Tokyo Trip

Finding flights from Hong Kong to Tokyo is pretty easy. All the Japanese airlines go to Hong Kong. Most of the Chinese airlines go to Japan. A lot of other airlines go to both on their way back and forth to other places. Even a couple of American airlines go through both on their way to Seattle or San Francisco.

Our only challenge is that Ryan is in Fuzhou, not Hong Kong. We either need a flight that leaves late enough in the day for him to get here in time or he needs to come to Hong Kong the day before and spend the night. If he comes to Hong Kong the day before, that takes a day away from our trip. He can only take so many days off work. It’s a lot better for the rest of us if he comes to Hong Kong in the morning and we take an afternoon flight to Tokyo. That’s not so good for Ryan since it means he has to actually wake up before noon. The later he gets into Hong Kong, the later we get into Tokyo.

Typhoon Matmo

It's typhoon season once again. Japan got hit by a big one earlier this month. It weakened just before it hit Japan, so it was not as bad as everyone thought it would be.

Right after that, Typhoon Rammasun slammed into the Philippines. They will probably see a dozen more large typhoons before the year is over.

Now we have Typhoon Matmo crashing through Taiwan and heading straight to Fuzhou. Since it went through Taiwan, it's not supposed to be as big when it hits Fuzhou, but they will have plenty of rain and wind. Ryan has been hit by more typhoons in Fuzhou than we will ever see here in Hong Kong.

A lot of people died in Taiwan, but that was because of a plane crash. I don't know why anyone would fly a plane in the middle of a typhoon. You would think the people in charge would never let that happen. Taiwan must have some version of the FAA. They seriously dropped the ball.

A lot of people are criticizing Malaysia Airlines for flying over war zones, but flying in a typhoon has to be a million times worse. Flying 30,000 feet over a conflict is potentially dangerous, but the odds are, nothing will ever touch your plane. Someone has to really want to shoot your plane down. Flying in a typhoon is like putting a loaded gun to your head and pulling the trigger.

Vacation to Somewhere part 9

We finally decided where to go. I'm very glad we did since we are supposed to leave in three weeks. We have known about this trip for four months, but only just figured out where to go. Instead of having four months to find a great hotel and hopefully get a good deal on plane tickets, we now have three weeks.

Since we could not find any common ground between all of our choices, Lily suggested we go somewhere else entirely. The idea was that if we picked a completely different place, no one would have to give up their first choice at the expense of someone else's first choice.

Kevin immediately suggested Tokyo. His company always sends people there on business trips and he has always wanted to go, but they never send him. A vacation is a lot better than a business trip since you can spend the day seeing and doing things rather than sitting in some meeting.

Ryan & I thought about Tokyo when we went to Bali, but we wanted something more private and relaxing. Since this is a trip with four people, it's not going to be as private as the Bali trip anyway. We really don't need a tropical island. A big city will work.

None of us have ever been to Tokyo, but Japan is one of those places that most of us want to see. We live very close, but none of us have ever bothered to go there. When I told Ryan that Lily, Kevin and I all thought Tokyo would be a good idea, he was not especially excited about it. When he goes on vacation, he wants to get as far from Chinese culture as he can. I tried to convince him that China and Japan are very different, but since I have never been to Japan, I'm just assuming it's nothing like China the way he's assuming it's just like China.

It took some convincing, and a promise that Ryan and Kevin would have some time to themselves while Lily & I go off and do things they are not interested in doing. Eventually, Ryan was on board with Tokyo.

Now we just have to plan everything.

Vacation to Somewhere part 8

It does not look like we are going to find a place that all of us can agree on. We might just have to draw straws or play rock paper scissors, which is called scissors paper stone in Chinese.

At the top of my list is Amsterdam. Ryan & I went there three years ago, but the main part of that trip was Rome. Amsterdam was just something extra we added because our flights went through Amsterdam's airport. I liked Amsterdam a lot more than I expected and I would love to see more of it and spend more time there.

At the top of Lily's list is Bali. She's looked at a lot of villas online and likes the idea of a private swimming pool as much as I do. Ryan & I have been there also, but we only saw a fraction of the island. August is the dry season in Bali and it would be nice to walk around with a little less humidity than what we experienced in the middle of the rainy season.

Ryan and Kevin both want to go to Thailand, but not the same place. Ryan wants to go back to Bangkok, where we spent a couple of days at the end of our big cruise last year. I would love to see more of Bangkok since we saw so little, but I think I would rather go back to Amsterdam. There are also some political issues in Bangkok right now, but I'm sure that would not affect us.

Kevin wants to go to Chiang Mai. I like that none of us have ever been there before, but I'm not crazy about the fact that August is the rainy season. In fact, it rains more in August than any other month. A little rain here and there is no big deal, but constant downpours can really put a dent in your trip. August is also the rainy season in Bangkok, but September is supposed to be the worst month by a mile.

