Phuket

In a very spontaneous move, we traveled to Phuket, Thailand recently. We thought about it on Wednesday, bought tickets on Thursday, and left on Saturday.

Phuket is an island off the coast of Thailand, about two hours NW of Singapore.

Beautiful sunset from the airplane window, looking over southern Malaysia.

We stayed three nights on the west coast of the island. It was the type of resort I don't particularly like, but it was good to get away from work and the heat of Singapore. It seems ironic that we had to visit a tropical island to escape anywhere. However, we were greeted by a constant cool ocean breeze at our hotel that we never feel here. Calling the breeze cool is very generous. It's not like we needed a jacket. However, it was refreshing. This is still the rainy season in Phuket, so there were fewer guests than normal. This is nice for getting seats at a restaurant or a chair next to the pool, but it limits one's people-watching, which is one of my holiday hobbies. The other downside is that there was no snorkeling. Phuket has wonderful snorkeling nearby in the dry season. Maybe we'll return some day, although I would prefer to visit about 50 new places before going back. It so vastly pales in comparison to beaches in places like Grand Cayman, San Sebastian, Santa Monica, and Hawai'i that I'm not too excited to go back.

Strong winds at the beach. Evidence of erosion here, and the roots of several trees are clearly exposed and vulnerable, which will likely lead to more erosion.

Unfortunately, the strong winds and rough currents meant no swimming on the beach. So, we walked around the resort grounds (six hotels all together in one large piece of land), read books by the pool, and ate some good (not great) food.

Nice pool, but almost no guests.

One highlight was seeing the resort elephants. They are both young, around four. As you can imagine, they are very popular with the kids. Thankfully, they don't get climbed all over all day. Each hotel has a set time when the elephants will arrive, and they stay for about 30 minutes at each before walking to the next hotel.

Kissing Hisako (hoping for some bananas as thanks)

About the attention you'd expect from any rare large animal in public. It reminds me of the attention maiko get in Kyoto.

After four days, we returned home. We've only been here three months and we've already traveled to two countries (and Thailand was a new one for both of us). I don't know if we already have island fever, or if we're still settling in and excited about the opportunities around us.

Where should we go next?

Vietnam market

We've been back from Vietnam for a week now, and it already seems like months ago. We're settling back into Singapore life, but I just glanced at some photos and decided to share them. One morning while staying outside Duong Lam, we walked around this market.  All of the fresh fruits and vegetables were pretty standard, though colorfully arranged: dragonfruit, mango, peaches, grapes, melons, lychees, and a dozen other things that I don't know the names of.

The highlight was the meat table and the bucket of eels. The meat certainly looked fresh, but there was something questionable about cutting and selling meat in the great outdoors. At least she was wearing gloves!

 

I've only ever purchased eels pre-grilled and in plastic, so seeing them swimming was great. I wish I'd been able to grill them up on the spot.

 

Hanoi Food and Drink

One highlight of any trip should be the food. Hanoi has its fair share of wonderful things to choose from. Bun cha is a dish of what appears to be mini hamburgers and grilled chicken in a thin broth, combined with rice noodles and heaps of herbs like basil. 

Grilled meats and fresh noodles.

Just add a mound of herbs!

Finally, any hot day can be made a little easier with a cold beer. We ended this day on the 12th floor rooftop bar enjoying a cold Hanoi Beer. Great views of Hoah Kiem lake and the Red River from up on the roof, and you can hear the city pulsing below.

Halong Bay

One of our highlights in Vietnam was a daytrip to Halong Bay - http://www.halongbay-vietnam.com/ OR http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halong_Bay - which has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1994. The ride from Hanoi took around four hours in a microbus, with a very international group of passengers - Russia, Cameroon, Israel, Australia, Korea, Japan, and the U.S. (only me).

One of the many boats taking tourists to Halong Bay.

Once we arrived at the docks we hopped onto a boat to eat lunch ...

Some of the salads and main dishes from lunch.

... en route to our goal - a large cave and a set of limestone islands rising precipitously from the ocean.

Our boat approaches the islands.

Beautiful, incredible, breathtaking landscape. If it had not been 100 degrees, it would have been nearly perfect. Many tourists stay one or more nights on these boats, eating multi-course meals, relaxing on deck chairs between swims in the bay, kayaking through limestone caves, sipping beer while watching the sun set over the water.

