Koreans Can Drink You Under the Table

I have come to realize that no plans are ever set in stone, even when you try to solidify them in your own head. I came to this conclusion last week, a couple days after that ridiculous Rugby Sevens Tournament. (If you haven't seen the pictures yet, please check them out. They only provide a small glimpse into what it was really like those three fateful days.) I said at the end of my last post that I wanted to go to Laos for the Lao new year, however, after I went to a travel agency and inquired about prices, there was absolutely no way in hell I was going to go. Then when I went back to campus and sat down next to my good friends Chloe (a French exchange student) and Ted (Dutch), who both go to the same university in the Netherlands, they said to me, "Hey, we're going to South Korea this weekend. Want to come?" I was a little taken aback, but after realizing that we had free accommodations thanks to Chloe and Ted's friends who are on exchange in Seoul, I decided to tag along. Man, what a trip that was!

South Korea is really a very different place from the rest of Asia. We walked off the plane, welcomed by a friend of Chloe and Ted named Marijn, and got on a bus heading to our apartment. Chloe and I had one place to stay, while Ted and Hana (Ted's girlfriend) were staying at a place across the river. On the bus ride, Marijn told me all about the country and the culture. The sky is covered in Yellow Dust - a yellowish smog that originates in north China and makes its way across to the Korean peninsula and mixes with South Korea's pollution to cover everything up. We couldn't see it at the time since we arrived at night, but it was definitely noticeable the next few days. I learned all about the lifestyle that the Koreans have built for themselves. The culture is incredibly Confucian-oriented. This means that working hard, striving for success, achieving greatness through activity as oppose to reclusion and introspection are all embedded in Korean families from childhood onwards. Family is also extremely important as well. Filial piety is a Confucian virtue that is held highly. Because of this, everybody works. They work and work and work - normally for 10 hours a day, five to six days a week. I also learned that this meant there are very few beggars and homeless people in Seoul, which I found pretty interesting. Now, as a result of the hardcore working values people hold, what normally happens after work is people go out to dinner and immediately start drinking. And I don't mean having a glass of red wine the way those wimpy Americans and Europeans do. They order some soup and meat dishes, and order bottles and bottles of what I assume to be the national drink - Soju. Soju is a small bottle of liquor, maybe 350-500 mL, that costs anywhere from $1 to $2 (1,000 to 2,000 won, the Korean currency). And most of the time if you start to order enough food or alcohol, restaurants simply give you bottles for free as a way of enticing you to stay or come back. Restaurants and bars flood the city, so they have to figure out some way to keep bringing customers back, and this is that way - by handing over cheap liquor. Soju is only 20% strong, so it's weak, and it's made from sweet potato. It's got sort of a bitter-sweet taste to it. It is not delicious to drink in any sense (although some may argue with this), but due to its cheap nature and accessibility (you can get this in any 7-11, Circle K, wherever), it is the only thing people drink. And it gets you DRUNK!!! I mean Koreans just gather around tables and order bottles and bottles of Soju, enough that it tallies up to around 2 bottles per person, if not more. I began this post with this explanation because I want to make sure all you readers understand the Korean culture, because we really experienced it, from our first night of arrival to heading back to the airport.

Once Chloe and I dropped our stuff off in the apartment Chloe's friend set us up with, we walked over to the center of the neighborhood, Sinchon, where bars and restaurants and more bars and convenient stores just line the streets. It's similar to Japan in that there aren't so many buildings for each establishment, but they all are just stacked one on top of the other. There could be two restaurants and three bars all in one building, but they're all on different floors, so you either take an elevator or stairs up to wherever you want to go. So Marijn took the two of us to this restaurant so we could grab a bite and we met a bunch of their exchange student friends. And first thing's first. Chloe's other friend from university, Jasper, was there and immediately ordered the following: a 5-liter barrel of beer, two pitchers of kiwi juice and Soju, and two more bottles of Soju for us to add to the alcoholic fruit-juice pitchers. And then it was just shot after shot after shot of kiwi/Soju juice. There was no messing around. That's what Koreans did. A few tables away from us was a group of Koreans just going at it with plain Soju. There were maybe 7 of them and easily there were at least 10 or 12 empty bottles of Soju scattered around the table. And to deny a shot of Soju - how dare you. Don't even think such a thought. That's not the Korean way. Just take it and kindly make your way to the bathroom, puke if necessary, and head back for 7 more shots. That's what Chloe and I saw that night. She went to the bathroom and came back with a look that just screamed "I just saw a girl puking in the sink". It was great. A few hours went by, and then we finally met up with Ted and Hana and some of Ted's friends. And then we did the next thing that Koreans do while drunk (aside from pass out on the sidewalk) - we went to noraebang (a.k.a. karaoke). We started at 3 am and made sure to bring in plenty of Soju and orange juice, singing songs, well more like shouting lyrics that appeared on the TV screen as loud as possible, everything from Elton John's Tiny Dancer to Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody to Backstreet Boys to Journey to 2Pac to Billy Joel's Piano Man to Neil Diamond's Sweet Caroline to Aerosmith to Bon Jovi. I mean how many songs can a group of six sing in 3 hours? Because that's how long we were there. We didn't get home until 6 am - and this was Thursday night, the first night we arrived in Seoul. It was an epic night for sure. And since I had the only camera with battery, I just left it on the table and let whoever had the urge to do so take pictures and videos. I woke up the next morning. One of my memory cards was full. We had taken 130 pictures.

I forced Chloe out of bed and once she had showered and woken up (in a grumpy mood as most girls are when they don't have enough sleep), we walked over to the Yonsei University, where Jasper and Marijn were studying. The campus is enormous, acting as home to close to 20,000 students (I think), stretching a good half mile length-wise. After lunch and desperately calling some tour companies to try and book a tour to the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone, 38th Parallel), and not having any luck connecting with anybody, Chloe and I made our way towards City Hall to see Deoksugung Palace. Built in the 15th Century and located in a central part of Seoul, it was very nice to walk around the gardens in peace and quiet, admiring the grandness of the buildings and being a bit surprised to see not only Chinese architecture but also Western-style buildings, with flat roofs and columns. Shortly after, we met up with Ted and Hana right as the changing of the guards ceremony was about to take place. It was incredibly touristy - a voice over a loudspeaker announced in Korean, English, Japanese, and Mandarin what was going on and giving a brief history lesson on the guards. Feeling ridiculous and forcing myself to experience the "traditional Korea", I walked over to a tent that was handing out uniforms to tourists to try on for free. Who was I to pass up this amazing authentic opportunity, to dress up as a real guard and stand next to a "commander/guard/leader" in the same uniform? So I put on the long robe and large-billed hat and "took part" in the changing of the guards ceremony. Very cheesy and corny and touristy, but still made for a good laugh for everybody. The four of us then went to Seoul's largest temple/palace, Gyeongbokgung. It was the original palace of the ancient Joseon Dynasty in the 14th century, and was mostly destroyed by Japanese invasions, and subsequently rebuilt. A huge complex with buildings for every purpose imaginable (housing, eating, hosting guests, etc...), it was really gorgeous walking around with the sun setting, turning the yellowish-blue sky into a darker orange color. After that pleasant visit, Chloe and I went back to our place to nap, since we were still so exhausted from the night before, and had set up a time to meet Jasper for dinner. The three of us went to an all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ place. Sitting around our own personal grill, Jasper brought us plates and plates of meet (pork, beef, spicy beef, and chicken) and as we grilled them to perfection, sprinkling cloves of garlic over it to give it some flavor, we started off with some beer and saved ourselves from the sickness that was a direct result from all the Soju from the night before. I have never been in a better place eating meat. The tenderness and juicyness of it all was simply unreal. It's customary to take pieces of lettuce actually and place pieces of meat inside it, smear some tangy/spicy sauce over it, wrap it all up, and just chomp down and devour it. All around us, the smell of cooked beef overwhelmed every other sense I had, as I watched tables covered in meat and Soju bottles and each table's residents just having another night of eating and drinking. Moderation is not in a Korean's vocabulary. After dinner, Chloe and I met up with Ted and Hana at a bar across town to celebrate the birthday of a friend of his, and we took it easy, only having a few drinks, enjoying the music and company and atmosphere of it all. In bed by 3ish, we felt lucky to have at least the chance to get more sleep.

The next day Chloe and I had planned on meeting Ted and Hana at a metro stop by a huge market called Dongdaemun. I was still a bit frustrated we couldn't book a DMZ tour and so I told Chloe I was going to actually go to a tour agency and try and do it. She was going to go to the metro since her skepticism kept leading her to believe it'd be impossible. I eventually found an agency in a hotel that had over 35 floors, and when I asked to book a tour for the next day, I can't imagine what the expression on my face must have looked like when she said, "No problem." It had to be somewhere between sunshine bursting in from a curtain-covered window and the smile one puts on after a few drinks have been consumed. Relief, joy, excitement - I immediately booked a tour for the four of us. Excited to tell the gang, I made my way back over to Dongdaemun and saw Chloe sitting alone waiting for Ted and Hana. After we both talked about how great it was that we would actually be able to go and see North Korea and how mad we were at Ted and Hana for standing us up, we began our trek through the Dongdaemun. The most impressive thing about that was the lines and rows and stacks of shoes. Literally hundreds of shoes just flanking the path, and calling out to Chloe. So I left her to her shopping and just wandered on my own, walking through the aisles of food stalls and clothing shops and the flea market where you can buy anything from a flat screen tv to a typewriter to second-hand guitars to porn. I met back up with Chloe for lunch and we continued walking through, just admiring all the things on sale and feeling shocked at how whenever we found anything intriguing and inquired about the price then tried to bargain, the vendors would not budge one bit. They gave us a look of disgust and insult, refusing to even think about partaking in the activity we were so used to in our travels. One of the weirdest things I did was try silkworm larvae. A huge bowl of empty shells sat next to another huge bowl of steaming larvae, and I just took a toothpick on the cart, picked one up, and bit into it. It was easily one of the most disgusting things I've ever put in my mouth. It tasted the way it smelled - old, salty, sea. It was just terribly unpleasant. And when I crunched into it, the microscopic inner organs and guts burst into my mouth and were so small that I couldn't fully swallow them, so they were stuck in my mouth and gums and I had to buy water to swirl it around and get the whole taste and feel of it out. I just went through that graphic depiction to illustrate just how gross I found it, though I'm sure locals gladly pay the few thousand won for a whole cup of it. After several hours of Dongdaemun, Chloe and I were tired but I wasn't ready to go home. She went back to our place to nap and I took a small detour to an area called Apgujeong. An exchange student from Korea told me about this place and he said it's interesting to visit because it's where everybody gets their plastic surgery done. I walked along the main street and was pretty impressed at the consecutive buildings all headlining their practice - "Plastic Surgery", "Aesthetic Construction", "Cosmetic Work". Just a couple stories high, but it was just where everybody gets that sort of work done. Kind of interesting to see that. Apparently it's a big thing in Korea for girls as a birthday present to receive a 'gift' of surgery. I went back to nap for a little before meeting up with Chloe, Ted, Hana, and some others (Ted and Hana apparently thought I was talking about another metro station and so they waited at the wrong station for an hour, thinking we would show up), but they were all very excited to know we would be going to the DMZ the following morning. That night was not that special. We actually went back to eat Korean BBQ again since Ted and Hana hadn't tried it and then we went to an area filled with bars and restaurants that is popular among university students. It was a good fun-filled night.

