BrainNoodles

Before flying to Japan, the kids considered China and Japan to be basically one in the same except that Japan had sushi. If they learned one thing on this trip, it’s that these two countries are vastly different.

Arriving in Osaka was a welcome relief from China. It’s so clean! It’s so orderly! People queue even to get on a subway train. In China, people don’t even let you get out of the elevator before they step in.

We caught the train to Kyoto and were thrilled to spot cherry tree’s in full blossom along the way. Our timing wasn’t so bad after all! A taxi got us to the modern ryokan that we had booked tucked away down a side street in the downtown area. It turned out to be a great location for exploring the city.

All through our visit to Japan we stayed at ryokan’s with Japanese style rooms. This first one was one of the best and was a generous 12 tatami mats in size. The staff prepared our beds each evening and put them away in the morning. Breakfast was served in the room by a motherly Japanese lady chatting away in Japanese as if we understood it. Every evening, the kids looked forward to their wash and soak in the public baths.

One fascination was the electric toilet seats. They’re heated! And they wash your bum with a spray of warm water and blow dry it too! I can’t help but wonder what the carbon cost of millions of warm toilet seats must be.

The first day of sightseeing was a washout – literally. It rained hard. We attempted to go to a museum but it was closed being a Monday. We salvaged the day by browsing the Nishiki food market and the Daimaru Department Store. The food floor in Daimaru would put Harrods to shame. We also explored the Teramachi and Shinkyogoku covered arcades. Determined to do some real sightseeing, we joined a walking tour of the Gion district in the evening despite the rain.

The next day was grey but at least the rain had stopped. We did the classic walking tour of Higashiyama going from Kiyomizu-dera up to Heian-jingu via Maruyama park. The temples blur together as there’s so many to visit but the cherry blossom tree’s are simply stunning and are truly glorious when the sun breaks through and lights them up to their full radiance. The wind occasionally blew the petals into a gentle blizzard that filled the air.

The following day, us boys visited some more temples in the northern bit of Higashiyama and walked along Tetsugaku-no-michi (Path of Philosophy) while the girls joined a long Arts & Crafts walking tour.

I regret that we didn’t plan to spend more time in Kyoto. You can certainly cover the highlights in three days but it would be very easy to spend a week or even more exploring the area. And it’s very well worth the effort going during the sakura season.

 

Apr 10, 2008 | Add Comment

China was much as how I expected it from what reading I had done.

My biggest impression was the dreadful air pollution. I've never seen anything like it except maybe L.A. in summer. There's also the legendary booming economy that's evident around the cities. There's plenty of well off people and plenty of poor. All true.

Spitting? Yep. Smoking? Everywhere. Dreadful toilets? Absolutely! Communist? No way. This is capitalism in overdrive.

I also found myself constantly getting stares. Now I know what it might be like to be beautiful! So I felt free to stare right back. It's a bit weird. My daughter attracted plenty of attention. Mixed marriages are very rare in China so they were very curious when they realised Jenny and I were married and our children mixed. Overall we found the Chinese people gregarious, loud and friendly. We never suffered huge hassles. Of course, we have been overcharged on occasions but there's nothing personal about it.

China faces huge challenges. Inflation is running high. The one child policy is going to have a huge impact as that generation ages. There's a huge disparity between city life and country life. The environment is facing disaster. Many laws don't get adequately enforced. I would hate to be trying to steer this juggernaut!

Apr 04, 2008 | Add Comment

After mulling over our options, we decided to hire a 4x4 and driver and explore northern Sichuan rather than fly somewhere else in China.

Domestic tourism is massive in China. With growing wealth, the Chinese must be travelling more and more so all the standard tourist sites are very busy even in low season. I would hate to see these places in high season. By getting our own wheels, we hoped to get away from standard tour routes and see the countryside.

Our driver and guide was a friendly Tibetan fellow by the name of Gonpo. It was great to get his perspective on the Tibet issue and hear about his life and ambitions. It was Gonpo that made our trip most special.

We drove out to Wollong National Reserve and saw the giant panda's there. We had already seen pandas in Chengdu but at Wollong, you can join as volunteer staff and help look after the pandas. Now this wasn't as exciting as it first sounded. Basically, we got to clean out their enclosures. We didn't even get to feed them. But it was still interesting to get a glimpse of life as a panda keeper. To volunteer to clean up panda poop, it costs 250 yuan each. If you want to play with a teenage panda, it costs 1000 yuan. If you want to play with a baby panda, it costs 5000 yuan!

The Wollong Hotel was unheated and it was very cold. Even the restaurant didn't have heat. You have to eat fast before all the oil in the dishes congeals. Each room had a rattling electric heater to wheeze out some warmth. However, the beds had electric blankets and thick comforters. It's the first time I've ever slept under an electric blanket. Fabulous! I think I'm going to buy one for chilly UK winters.

We then drove up to Songpan in about six hours enjoying the gradual demise of industrial landscapes in favour of rural valleys full of apple tree's coming into blossom and people tending their vegetable plots. Vegetables are grown anywhere there is a patch of dirt. Tibetan villages cropped up more and more. As we got to Songpan, spring disappeared and we landed in winter. It was cold.

No one seems to be able to afford heating. Everyone gathers around coal-fired stoves in shops or the occasional electric heater. Luckily we knew we were in for cold weather and had been buying assorted warm clothes.

The next day we enjoyed a Western breakfast at Emma's Kitchen and spent the morning walking around Songpan. It was much less touristy than all the other places we've been. It's not very large but well worth a few hours stroll. In the afternoon, we slowly made our way to Jiuzhaigou stopping for pictures along the way. This included stopping at a Tibetan monastery and having a good look around. Yaks, goats, and horses are all road hazards along the way. It was a more picturesque and rural China that we had hoped to see.

