... maat ventures ....

SEA Rankings

2010-08-29T11:06:00.000-04:00

So after around our second stop in South East Asia, Aaron and I decided that we were no longer going to extensively discuss how much we liked (or didn't like) the places we visited. We decided it'd be kind of fun to rank them, without a bias, and then guess how the other ranked them. The qualifications took everything into account: the city itself, our accommodations, the food, what we did, transportation, culture, people we met, how safe we felt, and just the overall experience. You'll see a few similarities, but it's interesting that they weren't necessarily the same. Below you will find our rankings:

Aaron

1. Bangkok, Thailand
2. Saigon, Vietnam
3. Hong Kong
4. Singapore
5. Southern Thailand
6. Manilla, Philippines
7. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
8. Macau
9. Jakarta, Indonesia

Lauren

1. Southern Thailand
2. Bangkok, Thailand
3. Saigon, Vietnam
4. Singapore
5. Hong Kong
6. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
7. Manila, Philippines
8. Macau
9. Jakarta, Indonesia

So there you have it! If you're planning a trip to SEA anytime soon you can see that both clearly enjoyed Thailand and Vietnam the most so those two would definitely be our suggestions. We were also both pretty bad at guessing the other person's rankings. After discussing them with each other, we also talked about the possibility that we may like places differently if we had visited them in a different order, or perhaps stayed in a different hotel or different part of the city.

Overall, it was an incredible experience we are very grateful for the amazing opportunity we had! We only have a few days left in India and we'll do another blog and let you know what we've been up to since being back here. Tomorrow we are going on an all day trip (6am-11pm!) outside of Bangalore and exploring some other parts of India.

I'll leave you with this picture I took the other day...gotta love India!

GHIJ....{KL}....MNOP

2010-08-25T00:08:00.017-04:00

Hi....(Back in Bangalore by the way)

This is a somewhat intentionally delayed blog about the last stop of our SE Asia trip, Kuala Lumpur, a.k.a. KL. KL is a fairly modern city. The most obvious landmark are the huge Petronas Towers, which stand head and shoulders above the next closest buildings. The towers are also spectacularly lit up during the night.

We arrived in KL during the afternoon of August the 18th after a whirlwind day of travel from Phi Phi Island to Krabi (by boat), quickly to the airport (by car), and finally to KL (by plane of course). When all was said and done it took us about 8.5 hours to make the entire voyage. A large portion of that time was spent sitting motionless in one of KL's notorious traffic jams. Our taxi driver actually backtracked about 15 minutes on one highway after running into a jam only to run into another one on the next highway. It took awhile but we eventually made it. When we finally arrived we checked into our hotel, had a quick workout, and then headed out to find some grub.

We took a taxi to a street called Changkat Bukit Bintang which is virtually incomprehensible when you hear it come out of a local's mouth. There were a plethora of dining options and we settled on a little Italian restaurant with an open air setting. The meal was a much needed relaxing end to a long day of travel. We were planning on heading out to a night market afterwards, however, it started into a complete downpour towards the end of our meal so we decided to just catch a cab back to the hotel as it was already getting late.

Cabs in KL are interesting. On every single cab there is a sign on the outside that reads "This is a metered Taxi. Haggling is strictly prohibited." That really sounds great, it's just not the way things work. Unless you are catching a cab from a place where the location hails it for you, such as a hotel for instance, the baseline price will be 10 RM or Malaysian Ringgit. There is about 3 RM to the USD. There is sometimes room for bargaining but most of them don't put up with much and would rather shut the door and move on to someone else. However, virtually all of our KL taxi drivers were extremely friendly, striking up conversations with us and pointing out landmarks as we drove by. One man even showed us his secret hiding place for his money so if someone tries to rob him they would only get the small amount of change he has out, in which case he said "It wouldn't be worth it they should just try to rob a bank". We also took the opportunity to ask this driver about why no one uses the meter and why it isn't enforced. He simply said the Police do not bother with these small things, two of his sons were police officers by the way. So at $3.3 USD per pop KL taxis aren't always the cheapest option.

We started Thursday morning by going to the KLCC (Kuala Lumpur City Center) to get some coffee and a little breakfast. The KLCC is basically a shopping mall complex located at the base of the Petronas towers. Here we were able to see the towers up close and personal. I felt that the towers had a different feel then most sky scrapers. As compared to others I have seen they were much wider up their entire height. That combined with their side by side design and connecting bridge about halfway up actually does not make them seem extremely tall. The Sears Tower, for instance, seems very tall and slender. However the KL towers actually overtook the Sears Tower as the worlds tallest structure for a short while. After this it was off to the Indian Embassy.

For those of you unaware of the situation, India put out a new set of guidelines a short while before our trip which forbid re-entry into India within two months of leaving the country on a tourist visa unless permission for re-entry was granted. So we were off to seek our permission. When we finally got to the embassy on the other side of town we waited in line for awhile and then spoke with one of the consular employees. She informed us that this was a two day approval process and we simply had to fill out an application and come back in two days. The problem of course was we were hoping to leave the city in about 28 hours. She said we should come back tomorrow at 11 and she would see what she could do. This wasn't comforting but it was the best we could do!

After this we set out to see some of the sights. At this point I think it is worth mentioning that it was Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting, during our stay in KL and the country has a heavy Muslim population as well as a large number of tourists from the middle east. Apparently August is an extremely hot month specifically in Saudi Arabia and many Saudis come to KL to cool off. This didn't mean much to us except that there was a much larger number of Muslim people and restaurants were either extremely slow or even closed during the day. Anyways, after the embassy we first went to the central market. This was a little higher class market than we were use to as it was indoors and air-conditioned so we enjoyed a good hour of strolling around looking in all the small little shops.

Afterwards, we headed for the most photographed location before the construction of the Petronas towers, the Sultan Abdul Samad Building. This was actually originally a British building designed by a British architect who had recently been influenced by travels in Africa and India. After this we took a quick stroll to the national train station and on the way we saw this...

That is fresh roasted lamb by the way...

The train station was really a detour on the way to the national mosque and the Islamic Arts Museum. The national mosque is quite simply what it says it is. It is a very large structure capable of holding up to 15,000 people. Its main roof is actually an 18 pointed star and has a single very tall minaret alongside of it. After a quick stroll by the mosque we entered the Islamic Arts Museum. The Islamic Arts Museum houses a large collection of art as well as historical artifacts from Islamic artists and cultures. The main highlight for us however was the amazingly ornate domes. The domes

are so incredibly detailed that afterwards I zoomed in on the center of a photo on my computer and it looked computer generated. It was late in the afternoon at this point so Lauren and I headed back to the hotel.

Later that night we went to KL's version of Sky Bar to celebrate the end of our trip! KL's version was much more vertigo friendly and was basically on the doorstep of the Petronas Towers. It is a pretty Chic place to be when the city is lit up. After this we were tired. We headed back to rest in anticipation of a busy day of travel, hopefully at least, on Friday.

Friday morning we checked out of our hotel and put our luggage in storage. Once again it was off to the KLCC to grab some coffee and breakfast. This was a little more of a casual morning and we ended up at the Indian Embassy full of prayers and hope! Upon arriving I made eye contact with the staff person who had helped us the day before. Her eyes didn't spell surprise or panic the moment she saw me so that seemed good. She motioned for me to wait as she helped some others. After about 30 minutes of patience and more prayer she signalled us over to the window that said "CASH". This was indeed a good sign as the permission required a small fee. After the fee was paid and another 20 minutes of waiting we were called to the window, our passports were stamped and we were on our way! Thank you God!

We did eventually make it back to Bangalore that day, though it was after a long drive to the wrong airport and a rushed trip to the right one. We are safely and happily back in Bangalore!

