Singapore

The month of March is flying by…

We had a long few days off the ship visiting Cambodia.  We flew from Cambodia to Bangkok, Thailand for a short day tour on our way back to the ship.  We had lunch on the 65^th floor of a hotel overlooking the smoggy city and also saw the Grand Buddhist Palace.  It’s interesting how I’ve seen so many temples yet each has a look of it’s own. 94 percent of the people in Bangkok are Buddhist so their temple was very extravagant.  Imagine walking through the Emerald City from the Wizard of Oz.  Large gold towers and perfectly decorated shrines, walls covered with glass beads and glitter. It was overwhelmingly impressive.

 

Our first day back on the ship was St. Patrick’s Day.  We take every excuse to celebrate and spent most of our day making decorations and confetti for our dinner party.  If the crew didn’t already think we were crazy, it is no surprise to them now when we call room service asking for green paper and balloons.

 

We stopped yesterday in Singapore, which officially marks the halfway point of the trip.  This was one of the three major disembarkment stops, so we had a large turnover of 1000 thankful people off the ship, and a brand new group of 700 victims to torture.  Because of the large number of people on and off the ship today, we stayed in port until 1am.  This was our first port to be able to stay off the ship past 5pm and we took full advantage of it.  Our morning consisted of a tour of the World War 2 battlefields where we were able to go underground into one of the battle box protection facilities. It was a very well done display that had figurine models of the people and audio of their conversations that took place at the time of the war.  It felt so real that it completely freaked out Isabelle and Grisha who both thought they were actually a part of this underground war facility. We also visited an old Prisoner of War camp, where Grisha kept wondering when he was going to get to see the prisoners.  As cute as it was, I finally broke the news to him that the prisoners were set free after the war ended. 

 

Self-exploration of the city isn’t something we have had the chance to do much, since most days we have had a tour and had an early return back to the ship.  Our first stop of exploration through the city of Singapore took us all the way to a much needed homemade lunch from Subway! (hey, at least we skipped out on McDonalds for the first time in 2 months.)  We then took a ride on the “ferris-wheel” as the kids called it, but more properly known as the Singapore Flyer.  It slowly takes you up and around in a large glass container that you can look out to see the whole city.  Our afternoon consisted of wandering around “little India”, picking up a jar of peanut butter at the local supermarket, oh and yes we did stop at McDonalds for a McFlurry.  Compared to the other Asian cities we have visited, Singapore was very westernized.  I never wondered if the people spoke English, I could read all of the signs around the city, and just like at home, there is a Starbucks or McDonalds on every corner.  The city is pretty small, not even the size of New York City, and is very well kept with beautifully planted flowers and trees along all of the streets.  It is also extremely clean.  Even when Grisha dropped his McDonalds cone, ice cream scoop down onto the sidewalk, he got an ok from dad on picking it back up and licking it like new.  We wrapped up our 13 hour day in Singapore with a trip to the local zoo for a night safari where we saw lions, and tigers, (no bears).

 

Back on the ship, I have just received a notice telling me that I have officially reached the Gold Membership Level on Cunard ships. Which means that I have new benefits on board and now have the same status as many 65-year-old travelers.  What could I want more than a good conversation starter next time I visit the retirement home.

Cambodia

We spent most of our day Saturday touring the city of Phu My, Vietnam.  It was a day full of a bus ride through the city with several stops along the way.  Similar to our first day in Vietnam were the needy people and under priced goods, only this time it was in the city center rather than the country.  The city was full of exposed masses of black telephone wire and fast paced, wreckless moped drivers. Of the 8 million who live in the city, four million drive mopeds, and I’m guessing the other 3 drive bikes or walk because there were very few cars.  It was a quick glimpse into their lives for the day.  We headed off to the airport in the afternoon for our overland 2 night stay in Cambodia. 

 

We arrived late that night and had a full day ahead of us at walking around the ancient temples.  I have to admit that I was not that excited because of the excess amount of temples I have seen while on this trip, but to my surprise this was very different than anything I have ever seen.  The temples were absolutely incredible.  Amongst the jungle are about 70 different temples that are beautiful stone rock carved with so much detail that you could spend days looking at each.  A lot of them have fallen rock and stones in them but the overall structure is still in tact so you can see what it once looked like.  I honestly can’t describe them only pictures, if that, will do them justice.  One of the tombs we saw was where Angelina Jolie shot her movie Tomb Raider.  After bringing their country publicity through the movie and also adopting her ten kids from there, they were proud to tell us that they have made her a citizen of their country.  Lucky her.

