School's Out!

It's officially summer vacation! Class three was almost as excited as me! Next stop, Japan!

Saigon

Saigon is a great city. We arrived really late/early the first day of our vacation, due to the delay in Shanghai. By the time we got down to the backpackers district, it was nearly 4 am, and our pre-booked hotel had closed! Luckily, we were able to find a hotel that was open, but had to wake the receptionist.

We explored Saigon one day on foot, and were able to see most of the tourist sites that way. Here's some of my favorite pictures of Saigon during the beginning and last few days in Vietnam.

The motorists would stop along the sidewalk to grab a quick bite of something:


Colorful tropical fruits at the Ben Than Market:


The beautiful Notre Dame Cathedral:


The best Pho we had in all of Vietnam:


We saw a few motorbikes...


And finally, the great Ho Chi Minh:

Vietnam- Tentative Itinerary

I'll be leaving for Vietnam soon. I have 10 official vacation days this winter, and I planned to take it over the Chinese Lunar New Year, giving me 3 extra "free" vacation days. I'll be in southern to south-central Vietnam for a total of 18 days!

I'm flying down to Ho Chi Minh City with Amanda, and Christina will join us a day later. The rooms are so cheap, Amanda and I decided to splurge on a $10 each hotel room rather than stay in a $5 each dorm room for the first night. However, when we're all together, we'll just stay in hostels.

We each have ideas of what we want to do, but nothing set in stone other than the first two days. We'll be staying in HCMC for a few days. I can't wait to explore and see all the French architecture! Oh, and dodge lots of motorbikes.



We want to do a few tours when we're there- The Mekong Delta (hopefully an overnight tour) and the Cu Chi tunnels.



From there, we'll probably go up to Mui Ne, a beach town famous for their sand dunes. I may consider getting a wind surfing lesson one afternoon, depending on the prices.





We may go up to Pan Thiet, the home of Vietnamese Fish Sauce. But we'll definitely make our way to Dalat, a kind of quirky town in the central highlands for some real adventure- canyoning, trekking, and mountain biking:





After mountain biking for a day through the scenic highlands, we'll end up in Nha Trang, just before Tet and spend our days relaxing on the beach, pina colada in hand. I also hope to do an island hopping tour and go snorkeling/scuba diving.





Eventually, we'll have to come back to HCMC, but I'm sure we'll just wish we could stay! One thing the three of us are really looking forward to is the food! Pho, spring rolls, dimsum, Vietnamese sandwiches, French bread, and real coffee! I can't wait to eat authentic, street vendor pho!



Anyone have any other suggestions of places to see or things to do?

USA Vacation

During my 25 days in the USA for summer vacation, I did a lot of nice things with my family and ate some great food! The big event that happened while at home in WI was going to my grandparent's 60th anniversary! We had a family reunion weekend filled with family, food, and fun times. Here they are with their cake!



Happy Anniversary!

As for returning back to Korea, I'm leaving Friday and will arrive Saturday night. I know I'm going to be jet lagged, and am not looking forward to having only 1 day to recoup before going to school on Monday!

Malaysia Trip Day 8~ The Last Day

On the last day, I had until around 8:30pm to goof around and see even more of the city. I spent the night in a comfortable bed (the bed in the private room was so uncomfortable, but the bed in the dorms were much nicer!) and slept soundly.

The first sight I saw was the National Monument, which is located close to the Lake Gardens in KL. It was designed by the same person who created Iwo Jima and is the worlds largest freestanding bronze sculpture.



The Lake Gardens themselves are very scenic and it's hard to believe its right in the middle of a huge city. I saw the hibiscius and orchid gardens, which were very pretty and the smells, oh, it smelled so great! The hibiscius is the national flower and wow, so gorgeous!



These are some orchids that were for sale in the Orchid Garden:



In the Lake Gardens, there is also a bird park. It is the worlds largest free-flight bird park. It is 3.2 hectares and there are about 2000 birds roaming about freely. I spent about 3 hours there! It was a lot of fun and I couldn't believe the amount of birds. Here are some of my favorite pictures:



I'd probably be pretty pissed too if I had this on my head:





This bird wanted some of my sandwich



Here's some birds sunning themselves:



It was a great end to a wonderful vacation, one I'm sure to never forget! ^^

Malaysia Trip Day 7

Today was pretty much all travel by the time I got going... 5 hours on a bus!

Before I left, I stopped at a McDonalds for a quick lunch and accidentally bumped into someone from Lacrosse, WI! It's such a small world!