When all was said and done we spent 84 total hours in travel related activities such as lines, airplanes, taxis, and more lines throughout our trip of SE Asia. The trip was truly the trip of a lifetime filled with fantastic experiences, sights and smells! Thanks to everyone for your prayers and support. More from India soon!

Aaron

Add this one to your bucket list: Phi Phi Island, Thailand

2010-08-22T09:15:00.000-04:00

I decided that this post was going to be mostly photos, rather than words, as I think they will pretty much speak for themselves. Southern Thailand is simply breathtaking. The majority of the time we were there, I kept thinking that it was surreal and everything around me was fake. It's so picturesque that I told my mom I felt like I was living and breathing in a computer screensaver or desktop background. The water is so blue and clear that you can see the bottom in 15 feet deep water and it's also refreshingly warm. Southern Thailand, or Phi Phi Island to be more specific, is definitely a place to add to your list of places to see before you die!

We arrived in Phuket in the early afternoon and immediately took a taxi to our brand new hotel, the Westin Siray Bay. It had it's grand opening in the beginning of August so we ended up getting a really good deal on our room. The hotel was immaculate and the view exquisite. At this point in our trip, we were more than ready for a little R and R and spent the afternoon and early evening basking in the sun and soaking up the view. This was one of the many times in our trip when we looked at each other and said, "think about where we are right now - this is awesome!" As we were traveling, it was easy to get caught up with where we were and not really take the time to actually put ourselves on a map in the world and think about where we were. However, it was pretty cool when we did. We had our first lazy day of the whole trip and topped the evening off by ordering room service for dinner.

At 7:30 the next morning we were checked out of our hotel and on a mini bus taking us to the pier a few kilometers away. Since the ferry company picked us up, we were quite early and had our choice of where we wanted to sit on the boat. There were several levels, both inside and out, and I'm pretty sure the biggest decision we made that day was whether to sit on the left or the right side of the boat. We, obviously, chose to sit on the top level of the boat and even ended up choosing the correct side to sit on (for taking pictures of the islands later). We were served coffee and croissants and I don't think either of us could wipe the smirks off our faces as we glided through the Andaman Sea with the most perfect weather imaginable. We arrived at Phi Phi Don (the main part of the larger island - there are two: one inhabited, but without cars, and one that isn't inhabited). We dropped off the folks who were just on the boat for the ferry service to the island and continued on a tour of Phi Phi Le, which is the smaller of the two islands and is where the movie The Beach was filmed (with Leo). It was glorious. After cruising around for a while, we took a long boat (with all of our luggage!) to the beach where we would be having lunch. Before lunch, however, we climbed back into the long tail boat to head out to the reef for snorkeling. Now those of you who know me, know that I'm not the biggest snorkeling fan and I usually prefer to stay on the catamarans that take me there. (I don't know what it is, I just don't like putting those things in my mouth when I don't know where they've been and I feel like when you snorkel in one place, it's all pretty much the same). HOWEVER, I sucked it up and realized that I would probably never have another opportunity to snorkel off the coast of Phi Phi Island and I'd go for it. There was even lipstick on the outside of my snorkel and I still went for it :). After snorkeling, we went back to the beach for lunch and spent some time relaxing on the beautiful beach. In the mid afternoon, a long tail boat (basically the island's version of a taxi) took us back to the main island of Phi Phi Don and we found our hotel. We had another relaxing afternoon exploring our hotel and the island a bit and I even had a traditional Thai massage (one hour for about $12 USD!) We had a fabulous stay in Phi Phi.

The next morning we were a little worried about everything that had to fall into place, but it couldn't have worked out more perfectly if we tried! We took the 10:30 am ferry to Krabi, which was supposed to arrive at noon, but didn't until 12:30. Thankfully, as we were checking in with our tickets before leaving Phi Phi, we asked the ferry workers about the likelihood of there being taxis waiting at the Krabi Pier. They told us that they happen to also offer taxi services so we booked one through them, they made a call, and there was one waiting for us as we got off the ferry. It was perfect. As we drove away (the first ones to leave the pier from our ferry) we didn't see any other taxis, but there was a phone number to call if you wanted one. Since our flight was scheduled for 2:00pm, and it was now about 12:45, we were extremely grateful for our previously made arrangements! We arrived at the airport around 1:15, checked-in with no trouble, didn't have to wait in line at immigration (this is a BIG plus), and even had time to enjoy a coffee before boarding our flight to Kuala Lumpur!

I guess there were still a lot of words in this post, but it was so fabulous that I had to tell you all about it. EVERYONE SHOULD VISIT THAILAND! I will now leave you with some photos:

soaking it all in while Aar checks us in

the Westin Siray Bay, Phuket

Aar enjoying some pool action

gorgeous sunset in Phuket

getting ready to sail to Phi Phi with my coffee

Maya Bay, Phi Phi Le

long tail boat - the main means of transportation

since thereare no roads or cars on the island

Aar - loving life

long tail boats on Phi Phi Don

Smile You're in Thailand

2010-08-19T06:49:00.017-04:00

Thailand is known to be an extremely friendly and hospitable place. Lauren and I both received and returned many smiles while shopping or dining at a restaurant. The people were so friendly in fact that you actually noticed it which is certainly a nice thing to notice while travelling abroad.

We arrived to our hotel, Lebua at State Tower, at around 2 PM on the 13th. We were pleased to find our room was a suite which we had booked at an extremely good rate due to the riots which were happening in Bangkok at the time of our booking. Our room had a pleasant sitting area, spacious bathroom, comfortable bedroom and even a deck with a view!

We started out our Bangkok experience by going to a tailor to get tailor made suits, which is one thing Bangkok is known for. It was to be my...Birthday Suit...I am so funny....We got a tailor suggestion from a bell boy who ended up being one of the most helpful hotel attendants Laur and I had ever met for the duration of our stay at Lebua. The Tailor arranged to pick us up from our hotel and we were off. After deciding on our Suit styles and fabrics we were both measured and then brought to our next stop (transportation provided by the tailor again) which was the Siam Paragon shopping center. Here we met up with a future classmate of Lauren's at LSE, Tarn. She lives in Bangkok and we had arranged to meet with her. We grabbed some lunch at a thai restaurant which included a traditional thai dish (I cannot recall the name), sweet and sour chicken (Thai style) and some fried rice. The traditional dish reminded me of a seafood soup. It consisted of a pink colored broth, shrimp, mushrooms, and various vegetables. After our late lunch we headed back to the hotel to settle in a bit.

Later that night we headed out for dinner. I was feeling a hankering for some birthday ribs so we found a little barbecue joint. The food was decent enough but Laur and I were tired, it was after 10 PM after dinner, so we decided to head home for the night.

We started Saturday with a fantastic complimentary breakfast buffet at our hotel. We decided to head for the golden mount first. The golden mount is basically a large steel hill with a building built on top of it and a Buddhist temple on top. We walked the winding stairwell up to the golden peak and checked out the view as well as the Buddha statues inside. It was a fairly peaceful place with a few monks, some Buddhists and many tourists. The view of the "Old Village" was worth the hike and the 60 cent entrance fee in itself. After this Lauren and I did a little bargaining with some tuk tuk drivers (a tuk tuk is basically a little larger version of an autorickshaw) for a ride to the Grand Palace. We started at 20 Baht (about 30 Baht to the dollar) for the ride and a "free stop at a great jewelry store along the way!" No thanks...the next price quoted was 100 Baht then around 80 and finally we settled for a price of 40 Baht which sounds cheap but was still probably twice what we should have paid. We were hot and ready to go. The tuk tuks it turns out are faster, and a bit more comfortable then the autorickshaws of India. The seat in the back is almost a recliner and is very comfortable but when the driver has a predetermined fare he simply wants to get where he is going as quickly as possible to get his next fare. That much was clear. That being said we arrived promptly and safely at the Grand Palace around 5 minutes later.