We got stopped by police for the third time on our way there. Gonpo displays a picture of a Tibetan Lama and a prayer book on his dashboard so with the ongoing Tibetan troubles, he gets targeted at any checkpoint.

After our stays at unheated hotels, we splurged on the more upmarket Kangba Noble Manor taking a double bedroom suite. While the lobby and halls are unheated as usual, the room was warm and it had an excellent hot shower! Recommended.

We spent the following day with the herds of Chinese tourists hiking in the Jiuzhaigou scenic park. It's a series of azure lakes and tumbling streams in a mountain valley. It's pretty but nothing exceptional in April (Autumn would be fantastic). The kids had a great time playing in the snow at the top of the valley. For millions of nature starved Chinese visitors, it must be heavenly. Hiking is a bit of a misnomer. You take a bus between the sites and walk along wooden or stone pathways. You're not allowed off the path. In China, nature needs to be protected from the hordes of tourists.

We covered the park in a day since there's a hefty fee for both the park entrance and the bus. We left the next day and tried to go to Huanglong, another scenic park, featuring a calcified terrace of water pools. However, we had to cross a mountain pass at 4000m that was covered in snow. Our 4x4 went into a low speed spin and hit the barrier in front of a very steep precipace. It made a few bad dents in the 4x4 but it didn't stop us moving on. We crawled carefully to the top of the mountain pass and after looking at the road down the other side, decided to play it safe and return to Songpan.

The government had closed off access to any towns to the west and snow prevented access to any other places we could visit near Songpan. We heard that police were even preventing buses from bring tourists to Songpan and the town felt half closed. We decided to end the trip a day early and drove back to Chengdu in 7.5 hours. The kids are taking these long drives really well.

Driving is manic in China and we saw the sad results of one accident. Cars weave all over the road in any lane and near misses are common. I held my breathe on many occasions!

Apr 04, 2008 | Add Comment

We're been in Chengdu for a few days now. Right from the trip in from the airport, it's obvious that Chengdu is a richer city than Xi'an. There are forests of new apartment blocks sprouting everywhere. Construction appears frantic here. There's also landscaping and attempts to make the place look nice which lacked in Xi'an. The downtown core is larger and more modern. There are poorer neighbourhoods and places we were told to avoid.

We were greeted at the airport by our driver and guide as the first four days of our trip was a private tour. They took us to our hotel in the Tibetan quarter where we were greeted with a police blockade and a few dozen police cars. They're parked a few to each block with their lights flashing. The area is heavily patrolled.

It's clear the authorities have taken the Tibetan riots very seriously. Travel to Western Sichuan is closed and there's no chance of going to Lhasa. It's been interesting watching the Chinese English-language news station. The rioters are simply branded as criminals and the Dalai Lama is blamed. There's is no mention of what motives or grievances there could be beyond labelling them secessionists. The main news websites like the BBC, CNN, Google and Yahoo are all blocked.

I don't support the violence in Tibet against the Chinese but do believe there should be a better political process. We've eaten at a couple of Tibetan restaurants and we're still staying in the Tibetan quarter as our token support. I must say I don't think I'll order yak butter tea again!

We've been to some temples on Qingcheng Shan, a holy Taoist mountain, and walked around the Dujiangyan Irrigation Project. In the 3rd century BC, Li Bing came up with this grand irrigation scheme which massively improved agricultural productivity in Sichuan. This filled the royal coffers and enabled Emperor Qin to unite China and build his terracotta army. It's more interesting than it sounds and is an important UNESCO site.

We went to the Giant Panda Research Base where I took pictures of the kids with a young panda. You have to get there early before the panda's all fall comatose after their bamboo breakfast. Afterwards we went to the Sanxingdui Museum which chronicles some quite amazing artifacts from the rarely mentioned ancient Shu Dynasty.

We did an overnight trip to the ancient town of Huanglongxi and Leshan to see the world's largest Buddha and climbed up Mount Emei. Huanglongxi was a tourist trap and Leshan was underwhelming but Mount Emei was good. We took the easy route which just involves 3km of walking up steps and then a cable car ride to the top. We lucked out with the weather. It was sunny and we had fantastic views all the way to the mountains of Western Sichuan and Tibet. The top was still covered with snow. For the first time, it felt like we were breathing fresh air!

With the private tour over, we're now hanging about at Holly's Hostel in Chengdu touring local sights and deciding what to do next. While as badly polluted as other Chinese cities, Chengdu has its pleasant spots.

Mar 28, 2008 | Add Comment

Made it to China. We almost missed our connection to Xi'an due to the massive queue/scrum for the domestic flights airport security check taking over an hour to get through. Great introduction to China - especially all the shouting and scuffles with security guards. And then they kept changing the departure gate for the flight!

I can't believe how terrible the air pollution was in Xi'an. Caught myself trying to take very shallow breaths just to avoid breathing it. It's so bad, you can barely see any blue sky. You have to look straight above you.

We stayed at the Bell And Drum Tower Hotel. Very convenient location but their rooms were rather tired. As we had heard, mattresses tend to be rather hard in China and this hotel was no exception. Still, it was clean and the plumbing worked.

We did lots of walking around. Rode bikes along the city walls. Saw the terracotta warriors. Browsed through the excellent Shaanxi Museum. Got caught in the rain. Exercised in the park. Bartered for souveniers. Enjoyed the serene Great Mosque. Found the start of the (Northern) Silk Road. Most nights we wandered around the Muslim Quarter checking out all the food stalls and shops. It's a modern city but not as modern outside the center as I expected. At least there was a Starbucks close by. I've read that there are now more Starbucks in China than the United States.