 

The people here were just as incredible to me as the temple.  It was hard because whenever I go to these places I want to sit and talk with the kids and play with them for at least the small time I have with them even if it be in passing while walking to the next place.  But, the kids here are different.  They live in small dirt floored huts along the road.  Picture a camping sight but instead of nice tents and sleeping bags, they have straw roofs and mats.  The kids have been trained and are literally human machines.  Just like the people in Vietnam they follow you until you hand over the money but here, they have about three recorded phrases that continue to repeat themselves throughout the day.  “Lady, you like to buy bracelet from me, 10 for one dollar.”  “Please I need money for school, for food, please.”  “You very pretty please buy bracelet from me, only one dollar.” It’s the largest dollar store I have ever seen.  The kids know no different, they were raised to know these few English sentences and have them on repeat all day long. It is so annoying that by the end of the day I had about 30 bracelets, 8 scarves and 2 packs of postcards….I hope you all will enjoy your souvenirs because I’m a sucker for these poor children’s faces and gave them a dollar because I felt bad.  I guess they are doing their jobs right.  Honestly the only things I could think was that a dollar means a lot more to them than it does to me. At the end of the day when we were leaving, I finally talked to some kids who I think were tired of selling and actually managed a sentence without one of the pre arranged phrases being included.  They were just like any other happy kids who wanted to talk to us yet because of their culture and dire needs, they often come across as annoying.  I asked one of the girls if she learned English at school and she said no, I learned it from the tourists.  Good to know we are teaching them the robot language that has become an annoyance upon ourselves.  

Nha Trang, Vietnam

I don’t know what I was expecting from Vietnam, but I was very surprised at what I saw there.  We pulled in to port at a beautiful beach and took a trip today that highlighted the local villages and countryside of Nah Trang, Vietnam.  We first stopped at a market in town that was unlike anything I’ve ever seen. I have been to Mexico, and other poor parts of the world before, but I have never experienced anything like this before.  The moment I stepped out of the bus, there were at least five people who had walked up to me and were shoving postcards, hats, paintings, and any other local souvenir product you can think of in my face.  As we walked down the aisles of the market, there were fruits and vegetables lined up next to the smell reeking from the fly covered slabs of meet laying out in the hot sun for sale.  It was incredibly overwhelming and after paying a lady five dollars to stop following me around and about 2 minutes time, we were back on the bus.  But don’t think that was an escape; they actually followed us to the window where our seats were and tried to sell us things through the window. It was one of the saddest and craziest things I’ve ever seen all at the same time. People on the bus with us would ask, “How much did you get that for, because I bargained mine down to a dollar”.  To me, it wasn’t even worth bargaining down for because these people were so desperate for even just a dollar from us.  I felt like without even my small contribution, they might not be eating the next day.  With that said, I don’t think my $20 worth of souvenir shopping today will save the world but it was both incredible and thought provoking to see the combination of Americans, who have thousands of dollars, bargaining for their already under priced small worthless trinket from five dollars down to one dollar, and the desperate locals who will agree to any form of payment.

 

After the market experience where “no” is not a word in their vocabulary, we went to visit a local kindergarten classroom.  It was a small open aired non air-conditioned, two classroom building with a bathroom and small room with a few tables for lunchtime. We were told before hand that we would be going here, so we brought along some candy with us to give out to the kids.  They were so cute and so excited to have candy.  None of them spoke any English, but here it didn’t seem to matter.  Both the smile and chocolate on their faces was enough to know they were happy.  It was a lot like any kindergarten class back home, all of the kids had their nap blankets set out and their art projects were hung on the walls, but something I’m used to seeing was a bowl of toothbrushes by the bathroom sink. I couldn’t ask because they don’t speak English, but I’m guessing the kids don’t have toothbrushes at home, so the school provides them.  Although they were all in a bowl together and it was obvious that they weren’t marked, I guess sharing a toothbrush is better than no toothbrush.