The Grand Palace was originally built as a home for the much revered Thai Royal Family. Included on the grounds is the palace itself, a few museums as well as a large Buddhist temple complex which houses the famed Emerald Buddha. The Buddhist temple complex was an extremely ornate and unique set of small temples and monuments. It was certainly a unique experience walking around and viewing all of the different sights. The grounds were mostly full of tourists like us so it didn't really have the feel of a serene temple environment. When we entered the central temple where the Emerald Buddha was I had a similar feeling to the one I experienced when I first saw the Mona Lisa. That's it? I thought. Some things have a larger then life reputation and are described so majestically in tour books and on the interWebZ that when you see something that isn't actually the size of a blimp but is more like 2 ft. tall you tend to be surprised at its lack of a shock factor. Do I sound like an ignorant American yet? That being said the importance of the Buddha to certain people was certainly evident in the number of devout Buddhist followers in quiet meditation in front of it.

After the Grand Palace we went on a long walk through several markets eventually making our

way to the Royal Barges Museum. Most tourists make their way to this museum via a water taxi and on our walk there we found out why. The Path was a twisted maze with small signs pointing the direction to the museum. The path wound its way through a local neighborhood of small shacks, bars, and restaurants. At every corner a new sign seemed to suggest the museum was right around the corner. Instead, we would find another local staring at us wondering why in the world we didn't take a boat like everyone else. It was about a 10 minute zig zag walk but after we made it through I was glad we took the less normal path and saw what life in Bangkok is really like for the majority of it's residents. Home means so many different things to so many people around the world. The Royal Barges Museum was a quick visit but certainly worth while and unique. It housed the boats which used to be used in transporting the Thai Royal Family. The boats were long and detailed pieces of art rather then your average row boats. We had arranged for a ride from the museum to our Tailor for our preliminary fitting of our suit. Our driver was waiting for us when we arrived so when we were done strolling through the large warehouse we made our way back to the Tailor and then to Crepe & Company for a late lunch.

Crepe & Company is a tiny little french style restaurant serving a multitude of Crepes. Whether you fancy something for desert likeNutella and banana or something for lunch or dinner like chicken and mushrooms (my pick) or ham and pineapple (lolo's pick) they have it all. After our very late lunch we decided to head back to home base. Laur and I did a little bit of pool siding and later went up and explored the rooftop "Skybar". This place is not for those who see large heights and immediately ponder the awfulness of falling the full distance as I often do. The place was so packed we didn't even order anything but we did meet a Danish man who was a photojournalist with a very nice camera and he emailed us the pic. Thanks again to Magnus! Afterwards laur and I headed back down and got a relaxing drink at the poolside, and much less chaotic, Muzo. Afterwards it was time to call it a day, and a good one at that!

Sunday started once again with that undeniable breakfast buffet. After this we headed out for what would turn out to be a rather frustrating and yet adventuresome trip to Chatuchuck market. This is supposedly the biggest or one of the biggest markets in the world. It spans the area of 5 football fields and is a seemingly endless maze of tightly packed stalls. But lets not make it to the market too fast! On our way we realize we are low on dough...of the actual paper kind...so we stop half way at an ATM annnnnnd no dice. Assuming of course the problem was not with us, we decide to get back on the train and try some other ATM's by the market. This stop only had one. So we get to the next stop and things go similarly well with every other ATM. So on to the backup right? No no no the backup is locked in the safe back at the hotel where it should be silly. This is all we got. So the problem is with the

card so lets us one of those old fashioned looking boxes with the cord that looks like its connected to a phone. Somehow you must be able to use it to make calls. Well unfortunately Calvin, Hope and Holland Christian all let us down when it comes to making a collect call on a Thai phone to your bank. We could never get through. So after a few more last ditch efforts (7 Eleven for calling card/cash back/any sort of hope) we had to head back to the hotel to get the back-up. This was rather depressing. It was probably about a 40 minute trip to the market so we had to trace that back and then do it again to get to the market. However we did finally make it to the market with money and good spirits none the less! Laur was looking forward to shopping in a giant market and I was looking forward to the ride home which meant shopping was over! HA. Actually, shopping in a market like this allows anti-shoppers such as myself to do a lot of sight seeing as opposed to product seeing so I was quite entertained the entire time. I was also paranoid. This market is notorious for pickpocketing and robbery. Our bell boy at the hotel even bothered to mention this which means it must happen quite a bit. But no robberies occurred as far as we know.

After the market was finally over Laur and I were both exhausted. We probably spent around 2 hours wandering throughout the maze. So we headed home got some pizza from a little Italian joint called Scoozis and called it a night. One big day at the market was enough for us.

Monday all we had was about an hour before we had to leave for the airport. So after breakfast we took a quick stroll down to the Mandarin Oriental to check out the famed Author's Lounge. This is a little cafe where a few famous authors (so famous I don't have to mention their names, though if I knew them I might) have penned a few works. It was closed, but we did sneak a peak and we didn't have much time for Coffee anyways! After that it was off to the airport and off to Phuket. Paradise here we come!

Good Morning Vietnam

2010-08-15T10:48:00.001-04:00

Well, after a very long day of travel and frustration, we made it to Vietnam! If you've read our previous blogs, you'll already know that we found out last Monday morning at about 4 am that our intended flight from Macau to Ho Chi Minh City with Viva Macau did not exist. Upon doing a bit of research, we found out that the airline no longer was in service. In fact, they ended up shutting down a day when they couldn't afford to put enough fuel in one of their planes. Unfortunately, they didn't send us an email or let us know in any way that our flight had been canceled. We tried to book other flights online but, because we wanted to fly out in less than 24 hours, using the internet was not an option. After doing a bit of flight research online, we ended up just going to the airport to try and talk to any of the limited airlines that fly out of Macau. We ended up finding an Air Asia flight that left in the late morning, but we had to stop and have a layover in Bangkok before continuing to Saigon. Had we not already booked all of our hotel rooms and other flights, we probably would have just swapped things around and spent time in Thailand and gone to Vietnam later. Unfortunately again, this set us back about $700 (which is more than half of the amount we spent on ALL of our flights around SE Asia put together.) We didn't really have much of a choice in the matter so we just tried to look on the bright side that we were actually able to leave Macau and get to our destination and only about 9 hours later than we had initially planned.

Now - back to Vietnam! Aar and I both loved Vietnam. I was trying to describe why I liked it so much, but couldn't really put my finger on it. I decided that I think it's because the Vietnamese are so friendly and always have smiles on their faces. They aren't as rude/pushy as we've discovered in other parts of the region.

We arrived at our hotel in the early evening and spent some time exploring the surrounding area. The Ben Thanh Market was right outside our hotel and it turns into a night market in the evenings. We spent a bit of time just meandering through the different stalls and then I decided to indulge into the Vietnamese culture by visiting one of the most common businesses in the country - the nail salon :). I got a mani and pedi (with a 30 minute leg massage) and all for about $6 US. Needless to say, it was an amazing way to spend my evening after a long and troubling day of travel. While I was getting the royal treatment, Aar went and found us some dinner at a local family owned Vietnamese restaurant that was recommended by some of the girls at the nail salon. He pretty much just "winged it" and ended up getting some sort of a spicy beef dish with rice. Initially, we weren't so sure if beef was a good idea but it ended up tasting delicious and neither of us got sick at all.