So far China is much as what I expected. Crazy traffic. Lots of spitting and other behaviours that would be considered rude in the West. Horrible toilets. Got overcharged just buying water. If you don't know the proper price, you're pretty much guaranteed to get overcharged. Stunning amount of building going on. Life feels rather frantic in the city.

Mar 26, 2008 | Add Comment

Tonight we’re catching a red-eye flight to China. Our first stop is Xi’an. Then we fly to Chengdu in Sichuan for a short local tour but we have about ten days to do whatever we want. Not sure yet whether we’ll go south or east or we could even try going to Tibet. We’re going to make it up as we go. By April 6^th we have to be in Beijing in order to catch our flight to Osaka. We’re hoping to be in Kyoto in time to see the cherry blossoms but according to current predictions, we’re going to be about a week late. Then we have a few days up in Tokyo before flying back to Beijing on April 15^th. We have a week in Beijing and then we fly back to Kuala Lumpur. No doubt its going to be our most challenging trip yet.

Mar 16, 2008 | Add Comment

At the top of my list of things to do while in Malaysia this time around was to dive the island of Sipadan. Sipadan is considered one of the best dives site in the world.

So I booked us on a 6 day/5 night package at Borneo Divers Mabul Resort. Mabul is the island next to Sipadan. You can’t actually stay on Sipadan as it’s now protected and visitor numbers are limited.

There are four other places you can stay. The Sipadan Mabul Resort (SMART) runs a high end Water Village as well as some value-oriented beach bungalows. There’s another water village at Kapalai and there’s an old converted oil rig platform called SeaVentures which offers good value for money. A fifth option which the cheapest of the lot is to stay in Semporna on the mainland but then you have a long boat ride out to the islands.

I was very happy with the Borneo Divers Resort. It was well run and the bungalows were bright, nicely furnished and comfortable. The staff were very friendly. The diving kit was a mixed bag: some stuff was new, some was rather old. If I was going to complain, I would say the food wasn’t inspiring. It was perfectly adequate but not a lot of choice. A minor niggle.

The daily routine is breakfast by 7:30am and then walk over to the diving station by the beach to put on your wetsuit and boots. Your fins, weights, BCD, regs and tanks are already loaded on the boat so there’s nothing much for you to carry except your mask and computer. The boat leaves at 8am and takes about twenty minutes to get out to Sipadan. It will take up to about 12 people.

At Sipadan, you have to first dock while all the permits for the day are checked. Lots of visitors are just there for snorkelling so they get off the boat and then the divers head out to the first dive site. After the dive, we dock again and have a one hour break on the beach. It’s catered with tea, coffee, water and some snacks. Lots of chit chat. Then it’s off for the second dive. The dive master switches all the tanks for you so all you have to do is a predive check and then backwards roll into the water.

After the second dive, the boat picks up the snorkellers and we all head back to Mabul in time for lunch. All meals are included in the package. At 3pm, there’s another boat dive but it’s only to either Mabul or Kapalai. After that, you have the option of doing a (free) sunset dive at the house reef without a guide so you must have a buddy.

After your last dive, it’s your job to wash all your equipment with freshwater and get it ready for the next day. Dinner service starts at 6:30 and the night is yours.

That’s the routine. I loved it.

The diving was very good. I was a bit disappointed at first as I expected to be blown away and I wasn’t. But the diving was very good.

Sipadan is a turtle island. You can’t go there and NOT see a turtle. You regularly see a few on each dive. They’re not easily scared by divers so you can approach them quite close as they lie sleeping on the seabed. You get both Hawksheads and Greenbacks. There’s also lots of whitetip sharks. You see them on almost every dive too. I don’t go so close to them!

I was really hoping to see a tornado of barrucuda which are often found at Barracude Point but they never showed up. Guess it was the wrong season for them.

The other star sighting we had was a large Eagle Ray swimming along the sea floor at about 40m depth. First one I’ve ever seen. Lovely creature.

Beside those, there was plenty of other sea life and I must confess I don’t know all the names of them. They’re fish. Tons and TONS of fish. Colouful fish. Little ones and big ones. One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish. Trigger fish, Parrot fish, Angel fish, Jack fish, Bum heads, Blue Spotted Rays, Alligator Fish, Trevalleys, Flute fish, Pipe fish, Groupers, Bat fish, and bazillions of tiny reef fish. Found a black frog fish. He was cool. Annoyed a Morray Eel. Even got to see a school of cuttle fish. This region has upwards of 3000 species of reef fish.

One of the highlights was playing with a large school of Jack fish. Jenny and I managed to hover in the middle of them while the school circled us. Weird having all those eye’s looking at you!

The point is that there’s lots to see. There’s also lots of nudibranches and other little things if you take the time to just explore. Even found a pygmy seahorse.

So after twelve dives, I was pretty happy with Sipadan.

Jenny had a couple of moments while diving. Once, she dived off the boat without putting her fins on first. The DM was standing around looking at an empty boat and calling out “whose fins are these?!”. Of course, no one let her forget that quickly. On the last dive, I noticed my no decompression countdown was getting close to zero. Then I checked Jenny and found she had slipped into a decompression dive. This is something that’s always avoided as you have to manage your ascents more carefully. It was easily sorted by a longer stint at 5m.

Overall, the diving isn’t difficult. There are currents but they’re easy to live with. The sea was always very calm with no swell. It can be freaky as you swim over the dropoff knowing that the sea floor is 600m below you. But you can get a wonderful sensation as if you’re skydiving. We visited Turtle Cavern twice and on the second time penetrated inside the cave a short ways and enjoyed the view looking out into the deep.