 

Everyone here rode bikes or motorcycles; there were very few cars.  Whether they were weaving a basket, carving a chair, or shoving a postcard in your face, everyone seemed to be hard at work.  The jobs and work being done were all very tedious jobs, which we would normally expect a machine to do. Although the people here seemed desperate and lacking, there was something in their smiles and attitudes that couldn’t help but make me think that maybe their lives are simpler than the complicated ones we often make up for ourselves

Beijing, China

Our first port we arrived in when we got to China was Shanghai.  Because we went on the overland tour, I only saw about 40 minutes of the city on our drive to the airport.  We got on a plane with about 40 other passengers from the ship to all go stay in Beijing for 2 nights and then fly to Hong Kong and meet up with the ship.  Before leaving that day, Jeanie and I raided the ship for bread, apples, bananas, peanut butter, and goldfish.  Survival foods in hand, we were ready to face China.   

 

It’s funny how you can be surrounded by American products and stores every day of your life at home and it has very little significance, but then you fly across the world and immediately American products become the biggest attraction.  You have no idea how many times I’ve heard “Look there’s a McDonalds!”  The minute we got to our hotel, Elliot and I went walking downtown Beijing to find the mall, hopeful for American food of course.  It didn’t take but two minutes before the “don’t step out of the box and try anything new” Americans were walking the mall, Starbucks frappuchino in hand.  As if our looks didn’t scream tourist enough, we have green straws to our lips and are wide eyed pointing out the neighboring McDonalds, KFC, and Pizza Hut along the way.  Much to my surprise, Beijing even has a Dairy Queen…I guess that’s what they like about Texas too.  And if the American food chain restaurants weren’t enough for us to forget where we are, we even got asked by two Chinese girls if they could take a picture with us.  Aren’t we supposed to be asking them that question??  I don’t know what it is about this place, but I love China!  I never thought I would say that, but I really do. I don’t know if it’s the fact that I’m just happy to be off the confined areas of the ship, or maybe it’s even the American comfort foods, but either way China has won me over.  After we unglued our eyes from the golden arches, we actually did find some real Chinese culture.  Amongst the bright lights, and large flat screen TVs that scaled the walls of the downtown buildings was a small alleyway for the Chinese market (sounds sketchy, and it was).  Now I’ve never been one to want to look like a tourist, but there’s no hiding it in China, all guards down I might as well have had on a fanny pack and an American flag t-shirt with the amount of pictures I was snapping at all the food stands down the street.  Raw meats on a stick, squid on a stick, seahorse on a stick, caramelized strawberries on a stick, and of course the most fascinating of them all, live scorpions on a stick.  Yes, live.  I guess they wanted you to see that they were fresh before they cooked and served them to you.  Five live scorpions stabbed onto a skewer moving their little legs around like they were trying to get free before someone fried them up.  Although we didn’t try any, we did go so far as to ask a Chinese man who was eating one to take a picture with us. 

 

Our first day in Beijing was one of my favorite days off the ship so far.  First, we climbed The Great Wall.  It was just as incredible as the pictures, and even better. I think part of the reason I liked it so much was because we actually got to experience it.  So many of the places we’ve been we have gotten to take pictures and look at, but having the experience of climbing the wall made it so much more fun.  It was so steep and actually took a lot of work to get up to the top.  It was extremely cold and windy but by the time we were to the top, we were all hot and tired.  Going down was almost harder than the climb up.  You had to lean way back and go slow, which was extremely hard for Grisha.  He just wanted to run down, and didn’t quite understand that if he fell he would start rolling and probably not stop until he got to the bottom.  Thankfully we all made it down alive.  Later that day, we visited the sacred way that led to the thirteen temples of the important leaders of China (or something like that)…obviously I was having more fun climbing on the statues that lined the path, and playing in the sacred temples with the kids than I was paying attention.  The next day, we visited Tian’Amen  Square, the largest downtown square in the world.  It was really cool to see and very high security.  It’s where the gates to the forbidden city are, and where a lot of their government is run.  There wasn’t really a lot to see there, but it was huge.  We also visited the forbidden city which was so big and extremely elaborate.  Every building had so much detail into it, with special carvings and paintings on the outsides, the inside walls and even the ceilings.  There are bricks that were laid on the grounds of the forbidden city that are still there, and they are 15 layers thick because the emperor was afraid people would try to dig tunnels underground to get in.  For dinner that night, we went to a traditional imperial dinner.  It, like the forbidden city, was very elaborate and we even got to eat with gold ware.  The so called “traditional” dinner didn’t seem to traditional anymore when I heard Kelly Clarkson music playing in the background. Something about that just doesn’t make you feel like you’re in china anymore let alone an imperial restaurant.  The few days in Beijing was great and helped us get to know some of the people from our ship better.  We made friends with an Italian actor, and two gay guys who travel with their teddy bear and take pictures of him everywhere they go.  You think I’m kidding, but no.  Actually they are really nice and very entertaining.