The next morning, the tour agency picked Ted and Hana up from their apartment, then came our way and got us, and we started the hour-long drive to the #1 destination that was on our lists when we organized our trip to Seoul: the 38th Parallel. After we got out of the city of Seoul, the road was all of a sudden walled-in by barbed-wire fences, that just followed the sides of the road all the way down. The feeling started to creep in slowly that we were about to see a country that is so isolated from the rest of the world, that is so different and controlled. We got off the tour agency's bus and got onto another bus, the official bus that would take us through to the sites that were included in our tour. The first thing we did was watch a 7-minute video of the current status of the DMZ. It opened up with a little girl in no man's land balled up on the ground with her hands covering her ears, trying to block out the sounds of explosions. Then the movie went into a narrative about the history of it and how North Korean and South Korean guards currently face each other at some parts and how it is home to "rare plants and extinct animals" (though I'm not sure how possible it is that extinct animals live there). It was just total propaganda, trying to reassure the tourist crowd that it's a safe destination and that it is and will always be a part of Korea's home and how it's not as dangerous as it really is. The closing lines of the movie were: "The DMZ is our land. The DMZ is our home." with the image of the same little girl from the beginning standing up with a big smile on her face pointing to a butterfly flying over the barbed-wire fence. How ridiculous! Walking away laughing, the four of us then descended into the 3rd Tunnel. In the '90s I think, South Korea discovered four tunnels that North Korea had dug and were planning to use to infiltrate their southern counterpart. Stretching over 1,600 km length-wise and 75 meters below ground, we were actually able to walk a couple hundred meters of it, up to this closed off door that leads through the DMZ and into North Korea. It was interesting to hear the North Korean's explanations of the tunnel that South Korea just took as a blatant lie because it was just plain false. Our next stop was the best of all, the Observatory. Located on a hilltop, it presented an entire view of the DMZ and into North Korea. The day was gorgeous and clear, so we were actually able to see all the way into Kaesong. Directly in front we saw the South Korea barbed-wire fence strangle its way along the land and then just barren dirt and grass for about 4 kilometers, and then the North Korean fence line, and along these two boundaries were guard posts. Very clearly in front of us was the 160-meter tall flagpole with the 300-kilogram North Korean flag waving proudly. This flagpole is in what our tour guide called Propaganda Village. It's an entire village, fully developed with buildings and streets and lights - but is empty. It's a ghost town. Nobody lives there. The government just built it there to make it look like a real village. Why? For what purpose? Who knows. But they're not fooling anybody. It's certain that nobody lives at there. Very creepy. We were looking out into another world. A world where Orwell's fictional 1984 is a reality. Where wiretaps are not uncommon and food is not a luxury. What's even more strange is that about 15 feet back from the front of the lookout area is a yellow line, and you cannot take pictures beyond that yellow line. The line is just far enough that you can't raise your camera above your head, take a picture, and get anything substantial, no matter how tall you are or how high you reach, and they yelled at Ted when he put Chloe on his shoulders to take a picture, and there are binoculars where you can put a coin in to get a closer look at the forbidden land set up about 5 feet apart from each other, so they block your view even more. It's virtually impossible for a tourist to take a good photo of the land of North Korea. However, Ted and I being the stupid risk-takers managed to place our bodies in front of our camera and click the shutter without the guards catching us. Well, actually as we walked away, one of the guards stopped Ted and asked to look at his pictures, and they found the illegal one he took, but it's so bad and you can't see any buildings at all that he talked his way out of it. And actually, one of his pictures is amazing. It's possible to see the flag and Propaganda Village, and he took it from behind the line. It's really incredible. The next cool destination was the last rail station in South Korea. Once/If the countries unite, that will be the way for people to go from Seoul to Kaesong or Pyongyang. And once/if this occurs, then the Trans-Siberian Railway is planned to go through the Korean Peninsula. Seoul to Paris - what a voyage that would be! That train station is pretty crazy. Completely built up, ready to go, and is actually operational, but doesn't go any further. And the South Koreans advertise it in a positive way: it's not the last station in South Korea, it's the first station to North Korea. Ticket counters, chairs, operational marquee signs with dates and times, it's all there. We went to lunch next and had traditional bibimbap. Not sure how to describe it. A mixture of rice and some meat and lots of veggies. Then we went back, and met up with Jasper and went to the Seoul Tower, a great spot to look out and see the vastness of Seoul, except that it was pretty cloudy and smoggy. Whatever. It was a good day. We finished up with a delicious fresh fish dinner, and another great repeat of Thursday night - Soju and noraebang. Turning it at 1 am though instead of 6, we got some sleep for our early flight the next day.

All in all it was a great trip and really an interesting experience. Seeing Korea and the DMZ was incredible. I feel like I've seen the real Asia between China, Japan, and Korea. And after visiting the Cu Chi Tunnels, Hiroshima, and the 38th Parallel, I've pretty much covered all major 20th century battles (with the exception of WWI). I think that's a pretty cool feat. As for the rest of my travels, I have about 10-14 days before finals to go somewhere (and it's between Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, or a combination of two of those three, or possibly Burma or maybe Laos and north Vietnam - I really have no idea) but I'm definitely going through Thailand and Cambodia after finals before the family comes over. It's been a great semester and I can't believe it's almost over. Check out the pictures to come.

Japan, China, and Rugby - Craziest 3 Weeks of My Life

Well, I just spent the past 2 hours blogging, writing about my travels through Japan, and my internet cut off for some reason and I lost everything. I am so ridiculously frustrated that I don't know how much I'm going to be able to rewrite, so forgive the brevity of this post (even though it may be a relief for some of you).

A little over a week after Vietnam, I traveled to Japan. This was an incredible journey. I landed in Tokyo and spent my first day and a half exploring there. Highlights included Akihabara (the intensive electronics shopping center, where anything battery-operated is sold) and the Tsukiji Fish Market (one of the largest fish markets in the world, where enormous fish the size of small children are sold and auctioned off). To be quite honest, I was not all that impressed with the city itself. The buildings were not nearly as interesting as Hong Kong's, both in size and aesthetically. What is impressive is the size of it. The Tokyo Tower (a building based on the design of the Eiffel Tower but to the Japanese is better because it's 9 meters taller) is the best place to get a sense of this. Taking those who are willing to pay the price up 250 meters, I got amazing views of the vast city, understanding why it's hyped up so much. Lights everywhere, traffic going in every direction imaginable, everything and everyone moving at light speed. I had some great first-time experiences visiting some shrines (Yasakuni-jinja) and the one day I visited the Imperial Palace, it was closed, so the best I could do was walk around the Imperial Garden and marvel at its beauty and potential when the cherry blossoms are in season.

I then took a shinkansen train (bullet train) to Hiroshima and walked all around the Peace Memorial Park. What surprised me about everything, the statues, the monuments, the Peace Memorial Museum, was how everything was dedicated to peace. There was no real hostility towards the US or other enemies, but rather a striving towards world peace and the drive to make everyone know the real dangers of nuclear weapons. Some other incredible memories include staring at the Cenotaph frame the Eternal Flame of Peace with the A-Bomb Dome in the background. The Eternal Flame of Piece is a long menorah-looking sculpture with one flame in the middle that will never be extinguished until the last nuclear weapon is destroyed and the A-Bomb Dome is the last standing building from the explosion (it's a UNESCO World Heritage Sight). One of the most moving memorials was the Statue of Mother and Child in Storm. This sculpture is of a mother so hunched over that her back is nearly horizontal, hugging one child under her stomach with her other arm clutching her other child that hangs on her back, arms hooked around the mother's neck. It is a very moving statue, that really depicts the feeling of destruction and despair that the Japanese must have felt after the bombing, and how no one, not even innocent civilians, deserve that. It was a really humbling experience. Another memory was walking past the Atomic Bomb Memorial Mound - a huge mound comprised of the ashes of all the victims. It's enormous. Check out the pictures. Very incredible. What's more was watching a tour group stand in front of it and pray together for a moment in silence. Very moving.

The next day I explored the nearby island recommended to me by many called Miyajima. Entering by boat, I saw the famous floating orange torii (Japanese gate that you walk through when entering a shrine) and the floating shrine called Itsukushima-jinja. The island was covered with wild deer roaming around, eating anything they could find off tourists and I hiked up to Misen, the tiny summit only 530 meters high. Once I got to the top, I reached a speechless view of the Japanese sea with random island pockets and a gorgeous view of Hiroshima. And believe it or not, it actually started snowing little flurries on the top. It was very magical and mystical. Really really memorable.

I spent the whole day there and that night took a short train to Kyoto where I had my first CouchSurfing experience. CouchSurfing is basically an on-line backpackers organization that brings travelers together by letting the traveler stay at a local's place/couch for free, allowing the traveler to experience the culture and life in a more real sense. It's a great thing, and I did it for the first time in Kyoto. The couple that lent me their couch were so nice that they told me where their key was and to let myself in once I got there because they work at night so they wouldn't be there when I arrived. How nice, huh? Once Maia and Brett came home, we all went out for dinner where I learned how they met and how they both have been teaching English in Japan for several years and are on their way to Thailand as we speak to get their teaching certificate and teach for a school in Thailand after. Pretty neat people. They were so awesome, giving me maps and drawing out routes for me so I could hit all the major spots and really get to know Tokyo. I had 3 full days there. All of which I spent to the max visiting temples, gardens, shrines, eating phenomenal food, and doing probably the creepiest thing I've ever done in my entire life: literally stalking a geisha. Hair pulled back, white make-up on, beautiful black and white kimono on with a velvet shawl wrapped around, she was scurrying down the street in sandals, trying to escape unnoticed, but she couldn't escape my eye - as she was absolutely beautiful. And like I said, I literally stalked her. I followed her around every corner and back alley for a good 7-10 minutes, until I saw her pull out a cellphone and a man came out and brought her into his place. Now she could've been going to either an appointment or going to another place to get ready for an appointment or she could've been a maika (a geisha in training), but either way she was authentic and was in the geisha business. It was very exciting and walking away from it, I remember thinking how that was by far the creepiest/sketchiest thing I've ever done in this lifetime so far. Of all the temples, gardens, and shrines I went to, here are the most memorable: first, Fushimi Inari. This was the first one I ever visited, and it was where Memoirs of a Geisha was actually filmed (never saw it but apparently it's the scene where she's under hundreds of orange torii). That's what this place is. On a hillside, it's basically one big maze where literally hundreds of torii create paths that you follow down. It's really incredible to be covered in this color and stroll down a walkway leading you around and up and through mini-shrines in the area. Near the top, when I came to a clearing that opened up a beautiful view of Kyoto, again, it started to flurry mini snowflakes on my head and shoulders. And once again, that feeling of mysticism arose in me, as sparkles of white fell from the sky and I looked out at the ancient city of Kyoto. Next was another great one: Sanjusangen-do. This houses 1,001 Buddhas - 1,000 normal-sized Bodhisattva's flank one big one with 40 arms, which sits in the middle. This is pretty impressive. As you walk along, the couple dozen guardians of the Buddha stand there, protecting the main Buddha. Probably Kyoto's most famous, and nearly everybody's favorite, temple is Kiyomizu-dera. An enormous wooden structure, supported by huge wooden pillars with great balconies that present phenomenal views of the city, it's just a gorgeous temple with lots of history that I can't go into now. One of its coolest attractions is this hole that you walk into. You take off your shoes, hold them in your right hand, and make your way down into pitch black only being guided by the rope that you're supposed to hold in your left hand. So dark you can't even see your shoes when held up to your face, you just have to make your way slowly with this rope, until you turn a bend and see a glow coming from a gigantic boulder in the middle of the black with a Japanese character written on it. Then I slowly made my way out, back into the light. I later learned this is supposed to symbolize being reborn - going into the dark, seeing the light, then coming back into life. I spent 8 hours that day walking around, visiting 7 or 8 different Japanese temples, gardens, and shrines. You can only imagine how sore and tired my legs were after that. Really, I could barely make my way back to the apartment I was staying at. I just collapsed. But of course I had to start out real early the next day, because I had even more to see and more ground to cover. But Maia let me borrow her bike for the day so I could see everything I wanted to. (They were such nice people!) One of the biggest places I went to that second day was Nijo-jo - the famous castle where one of the most powerful Shogunate's ruled. I could just picture James Clavelle's book, Shogun, taking place. I walked all around the castle, and through the wide gardens, taking breaks on benches to stare into the rivers at the reflections of the bushes and bare cherry trees. It was really nice being alone, just wondering on my own in my own world, sort of meditating and just taking it all in, allowing me to appreciate it all. One of the coolest things also was walking through the gardens and seeing the perfectly raked sand. Just straight parallel lines in the sand, so defined and precise, with concentric circles around rocks in place. They were really a sight to look at. I literally spent 8 hours that day biking all across Kyoto, from the south to the west, across the center, and all the way to the east. Now that may sound like a bunch of gibberish to those who don't know Kyoto, but look on a map and you'll realize this is no stroll (or rather tricycle ride) in the park. Not only that, but I told Maia and Brett I'd be back by 5:30, and at 5 I left my last temple, and got lost, and ended up biking down this major highway, and somehow ended up getting a flat tire, and biking the next 30 minutes at half speed with twice the bumps from this damn flat tire. That was a hell of an afternoon. That night I met up with a friend of my cousin's, and he took me out to a couple bars and we ended up meeting more of his friends, and finally, I experienced the ultimate Japanese phenomenon - karaoke! Quite different from the Westernized version, we rented a room and some microphones and were able to pick our own songs from thousands and spent the next hour drinking and singing to each other, eliminating shame from the equation. It was really a great time.