We made some friends during the trip. Divers are a friendly bunch and there’s plenty of time to relax and chat. The pictures I’ve posted here are from Tim and Lana who are a Canadian couple we met.

So I would recommend diving Sipadan but I probably won’t go back unless it’s a great deal. I want to dive Layang Layang with the hope of seeing Hammerhead sharks. Or I’d like to go somewhere to see Manta rays. Asia has so many good places to go diving!

Mar 14, 2008 | Add Comment

Found this rather explicit toilet sign in a restaurant in Malaysia. Wonder if they also do signs for squat toilets.

Mar 14, 2008 | Add Comment

The results of the 2008 Malaysian election are in and Barisan Nasional is back in power. This coalition is headed by the UMNO which has ruled Malaysia ever since independence in 1957. I don’t believe having the same party in power for 50 years is that healthy and certainly makes for a very suspicious and unbalanced “democracy”.

Like many Asian countries, the deal is that citizen’s can have economic freedom but criticism, protest and dissent are not tolerated. In Malaysia, all the mainstream media are controlled by political parties. Journalists lack freedom of expression and forums for debate just don’t exist. As witnessed by the recent Hindraf protests or the arrest of Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, the Malaysian government will freely use the draconian Internal Security Act laws to squash political opposition. Opponents can be detained without trial indefinitely. This is justified as the way to maintain stability, security and economic growth. It’s also a convenient way for the same party to stay in power.

The biggest issue in Malaysian politics therefore continues to be avoided and that is the unequal treatment of citizens of different races. I don’t see how a country can achieve racial integration when you keep reminding everyone that their race matters.

This latest election brings hope that a more open dialogue will begin. The opposition political parties have gained many new seats and Barisan Nasional has lost it’s 2/3rds majority in parliament which allowed it to push through legislature with impunity. It may force the goverment to listen more but it’s a long road to getting politics balanced.

Mar 09, 2008 | Add Comment

We got back from Australia on Feb 3^rd and spent the month chilling out in Malaysia. We celebrated Chinese New Year and also K*’s 9^th birthday. For a treat we took K* and several family members indoor rock climbing at Camp 5. Great facility. We’ve also been kite flying and a done few other local trips.

During the month we have also concentrated on sorting out the remaining few months we have in Asia before we return to the UK. All this travel takes a lot of research and planning. Australia took us to the end of our plans and bookings. It’s a tough life trying to decide where to go next.

One decision we made was that it was time for another diving trip.

Mar 08, 2008 | Add Comment

After Uluru, we returned to Melbourne for a few more days before flying back to Malaysia.

According to latest survey by The Economist, Melbourne is the 2^nd most liveable city in the world (Vancouver is #1). I can believe it. It’s an easy grid-based city with plenty of green area’s and lots to do. It’s big enough to be interesting but not so big as to be overwhelming. Southeast from Melbourne is the Mornington Peninsual which has some lovely scenic areas and quaint towns. The Dandenong Ranges National Park was a nice place to hike. We also went down to Authurs Seat for fabulous views one day and rode the Puffing Billy another day. There’s lots of parks with ubiquitous BBQ’s for picnics at the drop of a hat.

If I was going to live in Austalia, I would either pick Brisbane or Melbourne to settle in.

Mar 06, 2008 | Add Comment

We’re back in Malaysia but I still need to finish up blogging about Australia. I’m also trying out BlogJet as a way of writing these posts.

From Melbourne we flew to Ayer’s Rock to visit Uluru. In some ways, I had been dreading this part of the trip as it’s the middle of summer and I expected some terrible heat. And, after all, it’s a lot of money to go see a big rock. I couldn’t convince Jenny to drop this part of the trip as she really wanted to see this icon of Australia.

While flying there, you get to appreciate the size of Australia and how much of it is just desert. Miles and miles of nothing.

We got there and sure enough, it was hot – 40 degree’s celsius. However, the humidity is only 10% so it doesn’t feel that bad really. Generally, you do stuff in the morning and late afternoon and laze around the rest of the day. We rented a car so we could easily get about.

I really enjoyed the outback atmosphere. For such a dry place, there’s lot of vegetation. In the evening, there’s an orgy of insect life bouncing around. We saw several lizards and even a small snake. There’s bigger things like kangaroos and camels but we never saw them; they mainly come out at late at night. Of course, there’s also a bazillion flies that want to crawl all over you. By this time, all of us had nets to go over our heads.

We saw the sunrise and sunset at Uluru. The sunset wasn’t too great due to clouds but it was still a good show. We did a couple of walks around the base. We walked around the Olga’s and saw the sunset there too. Jenny and the kids also did a course on dot art painting. We didn’t climb Uluru as the local aborigines request that you don’t.

We stayed three nights at the Outback Pioneer Hotel and Lodge in one of their budget rooms. It’s just bunk beds and a bathroom but it’s great value and comfortable enough. Hotels can be very expensive around Uluru. Recommended.

Mar 06, 2008 | Add Comment

From Brisbane we flew to Adelaide and picked up our 6-berth campervan so we could meandre our way to Melbourne. This was our first go at a campervan holiday with the kids. We had six days and 1000km to cover.

With all the little detours, we actually covered over 1500km. Dozen's of national parks, dozy little towns and everchanging scenery. Huge streches of beaches with pounding surf. Highlights for me were the bat caves at Naracoorte and the Tower Hill reserve where we spotted wild koala bears and kangaroo's. The Great Ocean Rd scenergy was nice but I think it's rather oversold.

However, I probably won't do a campervan holiday again.