 

So after surviving on rice and McDonalds, I was glad we were headed back to the ship.  Much to my surprise, I loved China and learned a lot about the culture and the people.  A few things I learned while here:

1. Most of the time you are not actually paying for the product, but more paying for the lady to go away and stop asking you for the 100^th time if you want to buy a watch

2. The women must have strong legs after peeing in holes in the ground all their lives

3. I didn’t see one single fortune cookie while in China. Pei Wei is lying to us...

4. I am proud to say that I finally understand and can tell the difference between all of the Asian cultures.  One thing they all have in common though…tall, tall, tall, very ugly apartment buildings fill their cities.

5.  They still take pictures with the peace sign, and I still don’t know why.

Oh I almost forgot, we saw the water cube and birds nest from the olympics! They were sooo cool!

Pusan, South Korea

Well it’s a good thing we are getting out of South Korea today.  We just found out that apparently South Korea is canceling all flights in right now because North Korea has threatened to launch missiles their way. Between that and the pirates, I really do hope I make it home.  South Korea today, pre missile threats, was great! We again, did a bus tour and our tour guide gave us a lot, maybe too much, information on South Korea.  It was interesting but I think she just really liked hearing herself talk and after about the 3^rd hour out of 7, I’m pretty sure I tuned her out.  Buddhism is big in Korea and there are Buddhist statues everywhere.  We visited the most well preserved Buddhist temple in all of Asia today.  It was really interesting to see and learn about the religion and how different it is.  It was set up in one area and had several different temple worship rooms that you could go into.  Each one was beautifully carved and painted on the outside with so much detail and color.  We were able to walk up and into the shrine and see what was inside, but were not allowed to take any pictures once inside the rooms.  We also had to take our shoes off before we could go in.  Inside was an open room with Buddha’s set up on one wall and some lit candles.  They were very simple rooms with the main focus at the elaborate Buddha statues. The stairs to climb up to the temple were very steep.  They were at a 45-degree angle and each one came up to about my knee.  And, although hard to climb up, I will say that the smooth side ramps on the sides of the stairways came in use for us as a great slide down, keeping us entertained for a good 20 minutes as we climbed up the stairs and slid back down, smiling the whole way.  I’m not sure that the Buddhists appreciated our use of their temple as a recreational activity, and they will probably curse us to come back as fleas or something in our after life, but we sure did enjoy ourselves. We also saw the tombs where once powerful Buddhist kings were buried.  It is very similar to that of the pyramid burials only they didn’t intend for anyone to find them.  They were buried with the intentions of having an afterlife and were buried with all of their most prized possessions.  The way they did it in Korea was to be buried in what was made to look like a hill and then they would plant trees around it so that it would just look like any other piece of land.  We learned a lot about Korea today and I was surprised to see that despite my prior inability to recognize the differences between Asian cultures, I am finally realizing that they are all very different. 

 

In regards to my earlier reference about the Pirates.  I was warned prior to coming on this trip to watch out for pirates, and I kind of thought of it as a joke.  We talked to a couple the other day on our ship who were traveling a few months ago on another cruise through the Gulf of Aden and their cruise ship was chased by pirates.  I really didn’t think much of it before but after hearing their stories it kind of made me think more into it.  I’m sure my mom will love hearing this… All that said, be praying for our safety as we continue on our trip. I’m sure we will be fine, but it is a little scary to think about. 

 

To my roommates: I wore the garage sale dress to dinner tonight in honor of all of you!

 

I’m off to China for 4 days so I will give you an update as soon as I return.