On Tuesday we had a full itinerary of touristy things to do around Saigon. After having breakfast in our hotel, we set out on a walking journey. Central Saigon is pretty small, so we could walk pretty much everywhere. We stopped at various historical locations such as the reunification palace, the notre dame cathedral, the post office, the opera house, and a few other places. We had lunch at a delicious open-aired Vietnamese restaurant that was recommended by both locals and foreigners. We also visited the War Remnants Museum, which was extremely gruesome. They had several photographs depicting war crimes and we both left feeling very depressed. I know a lot of bad things happen {on both sides} during war, but I don't think it's necessary to share images with the public. Who knows, maybe it's good to make people aware of what occurs. We spent the afternoon walking around a bit more and exploring the market near our hotel. For dinner, we went to the number one listed restaurant on tripadvisor.com, but were less than impressed. It was super tiny and they only had about 10 things on their menu to choose from.

On Wednesday, we hired a driver and a tour guide to take us to the city of Dong Xoai, which is about three hours away from Ho Chi Minh City. Dong Xoai is the city where my grandfather's helicopter was shot down in during the Vietnam war in 1965. If you're interested in reading a bit about his story, you can find a synopsis of information here. I didn't really know what to expect and wasn't sure if we'd even be able to find the area we were looking for. Thankfully, our guide was able to ask a few people and we eventually found the rubber plantation where his helicopter was shot down, as well as the memorial depicting the battle of Dong Xoai. It was definitely a surreal feeling of being so close to where he was last heard from. It was a very long and bumpy ride, but well worth the trip.

Originally, we were planning on taking a day trip to Southern Vietnam to visit the floating markets, but we were both pretty wiped out from the long day on Wednesday. Our initial itinerary had scheduled us a free day without any plans, but that had been taken away during our mishap in Macau. We decided we'd have to go back to Vietnam another time and visit our places and that we would go ahead with our day of no plans. We sat at a cafe for a while, wrote a few post cards, ate lunch at a cute little french boulangerie, and basically just enjoyed taking some time to breathe since we had constantly been on the go for the past two and a half weeks. In the afternoon, we visited the National Art Museum, which was in a beautiful old building built by the french when they had colonized Vietnam. We had an early night and headed back to our hotel to pack, as we had to catch a morning flight to Bangkok on Friday.

As I already mentioned, we both loved Vietnam. Even though evidence of the war is embedded in many parts of the culture that we experienced, the Vietnamese were very endearing. I definitely hope to some day go back to Vietnam and explore the rest of the country.

Hong Kong. Personal space? No thanks...

2010-08-10T07:26:00.007-04:00

Greetings and salutations...

We are actually currently in Ho Chi Minh City Vietnam and are having a fine time, but please let me tell you about our time in Hong Kong. Ahhthankyou...

So we arrived in Hong Kong during the evening on the 6th of Friday. Our total travel time from Manila to Hong Kong was about 8 hours, this puts our running total of travel time at approximately 51.75 hours, yes we are keeping track. Transportation was a piece of cake using HK's MTR system. Once we got to the hotel we decided to grab a bite to eat.

We were dying for a bit of HK culture so we went to a Mexican restaurant :) It was three things...Delicious, Expensive, and in the middle of many adult themed establishments. eeeek. We had found the restaurant in a travel book and we had no idea of the neighborhood it was in until we poked up from the subway and we were surrounded. It was no problem however as none of the establishments were at all interested in a married couple walking together :)

The next day we got a decently early start grabbed some breakfast and headed for Victoria Peak. We took a tram to the top of the peak. The tram rides up very steeply and it reminded me of the upward ascent for the first peak on a roller coaster (I hate roller coasters). Needless to say I was waiting for the accelerating clicking sound and the sudden unstoppable pull of gravity. We survived. Actually the tram ride was very pleasant and I felt completely safe the whole time, however, it was steep. The view from the top was well worth it. The city of HK is certainly not a prototypical location for a city. Sky scrapers are either built on the side of steep hills, on reclaimed land right next to the water or in the small space between these two.

After this we trekked over to the mid levels. The mid levels is a neighborhood/district of HK learn more here, at wikipedia of course. The unique feature of the area is the worlds longest escalator or at least string of escalators going up the central area. In total they cover a distance of 800 m (Thats a little more than 2,600 feet America) which is a long way to travel on an escalator. It is actually used for transportation and switches its direction of operation depending on the movement of the masses (morning/afternoon rush hours). We stopped for lunch at a little place called Classified. It was a wine and cheese bar, which we enjoyed minus the wine. We took advantage of the create your own cheese plate and tried a dry/soft/bleu cheese which we got to pick from the walk in cheese cooler. It was all delicious. After that we headed for Cat Street which is a local market full of souvenirs. We were told that the markets in this area were prime for bartering, as in don't settle for anything more then 50% of the first price offered. We didn't have too much success as the locals seemed pretty stingy and we ended up leaving without to many purchases.

After the market we headed for the Ferry station and hopped on a boat across the harbor to Tsin Sha Tsui. This was an extremely packed place. Full of shopping malls and of course people. Many areas of Hong Kong are packed with people whether its the sidewalks, the subway system, or stores. People, people, people. If you really like that 2.5 ft that is usually empty on all sides of you then HK is not the place for you. If you do like that just hope that the person behind you on the train brushed his teeth because when you can feel him breathing down your neck, literally not figuratively, you can certainly smell if he had fruit loops or cocoa crisp that morning.

Later that night we headed for the Harborside intercontinential to grab some appetizers and a view of the Hong Kong light show. Starting at about 8 PM many buildings on the HK skyline take part in a coordinated light show. It was!!!...Underwhelming. Having seen some pictures of the show at it's wildest I think Lauren and I were ready for a combination of 4th of July and New Years on the side of buildings. Instead we got a more tame version, which wasn't nearly as quick or bright as we were expecting. All that being said, if we knew nothing about the light show and the buildings suddenly started doing what we saw we probably would have been utterly amazed.

After the light show we met up with Lauren's old young life leader Kat and her husband Dan. They brought us to a delightful Spanish Tapas restaurant and we enjoyed some food and some mutual feelings on life in HK compared to life in the states.

Sunday was a bit more of a casual day. We started the day in an area called causeway bay which we found to be far too crowded and we quickly headed for our turbo ferry ride to the "Las Vegas of the East", Macau. We arrived in Macau in the early afternoon and had some down time before heading out for dinner. We ate at a fantastic little Italian restaurant with the sights of all the casinos right outside our window. Afterwards Lauren and I decided to try our luck at the MGM Grand. We were lucky indeed as we walked through the casino without betting or spending a dime. Ha Haaa as a friend of mine would say, and you know who you are. We headed back to the hotel in anticipation of an early morning and long day of travel the next day...we had no idea what was coming...more on that in the next post.

So long from Vietnam!

long overdue post: MANILA!

2010-08-08T19:04:00.000-04:00

It's about time we update our blog I suppose. We were doing so well for a while there, but got a bit caught up in the moment. Though, I don't think that is necessarily a bad thing. We spent just under four days in Manila (in the Philippines) and had a great time. Our hotel was awesome - we had an aquarium as one of our walls and the hotel was right on Manila Bay. We arrived in Manila at about 5:30 am and were actually able to check into our hotel immediately upon arrival. Most hotels don't allow you to check in until after 2pm so this was a very pleasant surprise, as we were able to fall asleep for another couple of hours.

We arrived on Tuesday and, after taking a morning nap, we had an itinerary we were hoping to accomplish, but it didn't end up happening the way we had planned. We first went out in the morning and were blinded by the light of the sun so went back inside to get sunglasses. After exploring the lovely Rizal Park for about 20 minutes the sun suddenly disappeared and it started raining BUCKETS! We found it slightly ironic that it had only been a mere 20 minutes since we had gone back in for our sunglasses. By the time we ran back to our hotel we were basically drenched. Still feeling a bit tired from our red eye flight from Jakarta, we took another shower and put some comfy clothes on and decided to take advantage of the free wifi and cozy hotel room. We ended up just relaxing for most of the day and had dinner at the White Moon Lounge that overlooks Manila Bay.