A campervan is good if you like touring and you get to sit in the front seats. You don't get to see much in the back of the campervan and must while the time away as best as you can. A campervan is also quite awkward and ungainly to explore with or drive into a town. Note that there's no insurance coverage for overhead damage, water damange or damage caused if you go on an unsealed road. Once you arrive at a campervan park and settle in, you're pretty much stuck there shoulder to shoulder with the rest of the camping crowd.

On the plus side, the campervan isn't really camping. Ours had a microwave oven, air conditioning and even a DVD player. And it's nice always having a toilet with you unless you're the one that has to empty it.

I think it would be better to have a 4WD vehicle and tow a tent trailer or (dare I say it) a caravan. Then you can leave the tent trailer and go explore with the 4WD.

Feb 01, 2008 | 2 Comments

We took the train from Sydney to Armidale and visited a friend there. It's a small university town in the middle of a ranching region. Nice cool climate as it's up on a plateau. It's also very white which was very noticeable. There's lots of Asian's in the more urban area's of Australia. Unfortunately, there was too much pollen in the air so I was overwhelmed by an allergy attack.

From there we took a scenic drive down to Coff's Harbour. It's a nice windy drive through an area reknowned for a great many waterfalls. I discovered there were such a things as dry rainforests. The temperature gradually rises as you get to the subtropical coast.

After some oysters and ice cream at Coff's Harbour, we headed up the coast to Brisbane. Lots of driving. Jenny managed to get a speeding ticket within 90 seconds of taking over the driving from me - 72 kph in a 50 zone. Nasty fine. Not overly impressed with any of the scenery we saw whipping by as we drove north. Lot's of strip development but I'm sure we passed some nice beaches.

In Brisbane, we took the kids to the Wet 'n' Wild Water Park and Steve Irwin's Australia Zoo. The zoo was great. The Irwin's did the croc feeding show and we got to feed the kangaroo's and stroke a koala bear. The museum and art gallery on Brisbane's Southbank were good too.

We didn't have much time but Brisbane impressed me as being very liveable. Doesn't surprise me that lots of people are moving there.

Feb 01, 2008 | Add Comment

We're now in Australia for five weeks spending the first ten days in Sydney. I am dead happy to be back in a meat and potatoes country - a land of beer and BBQ's!

I've heard plenty about Sydney beforehand so I had some pretty set expectations. Sure enough, it was everything that I had heard. It's a city that I knew I would like.

Physically, it really is quite similiar to Vancouver but with a warmer climate. Vancouver has a more dramatic setting with the backdrop of mountains while Sydney is quite flat. Sydney harbour has a much longer shoreline with many more waterfront houses and an excellent ferry system. There's more "life" to the harbour. The downtown core of Sydney is smaller with a less impressive skyline than Vancouver. Sydney sprawls out  more compared to Vancouver which has a much more restricted space to grow. The architecture of the buildings and houses are similiar. Sydney seems to have a greater stock of cheap old houses which are now getting ripped down and replaced with new ones.

Unfortunately, both cities have nasty traffic problems and very expensive housing. It takes a while to drive anywhere in Sydney. I get the impression that the infrastructure isn't as well maintained in Sydney. It's clean but some of the roads and sidewalks are rundown. I assume that's just tax dollars being spread thinly over a wider area than Vancouver has to deal with. But like Vancouver, I can't afford the houses I would most like to live in.

The lifestyle certainly feels similiar in the two cities and the better climate gives Sydney the edge. Sydney has much better beaches. We spent a great afternoon hanging around on Manley beach. Much better than Kitsalano.

 

We spent New Years Eve down at MacMahon Point to watch the fireworks. We had a fabulous view and I can honestly say it was the best fireworks display I've ever scene. The fireworks exploded in a wide panorama from two barges, the harbour bridge and eight locations on office block towers in the city. Quite a spectacle.

Taronga Zoo didn't live up to the hype and entrance fee. It has a great location with views towards the city but the zoo itself is nothing special compared to others I've seen. The highlight for us was seeing the Australian animals and the platypus in particular. Alright, the meerkats are very cute too.

The Australian Museum was very good and we're sorry that we ran out of time just as we discovered the hands-on resource center. It had a good installation on Aboriginal history and culture.

We spent a day up in the Blue Mountains and did a short walk from Echo Point in Katoomba. Very pleasant area but not what I would call mountainous. It's worth a lot more exploration. Fantastic scenery.

There's a huge amount of other things to do in Sydney and the local region but we simply did not have enough time. You would need a few months! I have no doubt I would enjoy living here for a year or two. Australia has a much stronger British heritage than Canada but having lived in both countries, Australia feels very comfortable.

Jan 09, 2008 | Add Comment

Dec 21, 2007 | One Comment

We were lucky enough to spend a day volunteering at Prechrouk School while we were in Cambodia. Normally volunteers would spend at least two weeks teaching at the school but the Sage Foundation kindly let us volunteer for only a day as one of the Cambodian teachers, Vanak, was happy to have us help him teach English to the Year 8's and 9's.

The school is about an hours drive West of Siem Reap in a rural area not visited by tourists. The road isn't completely paved and the school has no water or electricity. There's no playing field or playground equipment. There's just two buildings: one for the primary school and one for the secondary school. They just have rooms, desks, chairs and blackboards and not much else for 700 students. They study subjects like math, english, khymer, geography, history and the sciences sharing the school between two shifts each day. Half the students study in the morning and half study in the afternoon. There's no fluffy subjects like art and music. There's no sports. There's no clubs.

