Wandering Tectonics

Reasons To Live: Amongst The Tectonics

2008-11-13T12:56:00.002Z

13th August 2008

2008-08-13T15:24:00.001+01:00

Gah. Bored and very impatient to get home. Travel today is a bit long and could go wrong as after this bullet train to Tokyo I've got to find the N'EX to Narita Airport, then somehow ring my hotel, communicate where I am and find some abstract pick up point for someone to get me. I also fail to have the brain cognitive power to red today, or anything else productive. Maybe I just lack caffeine. The kid next to me appears to be eating half the junk food on this train. The world is going by fast. I need to eat something other than sushi. And find a cash machine that likes my card. So mainly only 7-11s.

With extreme rushing, a grumpy man sold me a ticket to the 14.03 Narita Express with only 3 min to go, so I had to hotfoot two floors of Tokyo station. Not impressed.

12th August 2008

2008-08-12T15:22:00.000+01:00

Well after a strange bout of insomnia I got out of the hotel a bit late, and began my trek to the start of the Lonely Planet walking tour, while munching on some yummy sushi. Walk was shorted than I thought, which as good as the sun was baking and I was devouring water bottles. Turning up Goko-zaka and then Chawan-zaka (teapot lane) the streets were all lined with quaint Japanese shops and houses, and were really well kept. Next stop was the ancient temple Kiyomizu-dera, originally built in 798 but currently from 1633. A big sprawling temple complex with stunning views out across Kyoto from its huge veranda. The green hilly landscape was impressive as well so I looped around past a waterfall that has therapeutic properties. There was also a lovers shrine where people try to walk 18m between two stones to ensure success in love. There was also a bit where you could write your troubles on a piece of paper, for 200 yen and watch them dissolve away in some water. Unfortunately, I was so sweaty I was dissolving troubles before they could be written! The whole temple seemed to be making money from people trying to either make wishes or improve success somehow, a bit odd.

Next the LP took me through a load of tiny, beautiful streets with traditional buildings and paved floors. Ishibei-koji was particularly amazingly tranquil, lined with "elegant, traditional Japanese Inns and restaurants". I then went in a temple with a huge Buddha and was given a huge incense stick as part of admission, to plant. Next door was Kodai-ji, an amazing temple and extensive beautiful gardens. It also appeared to be sponsored by google....

A short walk via a water dispenser and I entered Marugarna Boen (a park), amidst a few others who were deviously following the LP as well. Finally, visited the immense temple of Chian-in, built on the site where the priest Honen taught and fasted himself to death. The fool. There are apparently 7 wonders of Choin-in, but only 3 are open to the public. On completion I stumbled to the subway station and got back to Kyoto after some out of service conclusion. More sushi was had along with buying tomorrows Shinkansen ticket to Tokyo. Played around the impressive station and on the sky walk and then returned to an evening of battling the washing machine and 'dryness machine', which fails to dry. Olympics are cool to watch though.

11th August 2008

2008-08-11T15:21:00.000+01:00

Blam. Today I will be mostly waiting for a train to Kyoto as my check in is very late: 4pm! A cheeky bonus though, was that my hotel gave me a free ticket to Kyoto! Nice. I stayed up last night to watch USA vs China basketball, very good game, and china, with their iconic player, lost. Anyway, I spent till 3pm chilling, writing a few postcards, and sending them. I then grabbed my kit and managed to scramble on a series of express trains to Kyoto station. Hotel was very easy to find and I like the feel of it. Room is Japanese style, with mattress to roll out, sliding door and wooden floor. En suite though and hotter than a blast furnace. Hotel has free net and laundry. Woo!

After a cold shower I investigated the Kyoto tower, which, as well as looking cool, gives a great view as far as Osaka apparently. Got some tasty snaps of orangy sky up there. Had a quick dinner in the big station based malls and then got disillusioned by how much cool clothing is is for women and kids but all menswear is boring. I scowled at many people, made way back, net an ready for early sleep so I Can utilise a full day tomorrow, following the Lonely Planet's Kyoto in a day walking tour.

10th August 2008

2008-08-10T15:19:00.000+01:00

Lose Campesinos: Another surprise, no idea who they were but very energetic, jumpy. Lead guy is crazy, 4 guys and 3 girls. AND I saw them wandering around just after. Then they were jumped on by 7000 Japanese. Awesome.

Kids in Glass Houses: Awful. I ran.

One Republic: Only caught last half but were very good, chillaxing and I recognised 1 or 2 of their songs

The Subways: Great fun, though starting to get all the girl/guy bands mixed up. Rocky and energetic.

Zebrahead: A bit crazy, knew less songs than I thought but they really got the crowd moving with circle pits and sitting down/jumping. Japanese favourite I think, not as good as I hope though.

Death Cab For Cutie: Why I was here. Totally awesome, though had some technical hitches and the crowd were a bit rubbish I think. I had overhyped it. Still amazing.

Lostprophets: Fantastic to see Last Summer as the sun was setting behind us. Great gig as always.

The Verve: Just caught bitter sweet symphony. Awesome!

9th August 2008

2008-08-09T15:17:00.001+01:00

To really journalise the past two days I can really only talk about each band I saw play at this music festival, interrupted between eating far too much, mainly foot long hot dogs ('sonic dogs'), and drinking insane quantities of water as both days were extreme scorchers. So much so that I managed to partially burn my neck on the first day, needless to say the second day I joined the strange yet fashionable cult of draping a towel over the back of my neck. And although it took 4 tube trains just to get to the bus, it was pretty easy and the number of buses laid on at night is astronomical. First night was dropped off at Universal Studios and saw it's cool exterior.

Anyway the bands:
The Wombats: On briefly, caught these, but this British Act seemed pretty good, tho the bands did start to meld together

The Ting Tings: Surprisingly awesome, big in the UK right now but I didn't really know their songs as I haven't been in the UK for half a year. Really got the crowd going, fun and jumpy. Lots of energy.

The Hoosiers: Big attraction for me, they were awesome, did a cover of Eternal Flame and crowd loved them, guy is crazy

Becca: Walking to Biffy Clyro, heard a tiny bit of Becca, sounded good.

Biffy Clyro: Meh, meant to be awesome, probably should of known some of their songs to like/hear them over their own noise. Very Red

The Kooks: Great, though a bit sloppy, funny when they got the whole crowd to sit down and all leap up when song started.

Super Furry Animals: Now it turned out I didn't know any of their songs by the end of the gig, but they were still very good, though not sure I'll 'obtain' their music.

Alicia Keys: After failing to see Hadouken! I was forced to see the pain and agony that is an Alica Keys concert. A bit too gospel and fake for me. Luckily I knew who was next

Coldplay: Mind blowing. Far better than I could have imagined, I knew nearly all the songs (thanks to getting their latest album) and their energy, showmanship and plain Britishness was awesome. Bonus points. Funny as well.

8th August 2008

2008-08-08T15:13:00.001+01:00

Woke up with some difficulty this morning as it was nice to have a normal bed and I stayed up a bit late as I used the wrong gadget as a time keep device. After showering and doing the packing thing, I checked out and set up camp in the seating bit as can't check into next hotel until 1pm. So far I've been flitting between coffee and facebook, so now everyone thinks I'm crazy with a vast array of caffeinated comments peppering the facebook. I'm very excited. About Summer Sonic and about going home and seeing peeps and new house. ARgh, man took away the coffee!!! I may check out Osaka-Jo (the castle) and the Osaka Museum of History this afternoon, and then head to Tempozan, as it's meant to be a nice port area, which I like at night. One day, in between the realms of musical euphoria, I want to see the Blade Runner esque Dotombari, which I suspect I should have seen last night. One I may also check out the Umeda Sky building, if I have time, it's meant to be dramatic and you can go up it to gaze across the landscape of ant like folk.

I shall let the caffeine simmer for now.

After successfully navigating the easy to use and distinctly empty Osaka underground service and battling with a man who sent me the wrong way, I found my excellent Keihan Tenmabashi Hotel, was a bit early so dropped off bag and pattered around outside a bit. Come 1pm, I checked into my very nice, though Japanese sized, room and after a shifty shower I burst forth to discover the nearby area. Was feeling very good and buzzing on caffeine. First stop: Osaka History Museum. Very good, quite a bit of English, some extremely intricate models of old style Japanese villages, a hands on archaeology section and a life size mock up of a Victorian Osaka street. Good view of the castle and park as well. Museum was a bit short though and the extra admission for the temporary exhibition wasn't worth it. The building itself is crazy and cool look though.

Next up was a short walk through Osaka-Jo gardens/park and across the moat to see the spectacular, though rebuilt, castle/jo. On scaling the steps to its entrance, past a water spraying device, I entered the castle and looked a bit confused. Mainly as its definitely not a castle on the inside, it's like an armadillo. Inside is a pristine, fully modern, built recently museum about the castle, meaning none of the original layout of the castle has been recreated. Built initially by Toyotomi Hideyoshi after he unified Japan, it took 3 years and was finished by its 100,000 strong workforce in 1583. Its apparently impregnable status was shattered 32 years later when it was destroyed by Tokuawa Ieyasu. Destroyed and rebuilt a few times more before being built out of concrete in 1931 and refurbished in 1997. Anyway, some of the displays concerning a number of mysterious archaeological findings were interesting and there was a great view from the top observation deck.

On leaving, I got slightly lost, met some metal birds and became unlost, so got the tube to the Temporzan bay area, which was NOT as good as Tokyo bay area, but I had my camera charged. I had a very fancy sushi meal with Udon noodles, with was massive. Very yummy as well. Then my brain broke and for some reason I thought I only had 1 hour till the Olympics opening ceremony, when in fact I had 3. So I rushed back, past a so called biggest Ferris wheel in the world, though aren't they all these days? Spent the rest of the evening watching the phenomenally amazing opening ceremony. Those Chinese sure know hot to put on a show. 2012 could be interesting....

7th August 2008

2008-08-07T15:12:00.000+01:00

Happily checked out of capsule hell. Station. Far too early. Long tube ride. Sit on platform. Sexy train. No battery in camera. Fast nice ride. Easy tube system. Found hotel, nice to have room and shower. Went to find a convience store. Food. Random wander. Find zoo. Cool empty and eerie, better condition than Beijing. Evening chill and net and food. Good.

6th August 2008

2008-08-06T15:10:00.000+01:00

Up. Happy. Alive. Better. Went to he 7-11 for food. Tube to Pagoda. Turtles, Tram. Tokyo National Musuem. Hot. Walk around temple and the lake, very pretty lillies. Saw a tram and fountain. Nice musuem. Art and stuff. Cool deserted museum building, like the style, not sure why? Wandered around. Back to station. To Ginza and saw the Sony Building, with an aquarium outside and musical/light up stairs. Hibiya Koen park. Metal guy. Nice food. Tokyo Tower in distance. Imperial Palace, outer garden and Palace. Hot hot hot. Water fountain plaza. Tube to Shimbashi. Tokyo version of DLR, nice ride to Odaibo and Tokyo Bay. Big ferris wheel. Beach. Bridge. Sega Joyopilas. Statue of Liberty?! Camera death. Took DLR all the way to the end of the line, back to Tokyo, bought Shinkansen (bullet train) to Osaka for tomorrow. £70!! but only 2.5 hours for 450km. Not quite maglev speed. Back, found some internet. Blam.

5th August 2008

2008-08-05T15:08:00.001+01:00

Feel Crap. The Pod hotel that I stayed in was incredibly Hot and Sweaty. I think I have dehydration death or something similar, I ventured out, however. Went around some Governmental buildings, and threw up on the way which made me feel much better, expelling china I suspect. Walked around Shinjuhu Chuokoen park, and went into some Tourist info/eco place, that was very confusing and no one seemed too helpful.

Went up a tall tourist tower to see across Tokyo, which was unfortunately a bit grey. Meh. After talking to the very friendly and nice tourist information place, I found the correct ticket selling merchant to buy summer sonic tickets!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Summer Sonic, is an awesome 2 day music festival in Tokyo and Osaka, with some amazing bands, like Coldplay and Death Cab For Cutie. After I had my precious precious slips of paper I went off to somewhere crazy I think, possibly a place called Times Square, followed by an awesome shopping place called Akihabara, which seemed to sell everything imaginable. Got a bit lost around the streets though.

4th August 2008

2008-08-04T15:07:00.000+01:00

This is how to do it. Japan wins. Amazingly nice people and survivable without a trust LP. Beginning with the Japanese Lady who shared a taxi with me, after 4 hours of sleep, at 5am AND wrote out some interesting places for me to visit in Japan, in Japanese! Also directed me to my airport check in. Then a plus for the Chinese, Beijing airport is excellent and so is the Japanese airline All Nippon Airways. Checked in mega quick, took easy internal train to my gate area depature lounge. Milled about, used all my final money on a variety of Beijing Olympics merchandise, still unable to find a cool jacket though. Had a coffee and breakfast in a small restaurant and bumped into my Japanese friend again.

Finished off cash in Olympic shop, and wandered to my gate to find the plane boarding, no queue, but about 15 staff memebers. Turns out the plane is mostly empty and I had selected a most excellent window seat with no one next to me or behind me. The plane had a camera on the front which you could watch the entire flight as if u were a plane nose, or like me, you could have selected to watch the fantastic Kung Fu Panda movie. Though I was interupted quite often with piles of food, drink and wet towels. Excellent food.

On landing, used the spotless toilets in the mostly deserted airport, got bag quickly and had an extremely nice and helpful man look through my bag at customs. Everyone is very polite and helpful, so after some initial ATM currency exchange calculation brain ache I went to the tourist information office, who printed me an exact map of where my hotel is and cheapest way to get there!

3rd August 2008

2008-08-03T15:56:00.001+01:00

Said bye to charlotte as she was flying home this morning, then strolled into town with my shoes of Death on my feet. Unfortunately it turned out that all the shops were shut for some unfathomable reason, until 11am. Luckily the PCC opened first so I chilled in there with a coffee until I met up with Lydia. Then participated in a long Jandal saga as my last pay had self combusted earlier, resulting in David having to lend me his. Found a cool north face pair in a 50% off shop.

We took the tube to beijing zoo. Very very hot and it was a long walk from station to the Zoo, though I guess we could have found some other mode of transport. Die. Heart. We got there, and it turned out most of the animals were living in horrendous condition and all the visitors were crazy and evil, not great. Therefore we decided to start a campaign to save all the animals. In other events I bought a loaf of bread from a food stand, then got a Subway for real sustenance before returning to the centre. Had dinner in a nice Japanese fast food place to get me ready for my next tectonic and said bye to Lydia. Returned to the hostel and made friends with a Japanese lady who I will accompany to the airport in the morrow. Blam.

2nd August 2008

2008-08-02T15:55:00.002+01:00

Breakfast at Hotel and then said bye to everyone before taking a Taxi to the City On The Wall hostel hostel, driver was extremely rubbish and went past the place 3 times, quite annoying, still tried to charge us the full wack so I got a bit shouty. Met everyone at the Pacific Coffee Company after another failed attempt at getting books. Lydia lost her bank card somehow so spent a while sorting that out. Then had to say a sad goobye to Liz and Martin before heading off to Silk Street in the evening. Madness! I did some excellent haggling. Then. Death. Back. Had food in a food court, Charlotte said farewell to Lydia then back to our exceptionally nice hostel for sleeps.