The next day I visited a small town 30 minutes north called Kurama. Known for its beautiful scenery, I took a couple hours and just hiked all over the mountain, seeing gorgeous and enormous mountains covered in green pine trees and reaching a shrine at the top. The best part of the entire day though was having yet another first experience - the onsen experience. This is public bathing in natural hot springs that reach temperatures in the low to mid 40-degree Celsius, which is in between 100 and 110 degrees Fahrenheit. That is effin' hot! But it felt so good, stepping into that scalding mineral-rich water, with the cool breeze flowing over equalizing the difference in temperature, watching the hundreds of trees covering the mountain sway like seaweed in an ocean. Absolutely phenomenal. The feeling of complete and utter relaxation, both mental and physical, is unequal to anything I've ever experienced.

That night I put my stuff in a locker and met up with another HKU friend in Tokyo (the shinkansen train is amazing and so worth it since I got a JR pass that allows me to take as many bullet trains as I want within the time period) and we went out all night. It was crazy and ridiculous, but nothing really to brag about. Stayed up all night and took the first train at 6:30 am back to Kyoto, then took a 30 minute local train to Nara, the ancient capital of Japan, where I met up with another of my cousin's friend, Akiko. This was one of the best days of the trip. She took me all around the city, walking all over the park and visiting the famous temple and pagoda and lake with deer running around, and of course, the Todai-ji Daibutsu, the largest Buddha in Japan enclosed in the largest wooden building in the world (and is also another UNESCO World Heritage Sight - I visited a lot of those). The best part about this was around the back of the Buddha, where a large pillar stood, reaching up to the ceiling. At the bottom of this pole was a hole cut in from one end to the other. It's said that this hole is the size of the Buddha's nostril, and if you can crawl through one end and out the other, you'll be enlightened. Of course, I needed this enlightenment, and so got in line behind the dozen 5-year olds who also supposedly needed it (I bet they don't even know what enlightenment is, stupid kids). So as I prepped myself up and stretched out, and read in the LonelyPlanet how to do this because they actually do have a strategy written out so you don't get stuck, I saw Japanese tourists step out of line from their kids so they could take a picture of the gaijin (foreigner) trying to do this. I managed to wiggle my way through and jumped out to the cheers and clapping of the crowd, with my arms raised triumphantly, and all of a sudden, a light shone from above and enlightenment crawled in me. If you got any problems, come ask me. I'm enlightened. Akiko was next and got through no problem also. She was a great host, very interesting and fun to talk to (spoke perfect English) and really excited to show me around and teach me all about Japanese culture and customs. She also took me to a place where they make the black chalk that is exported and melted to turn into the black ink that is used to Japanese calligraphy. This man she took me to is one of 16 people in Nara who produce this chalk, and 90% of the chalk in Japan comes from Nara. And in this session, where he taught us how to make it, we actually made our own chalk and is now in a box in my drawer where it needs to sit and not be opened for 3 months so it can dry properly, otherwise it'll crack. The craziest thing was once we finished he asked me where I was from, all translated through Akiko because he spoke no English, and he asked if I spoke Spanish, and I said yes. Then he started rambling off Spanish to me, telling me how he had lived in Peru and Bolivia with these people who didn't know Japanese or English so he was forced to speak and learn Spanish. Then we seriously had a 10-minute conversation about Peru since I had been there also. How many people in Japan can speak Japanese, no English, and Spanish? Not very many I would guess. But this guy did and we had a great time. I left with a big grin and an invitation from him to come back and have dinner with him when I returned to Nara. Akiko and I marveled at this experience as we hiked up a small hill to watch the sunset. That night, Akiko wanted to show me a temple that's supposed to be pretty nice at night, but we got there and there were hundreds of people crowded around, including a camera crew set up nearby. We then learned that there was an annual festival that night going on called Omizutori, where the temple's closed off and monks run across the upper level balcony with burning bushes on long sticks, shaking the ashes onto the crowd, and if the ashes fall on you, it's supposed to purify you. So we watched as these monks twirled huge bundles of fire and the ash sparkle down on the crowd, of course receiving some of this holiness ourselves. So not only am I enlightened, I'm also pure. Not a bad day, huh?

I took a night bus back to Tokyo that night, and spent my last day, wandering around. And I spent my last hours doing the best thing possible - relaxing in an extremely local onsen with 45-degree Celsius dark mineral-rich water. Super friggin hot, but amazing! There was also a 20-degree Celsius natural bath, and going back and forth between the two, shocking my muscles between the scalding and the freezing, felt absolutely incredible. Flying back on a plane never felt so good.

The Japanese people in general are actually some of the kindest people I've ever met. With a map pulled out, at least 2 or 3 people came up to me every time to make sure I knew where I was going, on trains, buses, or in the street. Once in Tokyo I was standing in drizzle, not much rain at all, it really wasn't a problem, and one stranger walked up to me and put his umbrella over my head so I wouldn't get wet. Honestly, who does that? I was shocked every time at how friendly and open and kind the whole country was, no matter where I went. This wasn't just a regional thing, it was nation-wide. And of course, I had some of the best food in the world. The freshest sushi and sashimi, best ramen and udon dishes, and the pork in these noodle soup dishes was just phenomenal. Soaked and marinated in broth so much that one soft bike into it and the whole slice of pork just broke off and literally dissolved in your mouth - it was so tender and juicy. My mouth is watering right now just thinking about it. I had another really cool dish in Hiroshima where the noodles and broth were separated and I dipped the noodles into the spicy broth, along with cabbage and other pickled veggies. And the only cup of sake I had was with Akiko for dinner, and boy was it delicious. Cold sake is much better than hot sake - write that down.

Two weekends later, and I experienced a complete 180, making my first trip to mainland China. I went with another exchange student Omar (from LA), and we flew into Chengdu, and spent the night again with a guy from the CouchSurfing website. Going out to dinner with him and his roommate, we had our first Sichuan meal (Chengdu is the capital of the Sichuan province). Unbelievably excellent spicy pork and veggies, and a beef and green pepper dish with rice. It was all unreal. The next day we got up fairly early and took a 2-hour bus to a town called Leshan, which is not worth visiting at all except for one thing: the largest Buddha in the world, the Dafo (literally Grand Buddha). That was quite a sight. Monstrous head, long drooping earlobes, and a towering torso, and feet so big you can take a nap on its toenail. The only crappy thing about that was all the Chinese tourists. They are the most rude people. They don't care at all about the pictures you are taking, they'll just walk right in front of you taking your picture and take their own. It was really annoying, and the line to walk down the stairs along the side of the Buddha was ridiculously slow because these tourists kept taking their sweet time. But seeing it was pretty amazing. I kept going back to my Petra visit in Jordan, and comparing the two. The Dafo took 90 years to build and started in the 8th century I think. Pretty incredible that it's survived this long. After having some more unbelievable Sichuan food, Omar and I took a 30 min. bus ride to the town of Emei. This was the main part of the weekend trip - our plan to climb Emei Shan (Mt. Emei), a 3,077-meter high mountain. One of the 4 most sacred mountains for Chinese Buddhists to ascend, we were excited to see some real amazing landscape views and of course, the wild monkeys that roam the mountain that are supposed to be just insane.

We started our trek up around 8:15 am, hiking up stairs and stairs and more stairs, up and around and over mountains and forests. It wasn't that strenuous, just lots and lots of steps. We reached temples and monasteries, sat down and took water breaks, just looking at the vast mountain range with a blue-white sky above. We came across several monkeys on our trip up, one of which actually growled and showed its sharp deathly teeth at us. Freaked us out so much that we basically decided not to hike alone on the chance that we would meet a pack of those beasts and be outnumbered. 9 hours later, and we finally reached the top. It was a great hike. We walked through snowy trails as we got higher and higher up the mountain, and the clouds slowly but definitively rose up to our level, eventually completely covering us and everything we could see. It was like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon style - if you fell over that mountain, you would literally disappear and never be found again. It was insane how much mist and fog there was. We took our time going down, spending a good 2 days enjoying the better views of the mountainous valley and making sure we did not piss off any monkeys. Took 6 hours the first day of our descent and we spent the night in a monastery covered in 5 blankets each because it was so damn cold. Then another 7-7 and a half the last day, reaching the bottom with a feeling of triumph and excitement...and of course complete exhaustion. Our knees, calves, quads, hamstrings, everything was just completely dead. We treated ourselves to a feast before heading back to Chengdu - fresh fish soaked in Xue Moyu sauce (a Sichuan-flavored sauce), sweet and sour cabbage, and double cooked pork (so phenomenal, I couldn't believe how great this tasted). I am officially the biggest fan of Sichuan food. Of course I need to get to the Hunan and Yunan province and try that stuff too.

Finally, this past weekend was the world famous Rugby Sevens Tournament. Unlike normal rugby, which boasts 15 men a side and lasts 80 minutes total (40 minutes a half), the Sevens is only seven men a side and 7 minutes each half, but on the same size pitch (that means field for all you ignorants out there). The game is incredibly fast-paced, non-stop action, with all the violence in regular rugby. It was amazing. I've never been to a bigger drunkfest in my entire life, in all the concerts and sporting events - this tops it all. People chucking pitchers and cups full of beer, citizens from all over the world dressed in their best costumes (from a team of Average Joe's to superheroes to cowboys/cowgirls to the Asian Bird Appreciation Association), and of course the rowdy naked drunkards. I went with Dave (from Ireland), Kristoff (Germany), and Jojo (New Zealand), and we painted our faces and wore some Hawaiian hula skirts. It was fantastic. Games started at 9:45 am, and the final didn't happen until 6:20 pm, where we watched the All Blacks (New Zealand) kick the crap out of South Africa. Those New Zealanders are so damn intimidating - you do not want to see them running at you. It was so hilarious. This one group of English chaps about my age just got so hammered and constantly picked on the drunkest guy who just poured beer over his head and shook his hair like a dog. Mind you, they were in the row directly behind us. At one point, they ripped ever single piece of clothing off of him. So here's this pasty English guy completely nude in the bleachers and then his friends start spanking his bum left and right in front of everybody. It was the funniest, grossest, drunkest thing I've ever seen people do. Then Dave, the mensch in the group, took off his undershirt and gave it to the naked guy, who put it on and stretched it all the way down to his knees. It was so ridiculous. I can't describe how funny it was. Dave got it right when he said, "There's only one word for this: carnage!" Keep an eye out for pictures.

I am so done with writing. Just a quick observation. Of all the drunks, English drunks are the worst. They are just mean, angry, and obnoxious (which can be funny at times). The Chinese are the dirtiest people I've ever seen. They just hock up the biggest loogies and spit everywhere, beside them, in front of where they're walking, on the goddamn bus. I was amazed at the really gross customs they have. Spitting is by far the worst. I can't believe at one point they considered themselves to be clean and the Europeans to be barbarians. Times must have changed. Hong Kong should never be associated with China.

I have a 3,000-word paper due this Thursday, of which I've only written one paragraph due to the nature of this Rugby Tournament. As for future travels, I want to try and get to Laos not this weekend but the next for the Laos new year, since I don't think I'll make it there for the rest of my time here. That would be an interesting time to go. Other than that, the name of the game right now is "school."

