Hong Kong seems like a nice city. I had a 12 hour layover here, and luckily they don’t require a visa to go see the city. For about 10 bucks, I got a round trip train ticket from the airport to the city itself. With only a few hours to spend, I decided I’d go up Hong Kong hill and then just wander around for a while. It was raining, so I got to see a lot of downtown while dashing from awning to awning. I finally got to the base of Hong Kong hill and caught the funicular train to the top. They’ve got a little amusement area up there with everything from an IMAX theater to a Ripley’s Believe it or Not museum. I hung out around the top for a while, and then when it became pretty obvious that the day was going to stay rainy, I headed back to the airport.

I don’t know why I waited so long to get over here! This island is so much nicer than Samui…it’s back to the old backpack vibe that I said was missing in my last post. I’ve got an amazing bungalow on a cliff overlooking the sunset side of the island.

Meg showed up this morning…she’s a friend who I’d first met in Malaysia, and we’ve kept running into each other thru SE Asia. She’s been in Australia while I was in Mongolia, and she’ll be spending the next couple of months seeing the parts of Asia she missed earlier. We’re going to grab a motorcycle and explore the island this afternoon, and then go out tonight.

Tomorrow I’ve got my flight to Hong Kong, and then a 12 hour layover before Africa. Hopefully I’ll be able to see a little of the city.

]]> http://theglobalguy.com/world-travels/southeast-asia/ko-phan-ang/feed 0 -90.0000000 1.0000000 http://theglobalguy.com/world-travels/southeast-asia/ko-samui-again http://theglobalguy.com/world-travels/southeast-asia/ko-samui-again#comments Fri, 15 Aug 2003 03:32:21 +0000 Henry Malmgren http://www.theglobalguy.com/se-asia/ko-samui-again/

Day three on Samui…so far it’s been very relaxing, but I’m a bit hungover from the full moon party last night. The mood of the island is different than the last time I was here. Last time it was mostly backpackers hanging out and being social. This time it seems to be mostly European holidaymakers out to get drunk and shag anything that moves. The "backpacker vibe" is missing, but it’s still an OK time.

Yesterday before the party I went sea kayaking at the marine park. I had done this previously, but I went with a different company this time. They used speedboats instead of large houseboat style craft. I think I prefer the other style, just because you’ve got more space to enjoy the journey out there and back.

Getting to the full moon party was wild. The promoters had sold about 10 times more tickets for transportation than there were spaces on the boats. Luckily for me, most of the people who were in line were British with their inherent need to stand in queues. With my Mongolian training, I just elbowed my way up to the front, and soon found myself waving at all the poor polite suckers who were going to have to argue with their travel agents tomorrow for refunds. The party itself was a lot of fun…hanging out with tons of new folks, watching the fire twirlers, and drinking lots of buckets of Samsung whiskey. It’s not something I’d go out of my way to check out again, but I’m glad I’ve done it once!

Korea’s been an interesting place, and it’s not just because there is no smell of mutton, and the pepperoni on the pizza is amazing! Of course I can’t really say that I’ve "seen" or "done" Korea. I’ve really just seen Seoul. And of that, I’ve really only seen the War Memorial, and the Itawon area where all the American GI’s go to pick up fat American women or Korean hookers.

The War memorial was amazing. I wasn’t intending to see it at all…I thought it would be something like the American memorial to the Korean war in DC. Just a simple statue with a plaque. Nope, this was huge. It’s more like the ANZAC memorial in Canberra. It’s got a list of all the people killed in the Korean war; Korean, American, and all the other allies. It’s got a museum tracing Korea’s military heritage from the Bronze age to the present. Of course a lot of it is dedicated to the Korean war. I think I learned more about the war yesterday than I did in all my American history classes in both High School and University combined. This was especially interesting since my Grandfather was involved in the war back in the day.

Today I went out to visit the DMZ. It was one of the best tours I’ve done, and was really the reason I even stopped here. First we visited a tunnel that the North Koreans had dug under the DMZ to try to infiltrate the south. Apparently there are 4 known tunnels discovered from 1978 all the way up to 1990. This one had the capability to move 10,000 troops an hour to within 30k of Seoul! After that we went to the DMZ proper. It’s a really beautiful area, and it’s a shame that it’s only so amazing because of an un-ended war The group visited the building where talks are held between the two Koreas. It’s actually bisected by the border, so I got to go into North Korea for a few minutes…granted, it was only about 5 feet, but it was interesting.