1st August 2008

2008-08-01T15:54:00.002+01:00

Had some yoghurt for breakfast, I'm not exactly sure why I wrote that down in my notebook, but it must be of vital importance. Went to Tiananmen square today though most of it was off limits due to the Olympics and whatever craziness they need to do, we saw an athletes team, though can't remember where from, possibly Jamaica or south Africa. Very odd security at the actual square where they would look through chinese people's possessions for books and paper that might contain anti-government propoganda and the such like.

Next went to the Forbidden City which is just across the road, and until last year (maybe) had a Starbucks in the middle. Apparently there was an outcry, so they got rid of it. And replaced it with their own generic coffee outlet. City itself was cool, though possibly not quite as impressive as I imagined, though I guess I have seen a lot of similar places by now. It was exceptionally big though and we got a bit tired walking all around it.

Afterwards David took us to a special needs school, in the winding back streets of Beijing, that Intrepid sponsor. We had an explanation of their work and then watched a performance put on by the students there, good fun! From there we walked to the main pedestrian shopping precinct, the long way round, and found a pacific coffee company to chill in.

In the evening we got some wine and had a drink or two in Martin and Liz's room before heading off to have our final dinner, in a traditional Peking Duck place. Very scrummy, and the chef comes out and cuts up the duck in front of you. It also happened to be Liz's Birthday, so we celebrated that with cake and magic. Finished off the day with a few more drinks. Good times.

31st July 2008

2008-07-31T15:52:00.001+01:00

Went to Great Wall today, following the Step-Way of Moun-Ting the Great wall. Weather was unfortunately misty, and cloudy which was a bit of a shame but it did clear up later, and the wall looked mysterious as we walked as far along as we could. Most of it had been fully restored, but after a crazy end step situation we saw some of the original wall, which is much more rubbly than the pristine area we had walked along. Top of the wall is big enough to possibly drive a car down!

Our return to civilisation was by way of a Luge, where you sit on a personal toboggan, and go down a long metal half pipe to the bottom, good fun, exceptionally touristie, though David didn't fancy it and took the chair lift down even though I think he could do it free with his magic tourist guide pass. Went back to the city, and some yummy noodle based food, where Martin and Liz were late buying suitcase as they had horrendous taxi issues. Took public bus to a really good martial arts kung fu show, which was most excellent, unfortunately David looks quite ill. Hope he gets better.

30th July 2008

2008-07-30T00:25:00.004+01:00

Went to the Yungang Caves before carrying on to Beijing, where some of the earliest Buddhist carvings in China are located. There are huge buddhas, tiny buddhas, and crazy buddhas in the 50 or so grottoes, though most of the impressive carvings are in the first 21. We spent a good time wandering around, taking photos and the such like, I think I may even have purchased some form of carbonated beverage. Afterwards we said our goodbyes to our mini-on-the-side guide Jenny and clambered majestically onto our train to Beijing, which awesomely was a soft sleeper for once, even though the trip was not in fact overnight, though I was a bit miffed as the other 4 were in 1 section and because of our crazy numbers I now was just with David. Ah well. We met some crazy Dutch lady in the carriage and we chatted for a while, though I think there were large periods of mistranslation between her and David, especially as he was trying to explain something guide related to her. Rest of journey we chilled with music and writing in my journal, though apparently in rather sparse detail, unless I was catching up with previous entries. On our arrival in foggy Beijing, we took 2 taxis to our hotel now that John and Jenny weren’t with us. Hotel was extremely nice, and after I threw my stuff in the twin room I had to myself (much luxury), I went down to the nice little coffee place they had in the foyer, and grabbed a coffee as you can see to your left, extremely strong but yummy. When we met for dinner I hadn’t finished it as it was very hot, so Charlotte polished it off. As Martin and Liz went off for a couple based dinner, Charlotte, David, Liz and Moi went to a cool cheap and phenomenally yummy pancake restaurant round the corner that David knew. The hotel’s surrounding area was very strange, almost west London like, very nice looking. The pancakes weren’t how you are probably imagining them to be, they were in fact indistinguishable to fried noodles, but tasted even more awesome. Then had an early night, where I must have done something productive, as that is indeed my special skill.

29th July 2008

2008-07-29T23:22:00.000+01:00

Woke up moderately early as always, missed breakfast due to a short bout of unconsciousness and woke with only 10 min to spare. Got on bus that was to take us to Datong. Got stuck in traffic jam for ages, caused by some unknown incident. Had a toilet stop or two before arriving at the famous hanging monastery. Weather was great, like a warm British summer day. With cliffs either side of a medium sized river, the hanging monastery is attached to one of the sheer faces, supported by long, spindly stilts. And possibly some modern day bolts into the cliff. Still, it's fun as you clamber through small hatchways and sidle along ledges with small guide rails. The monastry itself has shrines to buddism, taosim and confucism, so it's a right old mix up, but as the LP says, it covers all bases.

We clambered back on our infinite bus and carried on, not getting into datong until 7pmish. In the entire bus journey, I managed to finish Polly Evans' Chopsticks with fried eggs (meg) and Arthur Conan Doyle's Hound of the Baskervilles (awesome). Had a break, shower, nice dinner in hotel and then wrote my journal for ages in my awesome room.

28th July 2008

2008-07-28T23:48:00.000+01:00

Today we have mostly been visiting the Wang's residence, where all 100 million of the world's Wangs apparently originated. The Wang courtyard house consists of a labyrinth of 123 courtyards split into 2 main sections connected by a bridge. The new section is designed in the Chinese symbol for Wang, obviously much money had been made since their original bean curd business.

In the afternoon we visited on interesting newspaper museum, which showed a variety of local papers during some of the most momentous moments in Chinese History. We then walked to the Confucian Temple, which was a bit dull, checked out the very run down Catholic church and another close by temple before heading back to our cosy hotel and free wifi.

Had a cool dinner of that beef dish and cirspy onion. Yum in the face.

27th July 2008

2008-07-27T23:23:00.001+01:00

Arrived in Pinyao and took a stretched golf cart into the centre of the walled old town. Our guesthouse is really nice and traditional, we ate a scrummy breakfast and gout our rooms. All double bed rooms, which was alright for me as I had the room to myself. We spent the day touring various government houses, the first bank in China, treasury, a cool money place and some residences, intermingled with drinks in a restaurant somewhere. Oh, and the first place was a prison, and we watched a performance that all the Chinese tourists ruined by getting on the stage to take photos and crowd the actors. We left in disgust. We also visited the town wall, though my leg was in quite a bit of pain by then and was glad we had no plans to walk it's circumference. I also bought some crazy spicy and sugary twirly snacks, 10 Yuan for 0.5kg! Also went to:

Risengchang Financial House Museum
Former Residence of Lei Lutai
County Government Offices

By the end of the day we were shattered and my camera was full of many photos of cute animals we encountered on our way. Spent the evening eating awesome beef and potato based local favourite and chatted the night away.

26th July 2008

2008-07-26T23:12:00.000+01:00

Up early to go and see the crazy terracotta warriors, built by the emperor Qin Shi Huang to serve him in the after life, it was only discovered by some farmers digging a crazy well. We initially saw a cheap alternative to Imax movie, which showed a rather good re-enactment of the army being built. While waiting, one of the only two of the remaining farmers came to sign books, and Martin and Lydia bribed him to get a photo with them, rather than get viciously battered away with a fan, as everyone else was. I bought a pepsi max and an ice cream instead.

On to the first pit, which resembles a huge aircraft hanger, and we came face to face with the warriors, all be it from quite a distance, I'm not really sure how to describe the whole experience, it's all very surreal. On the one hand, it's amazing to see the vast expanse of warriors, but then you couldn't see up close to notice each warrior's unique details or take interesting photos. Plus a lot is still uncovered or just earthly trenches, still a great experience though. The other two pits were similar one a small scale, and one had a few warriors in glass cabinets surrounded by flash happy tourists.

In a very dark building there were also 2 half scale chariots that had been pieced together. We didn't see the tomb of Qin Shi Huing as at the moment it isn't excavated mound, but it is thought to contain palaces and rivers of flowing mercury, along with all manner of Indiana Jones style defences against intruders. No such luck to see it though.

Bus back and then all went to the Muslim quarter to participate in a food kafuffle, where the girls got a road side veg pancake and I got a spicy meat metal tasting one. Very hot temperature style. David wanted a restaurant extravaganza though, so the lads followed him through a labyrinth of roads to a restaurant that was shut, so we then followed David blindly for a while, then he got us some bread type rolls, and found a butcher to throw raw cow in them. Needless to say, John was not impressed, I loved it and munched it down, and Martin was a soldier, even though he didn't like the concept, he still ate nearly all of it! I finished his off. Anyway, after that we met up with Liz and Lydia, as Martin had stolen their money, for a sneaky coffee. Martin and I went interneting while the other two got their nails shined or something.

Met later and went to a nice bar for a beer or two, then Charlotte, John and I found a nice little square where we watched some more tribal umbrella dances, checked out a very local night market, photographed Wal-mart and got some epic cheap croissants from Bread Talk. Charlotte and I bid our final farewells to John who was staying on in Xi'an to join a 5 month silk route truck based tour! All met up, met Jenny a trainee guide who would be with us till Da Tong, took bus to train station, plush lounge and then soft sleeper overnight to PinYao - I was abandoned in cabin with guides. Everyone hates me *sob*.

25th July 2008

2008-07-25T23:02:00.000+01:00

Up and we all met up to bike the Xi'an city wall, except Lydia who was feeling pretty ill still, stomach hates her. The walls, built in 1370, are one of the few Chinese city walls still standing, though it looks vastly renovated/rebuilt. On commencing cycling however, we soon discovered it wasn't as smooth as we first anticipated, but it was an easy flat ride. A moat and a strip of park-land runs beside the wall, where many musicians, fan dancers, picnickers and badminton enthusiasts frolicked. after many photo stops, we had to rush back, as the morning heat began to rise, and to make it back within our 100 minute time limit, but overall it was still a very enjoyable and relaxing ride.

After a cheeky coffee extravaganza we perused the excellent market in the nearby Muslim quarter and found a restaurant where we were ushered upstairs. Without David, we floundered a bit in our attempts to order, but we all succeeded in ordering vast amounts. I got 10 chicken and shrimp dumplings for just 8 Yuan and, a beef and mushroom hotpot. The rest of the afternoon involved the buying of souvenirs such as a Mao book, postcards, extra strength tiger balm, and some magnets for mum. We also failed to go in a mosque as it cost to go in, looked too Chinese and was mostly cordoned off. Use the fastest and least censored net so far, met at hotel, returned to the Muslim quarter where we browsed until 11am and I got a special bread, toasted with loads of spice and beef kebab put in it. Mega delicious. Sleep

24th July 2008

2008-07-24T23:44:00.001+01:00

Arrived in Xi'an in another predictable blaze of taxi shaped glory. Sorted our lives out then went to a restaurant called Nyu Fong, where we left our run-down back ally, to emerge 5 metres away in a huge modern square, with the bell and drum tower as centre pieces. We crossed the square past various Starbucks, KFCs, shopping centres, and utilised a very useful underground subway to cross a road to find our restaurant. Very nice and incredibly cheap food, and I do believe we got our old favourite Gun Pao chicken, as well as 6 Yuan beer.

After lunch, Liz and Lydia collapsed for sleep, Charlotte went back book hunting, and us lads grabbed a taxi to the Big Goose Pagoda, which was built in memory of the monk Xuan Zan, on which the famous Chinese story "Journey to the West" and indeed the many incarnations of the Monkey TV show (BBC version circa 1970s). Our lazy taxi driver dropped us in the scorching heat and haze the wrong side of a huge square (there are a lot of squares in china), so we trekked up and around to the front pagoda complex, passed a gaggle of crazy lunatic girls who seemed to think I was famous or the new messiah. The pagoda and the surrounding Da Ci'en Temple was average, little explanation was offered, the pagoda itself was off limits due to earthquake damage, most of the temple looked like it was built recently. Still it was interesting even if our photos were a bit hazy. After dithering a bit, we eventually forced ourselves to grab a taxi to the Shaanxii History Museum, that turned out to be free with a sneaky wave of a British Passport (or any passport). Not the best or most captivating of museums, but we were all shattered and it did have some terracotta warriors, though most were copies (as the British Museum and international community has temporarily stolen a few). The English explanations were a bit sparse compared to the far superior shanghai museum. After spending infinite time trying to a get a taxi, we made it back, we found out Lydia and Liz both woke up at 3ish to feel the room shaking, at which Liz hid under her duvet and Lydia unplugged the tele and leaped for a door frame. Later we discovered that there had been another 6.9 quake in Chengdu, and they must have felt it! I must admit my initial reaction was to claim Lydia was a crazed lunatic, though I do that at most opportunities regardless of situation.

Anyway, I spent 45 minutes rushing around, failing to find the net for Lydia, buying the worst headphones known to man, an SD card and a tuna panini, which I had difficulty procuring in a cold state. By this point I was a bit stroppy with the entire world, so initially I kept quiet when I met John and David to go to a cultural performance in case I was short with anyone, which would be hard for me here in Asia, haw haw (height joke)....

Anyway, off we trotted to the performance, where David abandoned us to see his mum (who is very ill with Parkinson's) and we were seated on a table with a French family, in a hall full of well dressed westerners. So we had a romantic dinner of popcorn and beers and watched the excellent dancing and musical performances that lit up the stage. Highlights included, a quirky man playing some kazoo-like invisible instrument, a percussion dialogue and a story told in silhouetted dance. On the walk back we spotted some excellent night time photo opportunities, including the city wall looking amazing and a huge crowd of people dancing randomly to tribal drums with umbrellas and feather fans. Crazy energy in the air, apparently to do with Harvest. Closing in on our hotel, we chatted with a guy about nothing in particular, while shielding our pockets from his son, took some photos of the drum and bell towers and marvelled at the huge telescopes in the square that for 10 Yuan you could apparently see some resemblance of Jupiter. With the naked eye, we couldn't see 1 star in the sky!

Sleep (mmm long entry)

23rd July 2008

2008-07-23T23:37:00.000+01:00

Woke up early in an intriguing twist, moved bag to day room and then Charlotte and I made the long and rambling walk in the early morning heat to the Humble Administrator's garden. Successfully purchased tickets and spent a nice hour or so wandering around the rockeries, pagodas and water features, that were a bit same same. We only got roped into one photo extravaganza. After some confusion we found the entrance to the garden museum, which was a bit dull, outdated and full of old faded photos of the garden. By a random sequence of interconnected events we somehow found ourselves in a brand spanking new touch screen extravaganza of the same museum, entirely deserted but much better. Once more it turns out the garden was totally destroyed and it was all a remake AND the Dr Sun Yat-Sen garden in Vancouver, that I visited 4.5 months ago, was designed by the same person/team/company.

We meandered back through the back streets towards the city centre to meet Lydia in a random cafe. Did the normal coffee shenanigans, gossiping or whatever we do in caffeine fuelled, jazz environments. Decided on our fave noodle shop, after a quick shop in the slightly posh metromart, where I managed to get all manner of MSG containing foodstuffs. Ordered noodles via lonely planet Chinese character deduction and David texting the characters for the very option. Very nice, though nuclear heated as normal. Then bus->train, 16.44. Quiet boring, split into me David and John, and the others in separate compartment. But then kung fu hustle came on the TV and we watched it in between adverts.