We could always spend half the time in Bangkok and half in Chiang Mai, but that's really not my favorite way to do things. You have to pack your junk in the middle of the trip, take a plane or train to the other city and then check in and unpack at a new hotel or villa. That eats up a lot of time, especially if an airport is involved. I would rather just spend the entire trip in one place. No matter where we go, we are going to have to deal with enough waiting around at airports anyway. I don't really want to waste even more time playing hurry up and wait.

It almost looks like we will be going to Thailand since it has two votes. Since we have all been living in Hong Kong for a few years, we know what it's like to be somewhere when it's raining every single day. One of the benefits of getting out of Hong Kong is getting away from the rain and constant humidity. Going to Thailand in August might not be the best idea. As far as the weather is concerned, we should head north. Like Amsterdam, for example.

Vacation to Somewhere, Anywhere

The big Fourth of July party was very nice. Everyone had a good time. It did not rain and it was not especially cloudy, so we could go outdoors and enjoy that wonderful pool deck. Most importantly, no one got hurt.

We still have a big vacation coming up next month and we have no idea where we are all going. I always thought taking a trip with four people would be easier since we could get a bigger hotel suite or villa, but it's a lot harder since we all have to decide where to go. Going somewhere with just Ryan is pretty easy. He has a few places he does not want to go, but most of the time I can talk him into going where I want to go. Lily & Kevin are a lot harder.

7/4/14

Fourth of July 2014

Sometimes nothing works out the way you want it to no matter how hard you try. Sometimes everything just falls into place and all the stars align when you’re not even trying.

Life has a funny way of sneaking up on you
When you think everything’s ok
And everything’s going right
Life has a funny way of helping you out
When you think everything’s gone wrong
And everything blows up in your face.
Every year, usually during the summer, Kevin's boss goes out of town and Kevin looks after his house at Clear Water Bay. While Kevin lives there, Lily and I tag along. Mainly because it's a really nice house. This tradition started back when we lived in a tiny little 1 bedroom apartment, so sleeping in a large 4 bedroom house was a nice way to spend the summer. The big house has a lot of things that our old apartment never had, like more than enough bedrooms, a private bathroom for everybody, a real kitchen, a swimming pool and hot tub, a large outdoor pool deck and plenty of space.

Now we have a much larger apartment and we are not nearly as crowded as we were in the old apartment. We are still all staying at the big house, though. The new apartment has plenty of bedrooms, bathrooms, a nice kitchen and far more space than the old apartment. But it does not have a private pool or that beautiful pool deck. It also does not have amazing views of the ocean. The new apartment would be a great place to take a vacation from the old apartment, but the big house is still a great place to vacation from everywhere else.

Not only do we have the big house, but we have it during Fourth of July. That means a big party. This is a great house for a party and from that pool deck, we can watch fireworks over the bay. Hong Kong does not celebrate Fourth of July, of course, but the last time we were at the big house during this time of year, we saw fireworks for some reason. We are not facing the harbour, so it's not the Symphony of Lights fireworks.

As if all of that was not enough, Ryan will be in town. So I get to spend Fourth of July with my boyfriend at the big house. You can't ask for much more. There's nothing wrong with spending Fourth of July with Lily & Kevin, but they are Canadian, so it's not the same. They understand what it's all about, of course, but national holidays are always better spent with people who grew up celebrating them and have all those memories. My Chinese friends like having me around during Chinese New Year, but it all means a lot more to their Chinese friends.

This looks to be the best Fourth of July in a long time.

Weekend in Xiamen part 5

Zhongshan Park is at the end of Zhongshan Road, so we already knew how to get there. Zhongshan Road is pretty easy to get to since it is the main tourist area of the island and is probably the most popular shopping street in the entire city.

Neither of us wanted to go back to Zhongshan Road, but I wanted to see the park. Ryan reluctantly agreed.

Zhongshan Park was not the most exciting place in the world, but it was a nice, clean place to take a walk. Pretty much the opposite of Zhongshan Road. The shopping street was dirty, loud and far too crowded. The park was clean, relatively quiet and almost empty, at least when we were there. It was not strictly empty. There were probably hundreds of people there, but anything in China with less than a million people is empty.

The highlight of the trip for both of us was the grocery store. That might seem strange, but I am still impressed by how many American items this store had. People visiting from the United States would not care. It is a tiny shop compared to American supermarkets. Since we live far away from the United States and real American food is hard to find, this store was a blessing to us.

I liked one of the two Italian restaurants, but Ryan's favorite food in Xiamen was pizza. Our hotel, aside from being in a good location, had a Papa John's in the courtyard. They even delivered to our room, which is a small price to pay for mediocre pizza.

It's easy to find better pizza in Hong Kong. Pizza Express is not bad and Paisano's is quite good. Ryan has neither in Fuzhou. His pizza choices are Pizza Hut and Chinese pizza. Frozen pizzas are better than Pizza Hut and no one from Italy or New York would recognize Chinese pizza as pizza. The first time I saw a Chinese pizza, I asked someone what it was. They said it was pizza and I laughed. I thought they were joking.