Tomorrow I’m flying to Bangkok, and on Tuesday I’m headed to Koh Samui. I’m really excited about the beach!

So Steph and Julia finally made it back from Vietnam after I left them a few days ago. Julia had to leave back for the UK, but Steph was going to be able to hang out with me for a few more days. Before Julia left though, we had to go experience the nightlife in the Patpong district. This are is famous for its sex tourism industry, but I figure with two beautiful women with me, I wouldn’t get harassed too much. Of course I was wrong, as the girls just encouraged the locals to do everything they could to tease me. After that got old, we headed to a dance club and finished the night in style.

Now Steph and I have just finished a few glorious days in Ko Chang. It was a great end to this phase of the trip. The beach there was actually one of the best I’ve seen so far, with a perfect contrast between lush jungle, white sand, and beautiful blue water. I’ve got a flight to Mongolia at 2:00 am today. Hope it’s not too bad!

I caught a quick fight back to Bangkok from Da Nang yesterday. This city is starting to feel pretty familiar by now. I was able to find a great dentist who fixed my tooth for the price of 2000 baht. Originally he quoted a price of 1800, but after he was done he explained that I had "big American" teeth, and the cost would be slightly more. Honestly, I didn’t care one way or the other. It was first quality work, and was still only about $45.00. My insurance doesn’t even kick in till $200.00 so I was quite pleased with the results.

Once I got the tooth fixed it was time to do other errands. I found the American Airline office and changed my ticket around so that I could fit in Mongolia. After that it was quite the adventure trying to find the Mongolian embassy so that I could pick up my visa. They’d moved around a lot apparently, and it took three different motorcycle taxi guys and myself to finally track them down. It was a huge pain, but at least they were expecting me which made things a lot easier.

I had another day to kill before Steph got back into town so I signed up for a Thai cooking class. It turned out that Sunday wasn’t a popular day for the class, and I was the only student. That was kinda fun because I had three different instructors all doing their very best to be as attentive as possible. We made some great food, and I’ve still got the cookbook they gave us at home.

Meg happened to be in town, so she and I went out clubbing that night. We had way too much to drink, but it was a blast!

After leaving Nha Trang, I took the bus with Steph and Julie up to Hoi An. This is a great town for shopping for any kind of tourist stuff, but I really took advantage of the local tailors. I needed some clothes to work in once I got to Mongolia, and here was the place to do it. I got a suit, two pairs of trousers, six shirts, and two ties for less than $120.00 US! It all looks great, and while it may not be the exact same quality you can pay big $$$ for, I’m very satisfied with it.

Steph and I took advantage of the waiting time for the clothes to tour the local river. We hired a lady about half my size who specialized in rowing tourists up and down the river. For a couple of hours she only charged us about five bucks, which was well worth it. Seeing a bit more river life was a lot of fun. By the time we got back, it was raining, so we grabbed a few beers and watched a local festival which happened to be going on.

Unfortunately, I broke a front tooth while trying some of the local candy. Rather than trying to have it fixed in Vietnam, I’m going to fly back to Bangkok a few days early and find a good dentist there.

I’ve found my favorite beach so far! Na Trang is another beautiful seaside town that is just now starting to attract the tourist trade. Its not hard to imagine why. This place has absolutely everything…beach vendors selling fresh fruits and seafood, warm water, comfy chairs, and friendly locals. It’s got a great nightlife, mostly concentrated at a local bar called the Australian Sailing Club. There’s a great party here ever night, and I’ve been really enjoying it with the company of Steph and her friend. We went diving the other day and found some great areas. Not nearly as good as Thailand diving, but still a lot of fun, and extremely inexpensive.