22nd July 2008

2008-07-22T23:28:00.001+01:00

Via nefarious methods we caught the local coach from the 'backdoor' of Zhouzhuong to Suzhou, and felt like we saw a bit of the real china, factories and the such like. Taxi to our very nice hotel, general showing palavers and then grabbed some insanely cheap and insanely yummy noodle-soup-beef-dumpling collaboration (9 Yuan!). David then viciously abandoned us, and we fended for ourselves, noting a costa coffee on the way, wandered to the 'must-see' silk museum. Which was pretty boring, but some parts were alright, we got to see some silkworms happily munching on some mulberry leaves, ignorant in the knowledge that once they get all cosy in a nice cocoon, they'll get boiled to death for the cocoon's silky goodness. We pranced around a bit in the silk shop before struggling through the baking heat to have a quick outside look at the famous pagoda (North Temple Pagoda) and then returned to the city centre to check out the dire Temple of Mysteries, surrounded by loads of shops, coca cola umbrellas and the golden arches. Swipped back to costa for lunch and vast amounts of Caffeine!

I stayed and chilled there, writing my journal and relaxing 'n' maxing until I decided to wander back to the hotel, but spotted David in our favourite noodle party shop. I said "Ni Hao" and got roped into getting an awesome prawn based version of the afformentioned dish. Then hotel to get bus to see the master of nets garden and night time dance/music/performance show. Very good, but hot and crowded. Home, sleep. WHAM.

21st July 2008

2008-07-21T23:08:00.000+01:00

Woke up surprisingly refreshed and we waited until the train arrived to get off, as is the natural thing to do. Then participated in a 10min bag laden stroll in furnace-like heat to the local bus station, grabbed the 09:50 Suzhou -> Zhouzhuang bus, I bounced around the back, swimming in Charlotte's tea. At the othe rend we had a long furnace walk, with a break in for David to grab our tickets for the old town. Which gave John a chance for a little heat induced rant. Walked through the very nice and clean old town streets to our world heritage hotel, Liz and Martin got a very nice poster bed. We showered and refridgerated our souls. Had an awesome lunch, pork upper leg and a variety of dishes and mega cheap beer. Bonus points. Met David to explain the city, visited a few residences and gardens and a temple or two. Extremely hot, and at one point David led us down a fish lined street, causing poor Lydia to get into a frightful state, only for us to arrive at a fish garden.

Pretty shattered in the arvo, so Martin found a Majong set from reception, and Lydia, Liz Martin and I played in the semi-outside courtyard, Martin once more failing to win and getting frustrated with Liz's game antics much to everyone's amusement. We also found out some of Liz's shocking teaching shinanigins.

In the evening we returned to the same restuarent as it was awesome and I ate far too much by any standards. John showed off the bone and bamboo Majong set he bought for 150, with a very nice case. Gentle walk back through very quiet streets, canals looked beautiful, like a tiny venice. All the time practicing our greetings:

Zhou shan hao - Good Morning
Shou wu hao - Good Afternoon
wu shan hao - Good Evening
Ni hao - Hello

or something along those lines

20th July 2008

2008-07-20T23:00:00.000+01:00

Up mega early as John and Martin went to crazy (and pants) sunrise. Was awake so went to internet at 7am. Noodles. Met fools. Weather cleared and we began our crazy descent down mountain, vast amounts of steps, guys carrying up furniture, exposed tofu and buildings on their backs. John and David got left behind as we all scampered hardcore style. Bought some Dove chocolate on the way for energy. Finally, hit bottom and collected bags and laundry. Private bus then took us to Tunxi, where guys got oily and salty noodles, hunted for chargers, top ups and vitamins. Got back and showered in our day room (in a purely glass shower), and then chilled in bar downstairs.

Went for a nice emo walk along the river, marvelling at the multicoloured pretty lights that lined the river banks and waterfront buildings. Walked back through town to the screams of Brand New and met the guys in our day room. Then Bus->Train Station->Train->Split up->Rice->Blam, Wham, thank you ma'am.

19th July 2008

2008-07-19T23:51:00.001+01:00

Today, we woke up, and I ate an apple and maybe some noodles. After which, we met the rest of our crazy band of lunatics, and our laundry was't ready, so we safely left our bags in the front entrance. Then we walked to the shuttle station, where, via a series of ludicras multiple ticket shenanigans, we got on our cable car to heaven. Mist central. We then walked over the mist covered peaks of Huang Shan, beautiful but no views, and arrived at our 4 star hotel, perched high up in the clouds. Rested and ate crap for a while, before conquering some more peaks, with better views including the North Sea. Returned and had some noodles, followed by a mini hall party, and watched some very bad indian tele. Early sleep.

18th July 2008

2008-07-18T23:47:00.000+01:00

Late get up, then 5ish hour bus ride to Hangshou mountain. On the way our engine overheated, resulting in a fountain of boiling water in the bus. Good Fun! We also weren't allowed in the national park due to a permit issue, so we had to get on a public coach that whipped crazy style round the windy, but brand new, roads. Hotel was very nice but pretty dull. Found 2 beers that weren't frozen/warm, which we had outside the Karaoke bar. After a quick word with a hotel woman about our laundry, she said that a group of chinese guys would pay our Karaoke bar entrance fee and beers if we went in. The night then spiralled out of control as a drunk Chinese man kept forcing us to down glasses of beer, culminating in Lydia claiming she was pregnant to prevent drinking anymore, the guy threatening to bop me on the nose if I didn't drink, all the time seeming not to understand we couldn't speak Chinese. Our final soltuion? To break out into insane techno dancing, which succeeded in confusing him and he was eventually escorted out. So we sidled out and ran to our rooms to call it a night. I drank lots of water and was happy I had survived.

17th July 2008

2008-07-17T23:22:00.000+01:00

Begin the day with an amazingly large buffet breakfast, which I devoured. We met our extremely bubbly and enthusiastic local guide, Amanda, who would turn out to be our best so far. Our first port of call was the west lake itself, where we waited in slight disarray, while loads of Chinese people wanted to talk to me because, according to Amanda, I, or my hair, looked like a "playboy" from Veronica Mars.

The boat ride was nice, shame it was so misty though, Amanda said it's amazing in the spring. Still, we saw the 3 artificial islands, the famous water based pagodas, and a number of other pagodas on the surrounding mountains/hills. Our next destination was the largest Buddhist temple in China, oh and my jandals imploded much to my despair, so I wore David's. We learnt a lot about buddism, the various Buddhas, some cool cave carvings and I confirmed that I was born in the year of the OX, like my star sign, kinda. So apparently I'm stubborn squared. Or something.

We went to a farmers house for lunch, wher we somehow again managed to get a chicken smashed with a hammer. Not amused. Rest of food was nice though. Utilising the power of group decisveness, we went to a tea plantation where we got to try their finest tree for free. The Queen has had it, don't ya know. Unsurprisingly, Liz and Martin were persuaded to buy vast quantities of tea and we ran away stealthy style. Our final destination was the _____ Pagoda, which has been destroyed and rebuilt a total of 16 times. Its main prupose is to supress the dragon in the west lake, which is always a good thing. Unless it is a friendly dragon. With cooking abilities. Anyway, John, Martin and I bust up the pagoda for quite a nice view of the lake and city. Finally, we returned to the Braim Hotel and said our overally sentimental goodbyes to Amanda, who was awesome the whole time, though everyone else though she had a 'thing' for me. Due to some positive hair and teeth comments. In the evenign we went back to our favourite noodle restaurent, raided the supermarket for food supplies for the next 2 days up Hangshou. I spent about 140 yuan but did get two packets of hob nobs and some sardines!

Wandered back to hotel and participated in general kung fu searching on TV.

16th July 2008

2008-07-16T23:53:00.000+01:00

Today I have mostly not been stationary at an early hour. Up at 6 to take a taxi to wait ages at train station for a train to Hangzhou. Not sure if I wrote the right place there, it's wherever the famous west lake is. Spent time on the train utilising the lava water and the very large seatback table to catch up with my journal. Sort of. I also drew a pirate.

Arrived in one piece after buying a wind up style torch, for 10 yuan! Bonus. Obviously Martin bought most of the man's shop, including a musical gyroscope that was expertly demonstratted. Hotel is extreme luxury, so we dumped stuff off, showered and then all met to find a Starbucks or generic alternative. Hot, lond walk ish. Near lake front. Big mocha and quiche. Poured outside. Waited. Still hot, Charlotte, Lydia and I walked around the West Lake front and lotus flowers. Melted. Went to Watsons, and then went on a long walk, via cash machines, to Foreign Languages Bookshop - massive. Amazing cafe at the top. Coffee and beef and mushroom rice. Hote walk back, and got ready. Very nice noodle restaurant, famous for helping a scholar. Very cheap beer (7) and prawn+pork noodles. YUM.

Then went to a night market while busting for the loo, and was tempted by a Hancock DVD. Didn't buy it so we went home and slept.

15th July 2008

2008-07-15T23:25:00.000+01:00

Decided on a late wake up, met at 9 for a costa related coffee explosion. Enough caffiene to wipe out most countries. We decided our best course of action was taking the metro to Lucy Lui Street, where we could find the maglev station. The maglev connects Shanghai to Padong airport via a high speed train that hovers on magnets. Distance of around 30 km is covered in 6-8 minutes, reaching speeds of 431kph(300mph). As our resident trains potter, Martin was exceptionally excited, as was I as I tend to be about most rubbish. Return was only 80, and we zapped there and back insanely quick, with awesome banking at the curves. Inside the trains are quite plush and not overally crowded. Afer a short physics lesson, I convinced everyone that if you jumped the train wouldn't move under you, resulting in you smashing against the back wall. Afterwards Martin, John, Liz and I checked out the cheap (5) and good museum, where I completed some computer game where you have to rebuild a train.

Our next port of call was a long wander through various sky scrapers to the Chinese Sex Museum, which was a glammed up cereamics gallery. Next we took the mysterious Bund sightseeing tunnel, to the other side of the river. It was pretty bad, as you take a slow train module through a fairy light decorated, apparently brain warping, tunnel. After escaping, we fanned out and Charlotte and I got a very nice and healthy lunch in the Mojo cafe before finding the foreign languagtes bookshops and investing in some words of modern day literary genius. We wandered through the blistering heat to Regent's Park and finally to the Shanghai Art Musuem, which only contained European impressionism, which we skilled and fell into the Museum of COntemporary Art instead, rather good really, though had a bit too many art-videos which I find a bit wishy washy. Bring on Brick anyday. After discovering a cafe I could never afford, or be allowed into, we staggered back home nad got ready for the evening.

Via a chance meeting with David in the lift, he helped us to the hugh Jin Mao tower, unfortunately through the sightseeing tunnel again, as we had got return trickets. Tower was very busy but contained spectacular views of the city and was next to a huge tower that looked like a bottle opener. As normal, all the chinese tourist appeared more interested in taking photos of us rather than the view. Rather than torturing our central nervous system anymore, we took the 2 yuan ferry across teh river to admire the Bund at night. David then bundled us into two very confused taxis and we went to Vegetarian Style Life restuarant, via many red lights and death hazards. David even called as he was worried about us. Good food, we just got a big selection, no meat or alcohol, though we suspect the use of chicken stock. Metro back and sleep.

14th July 2008

2008-07-14T23:54:00.000+01:00

Up early for a costa breakfast (Massive black coffee)
Meet up with David, extremely hot walk to shang hai musuem
Massive queue, queue jumped behind another pre-booked group
Cool museum, very arty. Calligraphy, minority dressed, coin collection.
Ice coffee.
Very hot, walk down Nanjing East street to the Bund for an amazing view of the skyline and crazy TV tower.
Melted, then went to Yuyuan Bazaar, lots of old style, new shops. Largest privated owned Buddhist temple in china.
Still mind bendingly hot. Liz and Martin got name stamps.
Desweated.
Met later, not John though due to minor heat stroke.
Took metro to Acrobats
AMAZING!
Hoop jumping, rope craziness hat lunacy, balance shenanigans, cycling bonanza, candle balancing madness and finished with motorbike wall of death.
Martin bought DVD.
Home.
Went on internet. Blam.

13th July 2008

2008-07-13T23:09:00.001+01:00

Up earlyish, Only the 3 lads at brekkie.
Off boat. Bust to the 3 gorges Dam
Misty. Bit dull. Model. Various sculptures including a huge book.
Went closer to Dam
Cool celebratory garden, big diggers and tunnel. Scuptures and best view of the dam.
Then drove to airport via Yichang for lunch which had basically been smashed with a mallet then drowned in 2000 chillis.
Chilled in airport. Quick flight, then bus to very nice shanghai hotel.
Walked down the main strip. Pretty. Had a cheeky pizza in pizza hut!
Internet was very stupid as you need your passport and many sites like facebook were blocked.
Shanghai is awesome though, pretty lights everywhere

12 July 2008

2008-07-12T23:45:00.000+01:00

Mega Early Up
Fought Chinese for breakfast. Very nice Dumplings
Transfer to smaller boat, along a gorge
Extremely misty but very pretty gorges
Transferred to a tiny boat just for us + Lauren's group, rowed by some dudes, against stream
At a rough part they dragged us by rope, but not before passing round firewater and loads of chinese peeps photographing us.
After short drag, they turned us around and we zoomed back down stream, our western weight helping us along.
Our local guide sung a few traditional songs to us.
Back track to big boat. Sleep in the arvo
Dinner
David taught us Marjong. Me and Lydia on 1 team, and were awesome.
Retired to bar area as cooler
Watched a performance of dance
Beer. David did Karaoke, and a random lady went up halfway through and helped him. He is the ladies man indeed. Awesome.
Some weird musical chair game with Jackie Chan (or at least Lauren's group's guide)
Bit of beer and dancing. Suddenly all the Chinese vanished.
Sleep.

11th July 2008

2008-07-11T23:14:00.000+01:00

Bus to Yichang and big lunch in a hotel
Wandered around. Coffee. Supermarket.
Back to hotel, bus to 3 gorges and boat.
244 steps down to a very empty boat. Think were were very early. Very misty.
Room was awesome for a boat, private bathroom, and a TV etc.
Not sure if we had food, but we had a few beers in Liz and Martin's room. Lauren appeared for a bit.

Thursday 10th July 2008

2008-07-10T23:06:00.001+01:00

Cookery course
Went to the market, which had dogs (blowtorched, some alive in tiny cages, and half of a dog's head on a table), pig tongues and snouts, chicken feet etc. Lots of veg. Our chef lady bought supplies and explained the various foods.
Back to restaurant

Cooked:
* Gun Pou Chicken (Peanuts)
* Pork dumplings (I wasn't too great at their presentation)
* Veg and Noodles

We got cool chef hats and aprons, and a HUGE knife.
Liz and Charlotte cooked a veg selection, including awesome deep friend eggplant.
Was surprisingly nice and I ate far too mcuh.
Short break, coffee + cafe. Hot.
Calligraphy lesson
Learnt numbers 1-10. Progression of characters Wood>Tree>Forest.
Wrote my name, which translated to Basic, Success, Kind.
Everyone else's was way better

Liz: White Beautiful Lady Nice
Martin: Success, Clever
Lydia: Wealth, Wisdom
Charlotte: Summer, Water, Knowledge

Took a private bus to station and then the overnight train to somewhere near the 3 gorges and the Yangzi river. Nice again. Good sleep.