I didn't have any problems with the bus, yay! It was such a relief! It was an incredibly scenic ride. For 5 hours, all I saw was palm tree after palm trees. It would be like driving through the WI northwoods if all the pine trees were palm trees. We also got to see some of the Cameron Highlands, basically limestone mountains. Here's a view of some palm trees with mountains in the background:



Back in KL, I stayed at the same hostel, Red Palm, in Bukit Bintang. I did some shopping in the many malls in the area. I had to restock on some English books, I've gotten 4 new novels already. I know I've purchased a lot on this trip, but most things are presents for some people back home~ Happy Birthday, Mom! :)

Malaysia Trip Day 6

I was really excited to get back out on the motorbike this morning for the last day on Langkawi, so I forced myself to get out of bed early. When I got out on the road, I didn't have to make as many stops today because I knew where I wanted to go and how to get there without getting lost.

My first stop was Seven Wells Waterfall. I asked at the hotel which waterfall was the best, because I had a limited amount of time. They said Seven Wells, because there is a total of 7 waterfalls, including one large one. Compared to other waterfalls I've seen, this one wasn't too special. Not to high, not too wide, but it was still pretty. There were tons of large rocks at the bottom, which the water had smoothed over many years. I had to concentrate as I walked over them so I didn't slip!



This is above the large waterfall, where the other 6 smaller falls are located. I felt like I was on the edge of the world here. It was really slippery in this area!



For lunch, I went to a Thai restaurant on Chenang Beach, Sawadee Thai Seafood Restaurant. I really wanted to get just a basic Pad Thai, but they didn't have any. I opted for lobster, but because it wasn't fresh, as in caught that day, the waitress recommended the King Prawn. King it was! There were only 2 of them, and they were so huge! I got the kind with a pineapple glaze and it was delicious. Look at how big they are!



Late in the afternoon, I took a three hour ferry ride to Georgetown. On the way, I enjoyed some of the chocolates I bought in Duty Free. Langkawi earned duty free status a while back, and you can find good deals on perfume, alcohol, cigarettes, and chocolate. Since chocolate is very expensive in Korea, I decided to get MnM's and Whoppers... yum!

By the time I made it to Georgetown, it was dark and I was ready to crash. I had a few problems locating where to buy a bus ticket to Kuala Lumpur, thankfully I managed to get one for 12:30 the next day.

I stayed at the Hutton Lodge which is right next to the biggest night market in Georgetown. Unfortunately, I didn't have much time and was exhausted by the time I made it there. I was just hoping that I didn't have nearly as many problems making it back to KL as I did leaving KL!

Malaysia Day 5

I spent most of day riding on the motorbike my hotel hooked me up with. It cost about $30 for two days, which is a ton less than taking taxi's all around the island. I put two liters of gas in, and that cost about $1.50, so pretty good.

Once I got used to the bike, I rode up to Telga Harbor Park, which was so beautiful. It was windy but the bright blue water made up for it.



There was also the prettiest hotel on the bay, called Berjaya Langkawi Beach Resort. I would have loved to have stayed here, too bad the room rates were through the roof!



Later on, I cruised up to the cable car and oriental village. I was excited to see this so called Oriental village. To me, it looked like something you'd find in Disneyworld.



I had to wait about 2 hours to get up to the top, by the time I waited to stand in line and then stand in line and take the car up. I was lucky and met 4 fun Malayan young adults my age. We rode up together and hung around up top. Once we got to the top, the view was incredible! It was hard to tell where the water stopped and the sky began, it was all the same blue color. There was a rumor about it being cold up on the top, but it was still really hot! Here are the guys I met:



This is what part of the island and mountains look like:



Here's a view of the water and sky:



After taking numerous pictures, I got back on to the road and went to some beaches. I had to stop a few times to look at the monkey's sitting on the side of the road:



I relaxed on an almost-deserted beach, Tanjung Rhu. There are three small islands that you can walk to on the sandbar during low tide. I did that and as I was walking, I saw a gorgeous sunset. Here I am on the sandbar on the way back from the smaller islands.



I did a lot today, and had an awesome time on the motorbike. On the way back to the hotel, I got it up to 80 kph on the freeway. I'd love to have one of those back home!

Malaysia Trip Day 3- The rest of the day

So we eventually made it to Kuala Perlis around 9 am. After buying ferry tickets at the jetty, we had an hour and a half to kill. We grabbed some mango and honeydew, and tried the traditional Malay breakfast of roti canai. It is a pancake that sometimes includes an egg, and you dip it in a yummy curry sauce. It was tasty, but not very filling. This is kind of what it looked like:



We had no problems on the ferry; it took about an hour to get there. The boarding process seemed to take forever though! I thanked my new Iranian friends before leaving because without them, I'd probably still be in KL! I had successfully made it to Langkawi, an island off the west coast of Malaysia, so far north it is practically Thailand.