One of the most fun things we’ve found here is a day long boat cruise/booze fest. There are a bunch of companies in town that for about 15 bucks will take you out into the bay for a day of fun in the sun. There is unlimited cheap wine, fresh fruit, flotation devices, and snorkeling gear. The three of us went out and just got hammered! It was one of the best days on an ocean I’ve ever spent. Of course we paid for it the next day. Steph and I rented a motorcycle which didn’t really help the pounding in my head and explored the town. There are some old Chan temples outside of town that we went to see, and then we just explored the area. We found a cool little restaurant in a small fishing village nearby, and while walking on the beach we found the neatest little house perched on a huge boulder. No one was home, but it was one of my favorite sights in Vietnam so far.

It’s been a very strange day. I started by listening to Bush’s very weak speech to Hussein giving him 48 hours to leave the country. I think Bush is a poor leader for our country, and don’t have any respect for him at all. I support the troops who are doing their job in fulfilling his mission however. My brother is one of those who could end up in the middle of the action, and I hope things will work out great for him.

Before I knew about Bush’s speech, I’d already booked a tour to some old Vietnam-war era tunnels and the Vietnam war museum. It was interesting to see a different version of the war from the "enemy"s side. It really shows the true human cost of any conflict…I can’t believe that whatever Bush hopes to gain will be worth it.

Anyway, tomorrow I’m off to the beach resort of Na Trang. Some people have suggested I should head home due to the upcoming war, but I can’t see how that would do any good. I’m not going to let a single person’s misguided decisions, however far reaching, affect my life and/or my leisure time.

Getting to Saigon was an interesting adventure. I took a local mini-bus from Chau Doc, and found myself crowded with six people in a row of seats built for three. It wouldn’t have been so bad except that there was an older Vietnamese guy who kept stroking the hairs on my leg. I kept giving him dirty looks, and physically moved his hand a couple of times, but eventually gave up and tried to sleep.

When I got to the bus station, I hailed a motorcycle taxi for the ride across town to where I was staying. I’d never seen such insane traffic! The ride was a blast, with the feeling that either we’d be killed in a collision, or that I’d be pulled off the back of the bike by the weight of my pack every time he accelerated. Eventually we got to the backpacker section of town and I found a decent guest house to stay at. I wandered around for a while and found a stall selling pirated lonely planet guidebooks. I was surprised to see that they had one for Mongolia, so I picked it up and settled down at an Italian restaurant for some food and reading. The next table over had a couple of British girls, and eventually I ended up chatting with them. We ended up going out for drinks at a bar later that evening, and it turns out that Steph and I really got along well. They were leaving the following day, but we made plans to meet up in Nha Trang in a few days.

The next day I went out to see the Chu Chi tunnels nearby where the Viet-Cong would hide from American soldiers during the war. It was amazing to see how they’d built a complete city underground. Even more amazing was the small size of the access points to the tunnels. No wonder the Americans couldn’t follow them very well! They did have a special set of "enlarged" tunnels that westerners could fit into (barely!), but anyone with the slightest bit of claustrophobia would never be able to try them. After we experienced the tunnels themselves, we were able to head over to a firing range and play with some machine guns. For a dollar a bullet I got to fire an AK-47 on both regular and full auto. I’d never shot a gun with that kind of power before, and I really liked it. I bet my brother is having a blast with his M-16 in Iraq!

Later on I went to see the War Remnants museum (formerly the Museum of American war crimes). This presented the Vietnam war from the other side, and the image of the west was one of complete brutality. I’d never think that either side was innocent, but it was interesting to see how the current government presented their version.

]]> http://theglobalguy.com/world-travels/southeast-asia/saigon/feed 0 10.7500000 106.6669998 http://theglobalguy.com/world-travels/southeast-asia/the-mekong-delta http://theglobalguy.com/world-travels/southeast-asia/the-mekong-delta#comments Sat, 15 Mar 2003 04:15:18 +0000 Henry Malmgren http://www.theglobalguy.com/se-asia/the-mekong-delta/

After a completely enjoyable week on the beach, it was time to head down to Vietnam. I booked a combination bus/boat taxi service down to the town of Chao Doc and then on to Saigon. All together it would take two days to make the trip, which I wasn’t aware of until we’d stopped for the first night. My first impressions of Vietnam are that it is one of the friendliest places I’ve ever seen. Kids are everywhere, and they just want to keep talking and talking to all the round-eyes. The really nice thing is that they’re not asking for money or pens, or anything at all, which is quite a contrast to the Cambodian kids. At one rest stop, I pulled out my camera and the kids just went wild. They all insisted on being in a picture with me and the other tourists…eventually I had to just pretend to take pictures or I’d have run out of film!