Wednesday 9th July 2008

2008-07-09T23:52:00.000+01:00

No surprises that we were up early again.
This was mainly for our Tai chi lesson, that was pretty good, and taught us the correct way to hold watermelons.
Hired bikes and a local guide to cycle to moonhill.
Very scenic, paddy fields and mini-mountains.
I had an awesome red and yellow mountain bike, lydia and charlotte had crazy pink girlie bikes.
Big River.
Reached moon hill then had insane climb to the top
'step to the moon'
Loads of wet, slippery steps. Was shattering. Old women followed us all the way up trying to sell things.
Finally got to top without death. Very sweaty. Lauren and group were at the top. Big natural rock arch, looks like a crescent moon from below. We rested a while.
Headed back down. I went down chattering inanely to an old chinese woman, as I was worried I would "jandal-slip" to death. She offered to hold my hand all the way down, and thought Charlotte was my wife. Nope impressed when we didn't buy anything from her at the end!
Ate awesome meal cooked by farmer's family, big shovvling of food situation. Then it poured with torrential rain.
Double ponchoed up. Charlote got a flat tire. Cute dog and ducks at fixing place, probably for eating.
May have eaten Beer Fish. Slight situation with Lydia being petrified of fish.
In evening saw amazing light show designed by same guy as the Beijing Olympic ceremony. Better than Disney.
EPIC.

Tuesday 8th July

2008-07-08T23:00:00.000+01:00

Arrived in Yangshuo
Sort life and soul out
Walked around town and grabbed lunch
Bus down to river for river cruise on smallish boat
As we got on, HUGE thunderstorm erupted, the very fabric of this ethereal world shook around us!
Front window of the boat swung shut and smashed over David!
Hard to see much, but there was nice scenery somewhere
Various boat leaks
Went ashore, old village/hamlet. Temple
Short hike to 3 coloured pools. Only saw one because of rain, it was of the infamous colour "murky".
Cobbled streets and classic chinese architecture provided a very slippery environment. Lydia's flip flops broke and David came to the rescue.
Nice views from top. Very long boat trip back
In the evening went to see the fisherman fish with cormorants.
Tie off their necks, so they can't swallow the big fish, and so they swim close to the boat and dive under to grab fish. They seemed happy enough as they were eating just about all the fish anyway, or had indeed learned to just go for the small fish.
Dude let one sit on my arm. Only got 2 fish between 8 birds, mainly because of their hungry hungry tummies.
Ate a nice dinner at the Movie Cafe Blues
They sold dog and bamboo rat but was insanely expensive in relation to everything else. Very nice local beer though and our beds were comfy.

7th July 2008

2008-07-07T23:07:00.000+01:00

Lydia, Charlotte, John and I woke up earlish and made our way to the Avenue of Stars
Fell into the Pacific Coffee Company. Mocha, ham/cheese croissant, coffee.
General chatting and free internet use.
Picked up laundry from Chumpking mansions.
Sorted my toiletry situation, though shop had nothing that men could use to clean themselves. VO5 shampoo it is.
Back to hotel. Lauran's group there. They crammed 9 in 2 taxis, but we put 6 in 3! Lunacy.
MRT to border. Bust through border control, though Charlotte was held at passport control for ages.
Waited a while in train station, then we were in China!!
On train. Very nice. Frilly. 6 bed. Chat to guy who let David have the bed near us.
Lights out at 10! Had surprisingly nice pot noodle alternative. All got caught out by lights off time.
Kids crazy. I had the middle bed and could stretch legs out partially into the aisle. Very comfy duvet.

Sunday 6th July 2008

2008-07-06T22:41:00.000+01:00

Ellen & Harriot said goodbye.
Bust out and bumped into Lauren outside lift.
Both starving so we hit up Irish pub
Underground, uber nice. Guinness and steak pie!!!
Got my local payment. Max out bank.
Taxis avec Charlotte and Lauren to new hotel @ 12.
Very swanky. TV, Sofa, Awesome. Roommate not there yet.
Walked in rain quite a distance down Nathan street to find Toilet cafe.
Awesome.
Seats are toilets, urinals on walls a decoration, food came in toilets, yummy and cheap.
Humourous poo lights and souvenirs. Great find, courtesy of Charlotte's cafe 6th sense.
Afterwards I found crazy hairdresser, not much English, had hair washed and not too crazy cut, with layers apparently. Only 90 HKD.
Tried to meet Charlotte in Temple Street, drowned. Very wet, Hotel. Watched American Dragon. Met John. Safe.
Met group, cool, meeting, David is our guide and seems good
Went for dinner. Yummy Udon noodles again.
Wandered streets a bit, stock up on food, slept.

5th July 2008

2008-07-05T23:24:00.001+01:00

Faffed loads in the morning.
Took metro to Admiral, got lost.
Went in the posh Palace Shopping Mall, where there was a tuxed out guy on the piano
Walked to and through the very nice Hong Kong park, which had many a water feature.
Got to peak tram station, skipped the huge line with my octupus card.
After the insanely steep train ride, got to the top, scampered up loads of escalators.
Amazing views of Hong Kong and surrounding area. Very hot.
Generally wandered around Central and the IPC.
Went back after food and failing to see a film at the cinema, so admired my blonde hair, which is crazy and slept.

4th July 2008

2008-07-04T23:17:00.000+01:00

Up. Internet. Food.
Wander to dock
Offered drugs as normal.
Nice dock.
Walked along the Avenue of Stars, enjoying the skyline of Hong Kong Island.
Went in the art museum, a bit empty, but was a cool exhibition on modern digital art and I scammed the woman into giving me a student admission.
Carried on along Avenue of Stars, cool statues related to film and Bruce Lee.
Lots of famous Chinese and Hong Kong movie stars, and cement hand imprints. Jet Li, Jackie Chan, John Woo, Chow Yung Fat.
Pacific Coffee Company!
Mongkok. Wander around. Got a bit lost.
Crappy computer shopping centre
Buy cool dual sim phone. K-Touch D770
Meet girlies, and went to a Cat Cafe. Took forver to get cookie and hot chocolate, not great and expensive. But there were cats all over the place, scratching up the leather furniture.
Went to get visa. Woo! Got it. So did Charlotte.
Met others for a beer on Avenue of Stars. Sunset.
Wedges. Light show to music. Okay, and little band playing on the front.
Went to crappy restaurant.
Soho for a drink or two.
Slept.

3rd July 2008

2008-07-03T23:25:00.001+01:00

In an unsure state of mind (slightly panicing), I got up early and found the internet again, possibly booked a flight and my accommodation, though visa website scared me with no same day visas. Checked out and then tried to find some way to get to the ferry terminal. The hotel guy was my saviour once more, and after failing to get a taxi he took me to where the casinos have free shuttles to their locations, so I hopped into the Sands bus. After a medium boiling walk to the terminal past a number of amazing casinos, some in the shape of volancos and castle, I grabbed some sarnies and bought tickets to Kowloon. Waited in the “departure” lounge after being allowed through passport control. The ferry was quite fast to Hong Kong and I was on the top deck, mostly to myself, though they food people wouldn't take Macau money.

Arrived, with slight confusion, and took a taxi to Chumpking mansions. Urgh. Apparently I didn't have a reservation, and was giving some form of converted janitors cupboard in Tom's Guesthouse not much wider than my armspan. Stormed out, eventually found a net cafe to print out all my Chinese details, including a possible forgery of my departing flight confirmation. In the Visa agent I had to pay £156 to get my visa ready in time, though I did help her with her LG viewty, so I think she thought I was alright after initial reservations. Grabbed the awesome tube system to central, and ate Pret a Manger. mmmm. Met Holly and Lauren, had drinkies and got to finally relax after a large amount of stress and anxiety. Said bye bye, went to a big shopping centre called IPF or IPC. Shops, food and Pacific Coffee Company. Faffed, I regret I had Maccy D's, went back home to sleep and die a little bit.

2nd July 2008

2008-07-02T23:24:00.001+01:00

Possibly the most tiring, hectic and crazy airport tomfoolery to date, after spending the night on a night train from Sapa, which felt like the equivalent of trying to sleep in the Antarctic during a 9.0 rated earthquake, Steph and I arrived in Hanoi. After saying our goodbyes, I got in a taxi, only to discover you need to show your train ticket on exiting the train station. Failing to find Steph who had our tickets, I had to bribe the woman at the gate with 15,000 dong. Trying to relax on the way, I couldn't get any of the seat belts to do up and the meter was going up at an alarming rate. Finally arrived, paid far too much and had no money left, bust out 100,00 from a cash point, then discovered I couldn't check in yet (as it was 5.30am) and nothing was open. Vegetated for a while.

At 6am the “lucky restaurant” opened up, and I got glared at viciously and was seemingly told how I should eat my chicken, pork and noodle soup. Coffee was like tar. Tar of death. Check in appeared to be open, queued and nothing happened for a while, then when I reached the desk, my bag was apparently 2kg over, even though it was the same weight as last time I flew air Asia. She initially tried to convince me to take 2kg out, but I had no idea where I would put it, so I had to pay $5 per kg. Obviously I didn't have enough, so had to use the ATM, which was now broke, so panicking slightly, I went for my emergency $100 bill. But couldn't find my padlock key, this kids, is why you should never lose your combination lock.

After a few minutes of emptying my day bag all over the terminal, I found the key, stormed back to the check in counter and slammed down my passport and money. Sorted it, bust on upstairs to a café that had internet and tried to book my Japan flight with not much luck. Went to security check, where the guy wouldn't believe I was the person in my passport and had to get another guy, who I had to lift up my flowing locks to, to reveal my facial features. Surprisingly, I wasn't frisked and walked into the mostly empty departure lounge, where I remembered I was lacking any North Vietnam magnets, so exchanged some dollar for goods, and asked when flight boarding was, flashing my Xpress boarding ticket.

Sat down smugly while everyone else was forming a massive queue and then had awesome rock star treatment as air hostess invited just me to get on the plane, so I walked past the line with a triumphant smirk. Plane ride was fine, slight nap, then chatted to an American girl while filling in my departure card wrong. More dollar was spent on baguette and P-Max.

Arrived safely and got all baggage easily, then spent the next 6 hours, eating pad thai, drinking starbucks, wandering, being charged for 3kg over the limit, writing my journal, marvelling at the departure side stops and using the very cheap internet booths. I think our plane was delayed, I got the superstar treatment again, used my special power that stops people sitting next to me and ate a surprisingly nice chicken fried rice with P-Max. Landed in Macau, bust on through, got a taxi from a guy who knew no Englsh, but got to hotel alright. Very posh looking hotel. Spent hours trying ti find an internet café via the reception dude's very vague directions of swimming his arm in a 60degree arc and telling me to walk for 2 minutes. Was no use anyway, the places that had internet I thought were just arcades for the first 2 hours. They turned out to be underground dens of 200 computers with loads of teens in their all night.

I spent the time there basically panicking as I couldn't book a flight out of china and all info pointed towards I Was screwed to get my visa in time. I decided to collapse in a bath and ignore my lack of dinner before hitting the sack at 1.30am.

1st July 2008

2008-07-01T23:53:00.000+01:00

Woke up not too bad, huge breakfast. Ham and Cheese croissant, and omellette.
Debs and I met our dude and driver. Mini Van to ourselves
Scenic drive up to Thun Tui pass
Stopping everyone now and then for photo ops.
At top got out with bikes and began sailing down mountain.
Awesome roads. Amazing scenery, very wet.
Began to freeze, soaked, got back in van.
Turned up in town, looked around market, got a poncho, wet.
Dude smoke tobacco out of crazy pipe.
Went to a small road and took bike down paddy fields.
Manic water buffalo. Meep.
Kids laugh at me. "How many 100kgs does he weight?"
Cycle across bridge down crazy mud slope and stream.
Cycled up a hill for very pretty view.
Down to village, saw house.
Women hounded debs to buy skirt
Cycle back.
Lunch on bus back
Waterfall
Back. Shower. Sad Goodbye
Bus. Train. Death.

30th June 2008

2008-06-30T23:48:00.000+01:00

Arrived in Sapa. Haggled a bus to Sapa itself.
Very early, battle for hotel. $9 for 3 peeps!
Nap. Internet.
Went for wander. Tribes people. Chocolat and Baguette
Food and drink.
Book bike ride to Thun Tui Pass for Debs and I
Wander through town. Debs mobbed by tribes peeps. Funny.
Went to lake with old tribes lady still following us. Very beautiful (the view not the lady)
No ATMs in Sapa work with Cirrus cards.
Resign to a beverage seller. Beer. Debs had Rice wind?!
Pool
Check out top of a hill while dark, but not see much. Due to the dark.
Back to hotel. Get ready.
Bust out to a small bar, nice. Local beer.
Chatted with the Singaporean manager.
Failed to find curry house, turns out manager owns it. Currently a shell.
Went to his pizza place. Pizzas forgot to come. Free olives. Free Beer. 10% off.
Went to Tu Bar. Debs and I playe darks.
Steph talked to Irish dude who said he'd take her to pass on bike.
Shot sambuca
Sleep.

29th June 2008

2008-06-29T23:44:00.000+01:00

Early rise, swim, brekkie, lost kite wood.
Got on boat to Cat Bah island. Looked bad.
Very busy and touristic.
Took bus to a hospital (old) built into a huge cavern.
Very cool, guy sung a random Ho Chi Minh song.
Waited for bus and got on our cool mountain bikes.
Very hot. Great scenery.
Huge hill. Made it to top without stopping.
Pee in bus. Look up. HUGE spider
Break. Drink 27 gallons of water.
Steph and 1 or 2 others got on bus. Rest of us battled on.
Awesome down hill section to big flat plain
Stop for wikked lunch, loads of food. Ate half the world.
Bus to port.
Comfy speed boat.
Long 3 hour bus ride back
Debs + Zen + Brand New!
Train not booked.
Steph lost her card in a cash machine
Vegas Travel, $26. Overnight train to Sapa.
Tricked into Vege Handspan restaurant.
Wolfed down sarnies
Late, Taxi, Train
4 bed soft sleeper to ourselves. Nice.

28th June 2008

2008-06-28T23:37:00.000+01:00

Early up, swim
Others late, eventually got on boat. Just us 3 and Brent and Wendy
Apparently, Flip Flops are okay for hiking. Tired and sleepy.
Captain made beds for us 3 inside. Slept.
On mainland. Walk 6km or so through very nice mountainous surroundings.
National Park.
Village. Dogs and Ducks and very loud Karaoke?!
Lunch. Lyches and ants dumped on table
Can't be bothered to hike and wet and only have flip flops
Man of family invites us in for drinks.
Muh, Ho, Baht, Jew. or 1, 2, 3, Drink
Crazy strong rice wine made from suspicious things from the forest.
Guy obsessed with drinking
Brent bought some
Hire motorbike and drive to go back
Steph fell off while stationary!
Tunnel flooded, took boat back with beer. Apparently m voice is nice and calming?!
Debs drove boat, as did drunk Brent
Shattered. Dinner on outcast table
Doze on loungers. Sleep death.

27th June 2008

2008-06-27T23:23:00.000+01:00

After finding the wrong Ocean Tours office, the lovely lady came and got our wandering souls and gave us a yummy cup of tea. Seems very professional, we were given free tea, shown an alternative more active tour we could do (which turned out to be cheaper due to a promo) and Debs and I got some bread from the bakery. All crammed a bit tightly into a mini van, everyone else a bit older than us but they seemed alright. Waited at the port for a bit, tried to see if the old gang were here, but no luck, so we all got aboard our junk, a triple decker wooden boat where some people were going to stay on for the night. Sat with a dutch and german for lunch, though we bumped around the harbour for ages, and another junk ploughed into us with a crunch but no one seemed too concerned. Lunch was a seafood concoction, without much allowance for vegetarians but was yummy. The german (Thomas) and I ate most of the food really. After some chatting, the boat departed towards the bay and island, we finished the bottle of cheap Vietnamese wine we got (Dalat) and sun bathed for a short while on top as we were shattered as normal.