However, Halong Bay is not perfect. There are an incredible number of tourists and a large amount of garbage floating in the water. Many people argue that UNESCO World Heritage status had led to the kind of unregulated tourism that will eventually destroy the very object of tourism. This is certainly not the first time tourism has threatened a tourist landscape, nor will it be the last. In the meantime, we were glad to have seen Halong Bay and kayaked its waters.

Emerald water and vegetation-topped islands make a stunning landscape.

Museum of Ethnology

Saturday we walked through the streets, hitting some markets along the way. Terrific variety of shops selling silk, bowls, light fixtures, teas, plumbing supplies, and all kinds of food.

We soon tired of the intense heat of the city and hopped in a cab to visit the National Museum of Ethnology. It reminded me somewhat of the Museum of Ethnology in Osaka (Minpaku), given its collection of artifacts (clothing, musical instruments, household items, religious objects) from Vietnam's dozens of ethnic groups. The Viet group is the largest, representing over 80% of the population of around 90 million people. Some of groups are quite small, with only around 10,000 people remaining.

Next to the museum full of artifacts are a number of reconstructed homes of different ethnic groups, offering a unique opportunity to walk around and explore the architecture.

This home has an incredible interior with a sloped ceiling 30-40 feet high. With the raised floor and the high ceiling, it was a good 10 degrees cooler inside than out.



The most interesting thing at the museum was the many couples taking wedding photos in and around the old homes. They provide a traditional background for couples, among many locations used by couples for their memories.

Pho dinner!

We just got home from one week in northern Vietnam. I'm going to try to catch up on the blog before we forget everything that happened. I tried to blog while in Hanoi, but every time I did, the software opened in Vietnamese and I couldn't figure out a way to switch it back to English.

We flew from Singapore to Hanoi last Friday afternoon. It's only a 3-hour flight, so it was an easy trip. (If you move to SE Asia on this map you will see some labels of places we went.)


View Vietnam trip in a larger map

After checking into the hotel we took care of the most important thing - dinner. A student from the National University in Hanoi took us to eat pho at a nearby shop.

It was amazing - broth delicately flavored, noodles cooked to perfection, and beef thinly sliced and medium rare. And of course we washed it down with a cold beer. You gotta love Vietnam.

After dinner we walked around Hoah Kiem lake, in the center of the Old Quarter. We watched the young people zooming past in their packs of scooters, riding 2 and 3 per bike. We saw couples young and old making a circuit of the lake or sitting on benches, enjoying the show. The lake is lit at night in a colorful display of lights. With this being the 1000th anniversary of Hanoi's founding, they say the city is extra-exciting this year.

Boxes arrived

Our boxes finally arrived from the U.S., a full seven weeks from the day we dropped them off in Boulder. They went via truck to LA, then on the massive OOCL Tokyo from LA to Singapore. Twelve boxes packed into part of one of these huge containers, packed side-by-side on this gigantic ship.

Once the ship arrived at the port of Singapore, the containers bound for Singapore were offloaded and sent to a warehouse, where another company used a forklift to remove the boxes from inside the container.

Then, a local transport agent took our goods through customs by using our claim for tax exemption and our passport information. Finally, the transport agent trucked the boxes to our apartment on Wednesday night.

We received the boxes around 7:00, and we had nearly everything unpacked by 9:00.

We went out for a drink at that point and have only a few things to finish up, like getting rid of the empty boxes. It takes so much less time to unpack than to pack. It helps that we have lived in this space for about a month and have found places for everything. So when the new stuff arrived, we could fill the remaining cupboard and closet space and not have long discussions about where stuff should go, which are more likely with an empty space and a move involving all of one's belongings at once. Only two things broke along the way: a wine glass given as a wedding present (nine years ago) and a serving bowl that we hadn't used for five years.

I still have to assemble my bike, which requires a wrench. Since I have no tools, I'll put it mostly together and walk it to a nearby bike shop. There is a surprising number of recreational cyclists here. Nothing compared to Colorado, but with the traffic, I didn't expect to see any. I have also spoken with a few bicycle commuters who work at NUS. They say it's doable, although a bit dangerous. I may give it a shot.