The Delta itself was beautiful…warm muddy water with tropical tree lined villages all along the banks. Every time we passed a village kids would come running out of the houses waving and yelling at us “Hi Mister!” over and over again. It was amazing to see how happy the kids were even though the places that they were living in were nothing but shacks to western standards.

River life is incredible…you see everything happening…people washing, buffalo swimming, and even entire market places are operating. We visited one of these floating markets for a while just to see how they operated. Vendors would pile their boats with as much produce as they could, and they’d tie one of each type of fruit they were selling to a tall bamboo pole. Buyers would row around looking for the masts with what they wanted to buy, and an intense discussion would follow until they arrived at a mutually acceptable price and both parties left more or less happy.

Meg and I have moved on to the coast of Cambodia. Getting here was a little more complicated than we’d thought, but it all worked out eventually. We’d planned on taking the train from PP to the town of Kampot, but when we showed up at the train station, we were told "no train today". This was despite the fact that the same guy yesterday told us that there would be a train for sure. There was enough of a language barrier that we couldn’t be sure exactly why there wasn’t a train, so we just chalked it up to one of those traveling things. We headed down to the public taxi terminal and caught a share taxi that was headed in that direction.

Kampot was a really beautiful town with a great river for swimming. At the river there were fruit stands selling the typical tropical fruit you see everywhere around here, plus one selling durian which I’d heard about but never tried. Durian is fairly expensive, but all over SE Asia it’s considered a delicacy. The fruit is a huge spiky looking melon with a rich creamy texture and a flavor similar to custard. However, the smell is one of the worst things I’ve ever experienced! The odor is similar to rotten meat, and is so pungent that the fruit is banned from most public transport systems around SE Asia. The best analogy I’ve heard about the durian is that it’s like eating raspberries in an outhouse.

Meg and I hired two guys to drive us around on motorcycles to see the sights, and on our way back from the river they indicated that there was a wedding going on, and would we like to go see it. We felt a little strange at just crashing in, but the entire wedding party thought it was the greatest thing in the world. We weren’t allowed to leave until we’d met all the relatives, and posed for pictures with the bride and groom. Definitely one of the highlights of the day!

The following day we rented a dirt bike and decided to make the drive up to the abandoned hill station in Bokor national park. This used to be a popular vacation destination for the French colonials back in the 1920s but with war and independence it was abandoned and left to the elements. It’s usually very foggy and we’d heard that visiting it was a delightfully spooky experience. There aren’t any hotels or guest houses, but we’d been told that for a few dollars it was possible to sleep in the ranger station, provided you brought all of your own food. We made a stop at the local market, and headed up the trail. It’s about a 34km road that is in absolutely horrible shape. There have been no repairs since the entire area was abandoned, and it was just one pothole and sandpit after another. Meg was a great trooper, and did a great job of holding on and not screaming when we fell several times. I ended up with my first motorcycle burn from the exhaust pipe. Eventually we made it to the top, and made arrangements to stay the night. We walked all around, exploring the old church, hotel and casino. It was everything we’d expected it to be and more. Unfortunately that night someone siphoned gasoline out of our bike, and we ended up running out about halfway down the mountain. Luckily it was steep enough that we were able to coast down to the bottom of the hill where Meg found a family willing to take her into town for some help. She came back an hour or so later with the guy we’d rented the bikes from, and he towed us back into town.

After that adventure we caught public transport to the beach town of Sihanoukville. Meg and I managed to find a room with two beds right on the beach for the amazing price of $7.00 per night. This isn’t the best beach I’ve seen, but the atmosphere can’t be beat. The vegetation is different than other beaches…it’s less tropical plants, and more woody trees. It’s a very laid back area full of locals, and hardly any foreigners. We’re spending our days roaming around the island, lazing on the beach soaking up sun, reading trashy books, and eating tons of fresh fruit that we buy from the local kids. There are nightly rainstorms followed by mini-raves at a different bar each night where they really seem to enjoy hanging out with Meg and I. Dinner is always right on the beach, sitting at a candlelit table, and watching the waves roll in. Both of us agree that with the right person, this would be an amazingly romantic spot!

