travels: conscious and otherwise…

So, happy new year greetings from Beijing! We arrived at JFK yesterday (yesterday? it’s hard to tell what day it is what with all of these time changes) to find that our flight to Beijing was delayed by 2 hours because of a snowstorm in Beijing, which meant we would miss our connection to Bangkok. To make a long story very short, we were having a lovely day in Beijing today waiting for our flight out to BKK tonight when we found out about the bomb blasts all over Bangkok, and are now planning to stay in Beijing for another few days until we know what’s what. We’re not sure what we’ll do - possibly more of China, or Japan since our Chinese visas are only good for 7 days. Or Thailand still, or somewhere else entirely. Suggestions are welcome. We will see, but in the meantime hope everyone had and is having a happy new year, we’ll update you on our location and plans as soon as we know them! The best laid plans I tell you… I read about Thailand for months, and now here we are in China and we’re clueless!

BTW, it’s about 14 degrees F here - we had packed nothing but t shirts, shorts, and bathing suits for Thailand so when you see our pictures try not to laugh at our ugly (but dirt cheap) souvenir-stall-bought winterwear!

Oh yes, also - we saw the sun rise in Tiananmen Square today!

We’re officially doing China! Unfortunately the situation in Thailand doesn’t sound good so we thought we would postpone that trip until there are more peaceful times in the land of Siam.

We had an amazing few days in Beijing — we saw the Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square, wandered old town narrow winding streets and giant glitzy shopping boulevards, went to a darkly subterranean but completely respectable massage parlor, stayed in 3 hotels in 3 nights, breathed thick, smog filled air, stumbled through our Mandarin phrasebook trying to communicate, and I won’t even mention the toilet and sewage situation!

Last night we took an overnight sleeper train to Shanghai, and we spent a great day today wandering around trying not to get flattened by buses, bicycles, scooters, cars, minivans, taxis, and trucks — all going in different directions, all at once. Pedestrians do not have the right of way in China. We’re getting the hang of it though. We wandered through market after market trying not to buy every antique trinket and/or great smelling food item we saw. This is a truly crazy city - it’s much bigger and denser than Beijing and more exciting and chaotic. Better food, too. We had delicious soup dumplings for breakfast, street food-stall scallion pancakes for lunch, and we just ate dinner at an Indian restaurant to mix things up a bit. Now we’re off to a nearby street of bars to see what Shanghainese nightlife is like. Anyway, we’ll be here for a couple more days, and then to Hong Kong for a “visa run”.

Hope everyone is having a good first few days of 2007 - we love you!

It’s been a busy couple of days to say the least. Jenny has me penning this entry as we sit in the lobby (family room) of our hotel (boarding house) in Kowloon, an amazing Chinese version of 8th Avenue just across the bay from Hong Kong proper. Yesterday morning started at 12:30 the night before, when someone in the hotel called and woke us up. We assumed (since we don’t speak Mandarin) that the caller’s intention was to fulfill our request for a wake-up call, and we both grumbled about how tired we still were. Luckily, we had batteries for our clock and realized the time before getting up and showering. Later (6:00) that morning it was off on a car ride to the airport which can only be described as slightly slower than our flight to Hong Kong which followed. FYI, if you’re ever on a flight with a lot of turbulence it is even more scary when the announcements aren’t in English.
Hong Kong airport is actually on a nearby island called Lantau, and Jenny and I decided on the plane that it was time for a break from our big-city tour, and that we should endeavor to stay there if possible. The island is beautiful, like what you’d imagine an island in the South China Sea to be like, and the 64 degree weather was a nice break from the freezing cold of the North. We took a metro bus over a mountain to the opposite side to seek out shelter for the night and enjoyed the scenery, and the smell (or lack thereof). Unfortunately, after a few tries at hotels we decided to look elsewhere, and, like moths to a flame, caught a ferry into Hong Kong (the big city tour continues). By the way, if you’re to enter Hong Kong, by boat is the way to do it!

We decided to save Hong Kong for today and came over to Kowloon for a more affordable place to stay. We have not been disappointed! The place we’re staying has all the amenities one needs (bed, lights, western toilet) if not the posh extravagances one might hope for (heat). After turning in early (7:30 P.M.) we’re ready for a full day of touring.