We spent half a day getting an orientation of the school before the day volunteering. I was pleased to find that the Cambodian branch of Room to Read had provided the school with a library and a basic collection of school books. It's a charity we've donated to in the past. However, for the entire school, we discovered that they only had two dictionaries. That evening, we bought the school six more dictionaries but clearly they're desperately short of resources of every kind.

Vanak teaches 8 classes back to back. We missed the very first one since it started at 7am but we joined him for the other 7 working on the verb "to be" with his students. The class sizes weren't too bad and tended to range from twenty to forty students. The students were great. They're very well behaved, respectful and keen to learn. As in other countries, the really enthusiastic one's tend to sit in the front while some of the more reluctant students sit in the back. It seemed to me that the reluctant one's were just the students having a hard time keeping up with the pace of the class.

Vanak is an excellent teacher and clearly has a lot of fun with his classes. He's keen to be a better teacher but has no resources to help him learn. Cambodia needs a lot more teachers like Vanak but they're in very short supply. Many parts of Cambodia only have schools up to the primary level or none at all. Even if there is a school, it's a challenge to get the parents to consistently send their children to school as an education isn't valued. The children are needed to help with the farming work or sell souveniers to tourists. Ironically, the kids selling souveniers generally have very good language skills that will serve them well to get jobs in the tourism industry when they grow older.

Dec 21, 2007 | Add Comment

It's often a struggle to book a holiday. One option is to use a tour agent in your home country but I always feel you pay way too much for what you get. Essentially you're paying for a lot of marketing and sales overhead for a bulk travel product. You can also do it all yourself but it takes a lot of time and research and it's hard to get the itinerary all lined up nicely. You can easily end up paying rack rates and wasting a lot of time.

So an alternative is to find a local travel agency in the country you're visiting. The problem is finding one you can trust not to rip you off and that will customise an itinerary to fit your needs and interests rather that push you through bulk travel tours. The big drawback to these local agents is that you don't have much legal recourse if things go wrong so trust is a major concern.

We arranged our tour of Cambodia through AboutAsia Travel which is quite a unique tour operator run by Andy. Andy lives in Singapore and creates the custom itineraries while his head guide is based in Siem Reap and handles all the ground co-ordination. What is truly unique is that 50% off all the profits from a tour is donated to the Sage Foundation which helps children in Cambodia.

The cost of the tour was very reasonable but even if you think you're paying too much, it feels good to know that half of the profit is going to a good cause. What convinced me to go with AboutAsia Travel was a phone call I had with Andy where we discussed how to structure the itinerary and he clearly knew how to avoid the main tourist traps and offered ways to see Cambodia that many tourists missed. What really clinched it was that he could arrange with the Sage Foundation for a day of volunteer work for our family.

I arranged to pay on arrival rather than a bank transfer but in fact no one asked me for any payment when I got there. After a few days, I insisted it was time to pay and visited their office. Our guide told me it was considered a bit rude to ask for the money up front!

There were a couple of minor mess ups but nothing serious and nothing that they didn't bend over backwards to rectify. Overall, it felt like you were being looked after and that feels very relaxing after being so used to doing everything ourselves.

I managed to meet Andy before I left Siem Reap and had a interesting chat about the business and his work with the Sage Foundation. It's a great business model as it allows tourist dollars to have a direct impact helping local people. Today it's successful without any marketing and a lot of dedication from Andy. His challenge is to scale the business without him putting so many hours into it. Once the business model is proved and runs smoothly, then it can be replicated across Indochina and other developing countries.

So if you're thinking of visiting Angkor Wat, it's well worth your while contacting AboutAsia Travel and seeing what itinerary they can put together for you. Hopefully one day you can travel elsewhere with them.

Dec 10, 2007 | Add Comment

The modernity of Bangkok was a relief after Cambodia. We stayed at the Vengtai Hotel not far from the Khao San Road. Not very luxurious but clean and comfortable.

Unfortunately, my daughter came down with a high fever on arrival. I still had a bad cough and an on-again, off-again low grade fever. The two of us spent the whole of our time in Bangkok holed up in the hotel. Very boring.

Jenny and K* managed to cover lots of sights and get in some shopping. Luckily, they avoided catching what we had. R*'s fever finally broke before we were due to fly back to Kuala Lumpur.

Dec 05, 2007 | Add Comment

While Siem Reap is a small provincial town with rural sensibilities, Phnom Penh is very much a big city. It's crowded and the people aren't as friendly. The girls often dress with a sense of fashion and there's plenty of flash cars to prove that some Cambodians are wealthy.

Cambodia has a reputation as a very corrupt country. We we're never directly affected by corruption but we heard lots of stories. For example, the terrible road between Siem Reap and the Thai boarder never gets fixed because its alleged that Thai Airways pays a bribe to keep it that way. The guides we had technically work for the government but they give their salaries to their boss in exchange for not showing up at work. Instead, they all freelance and earn more however, they will still get a pension one day.

The roads in Phnom Penh are still dominiated by swarms of motoscooters. There's little sense of road safety and there's even less sense that there are any rules of the road. Many cars don't even have licenses and I heard many license are fake. Few helmets are used. Our tuk tuk didn't even use lights at night. At intersections, there's often no traffic lights or stop signs. Everyone just goes and weaves around each other! The main rule is that smaller vehicles make way for bigger vehicles and there's safety in numbers. Crazy.

Our first day, we visited the Tuol Sleng prison (S21) and the Choeung Ek Genocide Center at the Killing Fields. I've spent some time trying to understand Cambodian history since independence but its been a struggle to understand the Khmer Rouge and the purpose behind their brutal policies. The portraits of all the children they put to death at S21 was really upsetting. What I can't reconcile is this nice country and people with such a horrific past.