]]> http://theglobalguy.com/world-travels/southeast-asia/coastal-cambodia/feed 0 10.6332998 103.5000000 http://theglobalguy.com/world-travels/southeast-asia/phnom-phen http://theglobalguy.com/world-travels/southeast-asia/phnom-phen#comments Mon, 10 Mar 2003 04:09:35 +0000 Henry Malmgren http://www.theglobalguy.com/se-asia/phnom-phen/

After three days in Siam Reap, I decided to head down to the capital city of Phnom Phen where I was supposed to meet up with Megan again. I booked a ticket on a speed boat that would take me from Siam Reap down the Tonle Sap river to PP. The dock area in Siam Reap was at the end of a little fishing village..the main road was really just mud leading to the lake itself. Walking thru it was not the most pleasant experience, with dead fish and garbage floating by. The ride down was a blast but it was a little odd to see the driver putting on a motorcycle crash helmet before we started off! It took about four hours to get to PP, and I spent the time just relaxing, reading and chatting to some of the other passengers. I had a closer encounter with the "ugly American" type of tourist when one guy kept wanting to tell me about his photography gear and how many of the locals he could buy for the price of one camera.

Phnom Phen itself is a great city. It’s got a very French feel to it from the colonial days. I hooked up with Meg and another friend of hers, and we spent the first evening wandering around the markets and then drinking at a place called "The Mex". I don’t know how they decided to serve Mexican food there, but they’ve got a LOT to learn. The next day we hired a local to drive us around to see some of the local sights. One thing that’s not a lot of fun but seems to be on everyone’s itinerary is the genocide museum and the Chong Ek killing fields. These are the visible reminders of the Khmer Rogue’s reign of terror in the 70s and 80s. Talking to the Cambodians, everyone it seems has a relative or friend who was somehow affected, usually by being murdered. The killing fields are a place where the KR used to carry out mass executions. Now it’s a field with depressions all over the ground where they have unearthed the mass graves. After heavy rains its not at all uncommon for more graves to be uncovered, and human bones to float to the surface. The most visible reminder of the massacres here is a huge stupa with thousands of human skulls inside. While visiting this place, I’d never felt anything like it, except for Dachau in Germany. Following the killing fields we went to the genocide museum which was a former school turned into a torture and prison camp. Here they have preserved the cells, torture devices, and photographs of thousands of victims. One of the most stunning displays was a mural of modern day Cambodians who took part in these crimes. They are living free now, and their reasoning was very similar to Nazis at war crime trials…they were just following orders. Cambodia seems to have forgiven, and really wants to concentrate on the future instead of the past.

After this kind of grim morning we were glad to do something else for the afternoon. Our driver took us to a tiny little street vendor where we ate some of the best food I’ve had on the trip. I don’t think the bill for the four of us came to more than 3 dollars. Of course we bought our driver’s lunch…it was the least we could do for showing us this bit of the local culture. After lunch we toured the national museum where we got to see lots of carvings and statutes that had been removed from Angkor Wat and other historic sites for preservation and protection.

The next day after sleeping in late, I decided to wander around town by myself, and check out the waterfront and arts district. I ended up having lunch at the Foreign Correspondents Club which probably has one of the best views in the city. This was first world luxury at its best! The food and decor were fantastic, the views were amazing, and there were even Frank Sinatra tunes playing on the sound system. After lunch I wandered down to the arts district I’d read about in the Lonely Planet, and watched some people at work. Most of the paintings were absolute crap…the kind of mass produced stuff you see in flea markets back home. Some of the people carving statues were quite talented, and I really enjoyed watching the artists at work.