Junk was amazingly quiet and we drifted slowly past looming rocky green islands and amongst other junks onwards. We pulled up amongst some island to do some sea kayaking, everyone had tandem kayaks except me who was solo. We went through limestone caves and tunnels to tranquil sea lagoons, surround on both sides by island hills and watched some colourful and quite large jellyfish scuttle past. Needles to say, Debs and Steph crashed their kayak on a number of occasions, including into the limestone tunnel! After successfully climbing back aboard the junk, only slightly breaking it and spoiling Debs' “You've Bee Framed” photo opportunity, we headed to our resort, which turned out to be on our very own island with only a few bungalows on!

Free Tea
Nice bungalow, single bed
Swim
Met with others for dinner
Yummy. Yorkshire couple, Brent and Wendy
Happy hour, drink wine, vodbull
Karoke
Manhood and T. T-Hood. 3am.

26th June 2008

2008-06-26T23:18:00.001+01:00

Woke up at stupid o'clock to get our DMZ tour bus at 6am. The 5km wide DMZ each side of the Ben Hai River split Vietnam into the Republic of Vietnam (south) and the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. During the American war it became one of the most militarised zones in the world, still with more than 3 million mines and 350,000 to 800,00 tonnes of unexploded ordinance. The day mainly consisted of vast amounts of driving, interspersed by a few sites and food stops:

Highway 9 (part of the Ho Chi Min Trail):

1.The Rock Pile: exactly what it says on the tin, but used to have a US Marine Corps bas on it
2.Dakrong Bridge: a pretty suspension bridge, old bridge was part of Ho Chi Minh Trail.
3.Khe Senh Base: Site of controversial and famous siege. Recreated bunkers, a tank and some US helicopter are there, which I'm sure the US went back. Also a propaganda filled memorial museum as well as a guest book full of controversial opinions.

Highway 1A:

1.Truong San National Cemetery: or at least it might have been.... up a series of steps is a large statue honouring the women of the wars.
2.Vinh MOC tunnels: Highlight of the day, larger than the Chu Chi tunnels (width wise) we spent a good 20 min exploring, popping up at the beach and in the forest. Crazy guy who was born in the tunnels was also there and loved having his photo taken a bit too much. In total 7 people were born in the tunnels and are all still alive now. Only once did a bomb score a direct hit, and it failed to explode, so the hole was used as an air vent.

Showed off my bargaining skills much to the amazement of some tourist, basically walked past a whole line of sellers and just let the price keep dropping from 20 until it hit 5. Classic.

We then had a 3 hour bus journey back and I unleashed my Zen to Debs, though mainly the Eels who we all know are excellent. Arrived back around 6.30pm and mainly tried to sort out a Halong Bay tour for tomorrow morning!? Finally got one for $145 from a recommended company: Ocean Tours, but ran out of time for food. Hotel screwed up our taxi to airport and I was a bit terse with them, finally sorted, lept on plane, only 1 hour 20min, got taxi into central Hanoi, got mad at driver for taking us to a hotel opposite side of Hanoi from where we wanted and he finally took us there. Wandered around a bit with an annoying hotel guy pestering us, so went in a random hotel to spite him. Cheap but room was so high we were basically in Zeus's lap. We were all starving but were locked in the hotel and no food was on sale. Resorted to booking Sapa train then crashing out for ANOTHER early start tomorrow.

25th June 2008

2008-06-25T23:17:00.000+01:00

After a moderately early rise, we managed to find a cafe that was nice, but had no electricity, for a continental breakfast. We trekked across the Trang Tien Bridge in the baking sun to reach the edge of The Citadel, where we crossed the moat in a rather narrow bike filled tunnel. Admired the tallest flagpole in Vietnam (at 37 metres it isn't that big) as well as the 9 holy cannons (representing the 4 seasons and 5 elements). Bursting forth into the Imperial enclosure, and scaling the main gate, who did we bump into, but the intrepid Vietnam group. We complained about the heat with them for a while before they had to scoot off to get the train to Hanoi. We watched some Chinese tourist blatantly disobeying some “do not touch” signs and then pushed further into the enclosure, after feeding the fish, towards the Thai Hoa Palace, passing a man riding an elephant. The palace itself was quite small and a bit bare, but was made from some rather ornate timber. Out the back is a courtyard with 2 halls of the mandarins either side and sleeping man. Avoiding the very touristic dress up photo opportunity.

To the back of the court was the ruins of the Can Cah Palace and The Forbidden Purple City, reserved for personal use by the emperor and looked like a cross between ruins, a construction site and an abandoned festival venue. Most of the Imperial Enclosure is currently going through a 35 year restoration project, which may involve completely rebuilding of many things. You may be wondering why the citadel of Vietnam's previous capital city is demolished, well if you look closely you can still see the American and French bullet holes. Wandering around the lazy builders, in the boiling heat, we came out to the back of the enclosure by the beautiful lily pond moat. WE continued our random wanderings in a clockwise direction and I fell down a hole, but pulled off an elegant crumble to my knees. Found a random house which had an island gaarden, with an overgrown shrine amongst all the rubble. All the roads between the overgrown ruins, which incidentally, are baren of tourists, are pristine and well maintained. We clambered skillfully over a random bridge and played with some weeds/flowers that close when touched. Next was the renovated Royal Theatre, which was quite elaborate but we were at the wrong time for any performances. More temples in the form of the Thai To Mieu Temple Complex and we passed the front gate to continue onto the To Mieu Temple, where we all nearly died from heat exhaustion, especially Steph, so we haggled some water and ice cream and cooled down. Then I got tranquilly lost from the other two in Phung Tren Temple and the beautiful Dien Tho Residence. Finally say the under construction Truong San Residence and left the Imperial enclosure via the rear, wandered the citadel streets, where we were never harassed and it seemed more local. Walked besides the beautiful Tinh Tam Lake, then found an LP recommended restaurant, by which point Steph was feeling awful. Restaurant was not only racist (only Vietnamese were allowed upstairs) but food was dull, Debs “mixed veg” had just 1 veg and the ginger tea was made with a tea bag. Pants.

Checked out the dire (and closing) General Museum complex and Museum of Royal Fine Arts, before going across the river and stopping in another LP suggested café, where I promptly ate vast amounts (Chinese fried rice and chips) and felt like I was going to explode. Headed back to hotel where Steph went to nap and recover, while Debs and I hired bikes and made the perilous and darkening journey to Thein Mu Pagoda. Where we got there it was just about pitch black, but we wandered around the eerily quiet and empty pagoda grounds before watching lightening from the Perfume River front. Cycling back was fun as we had no lights and no street lamps, so we just tail gated a scooter and used their light. Went in the trusty Sinh Cafe and booked a demilitarised zone tour for tomorrow, before heading back, grabbing Steph, possibly some food and some sleep.

24th June 2008

2008-06-24T23:16:00.000+01:00

After waking far too early, to check out, we skipped and hopped down to the Hai Scout cafe to begin our cookery class. Relaxed, woke up and enjoyed our free drink (lassi all the way) and chatted to a random American guy who taught in South Korea for 2.5 years. The group of around 18 was split into 3 groups and our guide showed us around the central market, explaining veg, showing us the meat section (with unfathomable pots of boiling gruel) and trying to sell us strange yet effective Kitchen utensils. After following our infuriatingly slow and slightly spaced out guide, we met up with the others and took the red bridge boat along the river to the red bridge cooking school, past fishing nets and other boaters.

Instantly thrown into the fray, we took our seats in front of a work surface and large roof mounted mirror, where our charismatic, comical and possibly drunk chef was introduced to us. Initially a salad type food creation was demonstrated, followed by aubergine in clay pot, which we then went to our work stations and made, with some annoying aussie kid dropping the clay pot and burning himself. Swapping back and forth between demonstrations and cook stations, we made:

Rice paper (on steaming cotton) and used it to make yummy fresh spring rolls
Hoi An pancakes with shrimp/green leaf in rice paper, Debs had mushroom, she tells me to write.
Vietnamese plate decoration, where we did something fancy with a cucumber and made tomato roses

We departed our watefront covered cookery base and headed into the main restaurant/bar/cafe to eat chef prepared food that we were shown today and a noodle fish dish as well. Mega full up at the end as we ate what we made as we went along as well. Following some confusion, we got a taxi back to our slinky hotel and took the 3 hour bus to Hue.

On arrival we got swamped by hotel people and I spent the next 30 minutes running around various hotels, comparing rooms with some lunatics, being kicked in jest on the arse, and finally deciding on a very big room with 3 near double beds for $15. We then collapsed completely and relaxed, watching snakes on a place before going for a late tea near the other backpacking area which was a bit disappointing.

23rd June 2008

2008-06-23T23:15:00.000+01:00

After an all you can eat buffet style food fest for breakfast, where I naturally overfed myself, we headed out to start the LP walking tour of Hoi An. We then were reduce to a puddle of sweat instantly and found out that the traditional cultural performance doesn't show on Mondays, so our ticket was basically entrance to a shop at the Handicraft Workshop, housed in a 200 year old trading house of a Chinese Merchant. We saw some people pottering and painting, and I got semi-molested by a chinese tourist. Next stop, at the real start of the LP:WT, was the Tran Family Chapel, built in 1802. A nice woman took us around, and we threw ying/yang coins. You get 3 goes, and if you get 1 as ying and 1 as yang you get good luck. Debs: Bad Luck. Steph: Good Luck (after 2 goes). Tom: Mega bonus luck on first go! House was nice, though half the rooms had things for sale, including ying/yang coins, but they were copper so I'd turn green.

On to the museum of trading ceramics, an exciting excursion into the sublimely illuminating world of broken platers, though the restored house it was set in was nice. Past a few more buildings and we got to the Assembly Hall of the Fujian Chinese Congregation, which is pretty stunning and they had turtles in one of their ponds! After a bit more intense sunshine, we got to the Quan Cong temple, which sneakily led on to the Hoi An Museum of History and Culture, and more turtles. Carried on following the LP:WT away from town, checking out a bookshop, then looping back past some colonnaded French buildings where I haggled for a DC and I was informed about the Miss Universe competition for the 5th time.

Gazed out from the Cam Nam bridge, down the river, before making our way through the Central Market, past all the same-same stalls, and I got laughed at then hit by an old lady, in what I assume was jest. Then some woman said I needed a haircut and we burst free, back on the streets. Having met Harriot and Charlotte earlier, which I failed to mention, we went to a recommended garden cafe with artie sculptures, no menus, but nice mango shakes. Now in the Alpen cafe for lunch, after Debs got sucked into the tailors against her will.

22nd June 2008

2008-06-22T23:15:00.000+01:00

Woke up surprisingly chipper after staying out till 3.30am or some irresponsible hour, and having missed our haggled free breakfast, we just collapsed in/beside the pool. Swam and chatted until I went prunie, played on the net, then after a series of showers we went and booked our extravagantly priced cooking course for Tuesday at 8am. As hunger striked we went to a café which was dubbed “Alpen” restaurant, due to its excessive Aplen stock. After an awesome pork and cashew nut extravaganza I had a baguette. Yums! Steph went to get MORE stuff done in the tailors and we bumped into Lauren, Holly, Ellen and Emily unsurprisingly. After about 15 min of soul death on my part we all bundled into cargo café and I got my tea on. Feeling guilty over our lack of productivity we hired bikes off a dodgy man for 50p each and cycled across the bridge to the Hoi An peninsula and made a few locals laugh with our tom-foolery. Very nice there, though smaller than we thought, general houses and the river really. Got chatting to a Vietnamese girl, when we stopped for photos, about the soon arriving Miss Universe competition in Hoi An. Could explain the excessive road resurfacing and the tar all over my feet last night. Steph then went off once more to the tailors, so Debs and I cycled with crazy motorbikes and cars to the beach 4km away. Nice ride along the river, past houses, hotels, rice fields, until we randomly appeared at the beach where we got charged 10,000 to park our bikes! Spent the next 10 minutes bartering the price of a tiny kite with a shop guy, and we walked on the totally crammed by lovely beach. A minute walk led us to a deserted section, past the beach rugs for rent. Paddled and played with a crab while Debs constructed her kite, only to find, humourously, that the string was only 1 metre long and kite just span in circles. Watched the sky burst into a thousand shades of nuclear winter before releasing our night time cycling predicament. Avoiding various lanterns, BBQs, scampering children and old ladies selling unidentifiable food products, we found our way back to our non-stolen bikes and were promptly mocked by some kids. Survived the cycle back under motorbike light and was quite enjoyable, especially with the breeze. Collapsed in hotel, waited for Steph to get back and researched flights from Hanoi to Hong Kong. Cheapest way is Air Asia Hanoi to Bangkok, then after a 6 hour wait, flight to Macau (another odd province of China, like HK, but Portugues). Saves me $260, which is awesome, and with Air Asia, so not bad. Chinese visa should only take 2-3 days, and loads of peeps like Harriot, Charlotte, Ellen, Lauren x2 and Holly are going to be in town. Also Charlotte is going to be on the same China intrepid tour I just booked, woo! AND will hopefully go to Japan with me. Annie might be in Japan as well. Bonus!

Anyway, we went out to the LP recommended restaurant 96, where I had the local Cao Lau dish, cooked with water from the Buy Le Well. Also had White Rose Shrimp and Prawn in Rice paper, which was alright but also a local speciality. Now chillaxing in Tam Tam Cafe, with vast quantities of green tea. Awesome. History and Culture tomorrow.

21st June 2008

2008-06-21T23:14:00.000+01:00

Arrived at station at 10.30am, and took a taxi to Hoi An past marble mountain and china beach. Dude dropped us off and bargained with loads of hotels along the same street before settling on an amazing hotel with pool, aircon ensuite, etc for $21 between us a night, very close to centre as well. We had a shower etc before heading out to wander around, and bumped into Annie and Tereasa. Went to a tailors, that Hoi An is famous for, steph started her spending spree, and we saw others there. Weather was insanely baking, drank 4 litres of water, and steph somehow stood on a cat. Met others in “Then and Now” for charlottes birthday, there was an awesome cake and we gave her a card. Went to a beach drinking place. Alcohol. Russians watching the football, we did dancing, people broke glass. Took the bus home.

20th June 2008

2008-06-20T23:14:00.000+01:00

Early check out. Breakfast. Hired Boat with Debs. Snorkelled around an island, breathed in sea. Wandered around island a bit. Went to fishing village after some lost in translation action. Dinner. Cafe Des Amis. Massive strawberry ice cream, awesome. Taxi to train station to go to Denang.

19th June 2008

2008-06-19T23:13:00.000+01:00

Scammed by Taxi. Checked into Hotel. Slept. Walked along front. Bumped into Harriot and Charlotte. Breakfast. Others came along. Bookshops. Jpod. All arvo on beach. Nice. Train station hell trying to get ticket, people helped us. Mad Kim for really good pizza and cocktails. Bought some snorkels from convenience store for cheap. 11Pm sleep.