I uploaded lots of pictures. The links are posted to the right. Enjoy!

Cobras, Cat Fights, and Cops? Only in Vietnam!

This post is dedicated to Aaron, my traveling partner for the week I spent in southern Vietnam. His fearless attitude, easygoing mentality, and adventurous tastes made the whole week even more enjoyable. Our conversations from movies (both good and bad ones) to politics to religion to Vietnam to the world enhanced everything, helped put things into perspective, and really make traveling worthwhile. Sharing experiences with someone like that is something I would wish everybody to experience at least once.

What an interesting country, that good ol' 'Nam. We could feel the heat soak through our clothes the minute we got off the plane. Landing in Ho Chi Minh City (formerly known as Saigon), we were anxious to explore the city and really get our trip started. After bargaining for a cab (they just hounded us the second we stepped out of the airport, reminded me of South America), we went to the ex-pat/tourist area called Pham Ngu Lao, found a hostel, and decided to walk around the city. We only had about 3 or 4 hours left of daylight, so we were only able to see one museum, the Fine Arts Museum. Collections of various artworks and old ceramics lined the walls. Sort of impressive but not worth the time. Saigon itself is actually pretty cool. You really need to be aware of your surroundings at all times - what with the couple hundred thousand motorbikers driving all around, over, under, and through you. Bikers with babies on the front and back, bikers from the ages of 12 to 80, bikers driving on the sidewalks, going in the wrong direction on one-way roads, navigating on the wrong side of the street on highways - it's just indescribable the tricks and maneuvers these Vietnamese can pull with their motorbikes. This isn't just a scooter mind you either. This is a full-on motorcycle with 5 gears (including neutral), where you accelerate by pulling back the handlebar and brake with a hand-brake like on a normal bicycle. Also, honking your horn is not a sign of an offense or an exclamation of "What the hell are you doing?" (but of course it can be used as this). Most of the time though, probably 80 to 90% of the time, the horn is your best friend. It is your guide to letting you know when someone is coming from behind, from what direction they are coming from, and even more importantly, it lets other drivers know where the hell you are planning on going. When you honk, you better pass them. When you hear a horn nearby, move over to the right, because someone is coming up fast at about 50 mph. The reason I know all this is because I was one of those crazy-ass motorcyclists. After Aaron and I walked around the city for about 3 hours, seeing everything from the Imperial Theater to the People's Committee Building to the Reunification Palace to the Ho Chi Minh War Museum to Notre Dame Cathedral to the Post Office (the biggest post office in Vietnam, a big beautiful building, old French-style architecture), and after having a semi-early night (watching what the cool people do at night in Saigon: get your girlfriend or get with lots of other friends, ride around the round-abouts on a motorbike and post up on the sidewalk of a big park right by the center of town), we got up early and actually rented a motorbike for the day (only $6/day, which meant a measly $3 for each of us for the bike for the whole day) and decided to take a road trip to the Cu Chi Tunnels. Our only map was a cheap one Aaron bought off the street and the LonelyPlanet one in the guidebook. Other than that, once we got out of the city, we were on our own. I took the bike around the block for a spin, just to get a feel for the old girl, almost got killed, picked up Aaron, and then we ventured out into the wild streets of HCMC. The weather was gorgeous: blue skies, streaks of white clouds streaked above, and the city is pretty for the most part. Lots of trees and parks are scattered around, but it's sort of a brown-green, a dirty green color. The streets are pretty littered and dirty, which I think darkens the green of the trees, but it was still great to be in shorts and a T, riding a motorbike, Aaron clutching onto my shoulders for dear life. We had to pull over and pull out the map a couple times, but eventually we found the main street and (just barely surviving) headed out on the highway, with just a straightaway in front of us. On most major streets, there are two large lanes in the middle for cars, and two shoulders on either side of the street for motorbikes. Luckily, driving around the city and on the highway, around the round-abouts avoiding cars that just drive and expect bikers to move out of the way, was not too difficult because unlike the ridiculous British and Hong Kongers, Vietnam drives on the right side of the road, not the left. About an hour or so of biking out to the real countryside, where fields of farms lined the road, and asking a few locals how to get to the Cu Chi Tunnels, we finally arrived at our ultimate destination - both to my and Aaron's amazement. We bought our ticket to get in, and jumped on the back of random tour groups, making our way around the crazy small holes, tunnels, underground bunkers used for all purposes, from dining to sleeping to medical-help to making weapons to the officers' meeting room. The tunnels stretch over 250 km (around 150 miles), including all the way to HCMC, and there were normally around 16,000 guerrillas crawling around. We got to see the actual traps (trap floors, trap chairs, trap doors) that were used against the US soldiers, as well as crawl through a tunnel 30 meters long. Since there was sort of a group of us, we stopped several times in the tunnel, truly experiencing what it was like. Pitch black, on your knees, completely enclosed, no light anywhere. If you are claustrophobic, this would be great for getting over that fear. Aaron got a little nervous but kept his cool and we both made it out alive. In the midst of our walking, we heard in the distance a loud "BANG BANG", and Aaron and I turned to each other, recognizing the same expression in each of our faces: follow that gunshot! So we ran to this firing, range paid a couple bucks and fired a few rounds off an M60. What a rush to fire a machine gun! Pretty insane. In one tour group we joined, an old guy pulled Aaron and me aside and said to us, "I haven't told the Mrs. yet but I actually did a tour here. It's my first time back." He was an Australian who spent a year fighting during the Vietnam War, and as the tour group walked ahead, he told us of his experiences fighting against the Vietnamese with the US. Pretty amazing. Not only that, but he also told us, claiming to be 110% correct, that it was the Australian army engineers who originally discovered the underground guerrilla tunnels. Once we finished off the first tunnel site, Ben Dinh, we drove around 10 km (past the military cemetery, which we walked through; a gorgeous layout of graves and nature with thousands of names written everywhere, on benches, polls, etc.) to the other set of tunnels, Ben Duoc. Before we walked through these tunnels, we sat down with the rest of our tour group to watch a documentary on the War and the Tunnels. Wow, what an experience that alone was. It was basically the most anti-American movie I have ever watched, blatantly referring to the US as "the enemy", and praising children like little Liu for picking up a rocket launcher and attacking and killing American troops. It was pretty ridiculous. It talked about all the young guerrillas and how brave they were for avenging their parents death and taking arms against the Americans, and how some even were honored with the "Best American Killer" award, or something named similar to that. It was pretty crazy. After spending another 40 minutes walking around, we jumped on our bike and headed back to HCMC, where we proceeded to the bus station and made our way to the Mekong Delta area, to a town called My Tho (pronounced 'Mee To' weirdly enough).

We managed to find a cheap hotel (only $3 per person) after walking through the town. This was pretty strange - we were clearly the only tourists (which was fun to know) because every single pair of eyes were pointed towards us. Literally, I felt like I was in the zoo. Every single person just stared at us as we walked down the street. Pretty amazing to know that we were in the real Vietnam. The next day we hired a guy to take us to some islands and show us some stuff around the Delta. We went to Unicorn Island, ate some real Vietnamese honey tea, took a paddle canoe boat through some canals that led to the River, then went to a coconut candy factory, where we tried the most delicious coconut-chocolate candy, hot, fresh, and sticky, straight from the pan. It was amazing. Then our guide took us to another island called Ben Tre, and took us to this restaurant where we ordered a cobra. The waiter brought the cobra in his hands, holding onto its neck, pinching down, pulled out some scissors, and just cut the damn cobra's head right off in front of us. Then he drained the blood from its body into a glass of wine, swirled it around, and offered to me. How could I refuse?!? It was pretty weird. About 20 minutes later, out came the cobra, cooked in a delicious curry sauce with rice and onions. It was actually pretty tasty. The meat was a little tough and you could actually feel the scales of the snake when you chomped down, but it was super fun - at least until we saw the price. Our damn guide didn't tell us that it was a $35 dish (which isn't that expensive, especially for a cobra, but we are in Vietnam, where it only costs $1 for a bowl of pho, which by the way is so spectacular, I can't even begin to describe how good some dishes were). So of course we paid for it, then just let our guide go because we didn't trust him at all after that. The guide told us we were going to a homestay, which ended up being a room that the restaurant owned. Once we realized this, after the guide left, we told one of the waiters (he was helping us out, telling us he didn't like the guide because he always tricked tourists into paying for real expensive dishes) that we were leaving because we wanted to get to the mainland and just get to another town on the Mekong. Out of nowhere, he started freaking out, nearly crying (no joke!), whining and complaining about how we couldn't leave because he and his boss already told the police that we were coming and how they gave the cops 300 or 500 dollars, or something like that. We were a little worried at this point, having no idea why they would pay the cops or where they had found time to do this during our snake lunch. When he tried to explain to us in his broken English why they paid off the cops, he started saying, "We pay police if you die" or "in case you die." At that point, Aaron and I were saying to ourselves "Let's just get the F out of her", not wanting to have anything to do with the police or dying in Vietnam. So I was urging Aaron just to pick up his bag and start walking, but he was a little nervous, just because he didn't want the cops to come and then something bad happen. So he stayed in our room with our stuff, talking to this waiter guy, while I ran around the restaurant looking for other motorboats like the one we took, seeing if we could jump on it and get a ride back to My Tho or anywhere, just somewhere off Ben Tre. We were both pretty frantic. There was a pier somewhere, but we had no idea - really we were in the middle of the jungle. So finally I found a boat, and walked up to the Asian couple getting on and started saying My Tho, My Tho over and over again, trying to communicate to them. Of course they didn't speak English (just our luck) but I thought I heard them say something in Chinese, so I ran back, told Aaron to go talk to them (he's studied Chinese for +2 years), while I waited with the bags. 15 minutes later, Aaron came running back saying the boat was waiting for us. The waiter, this whole time, was telling us we could go if we paid for the room, then saying we could if we paid for half the room. I knew this was total bullshit with the police at this point. What would paying for our room (which was only $10 total) do with the police? What difference did paying for the room make? I just wanted to get the hell out of here. So we picked up our gear, hustled to the boat, which was perched right ahead of a pile of thick mud. Aaron stepped in but had no trouble getting his feat out since he was wearing sneakers. As for me, I was wearing my sandals, so one of my feet got stuck. So imagine this: a Vietnamese waiter and his boss (with this enormous scar across his chest that you could see from his unbuttoned collar shirt) chasing these two Americans who are running into a boat, one of whom is safely in the boat, while the other has one foot stuck in the mud and has another Asian couple tugging him out of the mud, making sure he's got all his things. In hindsight, it must have been pretty funny to watch. At the time though, we were a little nervous. Eventually, we both made it into the boat, and Aaron used the most outrageous hand gestures (slicing of the neck, I think) to communicate to this other couple (who turned out to be Vietnamese from Hanoi), to tell them how we had never agreed to stay at this hotel and had not spent any time here, so were not obligated to pay anything. Finally, the boss waived us off and we took off, heading towards My Tho. What an extravaganza that was! After a few minutes, we calmed down, talked about how crazy it was, and then the Vietnamese couple pulled out some beers and offered it to us. We flipped to the phrase book section of the LonelyPlanet Vietnam book, and showed them "thanks" and "help" which they laughed at, and then had small conversations by just doing this pointing back and forth. This little communication right here should illustrate just what an enormous barrier the language in Vietnam is. Nobody, I mean NO ONE knows English. And if they do it is barely anything, not enough to communicate. So most of our interactions were with hand gestures, pulling out the guide book and pointing to what we wanted to say, and when it came to bargaining, we would have to pull out our money, how much we were willing to pay, and point it towards us then offer it to them, to show that we would pay this much to the cab driver or whoever. It was pretty intense.