We also visited the Royal Palace which was fine but not overimpressive. It lacks the finish of fine artisans. We spent quite a bit of time at the Water Festival down by the riverfront watching the boat races. The tourist board had a special pavillion for any tourists which made it very easy to get a good view. The crowds in the city were phenomenal.

Unless, you are interested in the Khymer Rouge history, I don't think its worth visiting Phnom Penh. Rural Cambodia is more interesting than its cities.

My enjoyment of the trip was then cut short. I came down with a high fever and spent three days lying in my hotel bed while the family continued sightseeing. At least the Sunway Hotel was a very nice place. My fever broke just in time for us to fly to Bangkok. It seems it was a nasty flu.

Dec 03, 2007 | Add Comment

We've had a really good week here in Siem Reap. First, its a bit of a luxury trip for us. We're in a decent four star hotel rather than our usual three star or less. It's called the Angkor Holiday Hotel. It's a rather soulless design catering to tour groups but it's very clean and comfortable with aircon, a pool, a good breakfast buffet and our own safe in the room. The place is only two years old. The service from the staff is outstanding - friendly, prompt and eager.

After a week here, one of my strongest impressions is just how nice the people of Cambodia are. They're very polite and courteous but friendly too. Always quick to smile and laugh. Vendors aren't pushy except for a few around the temples. They regularly go out of their way to help you. Out of all the places I've been, no country has a nicer people.

We've had our own private van with driver as well as an English speaking guide to take us everywhere and look after us every day. This has made it a dead easy trip. Of course, we've done dozens of temples but there's hundreds in the area. I have to admit I wasn't overly impressed with Angkor Wat. It's interesting with some fabulous base reliefs but not awe inspiring - even when we saw the sunrise over it. However, Angkor Thom (aka the Tomb Raider temple) definitely lived up to its reputation. Fantastic. We also saw the temple at Beng Mealea which is in a state of total ruin and covered by overgrowth. Very atmospheric with few tourists. Overall, the temples were well worth coming here too see.

We also managed a few excursions further afield. The floating villages of Tonle Sap were interesting. The one at Chong Kneas is too touristy but Kompong Phluk was worth seeing. We even got paddled about a flooded forest. The whole pace of life centered around the ebb and flow of the massive Tonle Sap lake is fascinating.

We also visited the reclining Buddha at Kulen National Park. It's the only place I've seen beggars so far. The Thousand Linga was interesting. Basically a thousand phallic symbols turn the river holy. Ok, there's a lot more explanation needed but I've learned Hinduism is very complicated and I certainly can't explain all this penis envy. We had lunch at a beautiful waterfall downstream where there were few tourists and plenty of Cambodians splash about.

The best part of traveling Cambodia is just watching people go about their daily life. Jenny describes it as being very much like rural Malaysia 30 years ago. There are still bullock carts but motorscooters provide the main form of transportation. They're used for everything from transporting pigs to stacks of mattresses to families of five. It's a very poor country with few modern conveniences and not even simple machinery. It's a simple life and a hard life but I'm sure they have much stronger communities than what we have in the West.

We spent a day teaching at a local primary school. It was a great experience that I'll write up in more detail later. The school didn't even have electricity or running water. It was fabulous meeting the children and our kids had a chance to help teach them English.

Today is our last day here. Jenny managed to take a cooking course at a local cooking school while the kids and I went to see the Land Mine Museum. Land mines are still an horrendous problem here. In fact, there seem to be hundreds of good causes and we've felt compelled to donate to quite a few. It feels wrong that such a nice people have so many troubles.

Nov 21, 2007 | One Comment

Tomorrow we're on the road again. We have a two week tour of Cambodia that I arranged with Sage Insights (update: Sage Insights is now called AboutAsia Travel). This is a complete change as usually we do everything ourselves but Sage put together a compelling itinerary for a reasonable price and the profits go to a good cause. One of the highlights of the trip will be volunteering as a family at a local primary school. It should be a great eye-opener for the kids (and us!). We're also spending four days in Bangkok since Jenny's never been there. It was a horrid city twenty years ago when I last went but maybe its got better.

Nov 13, 2007 | Add Comment

Recently got back from ten days in Bali with Jenny and her brother John. It's the least I've ever been prepared for a trip. I didn't even have a guidebook or a map! But my focus was on diving rather than culture so my only preparation was reading about the various diving locations.

We arrived and immediately jumped into a taxi for a two hour drive up to Amed. Along the way, I realised to my horror that I had left my Samsung T9 MP3 player on the airplane. Doh! I'm pretty good at losing small things and now tend to avoid buying expensive mobile high tech gadgets. The T9 was an excellent little device but I ought to get something bigger so I'm less likely to lose it. On the return trip, I filed a lost report with AirAsia but I doubt I'll see it again.

I expected Bali to be a lot more "developed" than what I saw on that taxi ride. I was quite pleased that it wasn't. Amed is primarily a fishing village and most people go about their daily struggle to earn a living amid a few tourists. We checked in to the Three Brothers guest house. John had a small bungalow right on the beach front to himself while Jenny and I took a larger one just one row back. Clean and comfortable and we got them both for 200,000 rupiah. That's $23 US a night! No aircon but we had a fan and an occasional breeze. We also quickly arranged four days of diving with Ecodivers. Diving was $60 US per person per day with full equipment hire but John negotiated a 15% discount since it was low season.

The diving was absolutely superb; better than the Red Sea. The wreck of the USS Liberty in Tulamben was excellent but there are even better and much less crowded sites in the area. There's a huge variety of sea life and healthy soft and hard corals abound. Some of the highlights were bumhead fish, three octopusses and a pygmy sea horse. Saw my first shark. It was just a small white tip about 2m long. Plenty of anthias, jack, parrot, scorpion, lion, angel and a billion other fish I can't identify. Suffice it to say, there's lots of look at.