18th June 2008

2008-06-18T23:12:00.000+01:00

Chu Chi tunnels. Train ticket. Goodbye lunch with Jess and Phil. Burger. Wander old town. Shops. Cofee. Soco cafe. Met Jerry. Talked with students. Etc. Train at 11pm overnight to Nha Trang

17th June 2008

2008-06-17T23:12:00.000+01:00

5am brekkie. Boat to meet tour group. 3 hour boat trip to cai ran floating market. Rice mill. Fruit orchard. Eat fruit. Boat broke. Boat to lunch in Can Toe. Bus -> Vinh Lang. Market or cafe. Cafe. Ferry to Ceibe. Bus to Ho Chi Min. Mexican for Phil and Jess good bye. Cocktails. Go to bar. Shattered

16h June 2008

2008-06-16T23:11:00.000+01:00

Mekong delta tour with Sinh Cafe. Khai Pe Floating market. Coconut candy making. Rice paper making. Lunch. Chatted with a couple. Traditional music, bit meh. On boat. Vinh Lang. Ferry across. Can Toe. Taxi to homestay. Mega nice. Took his own boat to paddy field. Steph fell over in the paddy field, much hilarity. Back. Dinner. Cards. Beer. Bed

15th June 2008

2008-06-15T23:11:00.000+01:00

Check out. Bye to everyone. Check in to dorm. Lunch: highland coffee, local market. Walk around. Highland coffee. Notre Dame. Post Office. Hostel. Little street food. Tired. Crashed out.

14th June 2008

2008-06-14T23:10:00.000+01:00

Vietnam, 7 hour trip. Border
Lunch noodle soup. Coffee shop. Hostel and mekong delta booking.
Debs ill. Little street Mexican. Blue Gecko bar.
No night club. No dancing

13th June 2008

2008-06-13T23:09:00.000+01:00

Tuoul Sleng museum.
Killing fields Museum
Killing Fields.
Russian Market
Coffee shop.
Boxing on TV.
Group dinner.
Sofa
DVD, charades.

12th June 2008

2008-06-12T23:09:00.000+01:00

Took the morning bus to Cambodia's capital, Phnom Penh, checked into the “fancy guest house”, and went for a group meal in another place that helps handicapped people. Yummy pork burger, though waited ages for it, and as the group's food hoover, everyone was worried I'd waste away. Returning to properly shoe up, we headed to the Royal Palace, which was surrounded by dragonflies. The palace and ground was very similar to the Thai royal palace, even with a small emerald buddha. The so called silver pagoda, looked like load of dirty floor tiles. Unfortunately, my camera and phone ran out of battery near the end, but it was all good. Debs, Phil and I then tired to find a hammock bar, but gave up pretty quickly and returned home.

Group dinner on water front to help orphans, they even had a toddle there who was just dumped at their door. She was v.cute though. Food was nice, had a meat filled pizza. Pete then took some of us to mango bar across town, where we had a few chilled drinks.

11th June 2008

2008-06-11T10:07:00.000+01:00

Weather not great today, but 8 or so of us took tuktuks down to the quiet local beach, which took ages to get to, contrary to Pete's predictions once more. Went along very rough roads past some apparently slums and burst out next to a number of bars with sun loungers and no people. Sat inside as it began to rain and Debs, Norman and I swam in the sea for ages, going quite prunie. Then our tuk tuks arrived and we met the others (apart from Karl ) in Starfish Cafe all afternoon. BLT and Tea.

Bought Jane Eyre in a bookshop, found that Karl slept till 4pm, then we all went to a mexican, played darts, with Lauren A pulling a clever maths trick on Karl. A core few of us then said an emotional goodbye to Norman as we released him to the even crashing ocean. Then Sleep.

10th June 2008

2008-06-10T23:00:00.000+01:00

Went on an organised boat trip to the islands, though it appears Sarah's phone was stolen from her room last night. Split into 2 groups on two boats and we set off towards an island to snorkel around. Which I really enjoyed and Debs and I were in ages as most other people went in, then injured themselves on coral, fish and sharks or something. Lauren A got a sea urchin right in her toe! Can't pull it out as will break up, very painful for her. Others had lots of coral scratches. Not sure how they managed it, though a few points I did nearly get trapped amongst rocks and coral. We all scrambled aboard and went to another island where we landed, some peeps lay on the beach and harriott, Charlotte, Jess and I threw a frisbee in the sea and discussed Cambodian politics. Then the sky began to empty on us and we ran for shelter and kebab lunch. After learning that big craps are worth $10, Lauren A and I went hunting for them, and after failing for about an hour we caught one by caking it in sand. It was very small though, so we kept it in the pasta bucket. Some chillin later I Got restless and looked for another crab, debs helped and after chasing one for a while I managed to pick it up by it's shell, though not before another one stabbed me. Anyway, we now had Harry and Sally, though they didn't really take a liking to each other, so we emptied them into the wet and set said for the mainland. On the boat back we discovered that a shell I found in my pcoket contained a hermit crab who we named Norman. On land again we took a jeep back to the hotel, where Pete held on to me a bit too sensually. Hit up a Japanese restaurant, where I had a v.nice chicken with specialist Japanese sauce, with rice. We all retired with pete to the monkey republic for drinks, then a few of us played pool in poco loco until 3/4am as debs wouldn't let us stop till girls won (Karl and I v phil, debs and jesse). They never won. Will be tired tomorrow.

9th June 2008

2008-06-09T23:06:00.000+01:00

Long bus ride to soloukiville, beach place. Had lunch, walked to the beach, chilled amongst selling peeps, internet book shop. Relaxed, napped and watched tele until group meal in v.nice Japanese restaurant followed by poko loco next to hotel. Pool bar. Good fun.
Sleep.

8th June 2008

2008-06-08T23:06:00.000+01:00

Coach to Phnom Penh. Stopped in shopping centre for 2 hours, had awful fast food chicken teriaki wrap, supermarket for snackeroos. Man stared at my junk while I went to loo. Looked at some humourous books (How To Be A Sensual Woman). Back to coach, long drive to homestay. 3 dorms, Karl and I had 1 to ourselves, I got a bright pink double bed. Chilled in hammocks then played hacky sack type game for ages and pete tried to get everyone to dance as forfeits for being crap at the game. Had dinner, which was nice but a bit bland, then drank, chatted to some odd drunk Cambodians who may have been peer pressuring pete into drinking, played poker with pistascio nuts and ring pulls for chips. In a shocking turn of events Jess and I won as we both were far in the lead, but pete won via some suspicious ultimatum. Turned in around 10, avoiding drunk dude, and fell asleep to the heavy rain. Turns out girls' dorms leaked and they had 3 in a bed to avoid it.

07th June 2008

2008-06-07T23:03:00.000+01:00

Early bus to Kompong Cham, so called “5” star hotel: mental asylum. Dumped stuff and had a very slow lunch that we had to order an hour before we got there. Went to the market to buy school kids some presents, got a pen and notepad. Rubbish. We got some old bikes, and cycle to a ferry raft to cross the river. Cycled on a crazy bamboo path. Saw children in School, chatted and got hugged, possibly for presents. Some peeps got hit. Skipping rope emerged, I hid. Went to the next door Pagoda and saw the monks there who all had mobile phones and digital cameras.... Cycled around island, had some fresh fruit at a locals house, then went to a special after school english school. Helped them practice the language of Angleterre. Sunset raft trip. Cycle back.

Went to local house in the evening for a nice meal. Ate a quite tasty but very sharp cricket, Phil had a squishy brainy one.

Sleep.

6th June 2008

2008-06-06T23:02:00.000+01:00

Woke up a bit wack from beer. Met for boat trip to floating village, and went to a landmine hospital first, interesting talk and tour. Sad. Donation. Bus ride, very bumpy, and our photos were taken by locals once we exited the bus.

In boat, which was quite big and wooden. Many houses, schools, churches, and a basketball court floating on the river. Kids in boats climbing on to our boat to sell us drinks. One girl on a boat whipped out a snaked from the hull, and all the girls screaming, but pete saved the day with some linguistic tomfoolery. To restaurant, crocodiles, catfish, nice view across lake/river. On return to bus: photo plates. Old horrible market, awesome mexican (chimmichanga), with Ellen, Lauren, Lauran and Karl. Chilled in hotel lobby till evening when we went to Soup Dragon. Fish Amok. Yum. Crazy medics got their uni results. Bonus.

5th June 2008

2008-06-05T23:59:00.000+01:00

Arrived in Temple area. $20! Extreme heat and sun. Sun city gate. Temple. Very detailed carving descriptions. Insense Buddhas. Got a bit lost with Karl, but turned out we hadn't. Big buddha. Smaller temple, climb up steep steps. Crazy descent. Between even temple: accosted by kids. 'Hey Lady', 'where you from?', 'you buy', 'one dollar' and various london/uk facts etc.

Tomb Raider temple. Crazy pete poses. Lunch near Angkor Wat. Amazing moat around it where we relaxed in the shade after a 5-star toilet break. Walked into Angkor Wat. Harriot, Teresa and I nearly got scammed by a buddha man. Went to a temple for the sunset, but had to initially hide in the mini van from humourously persistent selling kids, who gave charlotte a very cute drawing. Unfortunately there was no sunset due to a vast amount of cloud that suddenly appeared. Strange beer seller on the temple?! Went to a restaurant, and watched a traditional dance while eating awesome food. Went to Angkor What? Party bar, did drinking games, and the drinks were cheap. Woo.

4th June 2008

2008-06-04T23:57:00.000+01:00

Leaped up early and headed down stairs, bit hungover and met the group. Split into two very nice minibuses and headed to the border on some pretty good roads. WE loaded our bags on a suspiciously rickety wooden cart, had lunch and then walked through the border which was very odd. First de-stamped through Thailand border into no man's land, which was full of beggars, children trying to sell things, rubbish and a fancy hotel. Glad we had Pete to guide us as I could see people ready to pounce and scam us. Took about 20 minutes for us all to get through the Cambodian border and onto 1 less nice bus where we prepared to travel on the “Dancing Road” for 4 hours to Siam Reap. Unfortunately, there was very little room, due to all our bags having seats, it was extremely hot and the road is the worst road known to mankind, possibly due to airline-to-government bribes. Then it started to pour. Really pour. Which cooled us all down no end, but made driving more difficult I would imagine, as the road disintegrates on contact with water.

On our arrival we cleaned up in our very nice hotel (still in twin rooms, bonus!) and took 4 tuk tuks into town for dinner: an awesome Khmer chicken curry recommended by Pete. Headed to the night market, which was the clearest and most civilised market to be found in Asia, so I got some more magnets and a small group of us invested in ice creams (dark chocolate and 'vanilla & boomive(sic)') before returning home via tuk tuk.

Slept

3rd June 2008

2008-06-03T23:57:00.001+01:00

Woke up and pottered around for a while until I got thrown out by the scruff of my neck and got conned by a nice tuk tuk driver to my new hotel in preparation for my intrepid tour. Very posh and nice hotel, sharing with only other guy out of 16 of us. I wandered towards the temples, batting away people trying to con me with Buddhist holidays and various suspicious foibles. Eventually after discovering the National Museum and The National Gallery was in fact closed via a coincidence of them being lazy on Mondays, I participated in some daredevil road crossing and headed on down to the Grand Palace, where I once more dodged some tour guides, got given some cool floppy trousers to wear, and headed into the Grand Palace/Temple grounds. My general conclusion was that it looked like it had been made with Lego and painted with tacky thick gold paint. Was interesting though, and I saw the only(?) emerald Buddha in the world, respectfully kneeling, with shoes off, not pointing feet at the Buddha etc. Melting some what on the way, I exited out of the grounds and fell into a coin museum, which was airconned but pretty dull overall. Collapsed in a dizzy state of starvation in a food supplying café and then wibbled back towards Khoa San Road. On the way a crazy birdseed selling woman CHASED me down the street trying to put the bags in my pocket.

To reward myself for surviving I bought a DV from 7-11 and as I was about to leave when I locked eyes with a random guy who looked strangely familiar. After 10 seconds we both finally twigged, and realised it was Mark and Kelly from Taupo and Wellington. Crazy coincidence and we had a good chat over what we had been up to etc. Nearly got lost going back to hotel and met my room mate (Karl), so chatted for a while with him. Meeting was at 6 with Pete (our Cambodian leader) and the 15 other members of the group (Debs, Steph, Lauran, Holly, Phillipa, Jess, Pren, Sarah, Harriott, Charlotte, Ellen, Lauren, Tereasa and Annie). All girls apart form Karl and I, and all UK apart from Annie who is from the US of A. Later in the evening Pete took us for a nice meal in a Thai restaurant just off KS road, where I had a yummy Pad Thai, and we went on for some drinks at a pavement side bar. Pete seemed to taken an (un)healthy liking to me, much to general amusement, and we had a number of beers before our group splintered, some returning to the hotel and the rest of use went to a bar in Koh San Road. A bucket of vodbull later (shared with Lauren S) and we were moderately tipsy and happy.

2nd June 2008

2008-06-02T23:56:00.001+01:00

Started off with a nice free brekkie of omelette, bacon, c/flakes and fruit, before walking out in the heat to Jim Thompson's House. Quite interesting, nice guided tour and then cooled off in a small modern art gallery. His house was made of a variety of traditional thai houses, and apparently he revitalised the silk trade and disappeared under mysterious circumstances in the Cameron Highlands. Walked back and checked out the MBK centre, which was full of identical tiny shops stretching further than the eye could see. Apparently its where all the cool kids hangout, but I was a bit like “blargh”, so I headed back out to the World Central Plaza trying to find a bookshop. Then walked for ages to another shopping centre, which was awful, and so far, plus epic pollution, so I just returned to the World Plaza and wandered around until I crumbled and saw Narnia II in la cinema, which confiscated my camera for piracy related reasons. Had some food at Mr Lee, horrendous cellophane noodles salad, made me feel ill so I ran away, after paying of course. I then hit up Koniecka Bookshop, where I got two Fforde books: The Eyre Affair and Easy Side Up, which look quite funny. Spent ages trying to find a new journal, but no where sold moleskine ones and the other ones had a poultry number of lines per page. Headed back to hotel and collapsed.

1st June 2008

2008-06-01T23:00:00.000+01:00

General packing, breakfasting, walking with pack, internetting, catching bus, finishing The Time Traveller's Wife (totally awesome) and arriving in Bangkok while forgetting to play Brand New's "Welcome To Bangkok". Wandered aimlessly for a while, got a taxi, once more no one knew where my hostel was and driver actually refused to look at my map, making me instead talk to someone on his phone whose english wasn't much better. Eventually found the Wendy House after asking another taxi dude, checked in and slumped in awesome room. TV/DVD etc. Walked out after some TV and investigated the extremely fancy Siam Shopping centres. Had awesome pork with Cashew nuts in the Discovery Centre, or wherever I was and generally played in varying shops. Couldn't find the books I wanted in any of the book shops though. Still, it's all very impressive, then I fell into an Imax cinema and saw Indiana Jones 4. I shall classify it as enjoyable but different. At some point I had a yummy falafel wrap and then walked really far on a sky walk to get to Central World Plaza or something, but it was already shutting at 9, so I head back to hotel. "Watching The English" is a bit boring. Watched Mythbusters and ULTIMATE STRIKE JETS!!11!!1!!eleven!! until 1am, then fell asleep.

31st May 2008

2008-05-31T23:08:00.000+01:00

Got up, went to a nice coffee shop then headed to a chinese temple by the edge of the beach. Quite nice. Wandered along waterfront road in the blazing heat, to fishing pier, then a bit of road tomfoolery and I got onto the beach, which I decided not to walk along as it REALLY stank. Next, I thought that a nice walk to Klai Kangwan Palace, in the searing heat, would invigorate me, as it didn't look too far on the map.

Curse my stubborness. And not reading: "Not To Scale" on the map. So after walking the entire length of Thailand, realising you can't really see the palace and getting a smoothie/frapp, I marched back towards the centre of Hua Hin. On the way, I got "Watching The English" from a book shop and checked out the Chat Chai Day market. I trekked more insane distance to the Hua Hin Market village, where I bumped into the couple I met yesterday, and I failed to go to the cinema as it was all in some strange foreign language, so had a mid arvo lunch.