We left prepared on Wednesday morning with both sunglasses and umbrellas, as we realized that the weather in South East Asia can change on a dime during the rainy season. Our first stop on Wednesday was Intramuros, which is the historical Spanish part of Manila. It's kind of a dainty little village within the city and is surrounded by walls that have been there for years. Interestingly enough, one of the top things to do in Manila is visit one of their many malls. So after Intramuros, we headed to a local mall and it was definitely something an interesting place and crowded with plenty of locals. We had lunch there and enjoyed walking around a bit and doing a little people watching. It started to rain again so we took a taxi back to our hotel before we got caught again. We had been craving some American food so we ended up eating dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe.

Thursday was, by far, my favorite day in the Philippines. We took an early morning boat over to Corregidor Island, which is an amazing little island situated in the middle of the entrance to Manila Bay. If you like history, like I do, then you would love visiting this place. It has an amazing story and has been used by the Spanish, the Filipinos, the Americans, and the Japanese. It has a strategic location, as it blocks the entrance to Manila Bay and can control what goes in (or doesn't go in) to Manila. During WWII, the Americans controlled it most of the time and there were countless barracks, as well as several large guns/cannons that could shoot as far as 17 miles. However, most of the buildings, etc. have been bombed out. We took a tour around the island and had an extremely informative guide. Overall, it was a very interesting day and we both learned a lot of things that we didn't know before. One little fun fact was that Babe Ruth was actually stationed on the island before he became a famous baseball player. We didn't get back to Manila until about 4:30 pm and were quite spent after being in the sun since 7am. We had a laid back evening and got Chinese food for dinner and just ate it in our hotel room.

Our flight was in the early afternoon on Friday so we just did a little more exploring and walking around before heading to the airport. We had a great time in Hong Kong and will do another post about that ASAP!

We're currently in Macau and in a little bit of a bind, as we're not sure how we're going to get to our next destination (Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam). We were supposed to fly out at 7:05 this morning but, upon looking up our flight information online at 4am, we couldn't find our flight and ended up finding out that our airline is no longer in existence! This was the only airline to fly to Ho Chi Minh from here so we're not exactly sure what we're going to do. We tried booking other tickets online, but because the window is less than 24 hours, they won't allow us to book them via the internet. We found some flight possibilities online that have us stopping in Bangkok, so we're just going to head to the Macau airport and hope for the best. Please say a little prayer for us...we're trying to stay in good spirits :)

jaKaRtA

2010-08-03T09:16:00.007-04:00

Greetings to all...

Lauren and I are currently in Manila safely but we spent most of the past 72 hours in Jakarta. Jakarta was certainly a bit overwhelming at first. We took a local bus from the airport to a local train station and a taxi from there.

Lauren and I laid low Sunday night and set out to explore on Monday. First thing Monday morning we went walking to a local antique market. It was set along a local street and consisted mostly of sets of booths selling luggage followed by one selling golf clubs, one selling good ole' fashioned records and then another set of booths selling luggage.

Following that we set out for the Museum. The Museum looked great from the outside! Unfortunately the inside was closed on Mondays. Haha Oooops. So it was off to SeaWorld!

Now when I think of SeaWorld I think of Killer Whales and Dolphins. So for about the equivalent of $4 it seemed like a great deal. Well SeaWorld Jakarta is a bit of a toned down version. It consisted of a completely indoor park with glass tanks. It may not have been SeaWorld USA but it was very fun and Lauren touched a Turtle!

After SeaWorld we headed to the National Monument. The National Monument was in the middle of a very large park. It was certainly a nice quiet escape from the traffic jams and constant chaos of the city of Jakarta. The Monument is an extremely tall peak as shown in the photo.

We polished our day off at a great restaurant called Blue Erawan. It was a really great traditional Thai restaurant. The service was wonderful and we happened to be the only people in the restaurant since it was a Monday night. The food was great as well! After that it was off to Manila. Our flight left at 12:30 that night and we arrived here in Manila this morning at around 6:30. All is well...More on Manila to come!

So long for now!

-Aaron

Singapore: Days 2 & 3

2010-07-31T10:58:00.001-04:00

We've really enjoyed our time in Singapore - I can't believe we're already leaving in the morning ! It has really been a unique experience, as the city doesn't seem to fit in Asia. As Aar mentioned in the previous post, it is extremely clean, organized, and efficient. It's also a very international city and there are people living here from all corners of the world.

Yesterday (Friday) we slept in a little since we were quite exhausted and had breakfast in our hotel. Unfortunately, it was raining buckets so we weren't sure what we wanted to do...especially since I seemed to have gotten Aar's cold. We decided we'd just deal with it and stuck with our original plans. Our first stop was Little India, which is one of the parts of town that has not been effected by the west as much as the rest of town. It was quite bizarre, as it was basically a cleaner version of the real India. Having just come from the real India, we weren't really as impressed as other tourists probably were. We could easily find everything they were selling in the shops back in India and for probably a third of the price! It was still cool to walk around and see some temples. After Little India we walked to another part of town to view a mosque. Thankfully, it wasn't pouring quite as hard as it was earlier, but it was still hard to take a lot of pictures and enjoy everything. The nice thing about the rain, however, was that it cooled the temperature down immensely. We walked around an arab part of town and then continued to walk down to the Raffles Hotel, which is an immaculate hotel that is several years old. We had a delightful lunch at one of the restaurants at the hotel called the Empire Cafe. It was a bit pricey, but reminded me of cafes in Paris. After the hotel, we went across the street to a place called Chijmes, which is a converted cathedral turned restaurant area. After having walked all around town for the majority of the day (in the rain!) we got a bit sick of it and decided to see a movie. We had both been dying to see Inception so we decided to go for it since it was raining anyway. After the movie, we headed back to our hotel to freshen up before meeting Saranta (one of my girlfriends that I met while studying in Paris) who is from Singapore. We had dinner with her and then headed to a restaurant that one of her friends owns. All in all, it was a good day!

Today we slept in again and spent a little time relaxing in our hotel room before going out in the 90 degree heat. We walked to China Town and walked around for quite awhile and saw a Hindu temple and two Buddhist temples. I find it quite fascinating to see the way that different people worship around the world. Culture, in general, is quite intriguing. I got a fresh squeezed pineapple/orange/banana juice (which was SO refreshing in the hot weather) and we had lunch at a delicious little Thai restaurant in China Town. We then walked (seems to be repetitive, doesn't it?) with the destination of the Fullerton Hotel and ended up stumbling upon the practice for Singapore's National Day Parade, which is on August 9th. There were countless military tanks/trucks/large vehicles that were lined up and down the road. Apparently the Singapore military doesn't do a whole lot (even though it's required for all male citizens) and this is the highlight of their year. We then walked to Clarke Quay, which is a strip right along the river filled with restaurants. Next, we took the MRT to meet with a new friend, Venky, who will be one of my future classmates at LSE. We talked with him for a couple hours and he directed us to an American diner that was near by where we had burgers and milkshakes for dinner. After dinner, we headed back to our hotel to workout and now we're just getting ready to start packing for Jakarta. Our flight is at 9:45 am tomorrow, so we have to get up moderately early to take the MRT to the airport.

Although it's quite expensive, we've loved Singapore!

p.s. I also uploaded the majority of our photos onto picasa so you can check those out here.

The Land of No Chewing Gum...?

2010-07-30T23:00:00.008-04:00

Howdy from Singapore!