The best dive was a Gili Silang - greatest profusion of corals I've ever seen. They just carpet the sea floor. It was a very worrisome dive though as it can potentially become a toilet bowl with bubbles going down rather than up. That's freaky. You have to respect the currents. We also hit a thermocline where the temperature dropped from 29C to 21C.

Ecodivers was ok but they were a bit lacking on checks and some of their equipment is rather old. But their service was fine. We had a mix of shore drives and jukung dives. Jukungs are small outrigger fishing boats that can only hold three people. You have to put your kit on and take it off while in the water. I was a bit dubious about this at first but it works well and the trips were short. The diving is very easy with little swell and gentle drifts. Visibility was generally about 15m. Diving heaven!

After four days and eight dives, we decided to take a break. Ubud caught our interest as offering a bit of culture so we took a taxi there and settled into Gusti's Guesthouse. Two clean and simple rooms cost us 280,000 rupiah ($32 USD) each night but again, there's no aircon; just a fan. Gusti's is built on a ravine going down to a river and has a beautiful garden setting. Across from Gusti's is Roda's restaurant which has excellent food at great prices.

At first we were only going to stay two nights but we extended it to three nights. John and Jenny were keen to do some shopping so I relented. There's tons of art and handicrafts and none of it is very expensive. We also took in a couple of cultural dance performances. I'm a bit cynical about performances for tourists but actually they were very good and I quite enjoyed them. Best of all, I fulfilled a minor ambition to watch a live gamelan performance. I love the sound of a gamelan when it's played slow and meditatively.

We spent our last two nights on Nusa Lembongan which is a tiny island just north of Nusa Penida. We got there on the public ferry which turns out to be just an oversized jukung. There's no dock; you have to wade through the water to get onboard. We stayed at Tetuk's Lonsoms gettings two rooms for 300,000 rupiah a night. Ours was on the first floor with a veranda overlooking the beach. Fantastic!

We managed a day of diving with World Diving which is owned by some Australians and run very professionally. They have a large jukung fitted out as a dive boat. Altogether, there were 12 of us diving the day we went out and we soon made friends with a few of them.

The islands have a wicked reputation for strong currents and cold water so we donned 5mm full length wetsuits with hoods. However, it turned out that the water was a warm 28C and the drift was gentle. On the first dive, we saw two massive mola mola. Unbelievable! It's a rare sighting especially given the conditions and season. It was a great thrill to watch these gentle giants. The second dive wasn't eventful but the extensive corals and sea life was still very rewarding.

While onshore, we wandered around the broad sandy beach watching the locals farm seaweed and sat around some of the beachside restaurants. We also wached some cockfighting which is barbaric as you might imagine. We also rented some motorscooters and spent a couple of hours exploring the coast eventually finding a placed called Dream Beach to have a cold beer.

The last day, we got back to the mainland and hired a taxi for 400,000 rupiah for the entire day. He drove us all over the southern part of the island with us getting him to stop at a variety of shops and temples. We checked out Kuta Beach and the more developed parts of Bali which cater much more extensively to the western ideal of a beach holiday.

This has been one of the nicest trips I've ever done. You get fabulous diving, an interesting culture and beautiful scenerey with excellent value for money. On the downside, it's very hot and humid and you regularly get bitten. The food gets a bit monotonous too. I'd certainly consider going back.

Nov 12, 2007 | Add Comment

We're now in Kuala Lumpur living at my in-laws. This is going to be our home away from home for the next seven months.  Yep, SEVEN months. It's a long time eating just rice and noodles. As you would expect, it's hot and sunny and dreary England is a long way away. No winter for us this year!

Today is also my daughters' birthday. She's turned 12 and is more like a young adult every day. It's a bit hard celebrating birthdays when you're travelling. We gave her a Calvin Klein Swiss-made watch that she picked out for herself yesterday and later this afternoon, we're off to a theme park inside a mall. And there's bithday money burning a hole in her pocket.

Today, I also need to pack my bags. Tomorrow, Jenny and I are flying to Bali to get in ten days of scuba diving all along the east coast. Jenny's brother is coming with us. He's a divemaster and has dived the area before. But that's all of us. The kids are staying behind since we can't look after them while diving. I'm really looking forward to getting back into some serious diving. We haven't done much diving since 2004 when we went to Egypt.

Oct 31, 2007 | Add Comment

So we learned a few things doing this last trip.

Our kids, at this age, do not do scenery. I doubt many kids care about scenery. We spent a bit too much time driving around beautiful places and would plan for less of it next time. Driving with bored kids is never fun . Audio books are the best way we know to pass the time in the car.

It's better to book accommodation in advance. While booking at the last minute offers a lot of flexibility, it also wastes a lot of time and finding room for a family of four is harder than if you're just a couple. Next time, we book it all.

We learned that we can't take our kids somewhere, show them something historic and then try to get them interested in it. It doesn't work that well. They need to know something about what they're going to see before we get there and then they're more likely to be interested. This means building in more time into the itinerary for learning about what we're going to see. See less and understand more.

If you travel Europe and you need Internet access, take a laptop. Internet cafes are few and far between but wifi is everywhere.

With kids it's all about "doing" and activities. We have to keep reminding ourselves that and not just rushing around and "seeing". The kids always seem to like climibing up to the tops of places.

On a long trip, we need to plan on more free days where you don't have any plans and can just take it easy and get the laundry done. We tended to have these days when someone ran out of underwear!

Oct 31, 2007 | Add Comment