The island was a lot bigger than I was expecting. The taxi ride to the airport was about 30 km! I stayed at Hotel Helang, which isn't on the beach, but the only hotel I could find for 4 nights in a row at the same place. Apparently everyone, even non-Chinese people, take a holiday during the New Year, so most places were packed. And with the $50 a night price tag, I could hardly beat that!

After a brief shower, I was off to Chenang Beach on the west coast of the island. It is one of the most popular beaches, and is where most of the "life" is. Here, you can swim, jet ski, ride a banana boat, parasail, or just relax with a book and beer in hand at one of the many beachfront cafes. I bought a chair for myr 10, kicked my shoes off, and enjoyed the scenery:



Once the wind changed directions, there were tons of people out parasailing. Most of the time, there were 5 different parasails up in the sky. It looked like a ton of fun, and even though I was pretty nervous, I gave it a shot. I'm so glad I did! It was fantastic! I could see everything it felt like. The surrounding islands were gorgeous, and I could see all of the 2km long beach. I've never done anything like it before, and would have loved to have gone a second time. I'm the one that is up the highest in the picture:



It ended up to be an excellent afternoon and evening, despite the stress earlier on! After having some dinner at one of those beachfront cafe's, I called it a night and headed back to the hotel. The lack of sleep and the sun made me completely exhausted!

Malaysia Trip Day 3- The Early Morning

I thought everything would go smoothly with riding the bus to Kuala Perlis. I guess I'll just start with arriving at the bus terminal...

When I got to Puduraya, it was packed. It was still about 85 degrees and 90% humidity. I was tired after carrying my bags but I was still really, really excited about going to the island. I made it to the gate easily enough and had about 1 hour to wait until departure time. I killed that time by playing Sudoku. I also happened to meet a Malayan who was on the same bus as me, so I waited with him.

That may have been the first thing I did wrong. Since the announcements were in Malayan, I of course had no idea what was going on. He was nice about it and said that he'd tell me when the bus was leaving, and we would go together. Well, it got to be about 11:50, and I asked him if we should go. He said, "not yet." So we waited and waited some more. Right at 12, he gave the signal to go downstairs to the platform. I hadn't considered how crowded the platform would be! It was packed, and I immediately lost my guide in the sea of tourists. The good thing was, or so I thought at the time, was that EVERYONE on the platform was going to Kuala Perlis. So I'd just wait with them, right? Wrong. It got to be after 12, then 12:15, and everyone was chatting and waiting. I was standing with some people when we decided to look at our tickets. Even though we were all supposed to go to Perlis at 12 from the same platform, we were apparently on different busses. Oh crap.

Then, someone looked at my ticket, and said, "Oh, you're bus 59, not 3359. Bus 59 left about 15 minutes ago." Oh shit. I started to sweat even more, and my world came crashing down. I wanted to cry! What was I going to do? My entire vacation, ruined! Go back to the hostel? Try to sneak onto a bus? Tell someone to get the bus to come back? Oh shit. I couldn't believe I had missed the bus. However, in my defense, there were approximately 6 busses on the platform right at 12 all headed to Perlis, and with the 200 people on the platform and announcements for departures in Malay, I had was just going with what I thought was the flow. So I spent about the next 2 hours freaking out. Here's what happened next.

After calming down a little, I thought, "maybe I'll just write 33 in front of the 59 and try to get on that bus." But then, what if I kicked someone else off the bus who really was supposed to be on that bus? Could they strap me to the roof? Could I sit on the floor for 7 hours? Hide under somebody elses seat? All sorts of questions were racing through my mind.

Soon, I met a group of 3 Iranians my age, and the girl Sharin was very sweet and helpful. She took the staple out of their grouped-together tickets and stapled mine in with theirs. The plan was just for me to try to sneak in with their group on bus 3359 when it came. Well, we waited and waited again. It was now over a half hour late! That would never have happened in Korea! Everyone on bus 3359 had started to sit down and wait on different places on the platform. Here's a picture of the ghetto bus platform from the backside. Most people are sitting off to the left hand side on some benches.



