my own time...I'm not going to pay someone to show me that stuff. Okay now back to the tour, its 10 am, and everyone is so excited to get on this coach bus and see Hong Kong. Our tour guide (you can see her in my album in the little pink shirt), is beyond ecstatic and is talk talk talking away while we leave CityU. She points out little sites here and there, tells us that Jackie Chan's OFFICE is a block away from our school but he only comes about once a month. (really...that was all I needed to know, thanks for my cultural tour, I'm done now!!!) JK...So we drive through the new territories and see some of the night spots during the day (completely different scenery). Then we all took quick little naps as we hear we are taking a 2 hour hike once we park.
We wake up to the biggest paved hill ever and walk up to find a museum. It was the Heritage Trail Visitors Center (sorry but its NOT CENTRE..like it says on the brochure...and yes I know I'm not stupid HK was a British colony), and the Ping Shan Tang Clan Gallery. We walked through quite quickly and learned a little bit about the past rituals of marriages and other customs. Then we took a quick walk to some temples and looked around at the views. The bus picked us up around 1 and drove us to the Seafood Restaurant. We were served chicken, pork, oysters, shrimp with eyes and their skeleton, beef with celery, a cabbage that looks similar to bok choi, fish in lemon sauce, dry white rice, and tea. So far I'm sticking to the pork, fish, veggies, rice, and tea. We finished up lunch with the tradition of eating oranges. Apparently in Chinese culture it is rude to just ask for the bill, so instead people ask for oranges signifying the meal is coming to an end.
After lunch there was a seafood market which we walked down. Sorry I didn't get any pictures of it, but it was smelly and all raw seafood that was the same at each stand. Next time I'll take more pictures!! At the end of the market we reached the ocean, but not just any ocean, the ocean which leads to China. So we all squinted through the smog and saw some building outlines...hooray!! After this we were taken to some visitor center that had some bridges nearby. We didn't really learn anything about why we were taken there. After that it was home to get ready for Macau, oh wait, just kidding!! That tour wore so many of us out we all took naps and said we'd go to Macau another time. No point in wasting money when we are going to Thailand on Thursday!!
PICS FROM THE CULTURAL TOUR: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2562167&l=70887&id=6844049
After me and the girls (Jasmine who is like in all of my pictures, goes to S.F. State, Latora who studied in Ghana last semester, Sarah from Canada, and Audrey from IU)...went to Mongkok to find some food. After my excessive coughing and loss of voice we also decided to get me some medicine and hope I'd get better! After walking around Mongkok for probably half an hour ...we finally found a restaurant that was basically the most amazing food we'd all eaten so far. I had a shrimp and salmon caesar salad with french onion soup, others had spicy crab soup, a sandwich, and gourmet pasta. Everything looked so good on the menu it was really hard to choose. The desserts were the best looking but we were honestly stuffed from our meals that we decided we'd have to come back again. Next we went off to go bowling in Kowloon Bay with some other people including a Hong Kong local. A couple of us watched while a couple spared the night away...ha..ha. The night ended in great fun and we took the last MTR home and passed out softly and soundly.
Sunday I literally did homework, watched every possible show on MTV.COM, and slept all day. I was determined to get better and gain my voice back. I totally don't regret not going to Macau, it was a lazy day that I needed. So around midnight (between Sunday and Monday) I say goodnight to my parents, finish booking my hotel in Bangkok, and talk a little bit to friends back home. Get in my bed start watching a movie on my ipod touch :) ....realize at 4 a.m. I'm still up coughing...not okay!! sooo I change my alarm from 10:40 (my classes on Monday don't start till 12:30...) to 8 o clock, determined to go to the medical clinic....UGH!!!
So at 8 I wake up ....and head down to the clinic. Fastest doctor visit I've ever had. They doctor prescribed me 4 medicines (who knew I needed that much) and that was that. Medical care at CityU is great!!
Finally time for my first class, my IS class where I don't know a single soul, until today!! First I talk with the professor (which local students never do), then I meet a girl, Selina, from Shenzhen, China. She was really sweet and whenever someone was saying something in Cantonese, someone would translate. The class is pretty simple its all about logical algorithms and programing them into computers...the not so simple part is binary code, but we'll see how that goes.
Second class, time for Transportation Logistics. We had to get into groups and the professor encouraged all of the exchange students and local students to mix together. So I'm in a group with Matt (from Purdue), Luis (from Arkansas), and 4 guys from Hong Kong (Raphael, Kwan, Jerry, and Keenan). Seems pretty exciting...we'll see how it goes!
After class, met up with Jasmine to go to Taste (the "expensive" grocery store) to get some dinner. In the evening (guessing around 6), all of the fresh stuff (sandwiches, wraps, salads, sushi) goes on sale. It was a really rough decision on what to choose but I ended up going with the equivalent of a spider roll...and got some raspberries for dessert...yum!! We had back to Student Res to eat. I put wasabi on all of my rolls, biggest mistake of my life. Apparently wasabi in HK is about ...I don't know I'd guess 10 times as spicy as wasabi in the states. After already having an irritated throat from my cough the last thing I needed is to be coughing from wasabi. Lets just say my face was red and I couldn't stop coughing for a good 5 minutes...at least the cafeteria was loud :). Anyways, tomorrow is my friend Jasmine's 21st bday so we are all going out to celebrate, or rather I'm tagging along for a little bit since drinking is clearly not on my menu tonight. Everyone is really excited for Hong Kong and counting down the days...or rather hours!!