I decided to stop at a cafe for a pineapple shake on the way back, and ended up chatting with a lovely American lawyer from Philly. We ended up hanging out for the rest of the afternoon drinking beer and people watching for a while. At 5ish, the local traffic jam started, including a guy riding an elephant down the street! We decided to break for a while and then meet up again later to try the local delicacy of "happy pizza". I’ll leave it up to the reader to figure out what makes the pizzas so happy, but suffice it to say there was no false advertising involved! Unfortunately I had to leave Patty early so that Meg and I could catch an early morning train down to the towns of Kep and Kampot.

I arrived in Cambodia after a grueling 12 hour bus trip. It’s so apparent that you’ve crossed the border. The roads in Thailand are first class, while those in Cambodia barely deserve to be called "roads". It took 10 hours to go 100 kilometers! When I got to Siam Reap, I tried to find Meg, but there was some confusion about the name of the guest house she’d give me. No big deal I figured, we seem to run into each other often enough that we’d end up hanging out again.

Angkor Wat is one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen. If these temples had been located in a more accessible and politically stable part of the world, I’d be willing to bet that they would be as famous as the Pyramids of Egypt, the Taj Majhal, or the Coliseum in Rome. Without seeing them for ones self, it’s impossible to convey just how impressive these temples are. I spent two days exploring the temples. The first day I saw all the major attractions..Ankor Wat itself, the Bayon with its nearly two hundred identical faces staring at all visitors, Ta Phrom where the jungle still keeps watch over the temple, and lots of other amazing structures. In fact climbing on top of one, I did run into Megan coming up the other side. Amazing!

The second day I rented a motorcycle to go see some of the more obscure temples. The ride out is still one of my favorite memories of the trip. I had a great time passing thru small villages where the kids would just run out of their homes and wave at the strange white tourist. I eventually made it out to Bantae Srei, which is famous not for its size, but for the delicate pink carvings in the stone. On the way back I saw the Rolous group of temples, some of the moats around Angkor itself, finally stopping for sunset at the top of Phnom Bakheng.

Angkor is definitely someplace I’d love to see again, only next time I want to come in the wet season, when the temples are covered with coats of stunningly green moss, the surrounding jungles are at their brightest, and the moats around the main complex still fill with water.

While waiting for my Vietnam and Cambodian visas to come thru, I decided to take a quick trip to the town of Kanchanburi to see the famous bridge over the river Kwai that inspired the movie of the same name. Of course it’s not the actual bridge of the movie…first, the movie was shot in Sri Lanka, and second, the original one was destroyed during the course of WWII. Still, it was something to do to kill a few days. I booked the trip thru one of the Khao San Road guest houses, and got exactly what I paid for.

The first day we were picked up from our guest houses at about 7:00 am and drove for three hours or so. We stopped at an allied war cemetery to pay our respects to the dead who fought in this area during WWII. I was surprised to see how well it had been kept up by the locals. It was just as well manicured as Arlington in Washington DC. After the cemetery we boarded bamboo rafts for a leisurely cruise down the river to see the bridge from underneath. After lunch (cheap pad Thai) we went on a cheesy elephant ride, and then got dropped off at a local waterfall to go swimming for an hour or so. Before heading to our guest house for the evening we stopped by "Tiger Cave" which was a dead cave filled with Buddhist relics and statues. The guest house was actually the highlight of the evening…we had our choice of staying in tree houses, or floating rooms on barges. It was a really nice area and they had kayaks, and a flying fox for us to play on. The food was pretty decent, and the cheap beer made it easy to get to know everyone else staying there.

The 2nd day was a great day of hiking and swimming in and around the Erawan waterfall. This is one of the most spectacular waterfalls I’ve seen on this trip so far. All together it’s made up of 7 tiers, with a trail going up beside them to the top. A guy on the trip and I decided that it would be more fun if we actually climbed up the waterfalls instead of using the trail, so we climbed in and started heading up. It was a blast, and we even got used to the cold water after a few minutes…we never did get used to the fish that kept nibbling at any bit of exposed skin though.

Our final day was dedicated to seeing the remnants of the old death railway cutouts that the allied POWs had to carve out. We took the local train over the Kwai river bridge to Kanchanburi where we boarded the bus to head back to Bangkok. I had dinner with Megan that night, and we figured we’d run into each other again in Cambodia in a day or so.

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