Returned to central Hua Hin, I think I booked my bus tomorrow, and played on the net before finding The Time Traveller's Wife, in a book stall and scampered home to read it all night.

30th May 2008

2008-05-30T23:25:00.000+01:00

Time to leave Koh Tao today, took taxi with girl, who had apparently only just remembered she had fallen off a bike the night before, to the ferry pier, where I got chatting to a really nice couple who were also going to Hua Hin, for about an hour. Gon on ferry and I spent the whole boat ride reading Pillars Of The Earth. Hour wait in Chumpton, then half empty bus to Hua Hin, took 4+ hours, finished Pillars of the Earth, woo! Got dropped off outside a very pretty shopping centre, tried to get a tuktuk to my hotel, but no one had heard of it, as normal, so I tried to find a net place, but failed in that as well, so just retired to a starbucks and pondered my options. After obtaining a useless map, I remembered it might be near the Hilton, so I got a tuk tuk there and fell into an internet cafe, found the address, and asked a helpful lady where it was, turns out it was basically on the road behind. Excellent.

Less excellently, the guest house is situated in the "entertainment" district of Hua Hin and the staff are all lunatics. Room is nice though, with TV and double bed. I headed straight out and wandered around, past a few 24 hour western fast food "centres" and found the night market, which I wandered through, quite busy, same old wallet/watch/jewellery type stalls you see everywhere and some interesting food stands. At some point on my wanderings I got handed a leaflet to a thai boxing match (Muay Thai), and decided it was a good bet. After the long trek there, and exploring a night market by it, it was time to go into basically a hall with a ring in and tables + seats for foreigners, as I suspect we pay loads more. Had cheap beer table service though.

6 matches in total, each 5 rounds. 1) Two 10/12 year old kids, very tough, one seemed to have a special punch-to-the-stomach move which did well. He won, and I liked him because he was less cocky. Though they both then came round asking for money. 2) Older guys, 20 or something, guy got randomly knocked out, no idea how 3) Older still, but very boring as they were too friendly and smiling 4) Tiny tiny kids, 7 years old? After a whole one appeared to give up/get bored 5) Half English dude won, no idea why, other guy just decided not to continue. 6) Good fight, lots of aggression, filmed lots of it.

Entire time some awful high pitch music was playing and announcer kept saying "ladies and Germans". I had an awesome time though, even if it wasn't exactly how Ong Bak portrayed it, probably for the best, KAPOW!

Walked back and collapsed in bed, after avoiding lunatic staff.

29th May 2008

2008-05-29T23:27:00.000+01:00

Up early again as we couldn't get enough peeps to do an afternoon rib dive. Had an awesome BLT baguette at cafe next to dive shop, same old boating scenario etc. Next dive was mega deep dive, which was really annoying a my equalisation went so we could only get to 35m (still very deep) and didn't have much time there (or death) and we had to do a simulated 8 min (at 5m) decompression stop for the course, including 1 min of breathing from an emergency air source. Deco stop ended up at 12 min as just as we were reaching the emergency air source, the damn boat people pulled it up and the boat drove to a new position, so we had to chase the boat!

Anyway, next dive was fine, in fact I use 20 bar less air than Rich, which I was quite proud of. We say moray eels, devil scorpion fish, HUGE groupers, squid, panda clownfish and a vast array of other things. Completed paper work with Rich and then had thai for luncheon again. That evening, and the afternoon, I used masses of internet and tried to find more books but still failed to find any I wanted.

Started reading Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follet again, and began to get back into it after being all monked out.

28th May 2008

2008-05-28T23:50:00.001+01:00

Up at a very silly hour, and had some form of cooked breakfast, which may have been overkill. Met up with Rich(my dive dude) for a quick chat and to check equipment before we marched down to beach and overfilled a tiny boat, so water was very close to spilling in,m and then went out to clamber, in a very undignified manner, onto the bigger dive boat. Took about an hour to get to the south west pinnacle. Dive was similar to the deep dive in my Advanced course, did a timed task above and below water and looked at the effects of narcosis, if it affected my reciprocal heading nav skills or not. It didn't apparently, though I found it harder as he put it on my left wrist. All the while I had the same air consumption as Rich, which I was most chuffed about. After a surface interval of 1.10, during which we briefed on next dive site, I ate some pineapple (which was really nice and it proves it's quite easy to force myself to like something) and swapped tanks. Next dive we looked at what the pressure does to a packet of crisps, a bottle and a squidgy ball. Well the well inflated crisp packet turned to rock, bottle was cranched up and ball was less inflated. Saw trigger fish. Returned to land, had a nice lunch from the Thai place from yesterday and met Rich at 1.30 where we spent 2-3 hours chatting about the knowledge reviews, which I got all right. He told me some cool anecdotes which I won't go into, but basically I REALLY don't want decompression sickness or extreme narcosis. Apparently the world record for deepest dive was set by a group of people who had to recover their friends body who had got so narked he was too disorientated to do anything.

Anyway, in the afternoon I was totally and utterly shattered. Dosed a bit, got a cheapish Italian and then listened to some Flight of the Conchords on my nokia, while dozing, and got my passport photos, photocopies and couldn't find any good books to swap.

27th May 2008

2008-05-27T22:30:00.000+01:00

After a nice breakfast and some net usage, I caught my 10.45 bus, which got us to the ferry pier 1.5 hours early, so I read more of Into The Heart of Borneo, which is really a very good book. Clambered on the boat, all got ordered to stand at front of it for some odd weight balanced turned manoeuvre , and then settled down to trying to drown out Superbad, with Death Cab For Cutie, while reading my book. Found enough coin to buy a roll as no where can change up 1000 baht bills, which makes them redundant money.

Trip took about 1.5 hours, at the Koh Tao ferry port I was harassed by 25000 people,but just got a taxi to the Rex-recommended Davey Jones' Locker diving centre. Only rooms left were huge double bed and single bed ones, had little choice and wasn't too bad price really. Dumped stuff and attacked the dive shop full on. Pondered options, deflected her suggestion that I stay here forever and decided to do the deep dive speciality. 2 days, 4 dives, one down to 40 metres to get narked! Does mean I will have lots of homework now though. I finished Into The Heart of Borneo, got dinner at a nice Thai place, though got eaten alive by mossies, used the interwebs and then worked lots on the deep diving manual, finally completing the entire book and settled down to sleep as I had to get to dive centre by 7.30am! Unfortunately, not only was there the thumping bass of the club to sleep through, but mother nature threw a party of her own with a HUGE thunderstorm erupting, I drifted off eventually.

26th May 2008: Evening

2008-05-26T23:00:00.000+01:00

There were lots of books, but none right for the Tom, so I headed back and foolishly swam in the pool for a while, which resulted in eye blindness and pain for rest of afternoon. Chilled in eatery/bar from 4-8 in a bleary state, much to the sympathy of the waitress. OR she was mocking me or she thought I was a lunatic on drugs. Koh Tao tomorrow!

In other news, I'm running out of space in this book, so I need to get a replacement in Bangkok, as the one I told Rex to get was wrong. Curses. I also need to decide how long I should stay in Hui Hin, 1 or 2 nights, it all depends if I want 3 or 4 nights in Tao, depending on what diving lunacy they rope me into. ARGH, huge hornet in toilet, I hear they turn you to stone if you look into their eyes. As I was saying, trip to Koh Tao seems like it will take quite a few hours. All these islands would be way cheaper if I was travelling with someone rather than getting a whole crazy bungalow to myself. Really looking forward to Hue in Vietnam as the LP map looks like a UO map, must show Ruffle. Vietnam in general looks awesome, mainly as I can fit most of it in and I know the places already. I need to find out if I Can buy China LPs in Hong Kong, as I've heard that they don't like maps without Taiwan on, or something, and they get confiscated at the Vietnam/China border. I also don't know if I can blog past the great firewall of China, perhaps though some cunning proxy server using a blah blah blah jargon blah, hats blah blah blah flux capacitor.

Number of Times I've been Semi-Concussed So Far: 2

2008-05-26T14:21:00.000+01:00

Apart from the Byron Bay incident, I have now just walked directly into a large shop sign, thanks to my ever tall height and the sweeping generalisation of Thai height. Upon removing hand from said head, and assessing the amount of blood, I thought it pertinent to return to the resort post haste before I looked like I'd been hit by a moped. One shower late, I'm not sure it had stopped bleeding, and it was stilling hurting, but it was pouring everywhere, so it's all good. My vision is fine as well, and I don't feet drowsy, just annoyed. I'm about to munch on a cheese and ham baguette though, so that'll solve all. It's MASSIVE.

Last night I finished The Road by Cormac McCarthy, which wasn't great and nearly sent me into a death-fearing spiral, but I started reading Do Andriods Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K Dick (or Blade Runner if you so desire). When I woke up, after a cool thai style brekkie of rice and pork soup, eges and fruit, I swam a bit but made sure I Washed out my eyes after, and finished Blade Runner at some point, possibly during brekkie. Went for a walk to fin dthe post office, which is about 1 km away, stopping off at net shop quickly en route. Sent off a parcel of goodies, walked back, brained myself on low flying signs etc etc.

I saw a book exchnage so I may check that out.

25th May 2008

2008-05-25T23:36:00.000+01:00

Woke up at 6.30am, no one around so just dropped key on a random ledge. Got over priced transport (probably) to airport and checked in pretty easily. Had an awful burger king, no idea why I chose it, and then leapt on your tiny prop. plane, just 75 people, and very ornately decorated. We had a tiny brunch type package and before I knew it we landed at Samui airport where I was shunted to a hotel booking desk, chose somewhere called Hutcha Resort, which was cheap enough and on Mae Nam. After a moderate mini van ride I got there and was very impressed, and it would appear I was one of the very few guests there. Have a little fan cooled bungalow, with double bed and ensuite. I dumped stuff and went for a wander to take some photos while it was sunny. Resort is very nice, and only 2 people at the pool, beach is 20ft from the bar and the sand was scorching hot so had to scamper to sea while deflecting a massage request. Wandered back, got pool stuff, chilled by edge, went in and splooshed around getting sued to forcing myself not to breathe underwater. Got out and sunbathed while reading The Road, which is a bit odd and a tad boring. I'm sure it's poignant or something. Headed back and collapse on my bed for a while, dreamt of superheroes, woke up with blurry vision from chlorine and its still not fixed at 9pm even though I washed my eyes out! Bit worried/annoyed.

Went to explore town, saw a cool Chinese temple, and walked down the main street which is made up of restaurants, massage parlours and internet cafes. Found one and did some interwebs for quite a while, including blog and listen to the latest russell brand podcast, very funny. Walked back and grabbed a thai green curry, extremely yummy. Now chilling in restaurant/bar, only guest in here, very odd, couldn't communicate it to the waitress though. Sounds like the kitchen fell on someone and they sounded like a cat. Wish my vision was alright. I can focus close range, but everything else looks like when they do a really band dream sequence in Sunset Beach or Hollyoaks. With James Blunt playing in the background.

I'm not sure what I plan to do tomorrow, I guess the normal sun, sea and sound combo, but I don't fancy boiling to a crisp or burning to a hot liquid mess. Or something.

24th May 2008

2008-05-24T23:29:00.000+01:00

Woke up at 7, and got down to dive shop surprisingly chipper. After a variety of busses we got on our huge boat with hot showers. Seeing as there were only 5 of us diving, much awesomeness. After our briefing and light breakfast, I spent the 3 hour journey to Koh Phi Phi finishing The Beach, very good book. Turned out I was diving one on one with dive instructor. Had a very good dive, got used to it straight away, saw some cool nudi branches, shrimpie things, puffer fish and the usual moray eels and clownfish posse. Had a really nice lunch between dives, then went to a new dive spot and I saw a bright yellow and very cute sea horse.

Boat ride back to the mainland was pretty boring as I had nothing left to read, but we had a HUGE platter of fruit. When we got back it was pouring down, and as our bus had no sides, we got soaked, so went back, changed, and bust out to Andaman Coffee to print out my flight info for tomorrow. Then had Thai from "the best Thai restaurant in town". Was realy nice actually and saw some guy fall off his scooter, which is why I won't get one. He looked fine though, as it was slow, but he had no helmet and was just in a t-shirt and shorts. Muppet. Headed back very stuffed to packed for an even earlier start tomorrow.

23rd May 2008

2008-05-23T23:46:00.000+01:00

Holy moly, pudding and pie, I needed that sleep (until 10.30!), didn't get of hotel till quite late and had a nice Thai meal for lunch, black pepper pork y'all. Then found an awesome coffee shop called Andiman Coffee Shop, that gives you 15 minutes of free net time with every drink. Wrote some blog and journal and had a mocha plus a coffee. Then went on the beach (after visiting my DVD selling friend) and chilled on a sun lounger for the arvo until the sun set. I read vast amounts of Alex Garland's The Beach, which is something I really should read, especially if I'm going to Koh Samui, and it's really good. Smug that no one charged me for using a lounger, though the beach was mostly empty anyway. I got a smoothie from the coffee shop but it was far too sickly sweet. I saved money on dinner by eating what I had in fridge and bag. Watched Epic Movie, nicely didn't use brain power, was better than Date Movie, but still awful. Also saw some kids hero type film with the guy from home improvement and he was training a group of kids who had power, was quite enjoyable. Sleep for diving tomorrow.

22nd May 2008

2008-05-22T23:00:00.000+01:00

Woke up, breakfast, packed and got to Karon beach surprisingly quickly, at least by 11 or something. Place I planned to stay (who didn't actually email me back), not only looked a bit meh, but it also failed to have a reception desk. So I perambulated to a nice looking place, though the crazy shouting woman made me sceptical so I asked to check out the room. Twas a paradise, so I was like:

Yes.

I desweated and chilled for a while, watching tele and noting my A/C, DVD player, wardrobe, fridge, kettle, ensuite and double bed before taking a stroll around my room. Oh the tribulations of a backpacker. I then actually ventured outside, melted, had a chat with a dive dude, found the beach, walked along, tried to buy 2 t-shirts, and some boardies, but failed to have any money, or at least enough. So I then broke my rule for thailand and went on the back of a girl's scooter to the atm and back. I survived, bought said merchandise, then bought Indian Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark off of a rather sketchy man, but I'm sure it's legit considering how cheap it was. Ahem.

I bought some sandwich making supplies from the next door supermarket. Returned in a pool of sweat, and couldn't stop myself watching it while rehydrating myself. Ventured out again, internet, booked a Dive excursion for Saturday for Ko Phi Phi, which is nice and wandered around.

Showered, tele, blah blah, went out for dinner. To an Indian restaurant, yeah I have it in for my stomach, that I could see out my window. Only person in there at 7pm? Low season apparently. Chef cooked me up Lamb samosa even though it wasn't on the menu, very delicious. Had a lamb biryani and mixed veg curry for main. To which the waitress remarked "lamb lover" to which I didn't reply with "Don't phrase it like that Lady". And we didn't all laugh merrily. Food was great, a crazy Indian guy stared at me the entire time and I had to order a beer at the end to allow me the time to finish this. The things I do for the love of writing....

21st May 2008

2008-05-21T23:32:00.000+01:00

Up earlish and had brekkie while some girls watched Sex in the City, not really a morning show. Then mostly been trying to organise what I'm gonna do next, and decided I'm not really well enough to do a live aboard so may just chill on Karon Beach and get some trips to the Similian Islands. Then fly to Koh Samui, then boat to Koh Tao then off to Bangkok. You really need 3 months for Thailand, it's foolish doing it this quick.