Stop number 2 on the so-called maatventure is over half way. The contrast between Bangalore and Singapore is certainly a large one. Singapore is known as being one of the cleanest cities in the world and it certainly has appeared that way. How this is accomplished is laws of course. Laws such as; no littering, no spitting, and yes, no chewing gum. It indeed, up until recently, was illegal to even possess chewing gum in Singapore. Though talking with a friend of Lauren's last night it sounds like that ban on possession is no longer in effect.

So we got here early morning on Thursday somewhere around 6:30 AM (6:30 PM in Mich). We both slept a bit on our red eye but we were a little spacey. We used Singapore's MRT (Mass Rapid Transit) Train to get from the airport to the hotel. This was a good experience, as it was a very simple system even though it was rush hour when we were on it and the trains were packed. We made it to our hotel around 8:30 or so, checked our luggage in, and headed out for the day.

First stop was the Singapore Botanical Gardens. The Gardens were beautiful. The grounds were extremely well kept and admission to the main gates was free. Laur and I spent about an hour wandering around exploring and taking a few pics! After this we headed for the Island of Sentosa.

We decided to take the cable car ride to Sentosa which was a very cool experience as we got to survey the skyline and the greenery from an elevated perch. The ride took only about 10 minutes but we took many pictures and let our legs rest a bit. We found Sentosa to be quite a tourist trap. We were apparently the only people on the island that after riding the cable car to the island didn't want to pay $10 each to ride a street luge to the bottom! We did however end up

walking down and we made our way to the beach. We went to a little beach restaurant called Coastes and grabbed a little snack and just relaxed and gazed upon the sight of about 30-40 ocean freighters sitting off the coast. At this point Laur and I were exhausted so we headed back to the hotel to rest up. It was a good first day we were hot, sweaty and tired and when we finally cleaned up and hit our beds we rested extremely well. I am going to pass the baton on to Lauren for the next portion of the blog...so long for now...

Off to Singapore!

2010-07-28T09:32:00.003-04:00

Hello everyone...

Well just a real quick note here before we take off to Singapore. I am feeling much better today perhaps it was the eucalyptus oil steam treatment that Auntie and Uncle had me undergo yesterday and the day before. As you can see by the picture I simply placed my head over a hot pot with a small amount of eucalyptus oil and the steam rose from the pot and I breathed it i

n. The blanket was to contain the steam. After about 5 minutes I was sweating like crazy and breathing clearly! Of course the stuffiness usually came back after an hour or so but then this morning I woke up and it was gone. So with me feeling better and no signs of Laur getting sick its off to Singapore! Our flight leaves at 11:30 PM which is about 4.5 hours from now. Which means I need to finish packing! Everything else is going great so...Good bye until Singapore!

laying low

2010-07-26T04:52:00.003-04:00

We've been laying low for the past few days, as Aaron has been a bit under the weather. Nothing too serious, just a bit of a cold/sinus issue, but it has kept us from being too adventurous. Once again, here is a brief synopsis of what we have been up to lately:

Thursday:

Aaron and I headed to Lalbagh Botanical Gardens in Bangalore. It was a lovely escape from the hustle and bustle of the city and we were able to see lots of greenery in the middle of Bangalore. The garden is HUGE - we only spent about an hour in there since it started raining, but you could easily spend a whole day wandering around the numerous different paths. It was nice to just walk peacefully and not have to constantly be worrying about where we were walking, what we were stepping in, or what might be coming our way. After the gardens, we caught a rickshaw to Forum Mall, which is essentially the same as a mall you might find in the US. I had been to the mall on a previous trip and my initial thought was to find a cute indian store to buy a ready made salwar, but the mall had mostly western stores and it was a bit hard to find. However, I did end up finding one :). We started to get hungry and ended up being lame and getting Pizza Hut for lunch. We've eaten almost all Indian food since being here, so it was nice to have a little taste of home. On Thursday evening we went back to James and Anita's house with Aunty and Uncle and spent the evening with them.

Friday:

A girl from the US came over (her sister had previously met Aunty and Uncle and wanted her to meet them as well) and we went on a little adventure to a Hindu Temple. It was pretty far away from Aunty and Uncle's home and we arrived at 2:45, only to realize that it was closed until 4:00. We decided to wait since we had gone all that way and it was an interesting experience. I had been to several hindu temples before so I wasn't as excited about waiting, but I'm glad that we did, as I think it was a good thing for Aaron to see. It was quite bizarre, as we were in a never ending line. It wasn't like most temples that I had visited where you could essentially wander wherever you wanted. There was only one way in and one way out and you were in the middle of a crowd the whole time. I prefer my own personal space so I didn't particularly enjoy the close quarters, but it was still interesting to see the way that other people worship. After you leave the temple, there is an endless zig zag of little tables set up selling various things that they force you to walk by. It's basically a scheme to try and make you buy things.

Saturday:

I think Saturday was when Aaron first started feeling a bit under the weather. In the morning, Uncle took us to City Market, which was insane! We arrived around 11am and Uncle said it was one of the slowest times of day. However, if you would have asked Aar or me we would not have thought that to be the case. There were people EVERYWHERE. It was really fascinating to see all of the bright colors and you can buy anything from pots and pans to flowers to fruits. We spent about 45 minutes walking around and taking pictures. As with the hindu temple, I thought it was nice to see and experience another aspect of the Indian culture, but I much prefer the smaller markets around Aunty and Uncle's home. In the afternoon Aaron and I went to the Coffee Day (coffee shop) around the corner again and enjoyed chatting and spending time together without worrying about being anywhere or doing anything. It was a nice relaxing day!

Sunday:

We went to church in the morning, but Aar was feeling even more sick so we pretty much laid low in our apartment most of the day. We went on a walk last night and ended up at a grocery store, where we found a few American food items. We bought snickers, a kit kat, and pasta/sauce (which we made for lunch today). I don't really even eat Snickers at home in the states, but it definitely tasted fabulous yesterday!

We leave for Singapore on Wednesday already - which is so crazy! I can't believe how fast time is going by. We've been having a great time with Aunty and Uncle, but we are also very excited for the next leg(s) of our journey. Please pray for Aaron that he gets better before we leave and that he doesn't pass it on to me!

Rickshaw Adventures...

2010-07-23T01:19:00.001-04:00

Hello again...Aaron Here...

So one thing so far critical to the Bangalore experience is transportation in auto rickshaws. Lets just say it's not your average taxi ride. The adventure begins in acquiring a ride.

So lets be up front here, we are white, we are American, we are targets and everyone knows it. Rickshaw drivers may not know we are American but the first one alone qualifies us as targets, the target of course is our pocket book. Each auto rickshaw is equipped with a meter similar to the one shown on the left. These meters start at a minimum of 14 rupees (around 50 rupees to the dollar) and after 2 kilometers starts going up at 7 rupees per km. This as I said is the minimum and the first thing almost every driver will try to do is squeeze more out of you...sometimes the offers are relatively outrageous...100 rupees for a ride that should only cost 30 or 40. Sometimes the driver simply wants another 10 rupees thrown on to the meter at the end. Our goal each time is the meter and the meter only. I would say we are successful with this about 90% of the time. However, it usually does take around 3 to 4 attempts before drivers behind see you walking away from other autos and realize that you aren't as easy of a target as you may look. (All this being said certain events do dictate higher rates for everyone such as nighttime, rain, heavy traffic, or many other reasons) So after hiring the auto, hopefully only for the meter, the real adventure begins!

In my estimation, rickshaw drivers as a collective bunch are fair, safe, and honest. However there are some bad apples in the bunch. The following stories will help illustrate that. Already while in Bangalore we have had the following; a driver from "The Fast and the Furious," an attempt at the classic bait and switch, and a crooked meter.