Miss the US a little bit.....(minus the weather of course). If anyone has any suggestions/comments/concerns for Thailand, let me know please :) razberries71@gmail.com
We wake up to the biggest paved hill ever and walk up to find a museum. It was the Heritage Trail Visitors Center (sorry but its NOT CENTRE..like it says on the brochure...and yes I know I'm not stupid HK was a British colony), and the Ping Shan Tang Clan Gallery. We walked through quite quickly and learned a little bit about the past rituals of marriages and other customs. Then we took a quick walk to some temples and looked around at the views. The bus picked us up around 1 and drove us to the Seafood Restaurant. We were served chicken, pork, oysters, shrimp with eyes and their skeleton, beef with celery, a cabbage that looks similar to bok choi, fish in lemon sauce, dry white rice, and tea. So far I'm sticking to the pork, fish, veggies, rice, and tea. We finished up lunch with the tradition of eating oranges. Apparently in Chinese culture it is rude to just ask for the bill, so instead people ask for oranges signifying the meal is coming to an end.
After lunch there was a seafood market which we walked down. Sorry I didn't get any pictures of it, but it was smelly and all raw seafood that was the same at each stand. Next time I'll take more pictures!! At the end of the market we reached the ocean, but not just any ocean, the ocean which leads to China. So we all squinted through the smog and saw some building outlines...hooray!! After this we were taken to some visitor center that had some bridges nearby. We didn't really learn anything about why we were taken there. After that it was home to get ready for Macau, oh wait, just kidding!! That tour wore so many of us out we all took naps and said we'd go to Macau another time. No point in wasting money when we are going to Thailand on Thursday!!
PICS FROM THE CULTURAL TOUR: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2562167&l=70887&id=6844049
After me and the girls (Jasmine who is like in all of my pictures, goes to S.F. State, Latora who studied in Ghana last semester, Sarah from Canada, and Audrey from IU)...went to Mongkok to find some food. After my excessive coughing and loss of voice we also decided to get me some medicine and hope I'd get better! After walking around Mongkok for probably half an hour ...we finally found a restaurant that was basically the most amazing food we'd all eaten so far. I had a shrimp and salmon caesar salad with french onion soup, others had spicy crab soup, a sandwich, and gourmet pasta. Everything looked so good on the menu it was really hard to choose. The desserts were the best looking but we were honestly stuffed from our meals that we decided we'd have to come back again. Next we went off to go bowling in Kowloon Bay with some other people including a Hong Kong local. A couple of us watched while a couple spared the night away...ha..ha. The night ended in great fun and we took the last MTR home and passed out softly and soundly.
Sunday I literally did homework, watched every possible show on MTV.COM, and slept all day. I was determined to get better and gain my voice back. I totally don't regret not going to Macau, it was a lazy day that I needed. So around midnight (between Sunday and Monday) I say goodnight to my parents, finish booking my hotel in Bangkok, and talk a little bit to friends back home. Get in my bed start watching a movie on my ipod touch :) ....realize at 4 a.m. I'm still up coughing...not okay!! sooo I change my alarm from 10:40 (my classes on Monday don't start till 12:30...) to 8 o clock, determined to go to the medical clinic....UGH!!!
So at 8 I wake up ....and head down to the clinic. Fastest doctor visit I've ever had. They doctor prescribed me 4 medicines (who knew I needed that much) and that was that. Medical care at CityU is great!!
Finally time for my first class, my IS class where I don't know a single soul, until today!! First I talk with the professor (which local students never do), then I meet a girl, Selina, from Shenzhen, China. She was really sweet and whenever someone was saying something in Cantonese, someone would translate. The class is pretty simple its all about logical algorithms and programing them into computers...the not so simple part is binary code, but we'll see how that goes.
Second class, time for Transportation Logistics. We had to get into groups and the professor encouraged all of the exchange students and local students to mix together. So I'm in a group with Matt (from Purdue), Luis (from Arkansas), and 4 guys from Hong Kong (Raphael, Kwan, Jerry, and Keenan). Seems pretty exciting...we'll see how it goes!
After class, met up with Jasmine to go to Taste (the "expensive" grocery store) to get some dinner. In the evening (guessing around 6), all of the fresh stuff (sandwiches, wraps, salads, sushi) goes on sale. It was a really rough decision on what to choose but I ended up going with the equivalent of a spider roll...and got some raspberries for dessert...yum!! We had back to Student Res to eat. I put wasabi on all of my rolls, biggest mistake of my life. Apparently wasabi in HK is about ...I don't know I'd guess 10 times as spicy as wasabi in the states. After already having an irritated throat from my cough the last thing I needed is to be coughing from wasabi. Lets just say my face was red and I couldn't stop coughing for a good 5 minutes...at least the cafeteria was loud :). Anyways, tomorrow is my friend Jasmine's 21st bday so we are all going out to celebrate, or rather I'm tagging along for a little bit since drinking is clearly not on my menu tonight. Everyone is really excited for Hong Kong and counting down the days...or rather hours!!
Miss the US a little bit.....(minus the weather of course). If anyone has any suggestions/comments/concerns for Thailand, let me know please :) razberries71@gmail.com
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