My stomach still hates me though and everything in the Juice Bar is very loud.

The greatest idea I came up with, since mixing water and electricity, was to try and walk to an outta town shopping centre that I was told could supply me with DVD/VCDs. This was quite an epic walk. Probably took 45-60min, though I'm not sure that the passage of time was consistent and I ended up drenched in sweat. Wasn't that bad though, better than trying to walk home from a random place in Orlando, Florida with my Dad. Anyway, the most contrasty thing was that after this walk of dodging diseased dogs, strange nauseating smells and mainly walking in the road, I came across a huge out of place western haven. A pristine shopping centre, with Starbucks obviously, over priced goods, people who open doors for you and then salute you (note: how do you politely acknowledge a salute?) and a 7 screen multiplex cinema. I sauntered around the shops, tried to dry off in starbucks, bought cloverfield, beowulf and rouge assassin VCDs on the cheap (but legal) and decided to catch Iron Man for 100 baht (1.66pounds according to my drastically revised exchange rate).

Seats were extremely comfy, I even remembered you had to stand up to honour the king before each film! (Thanks Rex). Film was really good and I saw a trainer for a weird film that stars the huge wrestler guy that Tony Jaa beats up in a temple that is on fire in The Warrior King, and it was actually advertised as such. After the film I had the worse pseudo-chinese meal ever, that was so sweetly sickly that I could have developed diabetes while sitting at my window cove.

Due to my unwillingness to walk back the way I came in case of dog attacks or moped attacks, I got (probably) swindled by a tuk tuk driver but it was very comfy and she didn't drive like a lunatic, like a certain Rex I know. Twas pretty late so just watched Rogue Assassin, which was generic actiony. Indy Jones was better.

20th May 2008: Phuket Town

2008-05-20T14:57:00.000+01:00

One of the issues with my crazy dutch posh accent is apparently ordering Americanos in Asian cafes. Mainly that I pronouce it "uh-meri-carn-o", and they expect "ah-meri-caaan-o". Or something. It's totally tipping down and today's supercharged possibly unsafely high strength ibruprofen is wearing off a bit. Surely 1 tablet shouldn't be 400mg. You're allowed to take 3 a day apparently, after meals, while under doctor supervision. Well maybe not the last bit. But 1 of those, a strepsil, and vast quantities of water semi-repaired me this morning, as well as a cheap breakfast by the hostel.

A note on cheapness: Everything here is silly cheap. 1.5l of water is 16bht (20p). This coffee in a swanky coffee shop was 50p. My ensuite, fan cooled, double room with TV and DVD is 6 quid a night AND this is a touristic place.

Anyway, after my miracle recovery, I ventured out and soon blasted a path through to the post office, which was far too busy to attempt any sort of business deal, with so I wandered off. Up Phuket Road found Juice Internet where I blogged a bit, had lunch and a huge smoothie for less than 1 quid. Checked out Ocean Shopping and Robinson's shopping centre, batting away tuk tuk and bike dudes at every step. I also perfected a fearless technique to cross the roads with little difficulty. Haven't been offered a massage or a suit yet. Bought some trainer socks for 1/200th of a penny. I kid, but still cheap. Also got billabong and DC shirts in a random shop, where a woman was literally throwing t-shirts in my general direction for me to buy. Anyway, they cost as much as a gram of lint and I now have some t-shirts after foolishly giving far to many to Rex to take back with him. Damn you rex.

I meandered back to the hostel, added another night to my stay, dumped off my stuff, and explained the issue of my shower filling up like some houdini-esque escape trick. Went for a walk around to see some shrines and then had to scarper away from some crazy dogs. The skies fell and here I am in a cafe with some crazy singing girls and an english guy drying his shoes with napkins.

Apparently I can successfully order a croissant in a pseudo-french accent. Which costs 25p. And is huge!

Note to self: Check actual exchange rate and not use one you possibly made up in your head.

19th May 2008

2008-05-19T16:00:00.001+01:00

On awaking today I discovered I had a combination of man flu and dolphin. Very groggy, no strength, aching, dehydrated, sore throat, and massive headache. After vegetating for a bit and eating some cold 7-11 nasi rice or something, I felt even worse. Decided that I had to take a taxi as I was too weak to do any complicated train tomfoolery, and it turned out train goes to wrong terminal anyway.

Hour taxi ride was a bit hellish, couldn't understand driver and was far too warm in there. Eventually, after passing the Malaysian F1 track, we got to the airport and I staggered around until, via some fortunate and random series of events, I found myself in the cramped departure lounge. Dying slowly. Eventually I got some Hersheys dark chocolate, which partially recovered me a bit, and I got some more food and lots of water from a cafe while walking around in circles. Plane was delayed, but when we did board, as I got priority boarding for $1, I got choice of seats, so sat near front for a quick exit. Flight went very quick (just over an hour) and I had some weird chicken, ham and liquid cheese sarnie. Bag was first off conveyor belt!

Shared a really really nice taxi with a random guy, so only cost 2.50 quid, for the 30min journey or something. Checked into hostel, really nice room with ensuite, TV and DVD player. Spent evening dying in bed, watching southland tales. VERY weird film. Fell asleep in a delusional state.

18th May 2008: Min Valley Mega Mall

2008-05-18T23:00:00.000+01:00

Using varying levels of skill I succeeded in getting to the min valley mega mall, which included changing from the Sentral line to the Kommuter line. Well the LP was definitely right about the size of this mall, it's epic huge. But still their entire "IT World" section, of 20 or so shops, failed to supply me with a female to female USB adapter. The book shop also didn't have what I wanted, but I perused the mall for a while before catching the train back home and chilling. I plan to use some form of express train to get to airport tomorrow, which should prove interesting....

18th May 2008: More Weirdos

2008-05-18T16:00:00.000+01:00

What, may I enquire, attracts crazy people to strike up inescapable conversations with me? After various wanderings, I spent far too long in the large bookshop here, got thoroughly lost and bought The Beach and Into The Heart of Borneo for travel related research purposes. I had a late lunch of rice, beef, spice, long beans and some other green veg I apparently chose and cruised into a net cafe to upload some photos and blog a bit. Within a few min a rather large snotty spluttering American gentleman heaved himself, via the back of my chair (which we all know I hate people disturbing when I'm sitting down), and into the chair next to me. After a short while he noticed I had a blog and it turned out he was a blogging government conspiracy nut that I had trouble escaping from. Especially after he found out I did a Comp Sci degree and therefore I spent some time showing him how to use blogger. To top it off he said he didn't like London.

Well then I flipped and drove his face through his monitor.

Course I didn't, I was nice, courteous, made informed comments, made exasperated facial expressions to the cashier, and supplied my contact details to him so in 6 months we could see if some government had intercepted and blocked our communications.

They were face details.

I'm now recovering over a mocha, sad in the knowledge that I barely caught up with my blog at all, and only in bullet point format. I also need a female to female usb adapter. Still it's all good fun. Looked at KT and KTs photos of their South American trip and realised I need to do more activities! For now, I'm off to Mini-Valley, or something.

18th May 2008

2008-05-18T13:16:00.001+01:00

Ah, the curious intricacies of solo travel, which I am once more in the furry depths of. Waking in my windowless room, I showered under a warm trickle of water and pondered the day ahead. After which I bust up to get my free brekkie and booked my next hostel in Phuket, after some obligatory facebooking. Still catching up on birthday messages and photo uploads. Tried to work out a general time plan for Thailand, and failed, so gave up and decided to just wing it crazy style. Though I'm tempted by a live on scuba diving boat. I may just make Thailand a scuba diving hol. A bit like Malaysia. I got the fever.

Anyway, talking of cultural ignorances, once entering the central market, I was accused of such by a random Malaysian guy who initially chatted to me with a friendly tone. He then proceeded to deflame backpacking in general and specifically British backpackers, and on a strange tangent, my internet research skillery. This obviously led onto the natural course of civil conversation and he said he'd take me to the butterfly house. I said "No" and sauntered off after distracting him with an abstract witticism.

In real life I may not have appeared so eloquent.

I wandered through the vast collection of indoor market shops/stalls, which are far too organised and clean for a chinatown market. I settled on a maraca type musical instrument with the idea to collect musical instruments from around the world. Dropping it off back at the hostel and found out the post office is shut today (sunday) and tomorrow (public holiday), which sucks.

Made my way to the LRT, not before witnessing a guy who was about to get hit by a bus, leap majestically into a martial arts pose. Luckily, the bus driver didn't follow suit and just applied the brakes in a more practical solution. After a close shave with a train door, I made it to the KLCC, where I've wandered around trying to find things on my vast "to buy" list. Unfortunately, most of it is not available in Gucci or Rolex. On the plus side, by entering an empty coffee shop I have somehow made it popular and fill up. Must be my hair.

Rex and Ad currently in Doha, Ad still with his acoustically orchestral souvenir. Turns out this regular coffee is nearly half a litre and 7 times the strong.

17th May 2008: Farewell fools

2008-05-17T23:00:00.003+01:00

Got up early
Nearly missed coach thansk to a gross locational misunderstanding
Quite luxious coach this time, thankfully.
Got to the big KL around 12 and got a taxi to times square.
Based ourselves in Starbucks (after a horrendous KFC at Ad's request)
Performed shopping shifts, wrote journal, used free net in SB
Took Taxi to hostel
Very nice and friendly, let the fools dump their bags in my room and it's very close to central market
Hit up central market. Ad bought a stringed monstrosity.
I got a magnet.... more stuff for rex to take back.
Had some weird tea, meant to help boost brain and immune system.
Dropped stuff off and worked out it only costs 160RM to get to the petronas towers. Did that.
Went around shops, and found a funtastic bookshop
Ate mixed grill kebab awesomness in a persian restuarant.
Ad didn't feel like throwing up for once.
Wandered outside, took LRT back.
Chilled in room/tuned guitar.
Said sad farewell to Rex and Ad.
Used free wifi in room till late. Naughty.
Decided Nokia N810 is greatest gadget ever made. So slept.

16th May 2008

2008-05-16T23:00:00.000+01:00

Faffed. Bakery: blueberry pancake and croissant.
Went to golf course
Rental shop shut. Stranded.
Taxi back, got collars. Went in Galaxy Cafe and had a really bad salad and they put evaporated milk in my coffee :( Took taxi back to golf course.
Played really bad. Lost lots of balls in rivers and the sea. Climbed cliffs to try and retrieve them. Was good fun though
On way back we found little england, but the food was very expensive.
Cheap taxi back
Had Steamboat for dinner, which made Ad want to vomit his insides out, but me and Rex soldiered through, though it was all a bit slimy
Used the internet for an extended period of time.
Packed and slept.

15th May 2008: Alcohol strikes

2008-05-15T23:00:00.000+01:00

Travelled back to Cameron Highlands. Had a croissant in the bakery on arrival.
In the evening we drank beer in a nice bar and watched some awful Divas DVD they were showing involving Tina Turner and Cher. Adam hates Brandy and thinks Tina Turner is a bloke.

That is all.

14th May 2008: Relaxtion Maxation

2008-05-14T23:00:00.000+01:00

Relaxing day for Rex and I. Ad's last 2 open water dives. Faffed around a bit and then went kayaking in 2 person kayak. Rex crashed us viciously into a rock, similar to the time he drove me into a tree in a dune buggy, but he confounded matters even more by grounded our vessel on some rocks later on. He's a menace I tell you. All good fun though. Booked our boats, coaches and flights to a variety of travelling destinations.

We grabbed luncheon, I fed my cornetto addiction and we watched a bit of a really bad film. Spent the afternoon in hammocks ready The Complete Robot by Asimov.

In evening we walked down to the only bar on the island and had a few tigers as well as some very yummy food, and free birthday cake as it was one of the employee's dad's birthdays or something.

Wandered back past the film crew again and tackled our huge bill, splitting everything and the such like. Whole stay, diving, food and transport back to cameron highlands cost no more than 330 quid!

Packed and slept.

13th May 2008

2008-05-13T23:00:00.000+01:00

My toes are half destroyed from crazy flippers, not much skin left to lose! Pain, Anguish + Happiness all rolled into a cute little ball.

Dup #1: Really bad! My bouyancy was totally off, and so not relaxed and ran out of air quickly. Pants.

Dup #2: Way better, muchos awesome, fun, even though photography is surprisingly insanely difficult underwater.

Had an extremely yummy Flora Bay Resort special burger, then my toes came back with avengence and it was hard to walk. Analysed our photos, and they weren't as bad as we previously thought. I showed Zamani a bit of photoshop tomfoolery and fixed some of Zamani's photos that were really good, just very red with the power of a magic filter, or something.

Tired. Dinner. Sleep. Adam encroaching on my soul in bed.

12th May 2008: More diving dives

2008-05-12T23:28:00.000+01:00

Breakfast early again before diving activities. Ad being screwed over as couple doing his Open Water course still aren't here yet. We did (with crazy 1000+ dive couple, the woman wearing VERY bold lipstick for diving?!?! and two dutch lads):

Deep Dive
Wreck Dive (went down with performance panda and Zamani took some photos with him)

After doing some theory, I'm now an advanced PADI dive. Woo.
Rex and I wandered down the beach, and there was a camera crew filming some soap or something. Ad got some diving in finally. We decided to do the entire theory and questions for the Digital Underwater Photography course. Which took about 15 minutes and I wrote some unflattering notes regarding the foolishness of some of the questions.

Had dinner and various humourous events may have occured. Read and Slept.

11th May 2008: My Birthday

2008-05-11T23:00:00.000+01:00

BIRTHDAY!
Got cards and had brekkie.
Did 3 dives

Peak Performance Buoyancy
Navigation (underwater.. duh) - Where I was awesome
Digital Underwater Photography

Ad not really get a chance to do stuff because his fellow divers not on island yet due to delayed train/plane/elephant
Walked down beach to nicer restaurant for dinner and chocolate cheesecake
Huge tropical storm hit, and we were trapped at end of beach.
Rang mum, possibly dangerously with the vast amount of lightening
Watched part of Invasion but then walked back in rain break, crashed out.

10th May 2008: To The Perhentian Islands

2008-05-10T23:00:00.001+01:00

Up early, got nice mini van with the same couple from tour yesterday. Lots of room. Cool ride. Stopped for change over of van for an hour. No decent food, so had a lunch of crisps and biscuits. Arrived. Waited for ages for boat, got involved in some food fiasco where it took far too long, so we just had to leave money on table and run to boat, but then boat didn't come, and she chased us with food, and we didn't have time/the desire to eat it.

Took the awesome fast boat to our island resort, a very nice bungalow room, though I'm sharing with Ad in a double bed. Went to the dive shop to sort ourselves otu, and I got roped into doing an Advanced Course. Rex was also conned into lots of dives but less qualifications. The resort/island is muchos nice, and the dive people are very cool/professional so we happily signed every human right away. Got huge book and lots of homework to do, so this is how learning to dive is meant to be... While chilling with rex outside, a gecko leaped from a great height, rex headbutted it onto my chest, where it sat for a while, and rex was like "take it off or it'll go in my pocket". After this it promptly dived into my pocket and hid behind my wallet, then after wallet extraction, it hid in the creases in my pocket, until eventually leaping to my hand and then the floor to my surprise.

For din din we had a slightly overpriced (in hindsight) bbq, but was all you can eat, which I hear is good. In the evening had to read loads and do questions. Ad also has homework with open water course, though his buddies aren't here yet.