Nagasaki, Japan

The first cold weather we have had was today in Nagasaki, it was about 50 and raining.  We took a bus tour that made several stops around the city.  The first was at the sight of the historic Dutch colony that was allowed in Japan as the Dutch East India Company, and also the only Europeans who were allowed to trade with the Japanese at the time. One interesting thing about Nagasaki is that there is a lot of history, but most of it had to be recreated because of the atomic bombing.  The Dutch colony was just a replica of what it looked like back then.  It was really cool to see but also very weird to start off in Japan seeing something so European. Next, we went to the Atomic Bomb Memorial Museum, which was my favorite.  It was incredible. The museum is right outside of location of the hypocenter where the bomb was dropped.  They have a memorial set up there with concentric circles around it to represent the effects of the bomb.  It signifies that the bomb not only affected people nearby but everywhere. Outside of the museum, they have paper cranes everywhere.  Paper cranes are the symbol for peace and happiness in Japan.  There was a story told about a little girl who was 10 when the bomb hit, and she was later diagnosed with leukemia. The hospital where she stayed told her that they would grant her a wish if she made over 1000 paper cranes.  Her wish was to be able to run again and while in the hospital she made all of her paper cranes.  She died before they could grant her wish, but all of the kids in the schools continued making the paper cranes in memory of her and of peace in Japan, and they still share them with the memorial to this day.  Inside the museum were so many remains and stories of people affected by the bomb.  Like so many other things that I have experienced on this trip, I didn’t realize how real it was until I saw it all.  These people’s lives and the city were changed forever after the bombing.  Like I said before, nothing in the city is history because it was all rebuilt after the bomb, there was nothing left. Since the bombing, Japan focuses very much on peace.  Our next stop was the statue of the warrior of peace (which is in the picture), and fountain of peace. They both represent the people who died and who were affected by the bomb.  I think what was made so real to me more than anything else, was how many people were not killed immediately from the bombing but who were affected later.  Our meal today, was a traditional Japanese lunch.  I’m sure it tasted wonderful, however I chose to stick to the only recognizable food on my plate, which was rice.  One food you know that will taste the same everywhere! Don’t worry I got made fun of for not trying it, so all of you who are wishing you could tell me what a mistake I made, it’s been taken care of for you (and let me remind you that I did try crocodile a few blogs back).  Next stop South Korea, I will let you know if the rice tastes the same there too!

Saipan, Mariana Islands

So I officially understand what having your “sea legs” means.  The past 3 days through the Philippine Sea have not let me forget that I am living on a ship.  The constant swaying of the ship does have a few advantages though.  1. You can be drunk and no one will know it…no one can walk straight.  2.  The pool turns into a great wave pool.  3.  My balance is impeccable. I now can run in place on the treadmill while practice my side to side defensive moves at the same time.  Too bad my days of soccer are long gone. 

 

We went a few days ago, to Saipan, which is part of the Mariana Islands.  It is just south of Japan. I knew nothing about it before, but had quite the history lesson while there.  It was actually very interesting and in my opinion the best way to get a history lesson.  The Island was fought over by the Americans and Japanese during World War 2.  We wanted it as a refueling place because it was so close to Japan and the Japanese obviously didn’t want that to be possible for us. We got to see the beaches where the American troops landed and began their fighting.  America took over the island and the Japanese women and children that were left began jumping into the ocean off the cliffs (shown in the picture), which are known today as the suicide cliffs. The Americans tried to stop them, but they were taught that there was no hope left once their husbands were killed and it was better to die than to live under rule of the Americans.  Also, there were stories of the people who were native to the island before Japan and America came over uninvited onto their land.  Some of the native people would hide out in caves for months so that they would not be affected by the war that was happening on their territory.  It was incredible to hear the stories and get to see the sights of these places.  Seeing the cliffs where hundreds of Japanese took their lives and seeing tanks on the beach left by the Americans made my idea of the war so much more real.  The island is now still owned by the US and all of the people who live there are considered US citizens. On a lighter note, we did find a Hard Rock Café, where we got our fix of American burgers and music.  We also found a market that had Oreos and Dr. Pepper.  Although, only 3 days later and our two bags of Oreos are now gone.  I guess Japanese biscuits and fortune cookies will have to hold us through the rest of the trip.