About 1:15 am, after eating some KFC, the man in charge said that bus 3359 was no longer coming! WHAT?!?! After all that?? And now we couldn't get there. But wait, a different bus was coming, so we needed new tickets. Because my ticket was grouped together with my new friends, we were issued 4 new tickets for the new bus, no questions asked. Phew! What a relief! After another half hour, the bus still hadn't shown up. The same man lead us up to street level and the group of about 100 of us waited outside of a restaurant for 20 minutes for the bus. One bus showed up and took the people that were headed for Penang (a state in Pennisular Malaysia). Then, there was about 65 of us.

Our bus did eventually show, and we all pushed and shoved to get on the bus. Lucikly, our group got seats together in the back. There were 6 more people to get on, but no more seats left. The same man came on, yelled for a little bit, and ticked people off that didn't have the "new" ticket that was issued. I'm not sure if a bus ever came to get those guys who didn't have the correct ticket! I was so lucky with how everything turned out, but I was still so stressed and wound up that I was unable to sleep a wink on the 7 hour bus ride through the middle of the night!



To be continued...

Malaysia Trip Day 2

Today I had literally all day in KL because my bus was leaving so late in the day! I used this opportunity to do a lot of sightseeing, and a bit of shopping.

My first stop of the day (at 12pm!) was Low Yat Plaza, a modern shopping mall in Bukit Bintang. This mall seemed to specalize in electronics, so there wasn't much for me to see there. I had lunch at Shikaya, a Thai-Japanese fusion restaurant. I had the Thai Vaki Tori- chicken satay and rice. It was decent, but I still think the street vendors have the best satay.

Afterwards, I stoped at the Thai spa on the same street as my hostel. Since I had all day, I opted to do a hour and a half package for about $30. I got a Hot Thai Compress Massage, and an Aromatherapy Massage. The spa was beautiful- clean, mood lighting, relaxing music, the whole nine yards. I asked afterwards and all the masseuses were Thai, and the owners were Malay. It really was an authentic Thai massasge! Wow, did that feel great!

I took a taxi ride to Merdeka Square next. I "borrowed" a KL travel guide book from the hostel and "accidentally" forgot to return it at the end of my trip, whoops. It won't be missed, there were probably 75 different travel guides other backpackers had left! So, Merdeka Square is the city's historic center, going back to colonial times when the British played cricket on the green lawn. There are many famous buildings in the area, and a perfect place to see a large variety of architecture.



Some of the buildings surrounding Merdeka Square are the Dayabumi Complex, Muzium Negara, and the Sultan Abdul Samad Builing. The Dayabumi Complex is some sort of religious building, though I'm not sure what exactly for. My travel guide says that it is a good example of modern architecure influenced by Islamic art.



The Sultan Abdul Samad Building was under restoration, so it is hard to get a feel for what it exactly looked like, and I couldn't really explore those "horseshoe arches and the fine design details... and arched verandah and stair towers," guess I'll have to come back someday! It was built in 1894 to house British government departments and it is now home to Malaysia's judiciary. I think the clock tower is very pretty.



I explored Chinatown afterwards, which was just a short walk over a bridge. There were so many people there, I think mostly because it was Chinese New Year and people were getting things ready. This neighborhood is where the cultural and commercial pulse of the city beats most insistently. There's a lot to see, and the architecture is also great. Theres culture and history around every corner in this neighborhood.

Central Market is one of the major attractions. It was built in 1930 and was originally the city's we (in other words, live animal) market. Now, it has been transformed into a shopping area with a large variety of stalls. There is a lot of trinkety things, but you can manage to find a few authentic things too. I ate lunch here at Old Town Coffee, and bought a few presents for some lucky people back home.

Central Market is on the left.


Before I went back to the hostel, I walked to Masid Jamek, the oldest mosque still standing in KL. It was built in 1909 and has a lot of charm and character. However, I couldn't really go in, because my jumper had spaghetti straps, and the man at the information desk passing out shawls was closing. However, I did quickly snap a picture before I was shown the door.



Jalan Petaling is really overrated, and even though my travel guide told me that, I still had to go and see for myself. The place was buzzing with activity and it wasn't even sunset, when the crowd really picks up. There were tons of Chinese and Indian men drying to get me to buy DVD's, vendors selling Peking Duck, and other vendors selling fresh fruit. The street vendors were crowding up the main drag by the time I left, and to be completely honest, I had had enough of people selling me DVD's.



Lots of shops were selling Chinese New Years supplies, here is a picture of what one of those stores look like:



I went back to the hostel later on in the evening to get ready to take the bus to Kuala Perlis for the second part of my vacation, and had no idea what stress/drama/confusion would await me in just a few short hours! Uh oh...