Finally, we got off Ben Tre, back to My Tho, and took a bus to Vinh Long, another very small town on the Mekong. Aaron and I managed to spend the night in a small residential house (a real homestay) that included a four or five-course meal (including elephant ear fish, beef teriyaki, and strong rice wine that we enjoyed very much). It was really quiet and peaceful, very nice to be away from people and just enjoy the nature of the Mekong, which included of course hundreds of mosquitoes and the resulting consequences that you can only imagine. The next day, we got up early and took a boat to this floating market called the Ca Bei Floating Market. Boats and boats with huge quantities of fruit and other produce lined this little area off the Mekong River, and you could just drive up to any boat and buy whatever you wanted. It was pretty neat. The boat ride though was just gorgeous. Seeing the sun rise over the Mekong, with little canoes and boat paddlers making their way across was very incredible, brushes and green trees lining the banks. Unfortunately, the Vietnamese treat the river as their own personal garbage dump (numerous times we saw people sweep up trash from their food cart, or whatever, into a garbage can, and then just dump the entire thing into the river, patting the back of it to make sure every last piece of trash and dirt was in the river and not on the streets). How unfortunate!

We then hopped on a bus from Ca Bei to HCMC, and spent the morning/day there. We went to the War Remnants Museum - definitely one of the most amazing museums in the world. Their gallery of photos of the Vietnam War are really incredible. Photos from international journalists line walls and walls. One unforgettable picture was a soldier with his gun strapped over his shoulder and in his right hand, he carried the torso of a soldier (meaning head and shoulders and half of a chest). There was a whole section on Agent Orange and Napalm and its disastrous effects and how it has impacted not only the people of the '70s but future generations also. I think the museum went a little overboard when next to the photos of all the victims, there was a glass case. Inside this case were two vats filled with a preserver-liquid. Inside the two vats though were unborn disfigured fetuses - one had two heads with distorted facial features, the other's head was abnormally large with a hare lip. The sort of thing that makes you gag at first when you see it, where your jaw just drops to the floor, where not only words but sounds can't even come out of your mouth. There's just nothing to do but stare and wonder not only how could we do such a cruel thing to each other, but how could the museum actually put this in public. Aaron said he couldn't look at it. I barely could.

The museum though was clearly, again, anti-American. The descriptions of weapons were similar to: "A rocket launcher used to destroy peaceful Vietnamese" and plaques with descriptions of events were extremely biased, describing how the US invaded Vietnam and did horrific things to the people of Vietnam, and how they had no choice but to retaliate and fight back. I don't know that much about the causes and origins of the Vietnam War, but it was just interesting to see the other side of the coin. Planes, tanks, helicopters, and enormous bombs also were scattered in the courtyard outside the museum. It was definitely an unforgettable experience and a must-do for anyone who is planning on going to HCMC.

Aaron and I eventually took a night bus to a coastal town called Nha Trang. We got in at 4 am, walked to the beach, and fell asleep waiting for the sun to rise. We missed it though because stupid clouds were all over the place and blocked out the sun. For the day, we decided to get on a tour that took us to four different islands. Once the sun finally came out, which took several hours, we got on the top deck and slept under the sun, missing out on the one part we really wanted to take part in - the open bar. The whole time though there were a few Aussie couples together who were just getting trashed. They had started drinking at 9:30 and we never saw them empty-handed. One of the weirdest things that happened on the entire trip happened on that boat that fateful afternoon. The tour guide person called everyone down from the upper deck and once we were all seated, announced that there was a band that was now going to perform. Placed center stage was a drum set (made by buckets), two singers, and an electric guitarist. Then they called up the people who signed up for the tour and asked what country they were from and then made them come up and sing a song they would play from that country. What's amazing is how many songs this band new from so many different countries: USA, UK, Switzerland, Australia, France, Germany, Sweden, Vietnam, Korea, China. It was insane. The best part was watching these 50-year old Koreans get up there and dance with the band the way old men who are having a great time dance. One can only imagine.
Later that night Aaron and I went to a bar on the beach, where a ton of people were hanging out drinking. They made a big bonfire and all the travelers sat around hanging out talking. I would guess half of them were all from Australia, traveling for around the country for their summer vacation. It was a good time.

We got up early the next day, ready to take a morning bus to the mountain town in the center of the country called Dalat. We got on the bus at 7:45 am, and it was supposed to be a 4-5 hour drive. We didn't get off the bus until 3 pm that afternoon. We were so pissed at how long it took, and how we basically wasted the whole day on the bus. Whatever. We rented a motorbike for about three hours, drove to a few waterfalls, then spent the night walking around the town, conversing with locals at the different markets. It was fun, seeing all the crazy tourist stuff they had out. Aaron bought a cute little kitsch wallet.

We went to bed early to get up early, so we could rent a motorbike and drive to this mountain past a village about 10 km away, that was supposed to have some nice volcanic peaks we could hike up. 10 minutes later, trying to find our way out of town, we ran out of gas. Of course. So we walked the bike up the street, bought some gas from a guy off the street, which managed to be good enough till we found a real gas station. Then we made it to the mountain, and started hiking. It was really great. Completely different from the rest of Vietnam we had experienced. Neither of us really felt like we were still in Vietnam. Lots of pine everywhere, tall skinny trees, a more luscious green than the dirty brown-green we were used to. Bright blue sky above, we basically quizzed each other on movies to make conversation, every now and then just staying silent, enjoying finally getting some exercise in such a gorgeous environment. After we hiked to an easy tourist destination, with a restaurant and tourist shops, we found the path that led to an even higher peak (around 2200 meters high). That was a really fun hike, steep, sweat pouring down us, one of those hikes that wasn't too hard but when you get to the top you're rewarded with just the most postcard-perfect scenery of all villages, mountains, and other landscapes in front of you. After just relaxing up there, not saying a word, not needing to say anything, just staring out into space, zoning out into our own little world, we headed down, and drove back across town to another highway, towards what we read was the biggest waterfalls in the area. They were over a little over 50 km away, so it took about an hour to get there. Only, once we got there, we found out that due to the building of a dam, there was no more water. So we ended up just driving to this huge rock formation, completely dry and lacking any sort of water. No matter - it was still an incredible drive, and a great way to spend our last day, just letting loose on the motorbike, driving super fast, and just being connected to backpacking and traveling in a completely different way than I've ever experienced before.

That night we splurged on dinner, spending around $4 or $5 US per dish. That's right, it was hard for us, but we decided to do it anyways. Then we took a night bus to HCMC, got in around 5ish, and slept for about 2 hours in the bus station, like real hobos. Just sprawled out across 4 seats, completely passed out. Then we went into town and went to the Ho Chi Minh War Museum, which was like the War Remnants Museum but not nearly as graphic and had a lot more interesting stuff on how Vietnam gained their independence from the French from the late '30s to the mid '40s. That included information on how Vietnam became more and more communist as time went on, which I found to be very interesting.

Heading home was sort of sad, but I definitely cannot wait to go back and explore Hanoi, Halong Bay, and the rest of the north. Some other interesting notes about Vietnam is this: the language barrier is worse than anything I've ever experienced. I can't emphasize this enough. It really took a lot of imagination to create some hand signals in order to communicate with locals, simply because they for some reason couldn't understand that we didn't speak Vietnamese so they would just speak to us in Vietnamese while we stared at them like a deer in the headlight. The LP guidebook for Vietnam is really probably the best one I've used so far, just because of how useful and relevant it is to a place like Vietnam, where if you don't know the language or how to pronounce even names of places, you can be really really screwed. Also, I can't talk enough about how ugly the language Vietnamese is. Listening to it is like listening to cats fight, nails on a chalkboard, tires screeching. Any other terrible noise you think of, that's what Vietnamese sounds like. People could be talking about normal everyday stuff and you'd think they were saying, "I just beat my wife yesterday!" or "I'm going to kick the shit out of you". Seriously, it's terrible. And listening to two women scream at each other in Vietnamese is one of the scariest experiences between people you could ever encounter. It really sounds like they are completely different species because the language is just so different and violent, using really nasal sounds that make it so unpleasant to even be in the room when it's being spoken. Man, it was terrible. But that of course won't deter me from going back.

Other than that, biggest thing I've done is participated in my first Open Mic Night. It was the day after we got back from Vietnam, so I really hadn't practiced at all, and did the best I could. I was super super nervous, and really did not play as well as I practiced. I played Tears in Heaven, Blackbird (by the Beatles), and Layla (acoustic version), or at least attempted to, and even though I got cheers from friends, I really did not do that good a job. But I'm glad I did. It was a real rush, to get up there and perform for the first time in front of not only friends but strangers as well. Next time though, I'll be only playing guitar, and someone else will sing for me. Less pain for not only me but the audience as well.

This weekend is the Spring Lantern Festival. Not sure what it is but tomorrow night I'm going to check it out. Pictures from the Vietnam trip will come up ASAP. I'm pretty swamped with work. It's all piling on now, and I want to get it done before spring break. Why? Because I'll be spending 11-12 days in Japan, and the day I get back I have a presentation, the following day I have a Chinese test, and the day after that I have another presentation. So don't expect any other post until after I get back from Japan. That should be quite a trip. I just learned today that another exchange student named Ben (from Chevy Chase, MD) is going also, and so we're now going to travel around together. He's a good guy, and I'm really looking forward to it all. Nearly everybody else is going to Thailand, but I need more than a week for Thailand, and I want to have my own experience there, and not be there when everyone else is. My temporary plan is to finish off finals early and spend 3 weeks in Thailand and Cambodia before the family comes in June to visit and then we go off to China. Can't wait for it all. Life is amazing here. I don't want to leave. What enhances it all is not only the people I'm with but the books I'm reading. Just finished "The God Delusion" by Richard Dawkins, pretty much the book of reason as far as I'm concerned, and anyone with an open mind or a working brain should really read it. Take it with a grain of salt, as I did, but still, definitely a book that makes you see things from a different perspective. I'm starting "The Satanic Verses" by Salman Rushdie, a book recommended to me by Vivenne about life and philosophy. These books just make me reflect more and more on life, and with people like Aaron and others who can make great conversation as well as have a good time, it just doesn't get much better than this. I don't know when in my life I'll be more satisfied with where I am than right now. Hope others are feeling at least half of what I am right now. Until next time...

Gong Hei Fat Choi!

GONG HEI FAT CHOI EVERYBODY! This phrase has followed me around for the past week, getting me connected with literally billions of people across this vast country. While it signifies nothing to Westerners, it means a great deal more than its literal translation - Happy Chinese New Year! When you say 'gong hei fat choi' to another, you are wishing them a healthy, wealthy new year - financially, physically, and spiritually. Probably in that order actually. Money and business is something the Chinese take very seriously, so the most common gifts during the Chinese New Year are actually simply a red envelope (red signifies good luck) with money inside. More to come on this - not to worry!

Since my last post, nothing really has changed around me other than the arrival of the Year of the Rat. Classes are pretty much the same. Still behind on the reading, like a normal college student. My roommate's tendencies have begun to get more and more annoying. I have come to the conclusion that he has some vampire blood in him. Why? Well, the fact that he sleeps literally all day is one. Going along with that, he'll stay up all night - literally all night - doing who-knows-what on his oh-so-precious computer. I'll wake up at 8 or 9 am, and he will still be at his computer where I left him at 2 am the night before. We don't really talk anymore. He probably thinks I am shy, I just think he's weird. It's hard to talk to him because he is just not that interesting when it comes to talking about anything other than China. Everyone else in my hall pretty much sticks to themselves or their computer, constantly playing Warcraft or whatever that game that encompasses their social lives is called.

Recently, I've been eating some absolutely scrumptious food. Omar took Janelle (another exchange student from LA, if I haven't already mentioned her) and me to what he claimed was the best dim sum restaurant he'd ever eaten at. And of course, after eating the ten dishes we ordered with stomachs stuffed to the max, feeling the post-food coma kicking in, I share the same opinion with him. The best dish we ate was called 'ham soy gok' - an extremely light, fluffy, puffy, cloud-shaped ball filled with steaming pork bits and some veggies inside. They were absolutely amazing, so good in fact that we ordered two of them. It's been a while since that time we ate there, so I can't remember much of the other dishes we scarfed down, but we did eat some great chicken feet, an unreal platter of siu mei, and the best mango pudding I have ever tried. The restaurant is in Causeway Bay, in the Times Square shopping mall, called SuperStar Restaurant. Next time you're in Hong Kong, GO THERE!