Papa John's is enormously flawed, but it is better than Pizza Hut and much closer to what most of the world calls pizza than Chinese pizza. The housekeeping staff at our hotel had to pick up a lot of pizza boxes.

Weekend in Xiamen part 4

The big sights in Xiamen are Gulangyu, Nanputuo Temple, Xiamen University, Zhongshan Park and Zhongshan Road.

We went to Gulangyu on our first trip to Xiamen and we absolutely hated it. There was nothing wrong with the island itself. It might even be pleasant on its own. The problem was that you can't really see it with millions of people milling about. Literally millions of people. It reminded me of Disneyland on opening day, only the people on Gulangyu were much angrier.

A quick ferry ride gets visitors from Xiamen Island to Gulangyu, but they cram the ferry as full as they possibly can. Even fuller than that, really. If you don't want to stand in a giant ashtray and smell what everyone else just ate, don't take the ferry. Gulangyu is an island with no connecting bridges, so there is no other way to get there. It is technically illegal to smoke on the ferry, but smoking laws are merely suggestions in China. Since pretty much everyone smokes, those suggestions are always ignored.

Once you are pushed off the ferry by the mob, it is still unbelievably crowded. Chinese people naturally push their way everywhere and this island is wall to wall people pushing to get to whatever they want to see. There is an observation deck on the highest hill, but getting there was an absolute nightmare. I have seen lions on the Discovery Channel that were more polite to the zebras they killed than the way most of the people on Gulangyu acted in their mad lust to be the first at everything.

We also went to Nanputuo Temple on our first trip. That was another place that is probably nice without millions of people all pushing each other. We did not even bother attempting the top of that hill.

Our first trip to Xiamen was in the middle of June and this one was at the end of May, so maybe we did not pick the best times to go. It might be less crowded in January. Maybe some of these places are better when there are only hundreds of thousands of people.

We never went to Xiamen University, on either trip. We never saw the point. There is supposed to be a nice lake at the university, but our hotel was next to a lake, so we never bothered.

Zhongshan Road is a major tourist shopping street. We went there on our first trip with mixed results. This was where we saw the world's filthiest Walmart and a woman urinating at the front door. There is nothing else on Zhongshan Road besides tourist shopping. Since we already knew that, we did not go back.

What we never saw on our first trip was Zhongshan Park, so we went there this time.

Weekend in Xiamen part 3

Xiamen Island is small, so getting to everywhere we wanted to go was pretty easy. There is more to the city than the island, but we were not there long enough to explore the outer reaches, and we really didn't care anyway. We mostly went for the grocery store. That was on the other end of Yundang Lake. We could have walked to it from the hotel, but then going back with all those groceries would have been too much.

We actually went to the grocery store twice. The first time, they were out of too many of the things we wanted. They said another shipment would come in on our last day in Xiamen, so we went back just before we left the city. It would have been ironic if the main reason we went to Xiamen was a bust, but that's the chance you take when you go somewhere for a single reason.

Across the street from the American grocery store are two Chinese Italian restaurants, Duole and Mamma Mia. We did not try either of them the first time we went to Xiamen because we were on a cruise ship full of free food, or at least food that was already paid. This time, we had to find our own meals, so we went to one of the Chinese Italian restaurants on our first night and the other one right next door on our second night.

From the outside, both restaurants looked basically the same. You could tell they were two different restaurants, but there was nothing that distinguished one from the other. From the inside, one definitely looked more like a traditional Italian restaurant than the other. We assumed that one would have the better food. We were completely wrong.

The restaurant with the more generic café interior, Duole, had much better food. I don't know who runs either restaurant, but I would be surprised if the chef in Duole was not Italian, or at least trained in Italy. The pasta was as fresh as could be and the sauces were excellent. Almost every single Italian restaurant in China serves dried pasta. The better places put more effort into the sauce. The worst places just slap ketchup on top. Duole served us fresh pasta that was probably made that day. The best part, to me at least, was the garlic bread. I love garlic bread. It is one of the hardest things to find in Hong Kong. Lots of places have Chinese bread. Some places have what they call garlic bread. No one has genuine, fresh bread with genuine garlic and genuine olive oil. Who knows why. Bread is not a Chinese staple, but we have fresh garlic all over the place.

Even if you find a place that says it has garlic bread, it is usually Chinese bread, which is nothing like Italian, French, German, Dutch, American, Canadian, Irish or Scandinavian bread. Sometimes they will put Chinese butter on it or Chinese vegetable oil. Chinese butter tastes nothing like what I think of as butter. I don't know how they make it, but something is just off, like vegan cheese. Chinese oil is usually corn or peanut oil, which is not always a bad thing, but is not ideal for garlic bread. Olive oil is more expensive and not a traditional Chinese ingredient, so few places will use it.

Cheaper places use something called gutter oil. The less said about that, the better. Foreigners can usually tell which places use gutter oil since you will have a dramatic reaction to the food right away. My rule is if any food comes out of me right after I put it in, I never go back to that place.