"The Fast and the Furious"
So Monday night we spent the night at James and Anita's and the following morning James helped us hire an auto. He was a young driver maybe 20 years of age with what looked like some pretty trendy jeans. We made record time. The driver flew down straight aways blowing by cars and bikes with an extreme herky jerky lane change method. He would get really close to something (a person, a cart, another vehicle, etc.) and make it appear like he was going to hit them, and swerve out of the way at the last second. Each time I noticed him looking at me in the mirror trying to gauge my reactions, which I am sure were not mundane. At one point we hit a speed bump so fast that both Laur and I went airborne in the back seat! So Tuesday morning got off to an adrenaline pumping start!

An attempt at the classic bait and switch...

On another occasion Laur and I were walking around commercial street (a market/shopping area) and decided we had had enough. Having expended some energy walking there we decided to get an auto to a coffee shop at another location. We followed the usual attempts at the meter at which point a young man, dressed far to nicely for a rickshaw driver in hindsight, approached and asked where we wanted to go. After we responded he waved us in his direction. After weaving in and out of a few rickshaws he booted a driver out of his and pointed us towards the seat at which point he said he would charge only 10 rupees for the ride (no meter even) this obviously raised red flags. Lauren and I both hesitated for about 1 second and decided to get out. Later after talking with James he told us this is a scheme used to bring people to shops to try and get them to buy some things. Your destination has nothing to do with the price. This was in fact a deal to good to be true.

The Crooked Meter

Yesterday Laur and I spent some time at a shopping mall called The Forum. Afterwards we once again went looking for an auto. After one attempt a man approached us and seemed to agree upon the meter until we were in the back seat at which point he looked at us and said "double the meter". After a few exchanges and attempts at leaving the rickshaw he agreed to only the meter. So after cruising along for maybe 30 seconds or perhaps 1/2 a km the meter started ticking away. Remember the meter isn't suppose to start until the 2 km point. I pointed it out to Laur and we both watched as the meter then proceeded to click away at at least double the normal rate. I told the driver his meter was wrong and he responded with "correct, no?" From talking with him earlier I knew he knew more English than that. After saying "correct, no?" 3 or 4 times we told him to stop we got out of the auto, I gave him 20 rupees (which I probably should not have done) and waved him on his way. While driving away he maintained a very unhappy glare at me which I returned :). Immediately after we got out a man who looked to be about 60 and incapable of hurting a soul pulled up. We hopped in and found our way home safely and with a story for only the price of the meter!

So those are just the first of many Rickshaw adventures that I am sure we will experience in our remaining time in India. So long for now...

P.S. I have seen Judith (Jame's and Anita's Daughter) at the end of two rickshaw rides. She was sound asleep. So apparently some people find them very relaxing : D

Funny sign near Auntie and Uncles...See JP if you want to see many similar examples...

life in bangalore

2010-07-20T00:40:00.000-04:00

Well, we are finally feeling settled and adjusting to life in Bangalore. Things have been going well the past few days and I think Aaron is beginning to see why I love India so much. In a nut shell, here's what we've been up to lately:

Saturday:

~There was a WCOI board meeting so Aaron had his first encounter with the traditional Indian dish of biryani, which is often eaten during celebrations/important events
~We went to the near by shopping area, Commercial Street, but it was even more congested than usual, as it was a Saturday afternoon
~I caught up with one of my friends from my last trip, Raja, who came over for the afternoon with his wife

Sunday:

~We went to church at Bethel Baptist - also the same church I attended during my last trip
~We fully engaged in "the day of rest" and took a two and a half hour nap

Monday:

~We started working for WCOI by cleaning out the library, which I don't think has been touched in the last 25 years. Lots of dust and bugs and I don't think we'll finish anytime soon!

~We took an afternoon break and walked over to Cafe Coffee Day. Here's the view of Ulsoor Lake from the coffee shop:

~We got caught in the pouring rain on the way home from the coffee shop, but luckily it's only a short walk

~We headed over to James and Anita's house after work to spend some time with them. We went for a walk and their daughter, Judith, ended up getting her ears pierced. Anita made a delicious dinner and we ended up spending the night at their home

All in all we've been keeping busy and having a great time!

Motorcycles and Rickshaws

2010-07-16T11:38:00.002-04:00

Greetings from India!

So Lauren and I have been in India for almost two days and I am already amazed at how different life can be in a different portion of God's planet! Already in this short amount of time I have traveled to a fish market, dealt with local law enforcement (more on that later) and experienced Indian style Pizza Hut.

So first things first, Yesterday (Thursday) James decided to start my Bangalorean adventure with a trip to the heart of one of the city's markets. I hopped on the back of a motorcycle with him as he weaved in and out of the chaotic and yet surprisingly quick moving street traffic. One thing on the roads that has caught my eye (other then the wandering cows) is the assumption that you are not the only person on the road trying to get somewhere quickly. Getting cut off by someone merging into traffic is an assumption not a nuisance and the horn is used as a friendly signal to fellow drivers ahead instead of a warning of a possible collision. The fact of the matter is everyone on the roads in Bangalore is moving quickly and some of the streets are so busy the only way to merge is to squeeze yourself into a place that the average 24 year old American man thinks is a death wish. However, no collisions take place as the brakes of the oncoming motorcycles, rickshaws and cars are quickly tapped to create just enough space. No special fingers are offered after something like this because all the drivers behind you have done the same thing 5 times in the last 5 minutes.

So after an exhilarating motorcycle ride that replaced my Jet lag with a dose of adrenaline we arrived at the market. The market was located in a part of the city composed primarily of Muslims, so women wearing veils was a normal site. The market was an extremely colorful and active place. We were there for fish and after stopping at a few stands James had found lunch and we took a quick tour throughout the rest of the market where I saw loads of fruits, vegetables, and flowers.

So onto dealings with local law enforcement. As many of you know Lauren and I had some difficulty in our last trip to Chicago attempting to gain permission for reentry into India in August after our Asia trip. We were told there was nothing we could do and we should register with the Foreign Ministry and seek permission when we arrived. So Lauren and I headed out this morning at around 10 AM to accomplish that. After some adventures in gathering all of the needed materials we finally hopped into line with our completed applications. After one of the pre-screeners looked over our paper work we were given numbers 948 & 949...they were currently serving number 867. So we took off and got some lunch and about an hour and a half later our turn came up. After another conversation with what seemed like the 5th person to look at our application without being able to do anything we were brought to the assistant to the head of police who proceeded to pass the buck again! He said that there was nothing he could do to grant this permission and that we needed to go to the Indian Embassy in the last country of our trip to secure or reentry. When we asked what if they will not grant it he simply responded with, "that will be less work for me"....greeeeat thanks! So we are still in the same place but at this point we really have no choice but to try our luck in Kuala Lumpur!

Alright well this has been far to long of a post and its getting close to bed time so good bye for now from Bangalore!

-Aaron

safely in bangalore

2010-07-15T02:16:00.001-04:00

Just wanted to give a quick update and let everyone know that we've arrived safely in Bangalore. It was a bit of a long journey (30+ hours), but it seemed to go by fast and we didn't really have any problems. If I were to describe our trip in one word it would be LINES. It seemed like we waited in a lot of {chaotic every man for himself extremely disorganized} lines.

We first flew from Chicago to Frankfurt, Germany, got off the plane only to wait in lines/go through security and get back on the same plane!

Next, we went to Mumbai, got off, waited in another very long and disorganized line, followed by a four and a half hour lay over before we finally arrived in Bangalore at 5 am local time, or about 8:30 pm in Michigan.