In terms of going out, the same old LKF and Wan Chai have gotten extremely old, so I have been hitting up the various jazz clubs that are scattered around Hong Kong Island. One, called Gekko, is pretty decent, but it's filled mostly with a lot of people and compared to this other one I found a floor above this random building just one street up from LKF, it is crap music. I have been going to this one place with a Filipino band, called Freddie T. and the Quatrocinco. They are absolutely phenomenal - their feel-good, have-fun, care-free vibe glows when they perform and just infects the entire crowd, pushing the whole band to play even better. I have come so often that the whole band knows me and always get a shout from Freddie when I walk in, so I feel sort of important. They say that eventually I'll have to get up there and sing a song with them, and I'm sure I will - that will be an unforgettable experience. On their break, the band members sometimes call me over and have me try their food while they sip on some drinks. They are all from the Philippines and have been together for about 9 months, and staying strong. All have been playing their respective instruments for at least 20 years, and the real energy-filled guy is the keyboardist. He will get so into every song, just feel the music in his fingers, that standing up and playing is too boring for him. No, this guy, Romeo, will lift his leg up and stomp on the keys. But sometimes that's not enough. No, then he will throw his whole knee and thigh up on the keyboard. But sometimes that's not even enough. When he really feels it, he'll pick up his stool, pound it on the keys, then throw it across the floor as the band closes its number! He's absolutely astounding to watch. You can't do anything but get on your feet and make as much noise for everyone, just so they can keep it going, keep that energy. Last time I went, the bartender gave me three shots of tequila. That place is the best.

OK - now I guess I should get down to what's really been taking up all my time this past week, the Chinese New Year, the Year of that friggin Rat! Last Monday, there was a big dinner for some exchange students and locals to go eat at a good seafood restaurant and then go to the Flower Market at Victoria Park, Hong Kong's biggest park. At the restaurant, we ate some pretty normal dishes, or at least they're normal for me now since I've been here. Jellyfish, shrimp, chicken (served whole, with the head and everything), a noodle/chow mein dish, some pork platters, and to top it off, hot red bean soup for desert (which I've found I'm not too fond of). The real highlight of the night was the lucky draw/raffle that came after dinner. The big host who was running most of it asked everybody on the mic who had a loud voice, and immediately, the entire table I was at, which was conveniently located right next to the host, started screaming my name. I faked having a sore throat, but after constant heckling and shoving and pushing, I got up there. The host gave me the mic, and told me to stick my hand in a box and pick a name and yell it out. So I did just that, the person came up, and then the host told me to ask where she was from, so I did, and then everyone started laughing and screaming for me. When I was about to sit back down, the host told me to just stay up there. So I basically played host for about 15 minutes, drawing names, handing the winners prizes, having one or two sentence conversations on the mic, and then sending them back to do it all over again. It was entertaining and fun, and when I got in the elevator after the dinner to get on the bus to go to the park, there were a bunch of locals all staring at me, looking at me like I was some big celebrity. That was a little odd, but oh well - that's the price that comes with fame. Heading to Victoria Park was absolutely insane. We entered under an enormous banner that said Happy New Year, only to be faced with crowds and crowds of people, all shopping with their kids getting ready for the new year. Above the five or six stalls that spread out across the park were traffic banners that were pretty entertaining to follow. The fact that the market actually needs traffic banners above them, declaring "No Entry Only Exit" and "Entry Here", should give you an idea of how many people come to this market and how it is absolutely 100% necessary to have some sort of traffic flow, otherwise people just won't get anywhere. So we walked down the aisles, absorbing all the flowers, the bonzai trees for sale, and most of all, the absolutely insane and random and just all-around tacky (and dare I say "Asian") inflatable toys available for the cheapest price you can think of. When I list off these things, just picture them in your home, and then picture them as an inflatable, and you will understand just how ridiculous this market was: caution-floor-is-wet signs, no-smoking signs, hammers, swords, tridents, mushrooms from SuperMario, the black cannons from SuperMario, plungers, axes, and my personal favorite - exacto knives (the ones architects use that you switch up and down because they are so sharp). I will never forget seeing that. Turning my head, and seeing a guy standing up on a stool, pushing the exacto knife up and down - how scary would it be to see a little Asian kid run around with that? One of the most hilarious toys was an inflatable ass. One guy was holding up just half a torso, from the waist to the knees, and there was just the ass, but sticking out of the crack was this white thing. It turned out to be a tissue. What the vendor was actually holding up was a tissue box but it was an inflatable ass and you pulled the tissues out of the crack - no joke! There was also inflatable condoms (not blown up but in the wrapper) and inflatable meat on a stick (like inflatable grilled chicken on a stick) and inflatable cigarettes and inflatable ice cream cones. It was just insane. Pictures will come, don't worry.

The cool thing is that market is only open 4 days out of the entire year - the 4 days preceding the New Year. The New Year officially began on Wednesday night, so Wednesday night, after going out with everybody (since we didn't have school Wed., Thurs., or Fri.), Vivienne, Aurore (an exchange student from Canada), and I took a cab to Victoria Park to catch the Flower Market at its most packed and lively moment. Just walking to the park was a trip - the streets were packed and filled and just alive with people. It was insane. Now we thought that was bad, and then we walked into the market. I have never felt more helpless than ever before. We were literally in bumper-to-bumper traffic but just all people. We could not move, literally. Worse than anything I had experienced in New York, London, or anywhere in South or Central America. Just throngs and masses of people. Absolutely insane. I have some pretty wild videos, we'll see if they make it up there.

The next day, Thursday, the official first day of the New Year, I was basically getting prepared for the parade that was planned for that night in Tsim Sha Tsui. Aaron, Vivienne, Janelle, and I met up right on the street the parade was planned for, picked up some beer from the nearby 7-11, and made our way to one side of the street, and actually got right up against the fence. We had looked at the map and made sure that we would see all of the parade, since the route mapped out for us in our brochure said it would flow down one side of a street then double-back and go on the other side. We were on the second side, once it double-backed. We were all so stoked. The 4 of us were just pushed up against the fence and all we did was scream 'Gong Hei Fat Choi' about ever 30 seconds. Eventually we had some performers come by: an African drum group, some older guys on stilts who actually stopped to ask us where we were from (once we told him were from America, he started going off about how much he loved American literature; picture a British guy with make-up on on stilts saying in an accent: "Oh, I love Faulkner, Scott Fitzgerald, I absolutely love American literature." It was pretty weird), a group of Asian cheerleaders who we took pictures with, and then they came back to take pictures of us. Then the real parade started. Random floats with various sponsors all lit up, with the craziest people all dressed up in everything from balloon-gowns, fake horse-things on rollerblades so across the street it looked like they were floating, children in tutus with cheese that ran around and did some choreographed little dance. There were more lit-up floats that I can't describe; there was the traditional dragon-flying with people underneath running around moving the dragon in wave-like motions, which was pretty cool to see in China. We saw bands come around, including an Asian Scottish band, and the UCLA and San Francisco 49ers Cheerleaders. Something unfortunate, though, did happen. The first float that came around, double-backed ready to head right towards us, turned off of the street toward us and went into some garage area. We were really upset, because even though the people all came down right in front of us, we wanted to see the floats up close. So we all thought it was worth it to give up our prime spot on the our side of the street for an ok spot on the opposite side just so we could get closer to the floats. Overall I guess it was a good idea. We ended up being with more friends and it was towards the end of the parade. There were a bit more people, so we couldn't see exactly everything, but it was still a lot of fun. We went to LKF after the parade, hung out for a bit, and had a pretty crazy night because of the New Year (everyone was partying)!

The next day I lounged around and had brunch with a bunch of people in my dorm. Then I headed down to Wan Chai with Janelle, and meet up with Ted (a Dutch exchange student) and Chloe (a French exchange student) and a huge group of other French exchange students. The harbor was host for the big fireworks display which started at 8. We had to hurry our way from the MTR station because we were running a bit late, but of course so was the rest of Hong Kong so it was more like a pack of late people herding their way across platforms and down streets so they could get to the harbor for a good view. As we walked down to the harbor, we were caught in a packed area and realized that there was an empty lane created by two fences that separated two groups of people - the group closest to the harbor and the group of people coming from the MTR. I guess they didn't want people to be completely packed on the harbor ferry. Then the fireworks began! There was never a moment when my ear wasn't ringing from an explosion or when my eyes weren't stunned by the massive circular images created by the explosions. Eventually, fireworks started exploding in the shapes of 0's and 8's to bring in 2008, which was really cool. The grand finale was just a spectacular show of everything going off at once, all climaxing towards one big blinding explosion that deafened even the loudest of ooh's and aaah's. It was pretty inspiring, and left us all ready to go out. Aaron met up with us and we got something to eat before going back to LKF, meeting up with other people, and then basically just roaming around the streets before the two of us met up with Dave (an exchange student from Ireland) at our jazz bar with that fantabulous Filipino band. They were on their A-game, due to the Chinese New Year, and the crowd was absolutely loving it. During their break, everyone came over to our table, brought their plate of food with them, and then we just started going picture-crazy, taking snapshots with the band members. Romeo, the key player, gave us his full name to facebook him, and the bassist, Mario, was telling us all about their other music they've been working on, and once again, about how I need to get up there and sing or play along with them for a song. It was a great time.

Instead of going home that night, I went back with Aaron and crashed at his place, all the way in Sha Tin, which is in New Territories - super far away. The reason was because the next day, Saturday, there was a big New Years race at the Sha Tin Racecourse. So we woke up, and made our way down there (it was only one stop away) and then met up with Janelle and another girl named Anika (an exchange student from Brisbon, Australia). We got out of the metro station with hundreds of others all ready to hit the bookies. We walked out to a gorgeous clear day with the green track in front, and four huge screens with numbers everywhere: odds, win-loss records, weights, etc. We had no idea what was going on. After watching a few races, we decided to place some bets and went to figure out how the hell to do it. We saw everyone had these cards, so once we found out where to get the cards, we just stood around like weirdos watching everyone else fill out their cards. All the locals were just staring at the newspaper or whatever other reading material they had with all sorts of horse-racing information and would fill out their cards accordingly. Once we thought we had done it correctly, and picked the race, and what horse(s) we thought would place and win, we took our cards up to the counter, only to see the people behind the desk place our cards in the machine and get straight-up rejected. This happened about three or four times before we finally figured out what we were doing and how to fill out the cards correctly. We each guessed three different horses in three different races and it only cost each of us $20. However, when Aaron handed in his card and the money at the same time, the guy behind the counter took the ticket and just left his money there. So when the guy handed Aaron's ticket back to him, Aaron just carefully took his money and his ticket back. Damn him! Just my luck, all my horses were in 4th place and fell behind in every race. Aaron's picks actually placed the first two races, but then his last horse fell behind at the end, and because of that he didn't win any money. Boo hoo! He still got a free bet. Then Anika left and so Aaron, Janelle, and I went to eat at Janelle's uncle's restaurant. We had a great, delicious meal of barbecued pork, roasted goose and chicken, and a great fried shrimp with veggies and walnuts dish. Plus, it was FREEEE! Yes. Janelle and I split up from Aaron and just went home and crashed, as I got ready for my trip to Vietnam!!!

I'm now at Aaron's place and tomorrow we're going to take the bus to the airport for our flight into Ho Chi Minh City (or Saigon as it was once known as). We are there for a week. We have no idea what we want to do (no real concrete stuff) but we are going to have a blast. If we can get a cheap flight, we will probably try and go to Hanoi just to check out Halong Bay, which is supposed to be the crown-jewel of Southeast Asia. I'll tell you all about it once I get back. Be prepared for stories of renting motorbikes, eating the most amazing food ever, talking to the most random locals, drinking some snake blood, and just having some ridiculous adventures and experiences. See you all in a week!

Gong Hei Fat Choi!

Heavy Drinking + Early Morning Tours = Awful Combination

It is embarrassing how seldom I update this blog, and I promise I will try and do a better job. You must realize, though, that I spend less than 30% of my time in my room at my computer, so please do not be too upset. But don't fret either. I have not forgotten about any of you.

