Month: January 2018

Day 4 – To Toba!

Unlike my grandmother, I happen to love taking the ferry! There’s something so exciting about needing to cross a body of water to get somewhere. I know Bridges do the same thing… But taking the ferry takes more effort, and I’ve come to realize that the things that take more effort are more memorable.

We’ve taken our fair share of ferries over the last few years. South East Asia is a poor area of the world and bridges are expensive.

Today we took our first ferry in Indonesia! This is the 11th country we’ve visited in the last 5 and a half years! I’m looking forward to the next 11 countries!!!

Day 3 – Malaysian Mountains

Although living in the city has its perks, Dave and I both grew up in rural Canada where the air is clean and the skies are huge. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to see the sky beyond all the sky scrapers in China… And the air… Well… It’s seen better days.

One of the things we love most about South East Asia are the mountains and the array of outdoor activities we can choose from. Whether it’s been canoeing through the Hongs of Thailand, floating down the river in Laos or visiting the Irrawaddy Dolphins in Cambodia, we tend to spend as much time outside as possible when we’re on holiday.

We’ve grown to expect a certain level of natural beauty in South East Asia. We’re pleased to say that Malaysia did not let us down!

Stay tuned for more on our hike next month!

Day 2 – Marvelous Malaysia

We can’t exactly say we’ve “seen” Malaysia at this point, but due to the layover options we had on our way to Indonesia, we were able to spend 2 days in Malaysia’s capital: Kuala Lumpur.

Kuala Lumpur is a beautiful, diverse and reasonably developed city in South East Asia. I had heard a lot about this great city from my students (several are Malaysian), so I was really looking forward to seeing the city for myself.

One thing that really took me by surprise was how delicious and spicy these tame-looking noodles were. Living in China, I eat a lot of red chillies, but green chillies aren’t used much here. Also, the little green peppers used in Malaysia are fresh, which is quite different from the dried ones I’m used to.

Long story short… If you’re going to be trying these chillies for the first time… Make sure you’ll have access to a bathroom 4-5 hours later!!!!

PS: they were totally worth it!!!

STAY TUNED!!!

I’ll be sharing a lot more about KL after our trip, but for now, I wanted to give you a sneak peak with my “post of the day”. I really loved doing daily updates in November, so I figured I’d do the same this trip. When the trip is over, I’ll be doing more in-depth about the things we did and the places we went!

Day 1 – Pudong Airport

Well, we are on day 3 of our holiday now, so I suppose I have some catching up to do if I’m going to blog every day!!!

The theme of my first post is simple: I hate Pudong airport. Pudong is Shanghai’s international airport, so we use it at least 4 times every year. Each time, I’m floored by how bad it is.

This year was especially bad because we flew over night and our flight left at 1:30am. Now, my big problem with PVG is that after security, the food and drink options are seriously limited. There are a few really bad Chinese restaurants (which confuses me because Chinese food is so good!!!), and everything is terribly overpriced… Even by airport standards!!

Burger King is one of the only decent options post security, so on Sunday night, Dave spent over an hour waiting in line to get a couple of burgers (we were flying Air Asia… They give you exactly NOTHING on their flights without paying extra so we usually just eat at the airport).

In the meantime, I set off to find bottled water (they seriously give you nothing…). I spent an hour running around only to find small bottles of Evian for 40rmb (350ml for nearly $10 Canadian). I couldn’t even find a functional drink machine either….I DID find SIM card vending machines though…. So there’s that.

In the end, I found an entire row of drinking machines about a half km down the airport, but by then, I was so thirsty I downed 2 bottles right away and then ran out of change! Luckily, Dave showed up moments later with additional coinage and burgers in hand.

A modern day knight in shining armour.

Snowy Suzhou

Suzhou doesn’t get a lot of snow. In fact, it only snows here every 5 years or so; and it rarely sticks around.

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We get enough to make an itty bitty snowlady every once in a while (credit: someone in my office…I’m not sure who)

Fortunately for me, this year was one of those ‘off’ years, where Mother Nature bestowed some of the white stuff upon this beautiful city.

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Quite a bit of the white stuff, actually (credit: my dear husband…my hands were too cold and I didn’t want to take my phone out!)

When people aren’t used to snow, it can be quite an ordeal! We saw one accident on our 5 minute walk home, and I can’t imagine how many delivery men wiped out on their e-bikes today! Imagine a late spring storm…with people who have never driven on ice before!

A chilly walk home!
The two cars in the intersection collided as we were waiting for the light to change. An hour later, they’re still out there, probably squabbling over who is at fault
Many of these notices were left around the city. Schools were PREEMPTIVELY shut down for 2 days because they knew the snow was coming. Unfortunately for my students…school had already ended so they didn’t get any bonus time off.
Kevin….pretending not to be thrilled about the snow. He was skipping through it a moment earlier…I swear!
Dave made a snow angel, to my disgust (Chinese sidewalks should never be laid on…)

I’ve lived in Suzhou now for nearly 3 years, and although I’ve had my challenges here, I really do love this city. Many of the gardens here are UNESCO World Heritage Sites and are considered to be some of the most beautiful gardens in China. We often spend afternoons walking through them because even the smaller ones are a nice break from the hustle and bustle of Suzhou. I’m always amazed at how quiet the gardens here are…especially when I consider the 8 million + people that live here!

Credit: Me!
Various parks around the city

Unfortunately for me, I never had a chance to bring my camera to any of Suzhou’s gardens today. Plenty of others did though, so I’ve collected some of my favourite photos from the day and compiled them so you can see what a lovely city we chose to call home. I can’t actually credit anyone specifically…China isn’t big on copyrighting things, so I’ll just say now that none of these pictures are mine….