About the bedtime: I’ve come down with some sort of cold which I’m calling Typhoid, but really is most likely a sinus infection. I’m pushing fluids, mom, so don’t worry. I think it’s probably a combination of exposure to the smog in Beijing and Shanghai (as an ex-smoker I can say that the smog there was worse than a pack-a-day habit on my oh-so-sensitive sinuses) and the recirculated air in planes, trains, and rickshaws. Also, the people sneezing, coughing, and at one point vomiting without covering their mouths. I’m taking it (and pseudophedrine) in stride and am soooo happy to have my glasses with me.

The next few days will be busy, with a bus tour today, the night market tonight and (yeah, we’re those ugly Americans) Disneyland Hong Kong tomorrow! We’re both having a wonderful time and we realized that, with all the stress of replanning the trip, neither of us is thinking about work, so, mission accomplished. We miss and love you all, and can’t wait to show you our pictures!
Till then…

Hi everyone, thanks for your   comments. Yes, this has definitely been an exercise in flexibility. We both think that we’ll do a lot less planning for our next trip and just let things happen, as we ended up doing this time. Also, we’ll pack a LOT lighter!Hong Kong was really fun. Disneyland left quite a bit to be desired - they had about 4 rides total. I plan to write a letter. But since the entire park took us only 2 hours, we had the rest of the day to go up to the Tian Tan Buddha on the top of a mountain on Lantau Island (near Hong Kong). It’s a giant bronze Buddha statue next to a monastery and a little village. They actually have cable cars that take you up there which was relatively terrifying but I got some great pictures. We had delicious dim sum in the village and now we’re intent on doing dim sum every day from now on for the rest of our lives.

We’re in Macau now, which is a strange and interesting mix of Cantonese and Portuguese food, language, architecture, and people. We took a very pleasant 1 hour ferry here yesterday from Hong Kong, and had a delicious Macanese dinner last night. It’s morning now, and we’re about to go find some sort of breakfast. We’re bringing back Macanese almond pork cookies for everyone, don’t worry.

Tomorrow we board a 24 hour express train for Beijing, and then home. Thanks for tuning in. By the way, I’ve already gone through about 512MB of memory cards on this trip, and just bought a new 1GB card so get ready!

I was walking down a street that looked like Fraternity Row, but I knew it was a Buffy set. I went inside and fought some evil. Then, I was packing up the parents’ minivan, we were leaving a motel and getting back on the road. We thought we were done but realized that all my stuff was still in the motel room and not in the car, we had only put my parents’ stuff in the car. I called Annie from the road to see if she and the people she was with (don’t know who) wanted to meet us for breakfast. She said they were already in New Jersey, the people she was with had just wanted to get going.

Waited in line to eat at a Jewish restaurant called Pearl Israel. After we were finished eating, we waited in line again to eat there again (not sure who I was with). Then, after work, I got into my red minivan (from the passenger’s side since there was a big white van parked next to the driver’s side) and there was someone in the back seat. The sun was in my eyes and I couldn’t see who it was. He was crying and smoking crack. He wanted me to drive him home so I got on the Turnpike (even though we were in CA)and all of I sudden I saw that it was really steep and that identically shaped cars but of all different colors were rolling back down the steep hill. We tried to drive up it, but couldn’t, then suddenly the road flattened itself out and we drove over it.

Something about being on a bus, and people getting off and the rest of us being able to switch seats, and I scrambled for the back seat but someone grabbed it. Then, I was in a locker room, a disgusting one, and I was getting ready to take a shower and someone was telling us the shower rules.

We were staying in a camper somewhere cold. We were on a road trip and stopped for the day. Annie decided to go to the mall and I walked over to a shopping center next to the mall where a music store was. I was looking for a birthday present for Daddy. I bought him a Rolling Stone magazine and a giant orange. Annie came in, then the parents and the Goldbergs. They said they were going to meet Leonard and his son Bobby who I knew when we were babies. I was in a car behind them (I wasn’t driving, I don’t know who I was with), and they were in a yellow truck like a Ryder truck except it had pink on it. There was a lot of snow and we were going pretty fast. I could see the truck bouncing up ahead. Snow kept spraying the windshield until it covered it. We pulled up next to them to tell them it was dangerous and to slow down, and they all looked at me blankly, they were wearing parkas with the hoods up.

There was an airborne contagious disease going around, where the first symptoms were red spots all over your face. I was the health person in the area who was supposed to go around telling everyone not to breathe through their noses so they wouldn’t breathe the germs in. It was mostly little girls I was talking to, I guess it was a school or something, and none of them were listening to me, they were all hugging each other and running around playing with each other. There was one little blonde girl who didn’t show any symptoms but was dead by morning.