The amount of information and experience I have consumed since my last post is a bit overwhelming. That Thursday night I mentioned in my last post, where I said I would try and find that poker spot, actually turned out to be a very relaxing night. Cornelius, another exchange student from Austria, and I walked around LKF (Lan Kwai Fong) and Soho (the upscale version of LKF) for a little over an hour in search of the club, only to feel silly to say the least when we realized there was a phone number on the club flier. So after calling it and getting to the place in about 5 minutes (the club actually was tucked away in an alley that would have been near-impossible to find), we found the poker room. There were about 5 tables set up, and the deal is you just come and play poker for free. No buy-in, no money involved. They just give you chips and you play and you get free finger-foods and half-priced drinks. So we signed our names up for the following week since all the seats were already taken. What was most impressive to me was how the sounds roaming the entire club, I'm talking every single table, consisted of talk in French. It was just a huge crowd of men and women conversing in French after a Thursday full of business work. It seemed like the French community in Hong Kong reunited there every Thursday. Cornelius and I stuck around and then met up with some friends for dinner. After we just walked around LKF and I called it a day because I wanted to get up early the next day and do some serious walking around the island.

As early as I planned on getting up, I didn't actually make it out of my dorm room until about 11, I think. I took the bus into Wan Chai and hustled my way over to the waterfront where I saw what's called the Noonday Gun. Right on the edge of the bay, surrounded by skyscrapers on one end and fishing boats and steamboats on the other, rests an old gun (although it's more like a mini-cannon) from the way-early 1900s, and every day this gun is fired by an officer in between the sounding of a bell. There are many rumors as to why this tradition continues, but nonetheless, it is still pretty cool to see. I ran up to this gated small courtyard just in time to see the officer walk over to a bell, ring it, walk up to the cannon, pull the trigger, (to which I jumped at, startled by the unexpected boom of the cannon), then walk back over to the bell and ring it to end the ceremony. I made a video of it that I'll try and post. It was pretty cool. After taking some pictures of the cannon, and one with the officer who fired the gun, I took the MTR one stop over to a small local temple (my first one since arrival). It was a Tin Hau temple. Tin Hau is the sea goddess, the "patroness of seafarers", and so this temple is dedicated to her. It was very small, but just walking in for the first time, completely untouched by tourists and scattered with locals eating lunch, meditating, praying, made the whole experience much more meaningful. It was a side of China that I had only heard about, but seeing it up close is completely different. The roof carvings are clearly rusting, but really the most marvelous thing about the temple was the overwhelming aroma of incense. You think one stick in your bedroom, living room, or bathroom is enough?!? Try hundreds of sticks stuck in pots of sand sparkled all over a room, not to mention with a few dozen thick coils that last for days on end! It's amazing (and just a bit ironic) how enormous banners are posted up near the entrance that declare smoking not allowed, yet the entire temple is covered by one enormous cloud of smoke given off by the incense. The whole place was, for lack of a more descriptive word, magical. Tables and pillars lined the inside with smaller shrines to the left and right, all leading up to one big altar hailing the omniscient Tin Hau. What I also found to be really incredible was how quiet the temple and tiny garden were, compared to the blaring lights and noises of the city. It was only about 500 meters away from the MTR station, and just tilting your head upwards gave way to gigantic residential complexes, just a steep staircase away. Yet the aura and mysticism and silence still managed to surround the temple and remain contained within its boundaries (both physical and imaginary). The pictures should give you a sense of what it was like, but really, it's something you need to experience. Especially a small local one like that. I stayed there and met up with Aaron, my other Jew-friend who goes to UC Davis and is also in AEPi, and after spending a few more minutes there, we walked out and grabbed some lunch at a local food stall. (More to come on the food situation here!) We then walked through Causeway Bay, past Wan Chai, and into Central (which sounds like a lot and looks far on a map, but really, everything in Hong Kong is exaggerated - it is actually super small and you can get anywhere in at most 20-30 min. of walking). We walked out to this pier-type platform where there's a 6 meter-tall statue of a Golden Bauhinia, which is the symbol of Hong Kong. It wasn't much to see but still...It's basically just a fake gold statue of this flower that marks Hong Kong's return to Chinese control after British rule in 1997, establishing the Hong Kong SAR (Special Administrative Region). Every morning at 7:50 there is a flag-raising ceremony conducted by the Hong Kong police, and on the 1st, 11th, and 21st of each month 5 min. before there's a pipe band. I told myself one day I'm here I have to go see that. This past 21st was not that day though. Possibly Feb. 1st. We shall see. Aaron and I spent most of the time wandering aimlessly around the city, having great discussions from life goals to life in Hong Kong to life after college. As dusk approached, we walked to another temple - the Man Mo Temple. This is located right next to LKF and Soho, and is a temple dedicated to a civil god called Man Cheung and a more popular military god named Kwan Yu (who ironically is also the patron god of restaurants, pawn shops, the police force, and secret societs like the Triads). This had a very similar feel to the Tin Hau temple - the intense smell of incense, the odd silence, the random locals running around performing various private personal rituals. I preferred the Tin Hau temple, but that may also have been because I was pretty exhausted and we walked in about 10 min. before closing time, so we didn't really get to see and experience much of it. We parted ways and I took a nap before getting ready for the big night - the Foreign Exchange party. Dress was formal, so all the guys got into shirts and ties. Basically, one guy rented out this club called Paparazzi and was the DJ, and it was open bar from 10:30 to 1:30. So we got there and it wasn't long before we all were in a "happy place", on the dance floor, and just having a great time in general. Time was measured by the intervals when the bartenders would pour alcohol in a gutter that ran around the bar and light it on fire, making crowds oooh and aaah and forcing hands to coil back to prevent further unnecessary harm while drunk. After 1:30, the open bar suddenly turned into a cash bar, which basically pushed everyone out the door into the streets, heading towards 7-11. That is another thing that I must mention right now. There are absolutely no open container/public drinking laws in Hong Kong. Every night basically is preceded by a trip to 7-11 to pick up cheap beer (they have great deals where you can buy two 32 oz. beers for like HK$20, which is like US$1.5 per beer), or some wine. So we went to 7-11, continued our fiasco, and eventually made our way to a place called The Flying Pan, a 24-hour breakfast restaurant. It was pretty much heaven. Ordering the biggest platter with Vivian must have been a sight not only because it was basically just us two eating, but because we simply inhaled the 7 pieces of toast, 4 eggs, several pancakes, several cups of fruit, 5 strips of bacon, two glasses of orange juice, and whatever else was on that plate that I can't remember, in a span of maybe 15 minutes. Needless to say, it was a great day, unbelievable night, and the last thing I remember is staring at my watch as I collapsed with absolutely no energy left. The hands read 5:30 am.

The first thing I remember the next day is the same sight. This time, the hands read 8:45. With that much sleep, I had to make my way to the library to meet the tour group, that left at 9 am. Imagine about 40-50 young adults (or young zombies rather) hazily walking onto a bus, everyone basically wearing a hoodie sweatshirt with the hood over each person's head, stumbling around everywhere, mumbling. Basically your typical, run-of-the-mill hangover. Except nobody got more than 4 hours of sleep the night before. That day's tour was of Kowloon and the New Territories (NT). We first bussed over to the Yuen Po Street Bird Garden and Flower Market. This was actually pretty interesting, despite how absolutely god-awful we all felt. The street was lined with locals holding their cages, actually showing off their birds. They all chirped and sang, wanting attention from all of the on-lookers. Some of them were very beautiful. There were some gorgeous green-colored and blackbirds. The highlight was seeing this one guy holding a cage with a beautiful bird sing its way around the cage, while he sipped beer from a straw out of a can. Then he would turn to us and open up his missing-teeth-mouth and say in broken English, "So many beautiful girls I have never seen before." What a guy! I stumbled my way around the market, just in awe of all the shops with cages and cages full of birds, then the shops moved on to bags and bags of crickets, maggets, and all other sorts of insects ready to purchase, all bagged in clear plastic bags. It was pretty cool. Our next stop was a ways out in the NT to the Wetland Park. This was not as cool as it sounded, but what was amazing was how deathly silent it was, and how amazingly clear the air and sky was. Only a 45-minute drive away, and the sun was burning down on us, with blue sky above us, spotted with white clouds. It was so drastic, I could taste the freshness of the air. We walked around, saw the empty fields, completely lacking any nature whatsoever (not even birds) and just behind us towered residential/commercial skyscrapers, all looking the same, identical, row after row after row. It rose a lot of questions, as you could imagine, the stark contrast between nature and industrialization/commercialization. But it was still nice to be hanging out in good weather. After lunch there, we drove back to Kowloon to another temple - the Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin Temple. This was actually three temples in one area - Taoist (the largest), Buddhist, and Confucianist. It was completely packed, but the good thing it was mostly with locals who were all there to pray. I pushed my way through the clouds of smoke that rose from all the sticks and coils of incense to get to somewhere near the front. Our tour guide told us that this was a popular place where people came to get their fortune told. You're supposed to pick up a cylinder full of sticks that are numbered and have different characters on them and what you do is make a wish, then shake the cylinder and keep shaking until one stick falls out. If more than one falls out then the wish is disqualified and you have to start all over again. When one stick falls out, you look at the number and take it to the fortune teller and the teller then determines whether your wish will come true or what your fortune is based on the number that came out and all other circumstantial evidence (birthday, year you were born in, life status?, etc.). I performed the ritual, got my number, but decided not to go to the fortune teller. Instead I roamed around the vast garden space they had. Streams surrounded walkways and paths, and there were little rock formations where you could sit down and just take everything in, meditate, whatever you felt like. So I just took a seat, and did just that. I think it was at that moment that it hit me - that I was actually in another country, halfway around the world (literally), where the philosophy and belief system is just so different from anything I've ever experienced. Seeing people walk around slowly, pacing the garden, or with their families, enjoying their lunch in this temple - it was all pretty incredible to say the least. I think I'm going back to see what it's like during the Chinese New Year, when it's really busy. I can't wait to check out the real temples and monasteries on the mainland. We then made our way to the Chi Lin Nunnery, a huge Buddhist complex with lotus ponds, beautiful gardens full of all types of plants, and nuns giving offerings. It was very beautiful and definitely worth the visit. Lastly, we spent the last 30-40 minutes of the tour at the Hong Kong Museum of History, which was interesting, but something I wouldn't go back to see. I feel like I could get all that information elsewhere and the exhibits weren't that intriguing, really. It really paled in comparison to the Smithsonian museums. When we returned home, I passed out for a quick nap and then met up with some friends to go see American Gangster (in English but with Chinese subtitles). Interesting fact: movie theaters here have assigned seats, but even more odd is that they charged more for this movie because it was extra long! Never heard of charging a movie based on its length, but then again, this is Hong Kong.