It's funny how cultures do things differently. For example, in the US, when you board a plane it is in a neat and orderly fashion with special zones for where you are sitting. Everyone {usually} waits their turn and doesn't cut in line. On our flight from Mumbai to Bangalore, our flight was never posted on the display and a man suddenly announced "all those going to Bangalore please board from Gate 4" and it was a free for all scramble to get to the door to try to be the first to board the plane. Not to mention, for some reason it was established that if you all stand really close together then the line will probably move faster. :) It was quite entertaining.

We slept a fair amount on the flight from Frankfurt to Mumbai, so we weren't very tired when we finally arrived in Bangalore. James Sundararajan was at the airport waiting for us and we took a bus back to the house. We had anticipated going back to sleep for a few hours but of course our bodies were too messed up to let that happen. Now we're just going to try and stay awake all day.

Well Aar is off at the fish market with James so I thought I'd give a little update while they're gone and I'm trying not to fall asleep...

wasn't sure if I'd ever see this :)

another bump in the road...

2010-07-09T14:35:00.000-04:00

Well, unfortunately, Aaron and I have encountered another bump in the road for our trip. Last winter, India made a new law that you are unable to leave the country and return within two months on a tourist visa. However, they indicated that you could ask for special permission to do so and if you are traveling on (and follow exactly) a specific itinerary then you shouldn't have a problem. Yesterday, Aaron and I drove down to Chicago with hopes of sorting it all out. There was a special form to be filled out for the Chicago Consulate and we thought we had everything in order. Once we arrived at the Consulate, there was a sign saying they would be closed until 3:30pm, so we had about 45 minutes to kill. In the mean time, we decided to head over to Travisa Outsourcing (where the consulate has outsourced their visa processing). It was only about a half mile walk and so we went there and tried to present our case to them, where they informed us that the Consulate is no longer accepting these forms, but as long as we register with the Department of Foreign Affairs right when we get there we shouldn't have a problem if we follow our itinerary.

We decided to try stopping at the Consulate anyway since we had already made the trip - but we found some even more frustrating news. After taking our number and waiting for about a half an hour, we were finally called up only to be told that there was no hope for us. The Indian government no longer accepts the forms that we filled out and if we leave the country we will not be allowed in for two months. We weren't really sure how to take this since we have already booked all of our flights and hotels in SE Asia and, not to mention, there website says otherwise.

We talked to one of our Indian friends on the way home and he seems to believe that we shouldn't have a problem and that the consulate lady didn't know what she was talking about. We're hoping that's the case because we have absolutely NO intention of skipping out on our SE Asia trip. I think that's enough rambling on that topic for now!

On a better note, we had a lovely trip to Colorado for my brother's wedding last week and we are only four days away from our departure! Here are a couple pictures from the trip:

Aar and I on a day trip to Boulder (Flat Irons in the background)

the bride and groom :)

bren getting the garter from his lovely bride

Rocky Mountain National Forest

Aar's feet at Grand Lake :)

good times had by all :)

-lsm

less than a month!

2010-06-17T09:42:00.000-04:00

Well, today marks 26 days until our departure for India - with LOTS to do before then. A few of the things from our long list of things to accomplish in those 26 days includes the following:

move out of our apartment this weekend
head to Colorado for the lovely wedding of my brother Brendon and Rachel at the beautiful Chateau Della Terra in Estes Park.

sell the remainder of our furniture
book our hotels for SE Asia
plus a LOT more that I don't want to bore you with

It's kind of sad to move out of the apartment that we've called home for the past year and a half. I don't think we have always appreciated it's uniqueness and location. But we do know that the closing of this chapter in our lives means the start of another and are both very much looking forward to this next adventure.

We've had a few bumps along the way - including an emergency trip to Chicago yesterday to try and sort out our UK visas. I received an email from the British Consulate on Tuesday saying that they weren't satisfied with our financial statement and it didn't meet all of their qualifications. They told me I had four days to get them another hard copy or our visas would be refused AND we'd be out nearly $700. Aar and I decided to head down to Chicago and hand deliver the new documents. We were hoping they would be able to tell us immediately if the new documents were sufficient and were hoping they may even be able to issue our visas on the spot. However, that wasn't the case and they told us we should hear by the end of the week. The woman at the check-in desk said she thought they would be fine, but it wasn't as reassuring as we hoped it would be. Oh well - we should be hearing at any time!

I am SO excited to go back to India and to take Aaron there for the first time. I have visited the country three times, but it has been four years since I've been back and I can't wait to see how much it has changed. I have so many fond memories of India and I can't wait to share some of those experiences with Aaron.

Next post may be from India!

Aar Here

2010-05-19T21:50:00.002-04:00

Ahoy Blog...
Ahoy Loyal Followers...

So Laurlaur encouraged me to get on and put some thoughts on the blog so I could get use to the idea of putting our experiences on the world wide webs and so here I am doing just what a good husband would. Anyways T-minus oh I dunno 50 some days until departure and LaurLaur and I are quite excited/nervous/annoyed of visa difficulties/etc. Things are coming together for the most part though it seems, Visas are certainly the most difficult part of this whole deal. While the UK is open to Americans coming to their country it seems that they like to make it very difficult so as to discourage it. Anyways, one thing that is on the horizon for me is a job in London. I haven't delved too deeply into the job search as of yet however a few Internet sweeps here and there have turned up results which seem to indicate, well, a general presence of jobs to be had in London. This is a good thing. Please pray that the perfect job will present itself to me!

Another feeling becoming more and more real is that of leaving behind home. Home being made up more of people than of places. Leaving parents, family, friends, quickly growing nieces and even dogs (Colby Jack of course) will certainly make for a bittersweet departure. I hope our visits home throughout the entirety of our stay abroad, no matter how long that may be, are often and long :).

So that's post numero Uno for this guy...

Cheers!

London Darling

2010-04-29T14:04:00.000-04:00

After debating whether or not to defer my admission to LSE for a year, Aaron and I decided to go ahead with our original plans and head to London in the fall. In fact, we just booked our flights this afternoon and got a GREAT deal from STA Travel.

One thing that we found very helpful when booking things online is to search for a promo code prior to purchasing. We were able to save an additional $40 on our flights to London, which may not seem like a whole lot, but it all adds up!

For those who don't know, I will be getting my Master's in International Relations (Global Politics) while in London. I just started an internship for a London-based company called BlueStream Global, which I am excited about. Upon gradutating, we're not really sure how the master plan will unfold. Everything pretty much depends on whether or not Aaron gets a job in London and if we really like living there or not. We could be back to the states in the winter of 2011, or we could NEVER come back! Though I don't think our families would be too fond of the latter.

We still have a couple months before we leave, but time is surely flying by!

it's official!

2010-04-19T11:16:00.004-04:00

Plane tickets have been purchased, visas have been obtained, and travel guides have been scoured - we have finally made our plans official! On July 13th, we will set sail for Bangalore, India to visit my Indian family. We will be staying with the same family that I lived with when I was there in 2005 (probably my favorite people on the planet) and we're also taking a three + week trip through SE Asia.

We've included a rough itinerary on our blog so that you can follow along with us, though we've already made a few changes since originally booking our flights. After doing a little more research (aka surfing the net for endless hours planning our trip) I decided that it was absolutely a NECESSITY to visit Phi Phi Island while we are in Thailand.

Doesn't it look amazing?? This is actually the location where the film The Beach (with Leo) was filmed, though I've never actually seen it. Needless to say, I felt obligated to make a few changes and so we will now be stopping in Phuket / Phi Phi / Railay Beach / Krabi before heading to Kulala Lumpur.

Although we have all of our flights booked, we still haven't booked our hotels. If anyone has any suggestions - we'd be happy to hear them!

That's all for now...