I woke up at the same time on Sunday for the tour of only Hong Kong Island. We first went to eat breakfast at a place and had a traditional breakfast I think: sweet bread and an egg custard-type. We then went south to Aberdeen to take a ride on a sampan boat around the bay there. Not that interesting to be honest, but not terrible. We just went around the tiny port, saw the enormous buildings around us, and went back to the bus. We then went to Repulse Bay (where Olivia and her family took me out to dinner) and walked along the beach. It was absolutely gorgeous weather (80 degrees and clear skies) - again just an indication of how bad the pollution is in the city. We strolled along the beach, went to the Chinese garden, just hung out, letting the randomness of the day fill up our conversations. We spent more time nearby in Stanley, at the Stanley Market. Basically this was just a bunch of tourist shopping, with lots of clothing stores probably cheaper than other places. We had lunch, walked around, and let the day pass us by. We ended up at the Museum of Coastal Defense, which if you're really into military strategy and war, would be a really cool place to visit. Otherwise, the only good thing about this place is the views it gave from its peaks, since the building actually was a former defense base during colonial times. We only spent about 30 minutes there before heading back home. For dinner, a group of us got together to have a home cooked meal (although Simon, another exchange student from NY, did most of the cooking). The rest of us did the shopping. We ate pasta with fresh sauce, salad, topped off with a few bottles of wine. Omar, an exchange student from LA, and I suddenly had the urge to stay up and watch the playoff football games, and managed to convince the rest of the gang to come out with us and have a few drinks while we waited for the game to come on. We figured they would be at 1 and 4 pm EST (so that would be 2 and 5 am HK time - early enough for us to watch the first game, since neither of us had class on Monday). Only when I went back home to confirm this did I find out the games were actually
at 3:30 and 6:30 pm EST, meaning they were at 4:30 and 7:30 am HK time. When I found this out, I called them up saying that was too late and I couldn't go out with them. After lots of talking and guilt-tripping, I was practically forced to come out since it was my idea in the first place to go out to LKF. So I told them I'd wait at the bus stop in front of my hall and just get on the same one they did (they were at another hall up the street). They called me and told me what bus they were on, so I knew what to look out for. As the bus strolls down the street, I waved my hand, signaling it to pull over, only to see the bus ignore me, and the whole crew wave at me, screaming at the bus driver to stop. Of course the bus kept on going, leaving me all alone while everyone headed on down. I couldn't believe it. Everyone offered to get off and walk back to me so we could all go, but I said that was stupid and I would just meet them out, since they did really want me to go out and who am I to disappoint them? After waiting 20 minutes, another bus came and I made it to LKF, where they had several beers waiting for me to guzzle down. We all headed to this tiny amphitheater located a block off the main street, and then more people showed up. It actually turned out to be a great night - just about 20 of us hanging out, having random, fun, intriguing conversations while 7-11 (now dubbed Club 7) provided us with the cheap booze we always wanted and the laws provided us with the public drinking we always dreamed of back in the States. I didn't get back home until around 3, missing the football games, but making up for it with great company and great memories!

What's more is that I woke up by 10 and was able to watch the last 7 minutes of the Giants-Packers game in my hall (dubbed over with Chinese commentary of course). Disappointing way to end the season, Favre, but oh well. I'm in Hong Kong - that's not going to put a damper on things for too long. The rest of this week has flown by at warp speed. It has consisted mostly of figuring out what I'm doing for the Chinese New Year, and getting my class schedule in order. For the former, I decided that I really wanted to stick around Hong Kong and see the parades and fireworks and all other events planned here, but I also want to take advantage of the days we have off (and my lack of classes on Fridays or Mondays). So Aaron and I went travel-agency-shopping both on the streets and online and we managed to find a pretty cheap flight to Ho Chi Minh City (a.k.a. Saigon) for a week. The great thing is that I'm only missing two days of school, but thanks to my class schedule (not having Fri. or Mon. classes), I am getting an extra 4 days of travel. We are both psyched out of our minds, and it's now up to us to figure out exactly what we want to do for the week we are there. As for my classes, I have been approved to switch from the Arts Faculty (which contains basically the history, languages, philosophy, and fine arts departments) to the Social Sciences Faculty (politics, public administration departments, etc.), so I can take more interesting politics classes. I am signed up for Hong Kong Politics, China and the World, Chinese Metaphysics, Economic History of China, and Putonghua I (that's basically Mandarin 1 for those who don't know what Putonghua is). My favorites as of now are Chinese metaphysics and the mandarin, because I'm definitely learning the most in both of those. The metaphysics class is super interesting. It's basically a twice-a-week one-hour lecture/discussion on oriental philosophies about time, space, causal relationships, and different beliefs in the world, going beyond the basic physics of it. I'm very excited to learn more about it. Like I said before though, the best part about all of it is that I do not have classes on Monday or Friday, so I have a 4-day weekend every weekend, allotting more time for me to catch up on school work or more likely to travel to places nearby on the mainland (example: if I left Thursday night, I could take an overnight train to Shanghai, be there by Friday morning, and spend the whole weekend there), or Taiwan, or other southeast Asian countries. What is absolutely necessary to emphasize though is how incredibly lucky I am to be in a hall located on campus! It's like living in Old Dorms at UVA all over again, whereas most people live in Hereford. They have to take a 5-10-minute bus ride just to get to campus. It's a 2-minute walk for me just to get to my classroom. There's nothing like rolling out of bed 10 minutes before class starts after a late night, and getting to class on time, knowing full well that everyone else in Sassoon Road halls have to wake up at least 30 minutes before me to get to class on time - and that's if they really rush!

I am getting adjusted to life in Hong Kong very fast. It's really not that difficult. The motto on the streets is ultimately shove or be shoved. You have to be very aggressive, or you won't get anywhere. Another thing that just blows my mind is how unbelievably lazy Hong Kongers are. They will wait a good 5-10 minutes for an elevator to go up 1 or 2 flights of stairs when walking that would take less than 2 minutes - woah, watch out, how dare you even think about exerting unnecessary energy. Escalators are like McDonald's or Starbucks' - they exist around every corner, in every building, and I'm sure if I went there, in every home. I kid you not - people take escalators in malls that bring them literally 10 feet up, rather than walk the stairs. It's funny too because the number of rising escalators doesn't even skim the surface of the number of descending escalators - that's what stairs are for, duh! It's pretty ridiculous.

Other major activities I've participated in here in Hong Kong have been my first High Table Dinner, applying for my HK ID card, and dinner with the Warden and the rest of the new exchange students in my hall. First, the High Table Dinner. That was quite an experience. When I first heard about it, I thought it was every night. It is a hall function that is mandatory for all the students in that hall. It is very formal - guys are to wear suits and ties, girls dresses, and if you do not attend, you get no refund. I also heard that since living in the halls at HKU is pretty competitive, each hall gives out points for every function (including like floor meetings, and high table dinners, etc.) and at the end of the year everyone is ranked, and the people with the least amount of points are kicked, or voted, out of the hall. It's something crazy like that. So basically everybody goes. We had our dinner at a restaurant called the Star Seafood Restaurant, about a 10 min. walk, in Kennedy Town. Frankie and Omar, two other exchange students, are also in my hall but because they are on the first floor, and I'm on the fifth, we couldn't sit together (the tables were arranged for floors to sit with others, and we weren't with them). So I hung around mostly with my roommate and some others on my floor and we sat down at a table with a bunch of girls from the fourth floor. I felt a little uncomfortable, since everyone around me was speaking Chinese, but everyone seemed really friendly and eventually the conversation turned to Universities in the US because some of the guys were thinking of going there as an exchange student (they were deciding between Michigan and Illinois). In the meantime, small plates of appetizers were brought out on the lazy Suzy in front of us, and everyone around just picked at it and brought small chopstick-portions to their own individual plate. If I remember correctly, there were a few plates of jellyfish and some salad-type dish. Then when we waited for the main course, one of the girls suggested we play an icebreaker game, for me mostly I guess since everybody seemed to already know each other. So everyone went around the table saying their name, major, and where they came from (most of them were actually from the mainland). Then when it got to me, I went and everyone just bombarded me with all sorts of questions about America and how I'm liking life in Hong Kong. It was pretty fun. Then the main courses came. Wow - Chinese really know how to eat. We got everything from corn/fish soup to chicken with cashews to fish to squid to shrimp balls to a chicken served with all its limbs (including the head facing right toward me). There were noodle dishes, pork dishes, some vegetables, lots of seafood, and for desert we were served this sweet bean-type soup dish and fried bread with that type of sweet bean inside it. It was all very interesting. Once the meal was over there was a big raffle where I believe the leaders of the Hall got up on a stage and drew ping pong balls from a box that had I think hall floor numbers then room numbers, and then the winners would come up and get their prize. But it was just amazing at how loud everyone was - all the girls would scream and shout when their friends won and all the guys would "woof woof" when their friend won. It was pretty nuts! Something I forgot to mention was before the meal: all the leaders of the Hall got up in front and instructed everyone to sing the Hall Song. That was probably one of the creepiest things I have ever seen. There was no count down, and so it was all timed by everyone inhaling one time deeply and then beginning. Everyone breathing in at once deeply actually made a big sound and then everyone broke into their broken-English hall song. It was a little scary - but then again, if one of them came to UVA and heard us sing the Good Ol' Song, one can only imagine what they'd think. After dinner, Frankie, Omar, and I decided to stay in our suits because it was the birthday of one of the exchange students in our hall and she had rented out a table at a fancy club, so we all stayed dressed up and went out to LKF for another late. Didn't get home until 3 am.

The next day I had to wake up super early to get to my appointment for my HK ID card on time. It was in Wan Chai at the Immigration Department, so I took the bus in and was able to cut the whole line because I made an appointment online. I took a number, waited for it to be called, then a lady looked at the application I filled out earlier and took my thumb prints and picture. Then they gave me another number so I had to wait again, and when I was finally called, I went to another booth where my thumb prints were taken again! Then I was given a temporary HK ID card (which is the size of a regular sheet of paper, it's pretty ridiculous) and told I could pick up my permanent one on Feb. 12 or after. I'll get it once I get back from my trip to Vietnam. Later, I met up with Aaron and we walked to the Vietnamese Consulate to apply for our visa for Vietnam. It's only HK$300 (about US$35) for single-entry, and it's ready in 4 business days - not bad. But they keep your passport, which is kind of unsettling, but everybody I've talked to said it's fine, so I'm not that worried. The two of us then met up with a group of friends for half-off sushi. This turned out to be a terrible idea though because Frankie, Omar, and I realized walking back that we had a dinner with the Warden of our Hall and the rest of the new exchange students.

The Warden ended up taking us to a place called Golden Shanghai Cuisine, a very upscale restaurant with unbelievable food. So even though I didn't need to eat more, I wasn't going to turn down free food - especially free good Shanghainese food. We had some unbelievable stuff, both real Shanghai food (chicken covered in and cooked with chilies, roasted chicken, noodles, jellyfish, shrimp dumplings, pork wonton) and some Western Chinese food (sweet and sour chicken). For desert, fresh chilled pineapple and watermelon (soooo amazing) and fried ice cream - apparently this is a very traditional desert dish. I could barely walk, let alone think about food after all that. I didn't even list all the dishes we had, which I think totaled to around 15 - no joke! I spent that night (a Friday night mind you) reading (I started a new book - The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, and so far it's very interesting) and doing laundry, due to the lack of energy after such a meal.

Today, Omar, Vivienne, and I walked around Tsim Sha Tsui and went to the Hong Kong Museum of Art after a really good Indian lunch at a place called Chung King Mansions, where you get mauled on the street by people trying to sell you everything from food to watches to suits. The art museum was actually very cool. There was a Chinese Fine Art Gallery (which consisted of paintings from the late 19th century and the entire 20th century), a Chinese Antiquities Gallery (basically all pottery reaching all the way back to the Neolithic Period - the coolest artifact was a pot from that period with the Buddhist peace symbol on it, the same symbol that Hitler switched around to represent the Nazi party), and a Contemporary Hong Kong Art Gallery, which was cool but not nearly as interesting as the former two. What was very impressive was how well-preserved all the pots and artifacts from the Antiquities Gallery - and that's only a fraction of the history that wasn't destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. Then we met up with some other friends and walked all the way to Mong Kok (which doesn't sound far just saying that, but that's 3 MTR stops away). It was pretty cool. We walked around a market called the Lady's Market. This is the place to get really really good knock-offs. This was also the very first time I felt like I really experienced China, and the reason for this was because of the throngs and masses of people everywhere! This was also during rush-hour time (5:30/6 pm on a Saturday evening), but still - that's what China is like. It's just overwhelmingly crowded with people. I really don't think this could compare to places like NYC or LA. Probably Mexico City. And Hong Kong doesn't even touch mainland, like Beijing. I was just enjoying it for the first time, but I certainly don't feel like going back there every day. I really had a blast though just walking everywhere in crowds, with hundreds and hundreds of people on all ends.

Tonight, we're having a rooftop pre-game party before going out, and tomorrow I think we're going to try to go to City Hall for the dim sum, before doing who knows what. Once the weather gets better (it's been so gray and raining a lot recently) before going to some other islands or doing some outdoor treks, hikes, camping, or whatever. Then it's time to get started on school reading, which of course I am far behind in, but don't worry mom and dad, I'll get it done.

Miss you all...but I'm surviving - not to worry!